In Peter Allison’s sermon, 'The Blessing of the Law: Pt 4', the focus is on Proverbs 28 and the blessings that come from adhering to God's law. The sermon explores how the law reflects God's holy and just character, serving as a definition of love and truth. It discusses the relationship between law and love, where breaking the law is seen as unloving towards God and others. The sermon highlights the importance of confession as aligning with God's definitions of justice and goodness. It criticizes the modern normalization of debt, contrasting it with the biblical view that sees debt as a tragedy rather than a norm. Usury, or charging interest, is condemned, especially in relation to the poor, emphasizing that wealth gained from usury will ultimately benefit those who pity the poor. The sermon outlines three types of tithes: the first for supporting the Levites, the second for personal feasting and rejoicing before the Lord, and the third every third year for the poor, emphasizing individual responsibility in caring for the needy. Jesus Christ is portrayed as the ultimate example of putting others' interests first, having sacrificed His divine rights out of love for humanity. The sermon calls for a transformation in thinking about debt, poverty, and generosity, urging believers to act out of love and obedience to God.

Please turn with me in your copy of God's Word to Proverbs 28. I'll be looking at verses 8 and following, but I'd like to read for context from verse 1. The wicked flee when no one pursues, but the righteous are bold as a lion. Because of the transgression of a land many are its princes, but by a man of understanding and knowledge right will be prolonged. A poor man who oppresses the poor is like driving rain which leaves no food.

Those who forsake the law praise the wicked, but such as keep the law contend with them. Evil men do not understand justice, but those who seek the Lord understand all. Better is the poor who walks in his integrity than one perverse in his ways though he be rich. Whoever keeps the law is a discerning son but a companion of glutton shames his father. One who increases his possessions by usury and extortion gathers it for him who will pity the poor.

One who turns away his ear from hearing the law, even his prayer, is an abomination. Whoever causes the upright to go astray in an evil way, he himself will fall into his own pit, but the blameless will inherit good. The rich man is wise in his own eyes, but the poor who has understanding searches him out. When the righteous rejoice, there is great glory, but when men wicked arise men hide themselves. Just as his hands have made us and fashioned us may He likewise grant us understanding that we may learn His commandments.

Almighty Father in Heaven, we ask that this word that we have heard might be mixed with faith. We ask that you would give us wisdom, that we might not only be hearers of your word, but doers of it. And I ask that you would sanctify my sinful lips, that through a vessel of clay, the riches of your glory may be brought to us this morning. In Jesus' name, Amen. Well, the past few weeks we've been looking at this section dealing with God's law.

We've seen the blessing that God's commandments bring. And last week, or in the previous weeks, we have seen how the scriptures define the law and honor the law as a reflection of the character of God Himself. And by that we saw that the law conveys who God is. God is holy, holy, holy. God is just, he is truth, he is love.

And the law is holy, just, good, and true. The law is also the definition of love. We often, we talked about how we often think of these as somewhat opposites, that the law condemns sinners while Jesus, who is loved, saves sinners from the condemnation of the law. And indeed he does, praise the Lord. But when the law condemns us as sinners, the law is saying we are not loving God and we are not loving our neighbor as we ought to.

And when it proclaims that we are under the wrath, under wrath for our breaking of the law, it is God's wrath that we are under. And the thunder of the law that condemns the sinner is the thunder of a holy and just God condemning unloving people who have scorned what is good and praised what is evil, who have rejected the truth and believed the lie. So confession then, we've seen, is coming into agreement with God and His definition of love. His definition of truth, His definition of justice, his definition of what is good and acknowledging that our ideas about these things are not loving just, good, or holy in any way. So That's a quick summary of what we've talked about in previous weeks.

We've also seen in these previous passages how widespread obedience brings cultural stability, how the oppression even by the poor, by the poor, upon the poor brings famines and food shortages, and how observing of the law, paying attention to God's word produces a resistance to evil, and how the knowledge of the law produces justice and how obedience sanctifies poverty And last week then we looked at the importance of companionship and specifically the companionship of Jesus Christ. And so we come to verse 8 then as we progress through this discussion of the law, particularly in its relation to civil government, that's the, I think the primary application on this passage, that some of the things that are taught here have been said earlier in different contexts, and they are repeated here in the context of the civil government. And so we come to verse 8 this morning that says, One who increases his possessions by Usury and extortion gathers it for him who will pity the poor. Now usury is simply interest. It's what you put your money in the bank in order to get interest on it.

