God’s Law Is the Benchmark - Deuteronomy 6:6-9

   
 “And these words which I command you today shall be in your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.” - Deuteronomy 6:6-9

    One of the most confrontational issues of the 21st Century is the subject of morality. If you want to inflame any social gathering just bring up the subject of morality. Better yet, paraphrase Pontius Pilate when he asked Christ - “What is truth?” - John 18:38. Substitute the word “morality” for truth and you will likely be accused of setting the fields on fire. Yet it need not be this way.
    Using the most conventional language, leaving theology out of it, and entering the laboratory we would all have to agree that a base understanding of the sciences requires that we create and maintain a “set point of reference” for the purpose of measurement. This way, unlike modern math, every equation has one specific right answer. Regardless of which side of the aisle you stand on, this is hardly a contentious position. It is, in fact, the only logical and rational hill to die upon. And when defining a set point of reference we use words like standard, benchmark, model, guideline, yardstick, or norm. Yet when discussing such an ethereal concept as morality, all the conventional points of reference become skewed by the shrill, insistent, and arbitrary demand that there can be no one set standard for morality. “In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in his own eyes.” - Judges 21:25. After all, we are no longer talking science here. Well, so goes that argument.
    The problem with this assertion is that once we leave the security of the laboratory and switch the controls  from benchmark to arbitrary, we wind up with this hot mess we call “the world.” And every problem we are forced to deal with in this world, i.e., crime, hatred, war, deceit, greed, corruption, racism, sexism, poverty, et al, can be traced directly back to the inability to standardize human behavior because the devil’s minions uncompromisingly declare that “what is right for you isn’t necessarily right for me!” Why?  “Because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be.” - Romans 8:7.
    So mankind arbitrarily chooses to obey the standards that suit him at the moment while brazenly disobeying those he chooses to ignore. And the fundamental argument is that you cannot force me to follow your morals because I have my own code of morality that I prefer to follow. Can you imagine a world where there were no standards, guidelines, or norms for us to follow? You don’t have to imagine it; that is the world we live in and we have seen the results of such arbitrary compliance. “There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death.” - Proverbs 14:12.
    We have visited the laboratory and seen the human experiment in morality gone wrong. It is time to return to God’s creation and the benchmarks He has provided for us. Clearly, there must be a standard we are to follow if we are to live out our days as we are meant to and that standard doesn’t include erroneous delusions of carpe diem, seizing the moment, the Millennial’s cry “you only live once, or the Nike mantra, “Just do it!”  God’s law is the benchmark for all men to follow, not just some men. We ignore His law at our own peril. “But Peter and the other apostles answered and said: ‘We ought to obey God rather than men.’” - Acts 5:29.
    Now there are many who will say that we are not saved by the law; the implication being that there is no pressing need to follow the law. This view is held by the Antinomians who contend that “the law is dead” and therefore there is no need to adhere to moral, religious, or social norms. This long-held belief is pure and unadulterated heresy! For while we may not be saved by God’s law, we are certainly for the sake of ourselves and our fellow men to follow it and live by it. Christ Himself issued the proclamation - “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.” - Matthew 22:37-40.
    When it comes down to whose morals we practice it’s not a contest between yours and mine. There is only one set point of morality literally carved into stone for all men, and that benchmark is God’s law.