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Understanding the Sixth Commandment

Let's come to Deuteronomy today. We are really going through a series within a series. The broader series is Deuteronomy. The series within this series is the Ten Commandments. So we have journeyed through the first five commandments. We come now to the shortest of the Ten Commandments, and it is simply four words, ‘You shall not murder.’ This is also probably the commandment which many would think is the easiest to obey, because you would say, “I've never killed anyone.” But even though that's what you think, and you may be tempted to switch off, because I've never killed anyone. I want to suggest to you this is maybe the commandment that most of us are guilty of right here, because there are different levels to understanding this commandment.

Give you an example. Think about singing. Some people sing on a world stage. Some people sing in concerts before crowds, before thousands and tens of thousands of people. But not everybody gets to sing like this. Some singer want to be but cannot be, will go to the karaoke to sing. You sing for your friends, you sing for your colleagues, you sing only to a very small group of people who are willing to bear with you. But some of us have some self understanding and awareness. We don't even dare to sing in the karaoke, we sing in a bathroom. So whether you sing at a concert or in a karaoke or in a bathroom, you all understand what it means to sing, and you do sing. At the same time, it's the same for a badminton player. (Pastor showing a picture of badminton player Lee Chong Wei executing a difficult shot).Very few people in the world will be able to execute a shot like this mean much less. I mean you can't even jump to this height. Some may be able to play better. You can do some difficult shots, but some may not even be able to do that. You can just hit the shuttle by and by. But even though not all of us can play like Lee Chong Wei, we can play a bit of badminton. You can say, “I play badminton.” So whether you are a singer or whether you are a badminton player, there are different levels of attainment. And so it is to the sixth commandment. There are different levels of breaking or obeying this commandment .

Levels of Murder: Level One

I'm going to share with you, today's sermon there is no alliteration, no ‘AAA’, ‘BBB’, ‘CCC’. But very simply, I want to share with you the three levels of this commandment. You shall not murder level one. What does it mean? Well, first of all, the Hebrew word ‘murder’, let me try to pronounce it in the Hebrew ‘ratsakh’. Ok, that's the word that is used. Is a word that refers to wrongful or unlawful killing. There are many words in a Hebrew language that is closely related to this, but they have different nuances. We can list at least five more in the Old Testament. In the Bible, there are Hebrew words that are related to killing, but slightly different. The first word is a word that is more general. It does not tell you whether it's right or wrong. It's just a general word for kill. The second word is used mostly for legal cases or judicial execution. The third word is used mostly for animal slaughter, sometimes used to describe the violent killing of people. The fourth word is a word used for rituals and sacrifices, and the fifth word is a general word that means to strike that sometimes may lead to death. I did not show you the Bible verses, but I just want to show you that there are different words for ‘kill’ in the Bible. And the word that we are looking at is the first one, ‘ratsakh’ which is wrongful or unlawful killing. Now this is not anything complicated, because even in our English language, we have different words for ‘kill’. You have the words ‘murder’, which is premeditated killing, and you have ‘manslaughter’, which is accidental killing. Then you have ‘kill’, a general word, like the first one, ‘harat’, neither good nor bad, it's just general word. Then you have ‘execute’, ‘judicial’, ‘sacrifice’ and ‘strike’. So we have all these words in English too. But in a Hebrew, we are clear that God is prohibiting wrongful or unlawful killing.

Exclusions and Inclusions in the Commandment

Now this means that there are some kinds of killing that are right and legitimate. What are they? Example number one would be capital punishment. The Sixth Commandment would not prohibit execution or capital punishment. We see, for example, in Exodus

Whoever strikes his father or his mother shall be put to death.(Exodus 21:15)

So in ancient times, in the days of Moses, if you abuse your father or mother, the elders will strike you, will stone you to death, and that is not wrong, that is legitimate. And this is not limited only to Old Testament Israel, it is also applicable in the New Testament times. So we see in Romans 13, ‘he’, that is the King, the authority.

…he does not bear the sword in vain…(Romans 13:4)

So the sword is used as a picture of execution, isn't it? So the governor or the king has power to exercise capital punishment because he is the servant of God, an Avenger who carries out God's wrath on the wrong doer. So we know that the sixth commandment does not prohibit execution. I let the cat out of the bag. I was going to ask you, what's the second exclusion? The second exclusion is self-defense. Nothing wrong with killing someone if someone is out to kill you. We know that in Exodus 22.

