This is a transcript of Pastor CD Brooks sermon, LOVE AND DUTY (from the Breath of Life Series by C. D. Brooks) transcribed and edited by Derek Morris. I have changed the title to, Relationship Between Love and Keeping the Ten Commandments.
CD Brooks sermon transcript – Love and Duty
Our subject tonight is “Love and Duty.” I want to read to you from the book of Ephesians 5:10. Please write the text down and check it in your Bible. You’ll enjoy getting into the habit of studying the Bible.
Ephesians 5:10. It says, “Proving what is acceptable unto the Lord.” Now, that’s what it says in the King James Version. I’d like to read it to you from another translation. This is what it says: “Try to find out what best pleases the Lord.”
Did you get that? “Try to find out what best pleases the Lord.” Now, really folks, that’s what a real Christian does and that’s what a real Christian enjoys. It doesn’t have to be some big thing. Even if it’s a little thing, if it pleases the Lord, that’s your pleasure. Amen? That’s what Paul is talking about.
Some have come up to me and asked me what the Bible says about a new commandment. I was driving along in my car the other day and I heard a minister preaching about a new commandment. Jesus did say, “A new commandment give I unto you.” Let’s go to Matthew 22:37 and see what the Lord said there.
Matthew 22:37. The Bible says, “Jesus said unto him, ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God will all thy heart and with all thy soul and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it. Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two hang all the law and the prophets.’”
Now, a preacher took this text (and you don’t know who it is, so I can’t offend you with this), and he said, “That proves that you don’t have to think about the Ten Commandments anymore, because the Lord gave a new commandment.”
He said, “The first one is: you should love God with all your heart, soul, and mind, and strength, and then you must love your neighbor as yourself.”
Now, I want to read you something, and it’s going to surprise some of you. I’m going to the book of Deuteronomy. What book did I say? Deuteronomy. That’s one of the first five books of the Bible, written by Moses. Now, I want you to listen very carefully. Deuteronomy 6:5. The Bible says, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul and with all thy might.”
Now, I’m going to read to you from the third book of the Bible, Leviticus. Leviticus 19:18. The Bible says, “Thou shalt not avenge nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.” These scriptures were given by God through Moses fifteen hundred years before the time of Christ!
Then what did the Lord mean when He said, “I’m going to give you a new commandment?” It is a fact that the children of Israel had fallen into legalism. Jesus said to them, you’re so careful about the letter of the law but you miss the spirit of the law.
The letter of the law says, “Thou shalt not kill.” But the spirit of the law is this: if you hate your brother, you’re a murderer. The letter of the law says, “Thou shalt not commit adultery.” But the spirit of the law is this: if you look at a woman and lust after her, you’ve committed adultery already in your heart. Would you say Amen?
Now, Jesus came to fulfill the law. He said in Matthew 5:17, “Think not that I have come to destroy the law and the prophets; I have not come to destroy but to fulfill.” I’ve come to show you how to do God’s will, not just in the letter but in spirit. The Jews came into conflict with Christ every day because they couldn’t see eye to eye with Him.
Christ was trying to show them how to worship the Father, but they were so accustomed to doing it their way that they despised Him. Jesus said to them, I’m going to introduce a new idea. Yet all He did was quote the Bible. He said, “You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and your neighbor as yourself.”
But He didn’t say that excludes everything else. He said, “Under these hang all the laws and the prophets.” Would you say Amen?
Now, Ladies and Gentlemen, Saint Paul said, “Love is the fulfilling of the law” (Romans 3:10). Our subject tonight is “Love and Duty.” Paul says love is the fulfilling of the law, and I want to show you tonight just how practical that statement is.
First of all, you’ve got to “love God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength.” If you love God that way, you’ll keep the first four commandments. The first commandment says, “Thou shalt have no other gods before Me.” If you love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength you will never worship another god. If that makes sense, say Amen.
The second commandment says don’t make statues and images and worship them, if you love Me with all your heart, soul, mind and strength. Does this make sense to you? The third commandment says respect Me and respect My name; not only should you not use My name in vain, in cursing and swearing and profanity, but you shouldn’t call yourself a Christian unless you live like one. Represent My name, if you love Me with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. Would you say Amen?
Then He said, “Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.” Well, why should we do that? “For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth.” There are many false gods. But the difference between the true God and the false god is that the true God made everything here, including the stuff the false god is made out of!
The Sabbath honors Him. God calls it “My Holy Day” (Isaiah 58:13) and says it is a “sign between Me and you that I am the Lord your God” (Ezekiel 20:20). If you love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength, you’ll remember the Sabbath.
So if you love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, you’ll keep the first four. That’s what Jesus meant when He said, “Under these two hang…” Now, the second one is, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” That’s a whole lot of love! Let me say this: you’ve got to start with a certain intelligent kind of love for yourself.
