Creation laws
God’s 10 Commandments are foundational in nation-building. They were given via Moses after the rescue from Egyptian slavery and the start of the preparation to enter the covenanted land. They were the foundations of true liberty and human flourishing.
After King Alfred’s astonishing victory over the Danish Great Heathen Army at Edington, he put the 10 Commandments at the heart of the newly written law code - the basis for the revival of a nation after the ravaging of its early Christian culture. The 10 Commandments also shape US law.
The commands are not just good moral laws they are an expression of God himself and thus axiomatic for us, made in His image. These laws are like laws of physics – only more so. Jesus says Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfil them.
The first five are sometimes seen as referring to our responsibilities to God and the second five as referring to our neighbour, but really all are our responsibility before God and for the benefit of our community.
Jesus’ summary is 'Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself’
But none bear fruit in us without belief in Him.
Breaking laws
‘for the wrath of God is revealed from Heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness’
Paul Washer argues that when these laws are broken, it is not the breaking that causes judgment but it is evidence of judgment as even though all know what is right we choose the opposite Therefore God gave them over…
Where are we now?
These laws of life apply to us individually and also by extension to our communities. I’m focussing here on how our culture ‘structurally’ misaligns with them - to what extent our culture is ‘systemically’ against the laws of life.
For the nation or kingdom that will not serve you will perish; it will be utterly ruined.
If you break the laws of life you break life; if the state does, national life.
1 no other gods
‘I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. ‘You shall have no other gods before[or besides] me.
Our county’s first and biggest failure – to reject God – how can we hope for renewal until we change from this? Our leaders believe in the atheism of the French Revolution and the divisiveness of Critical Theory. Our institutions are mostly hostile to Christianity but don't mind the odd ceremonial, however there have been calls to stop prayers in parliament.
So they trust in Machiavellian real-politic, friends in the City, ‘The science’ they made up, group-think, managing media (censorship), gold-plated pensions, jobs in Quangos and a hope for honours.
2 no worship of images
‘You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments.
This sounds like something that only primitive people do – we’re past that – or are we? Affectionately embracing your football team's mascot is one thing, but we are expected to honour LGBT flags, personal pronouns, BLM, DIE, selected wars, climate decrees - just-stop-oil to just-stop-Israel.
Being coerced to bow down (literally with BLM) and worship (virtue-signal) these ideologies has been enlightening. It’s shown itself as a form of elite mob rule as terrifying as any ‘primitive’ tribal ritual and it’s not the objects themselves (and wasn’t in past times) but who they represent and what they lead us to – linking to 1 above.
“This moral inversion is precisely the function of idolatry... What has happened in the secular West is not a matter of abandoning religion, but of adopting an idolatrous new one... One with a god that looks strikingly like our self..” Matthew Roberts. Pride - Identity and the worship of self.
And it’s also within national churches – unhelpful rituals, surrender to culture. We mustn’t begin in the Spirit but end up in the flesh (cf
He warns us of the damage that results from breaking this law and the benefit of being fortified by it.
3 don’t misuse his Name
‘You shall not misuse the name of the Lord your God, for the Lord will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name.
'let your ‘Yes’ be ‘Yes,’' says Jesus
This law thus reflects speaking the truth about yourself (where Law 9 is truth about other people).
How much more the honour of His name and we who seek to share it. If we are not true to Him and His Word we fail here. Jesus said he can do only what he sees his Father doing
There is also a sense of blasphemy here. We know who a nation’s ‘god’ is by what cannot be disrespected or contradicted. Clearly that is not the Creator! Christian blasphemy laws have been repealed. Instead it’s the unlikely alliance of Woke and Islam. Who enforces this? It’s done with lawfare and with intimidation by well-organised groups – often career-threatening, sometimes life-threatening. It’s tolerated by the Government and police – it's systemic.
4 keep Sunday special
‘Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labour and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.
So we shattered this one despite a valiant effort by the 1985 ‘Keep Sunday Special’ campaign. However important concessions were achieved and the campaign continues.
This is another angle on honouring our Creator and accepting or rejecting his blessing ‘he.. hallowed it’. As with all these laws, they are for our benefit and harm comes to us in terms of stress, unrest, loss of creativity and blindness to God when we reject them.
They also reflect our trust in him – like tithing – if we do these we trust him to answer our physical needs.
New York state is seeking to force food outlets in service stations to open every day in a move affecting a popular Christian-owned chain that has always closed on Sundays.
If undue work (a zero-hours contract?) is not proscribed we are literally breaking a commandment!
5 honour your parents
‘Honour your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you.
The family is under attack from many quarters. A TV contestant boasted that one of the benefits of not having children is that you can go to lots of pop concerts! Not her fault but just evidence of our cultural indoctrination against family life. This comes from a nihilistic influence that can only end one way – there will be none of you living in the land, which is the current demographic trajectory.