If a thief is found breaking in and is struck so that he dies. There shall be no blood guilt for him. (Exodus 22:2)

So someone comes to your house wants to rob you, kill you, and you somehow have a baseball bat and you whack his head and he dies. You're not guilty of breaking the sixth commandment. Self defense. And maybe the last exclusion, if I may add, from the Bible, is that of some cases of war, not all cases of war, but some cases of war. For example, God would command Israel to wage war against the Canaanites. That would not be wrongful. Or if another country or people invade your land and you're acting in self-defense, I don't think that would be wrong. So there are some just causes for killing in war, but not all wars are, of course, justifiable. So these are things that you should exclude.

But what are the things that you would include? Certainly, this commandment would include premeditated murder. Again, Exodus 21 is helpful, or rather, just remember Abel and Cain and how Cain killed his brother, Abel. And God said later on in 1 John that Cain was a murderer. We read in Exodus chapter 21 that says,

But if a man willfully attacks another to kill him by cunning, you shall take him from my altar (He is not to worship) that he may die. (Exodus 21:14)

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Take him from wherever he is to kill him, execute him, because this is wrong. So premeditated murder is included. What else is included? You think. This may surprise you. You don't know means you may do it, you know. So we know capital punishment is not part of it. Self defense is not part of this. Just war is not part of this. It includes premeditated murder and one more thing. This is a surprise. You thought you should not be guilty of this, but you are, it is and that is accidental or negligent killing. This is called manslaughter in modern legal terms. I know this because Numbers 35 tells us that there are cities of refuge designed for Israelites. Cities of refuge are cities distributed throughout Israel where someone who has accidentally kills another can find refuge. If it's far outside these cities, the Avengers, not, not, not the Iron Man and all this, but those who want to take revenge for those the person who is killed may come and take revenge and kill you. But if you are in a city of refuge because you accidentally killed someone, you may be saved there. Now again, the city of refuge is given to manslaughter, but it is no refuge for those who committed intentional murder. Now the word ‘ratsakh’ is found here in ‘manslay’ is an exact same Hebrew word, but he's called a ‘ratsakh’ even though he killed someone without intent. So the sixth commandment does include accidental killing as well.
So if I were to summarize all these things together, ‘Thou shalt not, or you shall not, murder or kill’ refers to wrongful or unlawful killing. It includes murder and manslaughter, but it does not include capital punishment, self defense or some kinds of war. And the severity, I think, is because God said earlier in Genesis 9.

Whoever sheds the blood of man by man, shall his blood be shed; for God made man in His own image. (Genesis 9:6)

You actually can kill animals. Okay, of course, in Singapore, you better don't anyhow say these kind of things because of SPCA. You don't want to be, you don't want to be cruel to animals. But biblically, animals can be killed, animals can be eaten, but you don't do this to man. Why? Because man is made in God's image so cannibalism is clearly out. So the sixth commandment is important, because you are dealing with God's image bearer.

Now let me show you a picture. What is this? This is Gordon Ramsay's favorite or iconic dish, right? It's the beef wellington. And if you look at the beef wellington, it is made of this wonderful golden crust on the outside, and then there's this dark brown mushroom dark cell lining. It gives that dish that extra kick of umami. Well, there was this lady. She decided to cook or to prepare beef wellington for her in laws, and she used a very special kind of mushroom called the death cap mushroom. The name already tells you something bad. Death cap mushroom. It is poisonous, and she deliberately used it to kill her in-laws and she is charged with murder. You can kill someone by cunning in many ways, including a delicious beef wellington. But you may also kill someone in a very direct and brutal way, like what we have seen in this week, the assassination of Charlie Kirk. But it's not just murder, it's also manslaughter.

How do you commit manslaughter in our day and age? Perhaps you are working in the medical field. Malpractice, negligence, that can be considered manslaughter. Maybe you say, I'm not a doctor, I'm not a nurse, I'm not a pharmacist. Well, how else can you commit manslaughter when you are employer? Employer perhaps of a helper, and you tell her to go outside and clean the windows, and she falls off from the top of the condo and she dies. That can be a kind of negligent killing. Or maybe you drink and drive and you put the lives of pedestrians at risk, or maybe in a recent report of someone who crashed and split his car killing his two passengers. You did not intend to kill, but you did kill. You were negligent. You were careless. You did not show regard for life that I think is included in the sixth commandment. And with this, it throws up a whole list of ethical dilemmas, about abortion, about suicide, about euthanasia. I wish I have more time to talk about these things, but I don't. But I have communicated at length with our CG leaders. We meet every Tuesday night to discuss the sermon that has been preached and the sermon that is going to be preached, and we talked about these matters. And I hope you can, if you are interested, discuss, dialog, have a conversation with a CG. Else this weekend, if you like, we meet, and we hope that they will be able to serve you well in these questions too.