And it was not to be charged to the poor or to those who are brothers in the Lord. We're not to charge interest. And if you haven't read some of these lately, let me just briefly summarize or review some of these instructions in God's Word about interest. That which we put our money in the bank to get. Exodus 22, verse 22 and following says, You shall not afflict any widow or fatherless child.

If you afflict them in any way and they cry out at all to me, I will surely hear their cry. If you afflict them in any way, I will hear their cry and my wrath will become hot. And I will kill you with the sword. Your wives shall be widows and your children fatherless. And if you lend money to any of my people who are poor among you, you shall not be like a money lender to them, not to be like a bank and charge them interest.

You shall not charge him interest. If you ever take your neighbor's garment as a pledge, you shall return it to him before the sun goes down, for that is his only covering. It is his garment for his skin. What will he sleep in?" So it is important to take a pledge. The pledge would be collateral.

If you borrow money, the person loaning it to you often will want some collateral. So it's important for that because you don't want the poor to take advantage of this and go borrow if they could borrow without collateral then they could borrow from ten different people but the collateral limits their ability to borrow indiscriminately But you're to bring it back if he doesn't have anything to sleep in. And it will be that when he cries to me I will hear for I am gracious. In other words it's oppression for to keep their collateral, their garment, their cloak overnight. Leviticus 25 verse 35 and following, If one of your brethren becomes poor and falls into poverty among you, then you shall help him like a stranger or a sojourner, that he may live with you.

You shall take no usury or interest from him. But fear your God that your brother may live with you. You shall not lend him money for usury, nor lend him your food at profit." Usury there, it's interest. Deuteronomy 23, verse 19 and following, You shall not charge interest to your brother, interest on money or food or anything that is lent out at interest. To a foreigner you may charge interest, but to your brother you may not charge interest, that the Lord your God may bless you in all which you set your hand in the land which you are entering to possess." And One of the descriptions of the righteous man in Psalm 15, which asks the question, who may ascend into the holy hill?

Who may abide in your tabernacle, Lord? And here's the answer in the Psalm, And in verse 5 it says, He who does not put out his money at usury or at interest, nor does he take a bribe against the innocent. He who does these things will never be moved. Now with our 21st century mindset and practice regarding debt, these laws may seem rather extreme and may be even rather hard to follow and hard to swallow. Because that would say we're not allowed to loan money to a brother or to family members, a brother in the Lord, or to family members at interest.

Now Some people have tried to get around or evade what this is saying by saying, well, usury, that's exorbitant high interest. So you're not to charge exorbitant, and you're not to do like the payday loan places. They're going to charge you 20% interest. That's what this is condemning. But it's okay to charge reasonable interest.

But usury is Biblically simply interest, any interest at all. I think the way that we can understand this is when we understand Debt in the same way that scripture does We've we've become accustomed to debt as a normal way of life You need to buy a house you're going to debt you need a car you're going to debt You need a sofa going to debt and now you can even go to stores and you want a TV or you go into debt to get it and and things are advertised today not when was the last time you saw a car price advertised Don't you always see what the cost per month is advertised? What's this much per month? Well that's just the implicit assumption that everybody's going to live in debt as a normal part of life. That debt is just a way of living.

It's just like eating, needing food and having clothes, you have debt. But that's not how the Bible views debt. The Bible views debt as a tragedy. A tragedy. The result of tragic circumstances.

It's that was like one step above slavery. If you didn't have enough money to meet your obligations and you didn't have enough collateral to borrow the money to meet your obligations, then your time, the ability to control your time and your labor was sold. And you became a slave until you could work off what you owed. That's, you know, we often bring into the Bible's use of the word slavery all the conceptions of slavery in the United States, all the unbiblical practices of slavery in the United States or slavery as it's practiced unbiblically anywhere else. But the Bible has a very different view of slavery.