Tax schemes don't encourage families. 'No fault' divorce. Progressives' Critical Theory says having two parents makes a child 'privileged' and therefore an oppressor.
Without children, our communities disintegrate with none left to support those who are old or can't work.
Families are creation work – the best and most rewarding kind. When people become Christians one of the first things God leads them to do is to reconcile with their families. That’s how important it is.
6 no murder
'You shall not murder.
The death toll from abortion is staggering and it is illegal to protest it or stand quietly outside a clinic – praying in your head! There are calls for abortion up to birth, just think what that involves surgically – who can conscience such a thing?
The demand for euthanasia is growing. 50% of NHS doctors say they are in favour. During Covid DNR notices were applied to patients without their knowledge. Apparently this was a ‘mistake’!
Add to this approving selected human oppression at home and abroad while ignoring others that don’t interest the state (Armenia, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Sudan, China).
7 no sexual sin
'You shall not commit adultery.
The prevailing ethos is that the only acceptable relationships are casual ones outside marriage. The evidence shows this leads to social isolation and poverty. Erstwhile feminists have declared that the ‘sexual revolution’ of the Sixties was the worst thing that could have happened to women.
This tragic wrong-think applies to gender dysphoria and same-sex issues. The Bible proscribes these things as they are not God’s intention for us.
How have we just come to accept all these things as normal – is our sense of creational love so neutered?
8 no theft
'You shall not steal.
In the US department shops are closing in ‘progressive’ States because the authorities will not prosecute theft under $1000. In the UK it’s not too different, domestic theft is not investigated. Why would the government do this?
More broadly the tax system takes your income away. The state does not produce anything so it has to take from those that do. We’re used to this but why do we assume that the state knows how to spend (your) resources better than you? Smaller government pushes the responsibility back to us (where God puts it). Excessive taxation disempowers you.
The massive national debt we have now is rightly said to be stealing from our children (if we have any!). The interest alone is over £80 billion a year, the size of the Education budget, that's over £2000 a year on average per taxpayer! I don't think we're getting a good return on that 'investment'!
9 don’t lie about people
‘You shall not give false testimony against your neighbour.
Speaking truth in politics or cultural leadership is rare. The prevailing approach is to accuse others of exactly what you are doing – to distract from your own cupidity. We all too quickly accept these false testimonies because to face up to the scale of lying and do something about it demands too much from us.
With lies generally, Solzhenitsyn’s ‘Live not by lies’ recognised that truth-telling was the most subversive and powerful thing you could do in the face of a distorting culture. We need to do the same, even ‘A man is a man…’. How amazingly powerful is social pressure that we baulk even at that, ‘so as not to offend’, despite ruined lives and mutilated young bodies - is that not offensive?
Tucker Carlson observed you don’t get cancelled for telling lies only for telling the truth.
And the Christian vision of Truth is so much wider.
10 don’t be envious and jealous of others
‘You shall not covet your neighbour’s house. You shall not covet your neighbour’s wife, or his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbour.’
Both Socialist and Fascist political ideologies say the state definitely should do these things! The state owns you, your children, your income, your property, your opinions, you are not entitled to anything. ‘You will have nothing and you will be happy’, the World Economic Forum declares. The WEF/UN elites are the ones in charge of the West and they are coming after everything. ‘1984’ is their commentary, 'climate' their excuse. Orwell’s account is merely a description of what was seen in the WW2 regimes. We thought we’d conquered these ideologies after the Berlin Wall – but man’s evil reasserts itself in different forms.
We realise that covetousness and its destruction of freedom are held in check only by God’s grace. If we reject that we suffer the results.
So...
God gave civil government for our good but ‘since a wicked prince is the Lord’s scourge to punish the sins of the people, let us remember, that it happens through our fault that this excellent blessing of God is turned into a curse.’ Calvin’s commentary on
'America is a pagan nation. We have to be faithful and watch the providential hand of God do what it’s going to do.' John MacArthur
Sadly we’re not doing so well and feel the consequences, a soft totalitarianism which we accept until we’re so disempowered that we can’t do anything about it.
Strong systematic pressures exist to oppose every Law of Life – despite being told that everything is fine.
I'll leave you to work out which don't relate to the Post Office tragedy!
But it has been worse in the past and God through his Grace has raised us up. It can be recovered – God is the great rescuer and almost against hope He moves to bring joy and reform. The state’s ruling elites are fallen people like us but held by God to a high standard in public life. They need repentance and renewal. It's a spiritual battle not a political one.
But as Ambassadors from a different kingdom, we had better ensure we are on-message and speaking up clearly. We have to work to change this kingdom's heart and mind so each law of life is honoured and followed - and people flourish.