Levels of Murder: Level Two

But I want to bring you back. We are only dealing with murder at level one. I said there are three levels. Let's go to level two. Those of you who have been in church for some time already know what I'm going to say for level two. You kind of guess where it's coming from. It's coming from the description or the explanation given by the Lord Jesus Christ Himself in the Sermon on the Mount. Because Jesus said in Matthew chapter five.

You have heard that it was said to those of old, You shall not murder…(Matthew 5:21)

So Jesus is here referring to your understanding. Your understanding in the past is only level one. The Jewish teachers have only taught the sixth commandment based on level one. Let me now tell you, I say to you level two. So get ready for level two, alright? Jesus's take on level two of ‘You shall not murder’ is encapsulated in these words.

Everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment. Whoever insults his brother will be liable to the council, and whoever says, , “You fool!” will be liable to the hell of fire. (Matthew 5:22)

Now it looks complicated, but really it's not. Level two can be divided into level 2a, 2b 2c. 2a, 2b, 2c. 2a is you're angry. 2b is when you insult. 2c is when you call him, “You fool!” And you know that they are 2a, b, c, because there are three different levels of punishment - judgment, counsel, hell of fire. Now, if I were to just bring it out a little bit, you can see that there are clearly three levels. When you're angry with someone, bitter against someone ‘buay song’, you know, we say in Singapore terms, you are not happy with someone, you are liable to the judgment. The judgment here refers to the local court. But if it escalates, this bitterness, this unhappiness is stewing, is boiling over and it explodes, then you insult your brother. Now the word insult there is actually in the original language, Aramaic, call your brother ‘Raca’, not Rachel. What is ‘Raca’? Well, it's an untranslatable word. Today. We don't have an exact equivalent, but it would be closest to the word ‘idiot’ or ‘numskull’ or ‘gundu’, whichever you like. So you are so upset with the person who say, “You idiot, you gundu.” then your punishment is more severe. You will be liable to the council. The council here is called the Sanhedrin. It's made up of 70 elders of Jerusalem. They are like the Supreme Court of their time. So now your crime has escalated. It's intensified. You call him ‘Raca’, but maybe after you call ‘Raca’ still not relieved, so you go on to the next level, where you call him, “You fool!” Now this ‘fool’ word is not primarily intellectual. It's more moral, like Psalm 14, verse one, where the psalmist says,

The fool hath said in his heart, there is no God...(Psalm 14:1)

So when you call someone, “You fool!” You are saying that you are a godless man. You are saying to him, “I wish you hell, because you don't believe God, you are going to hell.” So there is an escalation of that insult, and now you will be liable to the hell of fire. Now, in case we immediately think about eternal lake of fire, it may not be literally that, because the word ‘hell’ is the word ‘Gehenna’. ‘Gehenna’ is the actual place in Israel, southwest of Jerusalem. It's like the great incineration dump in Singapore. We also have an incineration dump in the island, right? So this is like the ‘Gehenna’, where all the dirty things, unwanted things, will be burned, and it's burning the whole day 24/7 because a lot of things to burn. It's fire, it's smelly, it's dirty, and there is this kind of worm that is very resilient and grows there. It does not die. So when the Bible talks about hell, actually, God is speaking about an eternal place of torment and is very much pictured, like as in the incineration dump of ‘Gehenna’. Then that's why in the Bible you say there is a lake of fire, there is the worm which dies not. It is taken from Gehenna. But I think you can see the intensification of judgment. And so we see that murder level two is not with your hands or with your mushroom. Murder number two is in your heart, and it will spill over in your mouths. That's why Jesus would say

for out of the heart come evil thoughts and murder…(Matthew 15:19)

Murder begins in the heart, and that's why our words kill. Our mouth is full of curses and bitterness. It's not just that we scold you or we scold him, but we also kill people with gossiping and slander behind their backs. We have done a lot of assassination with our mouths, as the Chinese would say, ‘ren yan ke wei’, which means the speech of man is something to be feared because we kill with our lips, and that is murder at level two. So you can say this is 2a, 2b 2c. But you know, when you go for PSLE, MCQ not ‘ABC’ one, must have ‘ABCD’. So let me introduce to you murder 2d. What is murder level 2d? You have to look at me like…the face won't tell you, it must be in the Bible one. What is 2d? Anyone has any clue? 2d is also given by Jesus, and it's the same text in verse 23 and in verse 24.