Now, I’m not talking about pride. God never encourages pride. Some people love themselves too much. They have inordinate affection for themselves. But you’ve got to love yourself. You’ve got to love yourself, not to abuse yourself with nicotine and drugs and alcohol.
If you don’t have some respect for yourself, you can’t respect other people. Nothing is more detrimental to character than a loss of self-respect. (That was the struggle that the young woman was going through that I talked to you about the other night). If you grow up into adulthood without self-respect, what kind of marriage do you expect to have?
Happy homes are homes where husbands look up to their wives, because they are ladies, and wives realize that they are being rewarded for their virtue; they respect themselves. Would you say Amen?
So you got to start with some kind of love and respect for yourself. And remember: you are valuable, not because you’re important, but because Jesus died to ransom you. If you understand that, that gives you self-worth. Then, when you understand your own feelings and your own emotions and your own impulses, you’ll have respect for the feelings, emotions and impulses of others.
If you love your neighbor as yourself, you’ll start off by honoring your mother and your father. And by the way, God’s law is broad and comprehensive. That means more than just your blood kin. It means you ought to be good to old people. Would you say Amen?
You ought to show some respect to those with gray hairs. You ought to say a kind word now and then. Now, I don’t like funerals. I’m tired of laying into the grave, people that I love. I’m looking forward to the day when Jesus comes, when the dead in Christ shall rise. Aren’t you?
What a wonderful day that will be! But sometimes it makes me sad when I go to funerals and see the piles of flowers and the stacks of sympathy cards. And yet I know that that dear saint who now rests in Jesus didn’t see a single card from one month to another and seldom smelled the sweet fragrance of fresh flowers in the room. Friends, don’t wait till they’re dead to do those things. Would you say Amen?
Do them while they’re still with you. Bring joy now. Bring sunshine now! Honor your father and mother, and that means more than just cards and flowers. It means you ought to come around and make the work light once in a while. It means that if mother is running all day and you’re watching some foolish television show, and she needs some help, you ought to love her more than that show.
If you love your neighbor as yourself, that won’t be any problem to you. You’ll keep number five.
Then the next one says, “Thou shalt not kill.” Now, who would ever kill somebody if you love him like you love yourself?
The next one says, “Thou shalt not commit adultery.” I don’t want to fool with anybody’s wife and tear up their home, because I know how I’d feel if someone tried to fool around with my wife. If you love your neighbor as yourself, then you’ll be true to your wife and leave the other fellow’s alone.
If you love your neighbor as yourself, will you steal? No sir. His car, his suitcase, his camera will be as safe as if it were your own, because you love him as you love yourself.
If you love your neighbor as yourself, will you bear false witness? Will you lie on him?
Will you covet? Get mad because he has a new stereo and you don’t have one? And then get yourself in debt just to keep up with him? And as soon as you think you’ve caught up, he gets a new car, and you’re still mad!
Don’t you see how practical it all is? That’s why Jesus said, I’m introducing a new idea: stop trying to force yourself with willpower to obey the commandments. Folks who do that are miserable. If you’ll only put the horse in front of the cart and fall in love with Jesus, then love is the fulfilling of the law.
You don’t do it now because you force yourself. You do it now because you love somebody, and when you love somebody you love to please that person. “Try to find out what best pleases the Lord,” said Paul, and do that! And you’ll enjoy it.
Now, Jesus said in John 14:15, “If you love Me”–do what? “keep My commandments.” Now that’s what He said explicitly. Implicitly He said, If you don’t love Me, forget it. You can’t obey Me. Love and duty. They’ve got to go together. Hand in hand. Duty without love is a bore and a burden. But if you love Jesus, you’ll delight to do His will. Would you say Amen?
You know, there’s a big difference between loving and talking. Jesus had something to say about that in Matthew 15. Beginning with verse 1 the Bible says, “Then came to Jesus Scribes and Pharisees which were of Jerusalem, saying, ‘Why do Thy disciples transgress the tradition of the elders? for they wash not their hands when they eat bread?’
But He answered and said unto them, ‘Why do ye also transgress the commandment of God by your tradition?’” Down to Verse 8, Jesus said these words: “This people draweth nigh unto Me with their mouth and honoreth Me with their lips; but their heart is far from Me.”
They don’t love Me. It’s just talk, and talk is cheap. Jesus said that. “They honor Me with their mouths and their lips, but their hearts are far from Me.” Someone once said the longest distance in the world is often the distance between the mouth and the heart.
Jesus said, Their mouth honors Me but their hearts are far from Me. They don’t love Me. They just talk. And they can talk up a blue streak, but when it comes to proving, when it comes to doing, when it comes to demonstration, they are sadly lacking.
