February 27, 2025

Today's Reading: Catechism: The Tenth Commandment

Daily Lectionary: Job 30:16-31; John 9:1-23

What is the Tenth Commandment? You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his manservant or maidservant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.

What does this mean? We should fear and love God so that we do not entice or force away our neighbor’s wife, workers, or animals, or turn them against him, but urge them to stay and do their duty.

In the Name + of Jesus. Amen.

King Herod was told by John the Baptizer that it wasn’t lawful for him to have his brother’s wife. But what law? If he’d taken his brother Philip’s wife by force, there would have been war. If Herod had acted in the legal wrong, Philip would demand Herodias back.

But covetousness pretends that nothing was wrong. There’s nothing illegal about convincing someone of something. Perhaps Herod convinced Philip that he should simply leave Herodias. It wasn’t illegal in Rome for Herod to marry a woman who was divorced. What law did Herod break?

It was God’s Law, of course. And let’s see it in light of the Tenth Commandment. Convincing others to destroy their relationships is evil. Especially when you benefit from that relationship being destroyed. Maybe it’s difficult to prove, difficult to legislate against, but God knows the heart.

The Gift this Commandment protects is the Gift of relationships, ours and our neighbor’s. He’s provided these relationships for us. Brothers and sisters, parents and children, husband and wife, all for our good. And so, our Lord protects these Gifts. And commands us to honor those relationships among our neighbors as well.

But, this is a sin that’s in our hearts. We want to have who we can’t. And we try to make it happen while appearing to do the right thing. Even when we hurt those who lose that relationship. Even when we hurt the one we’re after. It’s a lie by action rather than word. One we don’t plan to have found out. This is also the Commandment that convicts us, even if we convince ourselves that we’ve kept all the others. We cannot hide our hearts from God, even if we can from everyone else.

And so we repent. We’re sorry for our sin. And we turn in hope to the one who forgives sin. We turn to the one who has kept this Commandment in our place. Jesus faced all temptation for us, even the temptations of the heart. He refused to act selfishly, in ways that only appeared right. Instead, He stood against Satan in the wilderness during those forty days. He stood against Satan while hanging on the cross. And He fought to make even our broken relationships whole again.

Our relationship with God is restored. As we forgive one another as Christ has forgiven us, our relationships with them can be mended as well. And Christ mends our hearts. The Old Adam daily drowns in the Baptism that He has given. And we begin to desire what is good with the new creation in us.

In the Name + of Jesus. Amen.

You shall not crave your neighbor’s house Nor covet money, goods, or spouse, Pray God He would your neighbor bless As you yourself wish success. Have mercy, Lord! (LSB 581:10)

-Rev. Eli Davis, pastor of St. Paul Lutheran Church in Grants Pass, OR.

Audio Reflections Speaker: Pastor Jonathan Lackey is the pastor at Grace Lutheran Church, Vine Grove, KY.

What makes a church "good?" Come join the fictional family as they test out eight different churches in their brand-new town and answer this question along the way. Will the Real Church Please Stand Up? by Matthew Richard, now available from Concordia Publishing House.

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