Jesus went on to say,

So, if you are offering your gift at the altar, and there you remember that your brother has something against you, (Matthew 5:23)

So the picture is this. You offended someone. You offended Ah Beng, but you didn't want to settle Ah Beng, you brought up him. You came to church this morning, and you want to worship God. Hallelujah, worship God. Well, God says, Jesus says, “If you come to worship and you remember that you have offended Ah Beng, he has something against you, then

leave your gift there before the altar and go…
(Matthew 5:24)

Don't offer yet. Don't worship yet. First important thing, priority

…first, be reconciled to your brother… (Matthew 5:24)

Ah Beng,

…and then you come back and offer your gift. (Matthew 5:24)

In other words, this level 2d is saying you honor God by keeping the sixth commandment in ensuring not only you are not to be angry with anyone, but others are not angry because of your wrong. That's level 2d. 2a, b, c is about me, but actually, to keep the spirit of the sixth commandment, is not just about me, but also about others, because I don't want others to sin against God as well. And isn't this a very common scenario, you come to church together with your husband or wife or your kids, and you're screaming at one another in a car. Fight, quarrel, raise your voice, but then when you open the door in a car park here at Gospellight, “Hello, John. How are you?” Yeah, you're such an angel, but before that, they are killing each other. Well, the Bible is saying that actually, you should stay in a car and settle first. Or if you are here, then you actually… some of you can go. I'm sure no one is going to leave the church now or service now, but the idea is you should go and settle first, then you come and worship, and it's such a common scenario, isn't it? A biblical author and pastor humorously quipped, “As far as I know, this is the only time God tells you to slip out of church early. Apparently, he'd rather have you give your olive branch than your tithe.” So you shall not murder level one is with your hands, with your mushrooms. Level two is with your heart and so it is saying, do not have wrongful killing in your heart that may be expressed in your lips and also in other people's hearts. That's level two.

Levels of Murder: Level Three

Finally, let's come to level three. What is level three? What would it be? You know, in Chinese, we have this pugilistic novel, ‘she diao ying xiong zuan’ and then you learn the martial arts, the ultimate kung fu. Then, at least for some time, is the ‘xiang long shi ba zhang’. I don't have 18 levels of anger, 18 levels of murder, just three. So what is the ultimate? What is level three? And if you can do level three, you think your highest peak already, you have arrived. What is level three of keeping this command ‘You shall not murder’? Any one of you read the ‘wu lin mi ji’, the ‘xiang long tao mi ji’, the manual for this ultimate level? It's actually paradoxically simple. Level three is to love, to sacrifice and to do good. The sixth commandment, the ultimate fulfilling of it, is not just don't do this, don't do that, but it's actually to do this, to lay down your life, to sacrifice, to do good.

You see, the Ten Commandments are summarized into two tables of the law, or written on two tables of the law and subsequently summarized by Jesus to be loving God and loving your neighbor. And in the sixth commandment, we see ‘You shall not kill’, it clearly belongs to loving your neighbor. So God is saying, Thou shall not kill, is to be understood in the context of loving your neighbor. Don't kill, don't hate, but love, and that's why Jesus would say later on, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you instead of exacting revenge on them. Love them. Lay down your life for them. They want your life. You pray for their life. There is no good thing that will come out of a cycle of revenge, even the Chinese. I'm sorry I'm spewing a lot of Chinese, but we say in Chinese ‘yuan yuan xiang bao he shi liao’, right? You keep having revenge, when will it ever end? And just as Gandhi would say, “An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.” He's not a Christian, but this does make sense. Martin Luther King would say, “Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that.” And so when Jesus explains the second commandment, he talks about a story of a man, the Samaritan, who is an enemy of the Jew, who would sacrifice to take care of an injured Jew, and he deliberately talks about two other men who saw the injured Jew but did nothing about it. One is a priest, one is a Levite. They boot up, and when they boot up, meaning they did not bother with the injured man.