If they can’t find an excuse, they make one up. When you really love the Lord, you stop all this bellyaching and complaining and whining. All you want to do is find out what pleases Him. Lord, here is something I never knew before, but if it pleases You, I’m ready! Only a man who loves the Lord, can do that.
The Bible says in Matthew 15:9, “In vain do they worship Me teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.” You start by loving the Lord, and when you love Him, you like to please Him. He said, “If you love Me, keep My commandments.”
There are some people who join the church because they’re scared. They hear about hell, the judgment, and they decide they’re going to be in church because they don’t want to go to hell, because they don’t want to burn. But they’re in there because they’re scared.
Let me quote you a text. The Bible says, “But the fearful and the unbelieving and the whoremongers and all liars shall have their part in the fire” (Revelation 21:8). It starts off by saying, “the fearful.” You can’t serve God in fear. He said, “Therefore, there is no fear in love; perfect love casteth out fear, because fear has torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love” (1 John 4:18).
You can’t enjoy church when you’re scared. You’re there, but you’d rather be out. You can’t enjoy your religion like that. That’s why so many people are miserable in church. They’ve got just enough religion to make them miserable.
Like a man with a headache, they don’t want to cut off their heads, but it hurts them to keep it! They don’t want to leave the church, but it’s a problem.
That’s why they’ve always got something evil to say about the preacher, about the service. You can’t please them. If you preach loud, they don’t like it. If you preach soft, they don’t like it. If you preach the Bible, they don’t like it. If you don’t preach the Bible, they don’t like it.
If the choir sings an anthem, they don’t like it. If the choir sings a hymn, they don’t like it! They’re miserable! The preacher isn’t their problem. They’re their own problem! They don’t really love the Lord.
There are those who honor the Lord with their mouths but they want to keep on doing all the things they’ve been used to doing. The Bible says, “If any man”–now, that covers the field–“If any man would be My disciple, let him deny himself take up his cross and follow Me” (Luke 9:23). Now, that’s the way you’ve got to go, folks.
There are no special accommodations for certain people. The Bible says if any man would be My disciple, he’s got to deny himself and take up his cross. What does that mean? It means you’ve got to stop doing some things that you used to like to do.
The fact that you like it doesn’t make it right. The only way I know to do that is to love somebody enough. Then you’ll try to find out what best pleases Him when you really love. Got to give it up. Deny yourself.
Then there are some things that you don’t want to do that you decide to do because you love. I remember one cold winter morning, my wife and I were just waking up from a good night’s sleep. She touched me on the shoulder and said, “Honey, I’m thirsty.” That’s all she said. She didn’t even say, “Go get me some water.” That was implied.
Were it not, she wouldn’t have bothered me at all. She’d have got up and got it herself! So when she said, “I’m thirsty,” it was not just to let me know of her physical condition; it was an unspoken appeal: do something about it! I didn’t have to do it.
Thank the Lord she’s not the kind of wife who’d say to me, “Now look here, you go get me some water!” She didn’t say, “You have to go get it.” Now, in my house, I was under a toasty Scandinavian down comforter. It was wintertime.
You get up and you wake up, you know? You have to walk down the hall. And if you’re not awake by then by the time you open the refrigerator and the artic breath enshrouds you, you are rudely awakened! All of that popped into my head when she said, “Honey, I’m thirsty.”
I didn’t have to go get her a drink. There wasn’t anybody in my house or the next ten houses around who could make me go get it. But did I go get it? Now, what in the world makes a person do something that he doesn’t even feel like doing? And there’s no point in kidding you. I didn’t want to get up. I was toasty warm under the down comforter. I wanted to stay there! I didn’t want to. I didn’t have to. Nobody would make me, yet I did it. What makes a man act like that? Love. Would you say Amen?
Jesus said, “If you love Me and you want to be My disciple, deny yourself.” Get up when you don’t feel like it. Sit down when you don’t want to. That’s what the Lord is saying. Oh, but people hate the Lord. They hate His Word and they hate the law.
Do you know why they hate the law? Because they can’t sin the way they want to, and believe in it. Fooling around with a woman? They don’t want anything saying “Thou shalt not commit adultery.”
And you know every thief is not breaking in cars. Some of them are standing behind counters right now. Some of them are examining people in the office and overcharging. All kinds of thieves. They can’t afford to believe in a law that says “Thou shalt not steal” when they are carrying on like that. So they hate the law.
When you talk to them about it they say, “It costs too much to live for God.” Friends, think with me. Jesus is coming soon. This world as we know it is going to be over.
Most will not be ready. The Bible says that they will run to the rocks and mountains and cry, “Fall on us and hide us from the face of the Lamb.” Running in terror. I want to tell you tonight, it costs too much not to live for God. Would you say Amen?
