Encore Post: On the surface, “you will not murder” seems easy enough to keep. In spite of what the TV and the Internet like to make us believe, very few people outside the military ever actually kill another person. Most policemen on the job do not draw their weapons even once in their careers. It should be easy to check this one off, we are tempted to think.
In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus tells us there is a lot more to this command than that. Murder begins in our hearts when we become angry with someone and wish harm to them. (Matthew 5:21-26) hatred has a way of spilling over into action when we give it room to fester.
Martin Luther sees in this command every place God forbids us to harm our neighbors in any way. It also calls on us to help anyone who is hurting, in danger, weak, hungry or ill. God, the Author of Life, wants us to be for life, too. When we do not come to the aid of others, we kill them, even if it is only in a small way. Jesus even promises to remember on the last day when we do not care for them. What we do or do not do to the least important of our neighbors, he will count as having been done to him. (Matthew 25:31-46)
In our modern culture, it is ever more challenging to defend life, protect the weak and care for those who suffer. Mothers are taught it is their right to kill babies in the womb if they do not want to raise them. Doctors urge patients and their families to put to death those who suffer greatly. In some cases, governments take these decisions out of the hands of family and kill patients they find too expensive to treat. Rightly so, Christians come to the defense of the weak and defenseless.
Because God in Christ died so that we might rise again, we seek not to harm others, but to help them as he helped us.
Rev. Robert E. Smith
Concordia Theological Seminary
Fort Wayne, Indiana
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