The Seventh Commandment
Call to worship:
pastor bobby owens
Ephesians 5.22-33
Baptisms:
pastor Kevin mcguire
song:
O church arise
Historical reading:
Westminster Shorter Catechism Q&A 71-72 pastor Andrew loginow
song:
My Jesus I love thee
New member covenant:
pastor Brett eckel
Confession & Pardon (w/ 10 commandments):
pastor Michael champoux
song:
Doxology
song:
Christ the sure & steady anchor
Sermon:
dr. alex loginow
"The 7th Commandment"
Exodus 20.14
Introduction
This May will mark 14 years since Bethany and I stood right here on this stage and covenanted together in marriage. When we exchanged our vows the preacher looked at me and said, “do you Alexander take Bethany…?” The problem is my legal name is not Alexander, it’s just Alex. So I’m still not sure if I’m even legally married. And then we had our wedding reception in the gym here at church and the DJ announced the wedding party, you know, couple by couple as they do, and when he announced us he said, “Please welcome Alex and Bethany Vadnais.” So, I don’t know who Bethany is married to, but I don’t think it’s me.
Seriously though, on that day, May 16, 2009, we promised before God and our church to be faithful to each other until one of us dies. And while people in our culture make those promises all the time, we live in a culture plagued infidelity and divorce. Al Mohler tells the story that he was in a Hallmark store one time and actually saw greeting cards marketed toward people who are committing adultery with each other. In January 2018 the New York Times published an article entitled, “When A Partner Cheats.” Listen to this direct quote from that article,
“According to the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy, national surveys indicate that 15 percent of married women and 25 percent of married men have had extramarital affairs. The incidence is about 20 percent higher when emotional and sexual relationships without intercourse are included. As more women began working outside the home, their chances of having an affair have increased accordingly.”
But in the midst of our sexually confused and rebellious culture, the ancient Law of God still speaks – you shall not commit adultery.
The 7th Commandment
The word translated adultery in this verse is the Hebrew word נָאַף, which means, “lit. commit adultery: a. usually of man, always with wife of another,” but is also used of women and is used figuratively of idolatrous worship. The Greek word used in the LXX is μοιχάομαι, which is defined as, “sexual intercourse of a man with a married woman other than his own spouse.” It’s important that we use Scripture’s vocabulary so as to not soften our sin. When a married person has sex with someone other than his or her spouse, it is adultery. If an unmarried person has sex with someone who is married to someone else, it is adultery. It is not an affair, it is not cheating, it is not sleeping with someone else; we use these euphemisms to soften our sin. It is adultery.
As we move through the second tablet of the Decalogue – the commandments that teach us how to love our neighbors as ourselves – we began with the 5th Commandment to honor your father and mother, which serves as a bit of a bridge between God and people because parents represent God to their children. Then the 6th Commandment teaches us that we shall not murder because the most fundamental right that every image bearer has is the right to life. Now the 7th Commandment teaches us you shall not commit adultery because marriage is at the very heart of human civilization. The family is the foundation of every society and marriage is the foundation of every family.
Marriage is at the foundation of every civilization because marriage is grounded in creation. In Genesis 1-2 after God created the heavens and the earth, the very first thing God did was officiate the wedding of Adam and Eve. Before there was nations, or corporations, or even the church, there was marriage. And when God created Eve from Adam, they knew they were made for each other. Adam and Eve didn’t need a biologist or an equality officer to understand how their pieces fit together. From the very beginning God created one man and he said it was not good that the man was alone. And so God created one woman from and for that one man. And when Adam saw Eve he knew that she was like him – she was not like the plants or the animals – but he also knew that she was different than him – she was not man but woman.
Another reason why marriage is so intrinsically important is because of the nature of the marriage covenant. In marriage two people become one flesh; two people become one person, one family unit. Karl Barth said,
“Marriage may be defined as something which fixes and makes concrete the encounter and interrelation of man and women in the form of a unique, unrepeatable and incomparable encounter and relationship between a particular man and woman. Their encounter and relationship signifies in this context a life-partnership; this partnership is not partial but complete.”
The most obvious way in which a man and a woman become one flesh in marriage is through sex. God created sex for pleasure and procreation exclusively in the marriage of one man and one woman. Any sexual act that is not between a man and woman who are married is sin. Scripture is clear that fornication, which is two people who aren’t married having sex, is sin. Living together, homosexuality, incest, bestiality, rape, child abuse any sexual act committed between anything other than a man and woman who are married is sin.
This reality is even more underscored in marriage. Even though broad application can be made to sexual sin in general, the 7th Commandment does not speak to sexual immorality in general, but specifically to adultery. The consequences for adultery are far greater than any other sexual sin. There is something qualitatively different when a marriage is defiled.