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They did not fulfill the law. They did not love the neighbor, but the Good Samaritan, even though he was that enemy, fulfilled the law because he loved, he sacrificed for his enemy. So we understand that the sixth commandment is not just, don't do this, don't do that, but actively seek to do good to love, and that is level three. Many of you will be familiar with the story of Jim Elliot. He is a young missionary who went to the Auca tribe in South America with his wife to share the good news of Jesus Christ. But the tragic thing is that when he got there, he was speared to death by the cannibals. His wife is Elizabeth Elliot. She escaped from the place. She bore children, daughter, and they came back instead of bearing animosity or hatred towards the Auca people, they actually came back and shared the gospel with them. Quite a few got saved, and subsequently, the tribe changed their name from Auca, which means Savage, to Waorani, the Waorani tribe, which means the people of truth. An eye for an eye will only make the world go blind. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do so. You shall not kill. It's not just avoidance. It's doing good. It's sacrifice, because that's what the law is all about. If you think, “Oh, Jason, your explanation today, too complicated. What level one, two, A, B, C, D and three?” I'm saying to you, actually is not difficult, because just think of yourself as a parent to your children. When you love your kids, I guarantee you will not kill them. Sometimes you may feel like, but you won't kill them. Number two, you wouldn't want to hate them, and you wouldn't want to insult them for no reason. And number three, you will clearly be willing to sacrifice, lay down your life for them. This is not a difficult command, and this command really reveals to you what God is like. Our God is a God who loves people and values life.

The Role of the Law and Salvation

But let us be cautioned, because I think there's a danger for you to “Oh, now I know what's the sixth commandment. I'm going to keep the six commandments so that God will now save me.” “Ah, I know why. I'm in church this morning. I'm in church so that God can tell me I should not hate someone, and if I don't hate someone, God will let me into heaven.” No, no. No, no, no, no, that is not what the law is given for. The law is not given as a means for you to be saved, but the law is given to show you your sinfulness and your hopelessness. The Law, the Ten Commandments, are not an invitation for you to try harder, but the law is a condemnation to you, so that you know you cannot make it at all. It is to expose us, to lay us bare in our soul, to show us our guilt, to show us we are sinners. The law is given so that we will have no excuse, so that we can say together with God.

…there is none righteous, no, not one. For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. (Romans 3:22-23)

Because this morning you may have begun the day saying, “This is the easiest commandment, because I've never killed anyone.” True, you have not cooked beef wellington, you have not stabbed someone but have you assassinated with your words? Have you abused? Have you hated in your heart? Have you really done good to those around you who need your help? None of us can walk out of this place saying, “I have kept all the law.” So the law is given to humble us. But the good news of the Bible, the good news of the Bible, is that the Bible does not end with Exodus 20 or Deuteronomy 5 in the Ten Commandments. The Bible goes on to tell us about Jesus, about another mountain. The law was given at Mount Sinai. It was fearful, it was awesome, so that we may be struck with the enormity of our sin. But the Bible goes on to another mount where Jesus would be crucified, the law shows us what God demanded and what we do not have. But Calvary, where Jesus died, is where God shows ‘I'm going to provide for you. I'm going to provide a righteousness you cannot earn by yourself, but you need to go to the law. You need to go to Mount Sinai to know that you cannot make it.’ Then I tell you, that's how Jesus will make it for you. On the cross, Jesus was not there for his own sin. He had none. He was there for your sin. Remember in the Sermon on the Mount. How he said,

Do not think that I've come to abolish the law of the prophets. I've not come to abolish them, but to fulfill them. (Matthew 5:17)

And Jesus fulfilled the law. He never sinned. This is the amazing thing. He was not born of a union between man and a woman. He's born of the Holy Spirit. He's the supernatural gift of God. He's God, the very God born as man, and he lived a sinless, perfect life. He never broke the law, unlike all of us. And then he went to the cross, not for his sins he had none, but for your sins and my sins. And on the cross, even though he was unfairly treated, brutalized, tortured, he would cry out,

Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.(Luke 23:34)

He was not filled with hatred right up to the point of death. Jesus was murdered by murderers. Why? So that he can save murderers like you and me, so that Paul, who blaspheme and persecuted the church may be saved, so that the thief on the cross may be saved, so that I, who am a murderer deep in my heart, may be saved. God gave His Son to save sinners. He did not come to save good people. There is none. He came to save sinners. I'm telling you, the Ten Commandments do not save, but Jesus saves. The Ten Commandments are the X-ray machine to show you, to show me my sins, but I go to the doctor, the surgeon, Jesus. If the law could save, Jesus wouldn't need to come to die, but he's the only one who saves, and I beg you, urge you to repent and believe in Him.