To the person who says, I’ll lose too much if I commit my life to Christ and do His will I would say, you’ll lose everything in the end if you don’t! Think about it. Friends, what we need is for our love for Jesus to grow day by day. As our love grows, obeying God’s Word will not be a problem but a privilege. Would you say Amen?
Love and duty go hand in hand. It will be our greatest desire to find out what pleases the Lord, and then to do it. It doesn’t have to be big things. Whatever pleases the Lord, even the little things, because we love the Lord.
I want you to go with me to the cross again tonight, and see Him hanging there. He doesn’t deserve to be there. The wages of sin is death, but He never sinned. Why is He there? Abused by men. His back raw from the Roman whip. A crown of thorns crushed upon His head.
The Son of God dying. He’s there for us. We’re the sinners. He’s there because He loves us. Would you say Amen? He’s there to die in our place, to work out our salvation. He’s taking the hell that we deserve, tasting the second death, the death without hope.
Jesus, who deserves only eternal happiness and heaven, is willingly suffering what we deserve that we might be treated as He deserves. He is suffering our hell and offering us His heaven. That’s love! Would you say Amen?
That’s love. And Jesus would have gone through all that–suffered and bled and died–for just one person. If you’d been the only sinner, He would have died for you. That’s love. He says to you tonight, I want you to love Me back. Not just a lot of talk, not just honoring Me with your mouth but with your hearts. Would you say Amen?
Jesus said, “If you love Me”–do what? “Keep My commandments” (John 14:15). In 1 John 5:2-3. Please write it down. The Bible is so clear. “By this, we know that we love the children of God when we love God and keep His commandments.” Verse 3: “For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments, and His commandments are not grievous.”
They’re not a burden but a blessing. They’re not a problem, but a privilege! Would you say Amen? Now, they’re a burden if you don’t love Him. They’re a problem if you’re trying to force yourself. But when you love the Lord, when you’ve given your life to Him and asked Him to fill you with His Holy Spirit, then you’ll cry out like the psalmist.
Psalm 40:8: “I delight to do Thy will, O my God; Thy law is within my heart.” I love to do God’s will. I have a good time obeying the Lord. I have peace in my heart and assurance for the future. What a future it will be, for those who love the Lord and do His will.
The Bible says, “Blessed are they that do His commandments that they may have right to the tree of life and may enter in through the gates into the city.” Don’t you want to be in that number, with the redeemed of all ages? If you do, say Amen?
Artists have tried to depict the perfect beauty of the new heavens and the new earth described in Revelation 21. But the Bible says, “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath entered into the heart of man the things that God has prepared for them that love Him” (1 Corinthians 2:9).
The Bible says, “Violence shall be no more heard in thy land, wasting or destruction with thy borders. But thou shalt call thy walls Salvation and thy gates Praise” (Isaiah 60:18).
We’ve come to a violent age, but the Bible says there will be no more violence there. “The wolf and lamb shall lay down together, the leopard shall lie down with the kid, and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together and a little child shall lead them.
The Bible says in Revelation 21:4, “And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain; for the former things are passed away.” No more tears. Would you say Amen? No more funerals. No more broken hearts. Only peace and joy and contentment, forever. Bless the name of the Lord! And it’s ours by faith!
There’s something wrong with folks who don’t want to go. What could there be down here that a person could love so much, that they would be willing to hold on to it and be lost? How many of you want to be in God’s Kingdom? Would you say Amen?
And how many of you love the Lord tonight? Would you raise your hand? Praise God! The Lord is going to show you things you haven’t even known before. How many of you love the Lord enough tonight that you’ll follow wherever He leads? If you do, I want you all to stand up with me right now and show the Lord that you love Him.
Blessed Lord. We stand tonight, to show you that we really love You. We’re not just pretending. We really mean it, don’t we folks? We love You and we want to follow wherever You lead. Father, I’m praying tonight for each person standing here, that You would give us grace and power to do Your will, and that You would fill our hearts with Your love.
As the truth comes to us from Your word, send Your Holy Spirit to us and trouble us until we have made the decision to follow You all the way, all the way Lord, until Jesus comes. We pray in His name. Let everybody say Amen!
Related:
Strait Is The Gate and Narrow is The way (Hard To Save) – CD Brooks Sermon Transcript
Resurrection of The Dead At The Second Coming of Christ – CD Brooks Sermon Transcript
Sinful Nature: Born Into Sin (Wrong Desires) – CD Brooks Sermon Transcript
Man Stuck In The Mud (King Herod Perplexed by Jesus) – CD Brooks Sermons
I hope that you have been blessed by this CD Brooks sermon, Relationship Between Love and Keeping the Ten Commandments.