It's really more like what we would think of as jail. We don't hesitate to put people in jail. Well, we're controlling where they can live and what they can do. And it's much worse idea than if we simply controlled people's work and their time and allowed them to work off the debts that they've incurred, or the damage that they've done to people. But anyways, debt is a tragedy.

That's how the Bible, that's the underlying assumption in the Scriptures. Debt is for the poor. And the idea of going into debt to live in a 5, 000 square foot house is totally foreign to the scriptural view of debt and the scriptural view of thinking about the poor. So those who charge interest to the poor are oppressing the poor. It's the opposite of having pity on the poor.

And those who do so, the Bible says, are gathering their wealth for those who will pity the poor. The Bible has a solution for poverty. It's called the poor tithe. And Since this concept may be new to some of us, I'd like this morning to walk through just a brief summary of the Scriptures instruction on these tithes, and especially the poor tithe. Because this is how the Bible would call us to have pity and to care for those who are poor.

Not by loaning them money and putting them in perpetual bondage for 30 years, so just so they have a house to live in. So what does the Bible say then about tithing? Well there are three tithes actually taught in the scriptures and this is the understanding of many of the Jews throughout the ages. You can go all the way back even to the time of Josephus And Josephus speaks very clearly about the three tithes. And you bring that forward through the ages.

Many have spoken and understood the three tithes. Matthew Henry is another very well-known commentator who has taught on these three tithes. So you can go check any of these sources and the scriptures themselves. But the first tithe relates to the church, the support of the ministry of the word. And so in Numbers 18 verse 20 we read that the Lord said to Aaron, you shall have no inheritance in their land nor shall you have any portion among them.

I am your portion and inheritance among the children of Israel. Behold, I have given the children of Levi all the ties in Israel as an inheritance in return for the work which they performed, the work of the tabernacle of meeting. The Levites didn't get a piece of land in Israel. Every other tribe was assigned a section of land that was theirs. And it was theirs in their family, generation after generation.

They weren't even allowed to sell it. But the Levites didn't get any land. Their whole work was spent in the temple with the sacrifices, serving the Lord, and serving the land this way. And so to them was given the first tithe. It was for the maintenance and support of the Levites.

And the Levites in turn, So the Levites lived throughout the land of Israel. And people, they lived in all the cities and villages, and they taught the people. They preached every Sunday, Acts tells us, that Moses was preached throughout the land, in the synagogues. And so the tithes were brought by local people to the local Levites. And then the Levites gave a tithe of what they received.

They gave a tithe to the priests in Jerusalem. And so in Nehemiah 10, verse 35, we see that the Israelites, when they returned from captivity, they established this same structure again in Israel and it says we made an ordinance to the bring the first fruits of our ground and the first fruits of all the fruit of the trees year by year to the house of the Lord. See that this tithe is going to the house of the Lord to support the Levites, to bring the firstborn of our sons and our cattle as it is written in the law, and the firstborn of our herds and our flocks to the house of God, to the priests who minister in the house of God. So people were redeemed there. To bring the first fruits of our dough our offerings the fruit from all kinds of trees the new wine and oil to the priest to the store rooms of the house of God to bring the ties of our land to the Levites for the Levites should receive the tithes in all our farming communities." That's what Nehemiah wrote.

And the priest, the descendant of Aaron, shall be with the Levites, and when the Levites receive tithes, the Levites shall bring up a tenth of the tithes to the house of God, to the rooms of the storehouse." The Levites tithe to the priest a 10 percent of what they received. And so the whole Levitical, the whole tribe of Levi was then supported by this first tithe. So let's just summarize it. This tithe is given of the increase. And there's specific instructions that we won't get into this morning on how that increase was calculated.

The Lord is very gracious in this. He didn't want tithes of things that the wolves had killed and blight had gotten. It was a tithe of the true increase of what he blessed us with. And so this tithe was given specifically to the Levites, for the Levites. The Levites controlled and had jurisdiction over that tithe and how it was spent.

Now, the tithes were brought to the synagogue, to the people, to the Levites themselves and given to them. Okay, that's the first tithe. Now here's some more instruction on the tithe. Doesn't call it a second tithe, but I think as we read you'll see it clearly has to be different because of all the things that we just discussed. Deuteronomy 14, 22.