Christian Living and Community

I want to close, however, with one more thought, and this is for Christians only. If you're not a Christian, this is not for you. The law is given to show us our sins so that we may turn to Jesus to be saved. But after we have turned to Jesus to be saved, we now want and should keep the law, because you can. Finally in your life, you can. Why? Because Christ lives in you. Now you are no more a slave to sin. You are joined with Jesus. It is death, and you are joined with Jesus in the resurrection. So now you have a new identity. You're no more a slave to sin like in the past where you have no choice but to sin. Now you have a choice. You can choose to obey God. You can choose to yield your body parts as members of righteousness unto God. Not only that, the Bible tells us,

If you are in Christ, you are a new creation...(2 Corinthians 5:17)

God gives you a new heart. In the past, you can hate for all you want and you don't care. But now you know you do not want to hate because you want to honor God. You want to live righteously. God has given you a real and new passion in your soul. And also, thirdly, God's spirit now lives in you. The Holy Spirit of Christ lives in you, and He gives you the power to finally obey. So I say to you, according to the teachings of the Bible, a Christian is not marked by someone who just comes for church service and goes home. A Christian is marked by this characteristic of love.

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Conclusion and Call to Action

It really is. How do you know you're a Christian? Do you love? Do you love God in obeying Him? And do you love others? Yes, the great proof of the disciple of Jesus is love.

By this shall all men know you are my disciples, if you have loved one for another. (John 13:35)

1 John tells us we know that a man who hates is a murderer, and we know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him. So if you are someone today who hates, who is bitter against another, and you will not let go, you really have to ask yourself, “Am I really born again because the great proof of a Christian is love?” One of the sad things I see in church is when people have tiffs and fights, and we do have, it's inevitable that if you actually, this is the thing. If you are just a church ninja who wants to come in and come out, you will have no fights unless maybe you are queuing for a car park or getting up the lift. But when you really want to obey God in living out gospel community, living closer to people, you start to see people are like porcupines, and they are what do you call it, the quills poke you, irritate you. And if you are someone who quits at the first book, this person say this about me, I don’t  want to come church already, then you will never have the opportunity to live out love. I see actually in our church, people who get into quarrels fights and they leave. That's a modus operandi from church to church to church. They just leave. Because whenever there is difficulty, they quit. I'm saying to you, I'm not saying this to keep our membership big, but I'm saying this to you according to the Bible. You don't quit. You don't give up on community, you don't give up on how God has placed you in a local body of believers. Have you ever read Apostle Paul writing to the people at Ephesus, if you have something wrong with another brother, go to Philippi, go to Galatia, go to Colossae, go somewhere else, just don't go to the church at Ephesus? Has he ever said that? No, he says, “Work out your differences. Esteem one another more important than yourselves. Live peaceably as best as you can.”

That is the Christian ethos. We bear with one another. We forgive one another, forgive one another, be tender hearted towards one another. Why? Because God, for Christ's sake, has forgiven you. I think this is what church is to be. It's not just a room where we gather to hear sermons and seminars and Bible teaching. That's important, but it's also where we live out communities of love, and that is what keeping the sixth commandment should look like. We love because he first loved us. May we love one another. May we commit to gospel community and honor God. Keep the sixth commandment and show Himself glorious because He is worthy.

Let's bow for a word of prayer together, Father, thank you again for your word, and we pray that as we contemplate about your love for us, we would be faithful to love the people around us. I pray that we will be a church where people would esteem one another more important. We will be a church where we do not slander or back bite. We would be a church where we forgive one another. We will be a church that restores one another, that loves and serves one another, so that Punggol, Singapore, the world, will know we are your disciples. Thank you. We can draw from the love of God in the Gospel. Help us to love because we understand how much you first loved us. Thank you. We pray all this in Jesus name, Amen.