Because in adultery the one flesh union is broken. Marriage is the most intimate relationship in all of humanity. Marriage is the only God approved relationship for sexual intimacy. Through that sexual intimacy and husband and wife can become a father and mother; God has ordained the sexual love in marriage to bring image bearers into the world. In marriage your life is shared and in adultery you bring a third person into that one flesh relationship. In adultery the desires, emotions, and satisfaction you are supposed to exclusively feel for that one person are being given to another person.
How does adultery happen? How do you move from the joy of your wedding day to in bed with someone else? Our flesh deceives us that if something feels new, exciting, or different that it’s good or we’re missing out. All of the sudden you’re talking with someone at work or the gym or reconnecting with an old friend on Facebook and it feels new; it feels like it did back when you were dating your spouse. And this new person isn’t nagging you to take out the trash or they’re not fighting with you about money, or the kids, or about how you work too much, or about how they never want to have sex. This new person hasn’t seen you at your highs and lows.
And while adultery feels exciting at the beginning, it only leads to broken relationships and broken lives. Adultery hurts children. Adultery rightly creates sadness, bitterness, confusion, and distrust between spouses. Adultery often leads to divorce.
Our culture tries to act like divorce isn’t that big of a deal, like it can be amicable, but anyone who’s ever experienced divorce knows that’s not the case. Russell Moore had a great article about the pain of divorce. Even when divorce is necessary or biblically grounded, it is still the amputation of one flesh. Just ask an amputee who lost a limb, maybe even to save their life, they are still alive but if you lose an arm or a leg you’re not the same. Divorce is the amputation of one flesh and no one is unscathed.
But the most important reason that adultery is so damning is because it points to spiritual adultery. One third of biblical language concerning adultery refers to spiritual adultery. The one true God – the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit – is a jealous God and will not share his people with other gods. The former prophets like Ezekiel and Hosea paint a graphic picture of Israel whoring after idols. This word picture revealed to Israel and reveals to us that we’re all spiritual harlots. We may not whore after ancient pagan idols, but we whore after power, sex, money, bigger homes, bigger bank accounts, cultural approval, political influence, and false religions. Every human is guilty of spiritual adultery.
Jesus Followed & Fulfilled the 7th Commandment
So maybe you’re like, “you got me; I have committed spiritual adultery, but I’ve never committed literal adultery and that is something I don’t have to worry about.” But just when you think you’re safe Jesus arrives on the scene and reveals to us that we’re all more guilty than we think. In the most famous sermon ever preached – the Sermon on the Mount – Jesus Christ said:
You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart (Matt 5.27-28).
I’ve heard preachers say, and probably have even intimated myself, that Israel knew that the 7th Commandment merely spoke to physical adultery and when Jesus comes on the scene he deepened the commandment. As if lust was not sinful under the old covenant but it is now under the new covenant. But that is not the case. Jesus does not deepen the 7th Commandment, Jesus faithfully exposits and applies the 7th Commandment. And Christ’s exegesis reveals to us that when we lust after someone to whom we’re not married we commit adultery with him or her in our hearts. And just like that we’re all guilty.
And while there’s no doubt that some of you have committed physical adultery, we all stand guilty of the 7th Commandment because we’ve all committed adultery in our hearts when we have lusted after someone to whom we’re not married. And before you take a defensive posture in your heart and mind remember that 1st John 1.8 says that if we say we have no sin we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. That doesn’t merely apply to people who think they’ve never ever sinned; people that think they never have to ask for forgiveness, no this applies to specific sin as well. We have all lusted and so we’re all guilty.
Some of you may be thinking, “ok, I’m guilty, but what’s the big deal? Why does God care if I look but don’t touch? I’m not actually doing anything with anyone.” Lust is deadly for so many reasons, for example lust fuels unhealthy comparison in marriage that yields conflict, unmet expectations, and dissatisfaction.
We live in a hyper sexualized society that tells us that the perfect woman looks like a Victoria’s Secret model. And then instead of being drunk on the wife of your youth (as Scripture commands us to be) men can look at their wife who doesn’t have a professional makeup artist, and has had children, and isn’t a size zero, and men can look to other women for sexual fulfillment. Women can read romance novels or watch romantic comedies or Hallmark movies, which pain the picture of the perfect man who lives for you and looks like Chris Evans. And when you give your heart to that image of a man, your balding, overweight husband who spends all Sunday afternoon watching football just doesn’t look as good.
We get unsatisfied with our spouses based on this arbitrary standard that the world just made up. You start to hear this voice telling you, “What you have isn’t good enough. You deserve better. You deserve to be happy. You deserve to feel like you did at the beginning of your relationship.” And that voice you’re hearing comes with a hiss.
But not only is adultery and lust so offensive to God because they are antithetical to God’s law but also because they are antithetical to the gospel. In our call to worship we read from Ephesians 5.22-33 where the Holy Spirit reveals to us that marriage was created to image the good news of Jesus Christ. Listen again to verses 31-33:
“Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church.