You shall truly tithe of all the increase of your grain that the field produces year by year. That sounds just like the previous command. And you shall eat before the Lord your God in the place where he chooses to make his name abide, the tithe of your grain and your new wine and your oil, of your firstborn, of your herds, of your flocks, that you may learn to fear the Lord your God always." So you see right away this has to be something different. The first tithe was given to the Levites. You didn't eat of it.

This tithe is saying you're going to eat of this tithe. So this is a different tithe. This is a second tithe. But if the journey is too long for you, so that you are not able to carry the tithe, or if the place where the Lord your God chooses to put His name is too far from you where the Lord has blessed you, then you shall exchange it for money. And you take the money and you go to Jerusalem and you bought with that money anything that your heart desired.

So and you shall spend that money for whatever your heart desires, for oxen, for sheep, for wine, or for similar drink, or whatever your heart desires, you shall eat there before the Lord your God, and you shall rejoice, you and your household." And you should also remember the Levite, and for he has no inheritance. In other words, you need to give something to the Levites so that he can also rejoice with you. So the purpose of this tithe is the individual is consuming it, But they're doing it in a special place. They didn't do it at home. They did it in Jerusalem.

And the purpose of this tithe was to rejoice before the Lord at the increase that He had given. Deuteronomy 12 goes on, There you shall take your burnt offering, your sacrifices, your tithe, the heath offering, and so on, and there you shall eat before the Lord your God, and you shall rejoice in all to which you have put your hand, you and your households in which the Lord has blessed you. There you shall bring all that I command you, your tithes, your offerings. You may not eat, verse 17, you may not eat within your gates the tithe of your grain or your new wine, or of your flock or your herds or of your free will offerings. But you must eat them before the Lord your God in the place where the Lord your God chooses.

You, your son, your daughter, your male servant, your female servant and the Levite who is within your gates so you shall rejoice. Rejoice before the Lord your God in all to which you put your hand. See this is a very different tithe. This is for the purpose of rejoicing, of feasting before the Lord. And where we lack this, I think we as a church suffer.

We as a community of believers, we as families. If it is always just work, work, work, work, work, and there is never a time to stop and rejoice and feast before the Lord for what He has given us. We miss something. And what happens, I think, when we miss something is that the next generation goes out looking to find and replace what was missing. And they end up often rejoicing in all the wrong things.

But God has given here a tithe, He's ordained a tithe that we're to set aside solely so that we're able to rejoice before Him, so that we're able to feast upon the good things of the land, so that we are able to enjoy the beauty, the aromas, the fellowship of a wonderful feast. It's anything. It's Anything your heart desires you could buy even alcohol But doesn't that just completely counter all the myths of Puritans and So forth that There is an aspect here of beauty, of feasting, of rejoicing that's commanded to do, and there is provision for that. The only thing is we're to remember the Levite. And so if we look at this tithe, we see the purpose of this tithe is to provide funds for feasting and the seven feasts that were commanded.

This tithe was not given to anybody. This tithe was eaten or if you couldn't eat it you would sell it and bring the money and buy something. It's eaten. The first tithe wasn't it? You gave that to the Levites.

You didn't eat that. It's very flexible. Whatever you want. There's no restrictions put on here other than that you eat it before the Lord and you rejoice. This is controlled then by the individual giving the tithe, whatever his heart desires.

He doesn't have to ask anybody. So when we discovered this years ago in our family, you know, this becomes a way to go to conferences. This becomes a way to fund the travel. This becomes a way to buy books and things at those conferences, which can then be used and benefited from the rest of the year. But then there's more.

Then there's this third tithe. Deuteronomy 14, a different passage again. We've looked at Deuteronomy 12. We've looked at Exodus in Numbers 18, but this is now Deuteronomy chapter 14 at the end of the chapter, verse 28. At the end of every third year, you shall bring out the tithe of your produce of that year and store it up within your gates.

