Our Psalm today begins, “Hear my teaching, O people; incline your  ears to the words of my mouth.”  Then in verse five, we read, “[God] gave his decrees to Jacob and established a law for Israel, which he commanded them to teach their children.”   This is a fitting Psalm to accompany the lessons from Deuteronomy and Matthew. 

            Moses spoke to the tribe of Israel on the shore of the Jordan River just before he departed them and Joshua took the people across the river into the Promised Land.  Perhaps more important than his instruction to the people to follow the “statues and ordinances I am now teaching you to observe,” is the conclusion of this passage:

Take care and watch yourselves closely, so as neither to forget the things that your eyes have seen nor to let them slip from your mind all the days of your life.

Moses is warning the people not to forget God and that the Promised Land is a gift from God.  He knows it is easier for the people to remember God when they have just enough to live on each day.  Once our stomachs are full, we have a nice home to keep us dry and warm, and we’re no longer worried about where our next meal will come from – it is easy to take everything and God for granted.  We forget that it is God who is the source of life.

            Moses also, like the Psalmist, tells the people to teach their children all that God has done for their people. With each succeeding generation it is more and more difficult to understand the experience of living through the depression – though it is much easier for many today than it was five years ago.  Also, it is more difficult for many who have grown up believing that science contains all truth, for them to conceive of a man who was crucified for his teachings, raised from the death, and is revealed to us today.  Moses and the Psalmist know the importance of remembering and teaching our children the tenants of our faith in a world that is full of temptations to forget God.

            In Matthew, Jesus dispels the idea that his teachings are contrary to those of his ancestors, to those of the prophets.  It is important for everyone to understand that the laws are not to be ignored for they were given to the people by God.  If we were to continue on in Matthew, we would hear Jesus expand on the law – saying we are to do more than merely follow the law.  The first example he uses is concerning the commandment, “Thou shall not murder.”  Even anger with another person, Jesus says shall be judged.  Therefore, he says, make peace with your neighbor before coming to the altar. 

            Here Jesus makes the point that we should not simply follow the laws for the sake of following the laws.  Rather, we should follow the laws because they were given to us by God to help us live in relation with God and our neighbors.  It is also to say that we should follow the laws in our hearts – for anger, lust, retaliation and other sins separate us from God. We are to, as the Psalm says, "incline our ears to the words of God." Which is to say we must listen to hear what God intends for us to do and how God intends for us to live. Let us pray.