Marriage was created by God to be a picture of the gospel and when there is unfaithfulness in marriage it is proclaiming that the gospel is not true. When a man commits adultery against his wife he is declaring with his actions that Christ is not faithful to the church. When a woman commits adultery against her husband she is announcing with her actions that the promises are not true, that the gates of hell will prevail against the church. But the good news of Jesus Christ tells us a different story.
The gospel of Jesus tells us that the one true holy God created us in his image to glorify him and enjoy him forever. But in our father Adam we fell in sin and we have sinned in though, word, and deed, by what we have done, and by what we have left undone. Because of our sin we rightly deserve eternal conscious punishment in hell. But in his grace the Father sent the 2nd person of the Holy Trinity, the Son of God, to take on flesh and dwell among us (John 1.14). And so Jesus of Nazareth was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary.
Jesus lived a truly human life yet without sin (Heb 4.15). And part of his sinless life was that Jesus never broke the 7th Commandment. Jesus never broke the 7th Commandment in thought, word, or deed. Jesus never broke the 7th Commandment but what he did or by what he left undone.
Because of his sinless life, Jesus stood in the place of his people as he died on the cross enduring the wrath of God against the sin of the elect. Jesus was buried and on the third day he resurrected from the dead. And this is where we see the Ephesians 5 explanation of how marriage represents the gospel. And this is how Jesus Christ fulfills the 7th Commandment. Jesus lived, died, and resurrected in order to win his bride back from sin and death.
The book of Revelation tells us that when Christ returns he will finally and truly be wed to his people. The church is the bride of Christ and we will enjoy the marriage supper of the lamb with our groom for all eternity in the new creation. The friendship, the intimacy, the satisfaction, the safety, the partnership, the completion, the fulfillment, all of the things we’re meant to feel in marriage, we will fully and finally feel with Christ in his eternal kingdom.
The 7th Commandment & the Church
But this is only true for those who will repent of their sin and believe the gospel. To repent means to acknowledge and turn from your sin. To believe means to have the knowledge of who Jesus is and what Jesus did. If you have been listening to this sermon then you have the knowledge now you need, but you can’t merely know the details about who Jesus is and what Jesus did, you must also acknowledge that they are true. You must assent to the validity of the truth claims of the gospel.
And while knowledge and assent are essential for faith, they are still not enough. You must take this knowledge and assent and you must transfer your trust to Jesus Christ alone. Only you can know whether you’ve done that or not. Only you can know where the trust of your heart lies, but every person must trust in Jesus or else you will stand before Christ as judge and he will not be your advocate. Repent and believe the gospel.
For in Christ alone do we find the forgiveness of our sins and the promise of resurrection and eternal life. But it is also in Christ alone through the power of the Holy Spirit that we can even try to keep the 7th Commandment. And so our first step when we fall into lust is to repent and trust that if we confess our sins Jesus is faithful and just to forgive us of our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Once that sin is confessed, whether it is lust or even adultery that you have confessed, the devil will remind you of your guilt and shame and you can remind him that your “sin oh the bliss of this glorious thought, [your] sin not in part but the whole is nailed to the cross and [you] bear it no more, praise the Lord oh my soul.”
And while we know that we can never keep God’s law, that’s why we need Jesus to do it for us, but also our obedience to the law is proof that we have been justified by faith alone. And we believe in God’s providence; we know that nothing is coincidence. God in his providence has ordained that we would preach on the 7th Commandment on March 26, 2023. And so it’s possible that someone here may be entertaining the thought of or even planning adultery right now. Don’t do it.
Sex is like fire. When it is contained in the fireplace of marriage it produces light and warmth in the home. When it is outside of the fireplace it burns the house to the ground. Don’t burn your house to the ground.
Be like Joseph. Flee immorality. If you are planning adultery right now cut it off today. If you can’t help but flirt with that co-worker get another job. It’s better to be poor than to go to hell.
If you can’t help but flirt with that gym crush, stop going to the gym. It’s better to be out of shape than to go to hell. If you can’t handle having a phone or a computer because of porn, get ride of them. It’s better to have a flip phone than to go to hell.
Conclusion
The 7th Commandment is more important than you think because the 7th Commandment is about the gospel. The story of humanity as revealed in Scripture begins with a wedding, is all about a wedding, and it ends with a wedding. Jesus came to win his bride and he does not commit adultery against the church. This truth is beautifully detailed in the wedding vows that we use for all of our weddings here at Christ Community Church. I’m going to read them now and as I do so, if you’re not married, listen to these words and live your life in such a way that if or when God does give you a spouse you are ready. If you are married listen to these words and recommit to following the 7th Commandment afresh today.
I take you to be my spouse.
To have and to hold from this day forward,
for better or for worse I will love you because Christ has loved me.
For richer or poorer I will be faithful to you
because Christ has been faithful to me.
In sickness and in health I will care for you because Christ has cared for me.
I promise to never divorce you and to continually pursue you because Christ has continually pursued after me.
I will love and honor you until death do us part.