So this is not done every year. The other tithes were every year. This is every third year. And the Levite, because he has no portion or inheritance with you, the stranger And the fatherless and the widow who are within your gates may come and eat and be satisfied that the Lord your God may bless you in the work of your hand which you do." Deuteronomy 26 Verse 12, when you have finished laying aside all the tithe of your increase in the third year, the year of tithing, and have given it to the Levite, the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow, so that they may eat within your gates and be filled, then you shall say before the Lord your God, I have removed the holy tithe from my house and have given them to the Levite the stranger The fatherless and the widow according to your commandments which you have commanded me. I have not Transgressed your commandments nor have I forgotten them I have not eaten any of it when in mourning, nor have I removed any of it for unclean use, nor given any of it for the dead.

I have obeyed the voice of the Lord, and done according to all that you have commanded me. Look down from your holy habitation from heaven, and bless your people Israel and the land which you have given us just as you swore to your fathers a land flowing with milk and honey." See here's a third tithe. It's only collected every third year so it's really only a third of a tithe, three and a third percent. And it's specifically to be given to the poor, to the stranger, to the fatherless, to the widow, those people who have a need. See the purpose of this tithe is exactly what our text is talking about.

Somebody who pities the poor. Somebody who doesn't increase their wealth through interest and loans to the poor. This is God's solution, the biblical solution or the biblical prescription for poverty. See it's administered by the individual. It's not administered by the state, Caesar.

It's not administered by the church even. It's administered by the individual. See when we're spending somebody else's money with minimal accountability, the money is a lot more likely to be wasted. But when we're spending our own money that we've worked hard for, we're a lot more careful about where we spend it. We're typically more discerning.

And we can begin to bring some kind of discernment to giving. There are the people that won't work and Paul said they shouldn't eat. And it's not wise to be enabling them to not work, enabling them in their laziness. But there are many others who are poor through no fault of their own, or maybe through tragedy, or financial reversals, through hurricanes, things that destroy homes or destroy crops or businesses. And This is what the Lord has ordained for those people to be helped.

And so we can show discernment in not funding people that aren't working and we can funnel our money into those that are. And you see what better person to be able to administrate that than the individual who lives right there, who sees every day what is happening and what isn't happening. As opposed to somebody in another city, in another state. How are they gonna know with this kind of discernment who's working and who's not working? And so there is also another aspect of this tithe that doesn't just enable the poor to barely stay alive and simply subsist month to month, month to month for the rest of their life.

This isn't a monthly allotment that just enables them to keep body and soul together. This is something that can radically change their situation. This is a tithe that's stored up. Whether you take a third of a tithe day by day, year by year, or whether you take a full tithe every third year, it really doesn't matter. The point is there's a significant sum of money.

There's a difference between a dollar a month or a dollar a day and $300 at one time. There's a difference. There's a difference between $500 a month and $50, 000 in hand at one time. See the $50, 000 in hand at one time or $100, 000 can substantially change the life and the situation of somebody who is poor. It can provide a house.

Yes, you can buy houses for under $100, 000. I've seen it this year in my own family. And so You can eliminate that whole cycle of rent or of debt bondage for 30 years. You could capitalize a business with that kind of money and enable somebody who doesn't have any income to give them an income. You could provide capital, for example, to plant and harvest a crop.

Sometimes people are just maybe not able to come up with the capital to put the seed in the ground and to live while that seed grows and then have the capital to harvest it. So you fund that. And once they have that, then they get the harvest and they get the return and then they can save and you've set them up to support themselves. See, that's the idea with this poor tide. It doesn't just enable somebody to continue in subsistence, it changes radically people's situation.

To give them a chance, to give them an income, to provide for a home, so that they can take the money that would have been going out every month for a home and save it. That's what God does to care for the poor. One who increases his possessions by usury, by interest, and extortion gathers it for him who will pity the poor. For him who will demonstrate this generosity toward those who are poor. That will, a generosity that will transform their life and lift them out of month by month, paycheck by paycheck living.

I think this is one of the next areas that we as the church need to recover. Many Christians in the past couple of generations have recovered education. We've paid double for education. Once for the government schools, actually three or four, maybe even ten times. And then also we've paid again to educate our own children.

We recognize that's what we need to do. And I think we need to say we need to come to that same recognition with respect to how we handle the poor. We can't just allow the government to continue to handle the poor. What we've seen, they've been doing that now since the 60s, and all we've seen is an explosion of poverty. You get what you pay for, you get what you subsidize.

They've subsidized poverty and now we have more of it. I think as Christians we need to look to the Word of God to what God would have us to do and how he would have us to pity the poor and We we see that then that we're gonna have to pay twice we're gonna have to pay the tax to the government so they can subsidize the poor to increase the poverty and also then pay the poor tithe, Which is God's remedy for the poor. Which is true pity for the poor because it truly has the ability to change their circumstances. This proverb when it talks about those who will pity the poor is really saying exactly the same thing that Paul said to the Philippians. Let Philippians 2, let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind, let each esteem others better than himself.

Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but also for the interests of others." Isn't that a summary of what the Proverbs is saying? Those who have pity on the poor. That each of you look out not only for his own interest, but also for the interest of others. Those who are looking out for the interest of others are those who have pity on the poor. Those who increase their wealth by charging interest to the poor, the Proverbs says, will lose their wealth to those who are showing pity on the poor and looking out for the interests of others.

But here's the amazing thing. Paul then, immediately after that verse, goes on to give us an example of how that looks. What does it look like when someone has a pity on the poor? When someone is looking out for the interests of others, and not just their own interests. And who do you suppose he gives as an example?

None other than Jesus Christ. The very next verse is, let this mind be in you, which is also in Christ Jesus, who being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made himself of no reputation. Christ gave up his rights. He's the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. He lived in unapproachable light, but he took to himself a human body and submitted himself under the government and discipline of people, of humans, who were far beneath him, Far beneath Him.

He gave up His rights. Why? Because He had an interest in us. He loved us. He made Himself a slave, taking the form of a bond servant, and coming in the likeness of man.

He made himself a slave. He washed the disciples' feet. That's the work of a slave. He was found in appearance as a man. He took upon himself a human body.

And now as a human, he knew hunger, he knew tiredness, he knew pain, All because he was looking out for our interests. So that we could have a high priest who could sympathize with us in our weaknesses. When we have pains, when we're tired, when we're weary, when we're struggling, we know we have a high priest who's endured all those things and can sympathize with us. That's the example Paul gives us, someone who is looking out for the interest of others. He humbled himself.

He yielded his rights and submitted to human authority. Him who was the king of kings submitted himself to his parents, subject to them. He submitted himself to the civil magistrate as well. He paid taxes that he didn't owe. And he became Obedient to the point of death, when he was arrested, he could have called 12 legions of angels to come fight for him, to rescue him.

But he didn't. He could have, But he didn't. Because he was looking out for our interests. Christ came to redeem us. He didn't need anything.

In the Trinity He had perfect fellowship. There was nothing that he lacked. He was all glorious. He didn't need us. He did it all because the Bible says because He loved us.

He laid down His life for us. And Paul says in the next verse then, therefore, because He's done this. Verse 9, God has highly exalted him and given him a name that is above every name. Christ is our example. Christ is our Savior.

And as we want to show pity on the poor and help them, we have to do so because of Christ. If it's not because we love Christ, then all the things that we might do, Paul said even if I give my body to be burned, they profit nothing. The pity that we show to the poor is to be a pity that arises out of our love of Christ and because He is working in us and because He has given to us this example and because and we want we want to glorify Him. We want to have His fellowship, to have His companionship, to know His grace in our life. We can't be doing this simply because we think that by doing this we will be acceptable either to people or to God because it won't make us that.

May God transform our thinking regarding debt and regarding care of the poor, regarding even our cultural understanding of money so that we as a church, as individuals, and as a nation, as a state, are those who show a godly pity on the poor. Almighty Heavenly Father, We do thank you for your example, but most of all, Lord, we praise you that you have loved us, that you have redeemed us, that you have called us accepted in the beloved. Not from anything that we have done, not from any pity that we have shown to anybody. That you have done this solely out of your grace. And Lord we want to offer out of our love to you, out of our desire to glorify you, out of our desire to see your kingdom advanced.

We want to offer you lives that show pity for the poor. A true pity, not the pity of our own imaginations, of our own vain imaginations. We ask, Lord, that our where our thinking has become the thinking of the heathen, of the Gentile, that you might transform our thinking and renew it according to your word. We ask that you might revive us. We love you, Lord, and we want to offer our bodies as living sacrifices to you.

We pray for your grace to do so. In Jesus name, Amen. Then.