Complete Compensation - Exodus 21:18-27

Well, good morning, everyone, and welcome to Faith Bible Church. Woke up to a little bit of rain this morning. Sort of felt like, for those that have lived in the Midwest, it sort of felt like the Midwest.

You're in the summertime and then there's rain and clouds and then it gets muggy. So I'm thankful I live in California. Announcements, it's in your bulletin. Summer Bible study has begun on Friday evenings, late afternoon at 530 in the Fellowship Hall and everyone is welcome.

Women's Bible study is next Saturday, June 18th at 10 o 'clock in the morning. And men's Bible study every Saturday at 330 in the Fellowship as well. Except for the...

Yes.

Thank you. I've got my commentary in the front row, my fact checker. You know, we need those fact checkers. It's okay, because the camera can't see her, it's Kim Terrell, so you need a good fact checker.

She's available. Oh, my. It's wonderful that we can gather together as a church and enjoy each other's company and gather around the Word to pray, to sing, to hear the message and we do that every week because we're forgetful people.

But it also encourages us every week to keep going, to stay the course. And that's a challenge sometimes, but we have something to hold on to, the world doesn't. But we need to share that with those around us as we do go about our business during the week is to remember there's a lost world and they need the gospel and we're God's ambassadors to do that.

Worship, Praise, and Prayer

And preparation as we think about worship and what that means, we're always talking.

About praise.

Praise and worship.

Praise.

And that's what we do to the Lord because he's worthy of our praise. Psalm 135 says, praise the Lord, praise the name of the Lord, praise him, O you servants of the Lord, you who stand in the house of the Lord, in the courts of the house of our God.

Praise the Lord for the Lord is good. Sing praises to his name for it is pleasant. For the Lord has chosen Jacob for himself, Israel for his special treasure. And I like it that he says, God, the Lord is good and for it is pleasant.

Isn't it pleasant when we're worshiping? You know, there's just something about it that is God given. It's not from something we fabricate, but it's something that comes from the Lord. So let's go to the Lord in prayer.

Please join me. Lord God, we do come before you now to give you praise in all things, Father, because you have shown yourself worthy in your word. Thank you that we have your word to hold on to, to learn from, to grow, and to understand more fully about your universe, Father.

God, we are blessed to have experienced and to know the love of your son, Jesus Christ, who died for us. God, we pray for those that are traveling this weekend. There's many away and there's some illness around.

Lord, we pray for comfort, for healing, for safety. God, we pray that all of your saints would be remembering you today, Lord, remember you every day for that matter, Lord, that we can worship you and give you praise, Father, that as we reflect on things in our lives, Lord, we ask that you would, we would always put that forward around your word, that it would be, that would be our standard, that that would be our guide and our compass.

So God bless us this morning. May we honor you with all that we do, Father, and we thank you. We give this all praise to you, Father, in Jesus' name. Amen.

Henceforth, there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day, and not to me only, but to them also that love his appearing. And let's stand and sing.

Verses 16 through 21. Well, henceforth, though we no man of the flesh, yea, though we have known Christ of the flesh, yet not now. Henceforth, know we him no more. Therefore, there is a man being Christ, his new creature.

Though things are passed away, behold, all things are become new. Now think of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given us, have given to us the ministry of reconciliation, to wit, that God was Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them, and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation.

Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us. We pray that you, in Christ's stead, be reconciled to God, for he hath made him be sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made to know the righteousness of God in him.

May the Lord allow us to read his word.

Let my mouth be filled with the praise and honor of the Lord all throughout the day and at the time to worship through the word, with our pastor Iljin Cho, and the children are now dismissed of Children's Church.

Exposition of Exodus 21:18-27

Please turn with me to Exodus chapter 21, verses 18 through 27. If men contend with each other, and one strikes the other with a stone or with his fist, and he does not die, but is confined to his bed, if he rises again and walks about outside with his staff, then he who struck him shall be acquitted.

He shall only pay for the loss of his time, and shall provide for him to be thoroughly healed. And if a man beats his male or female servant with a rod, so that he dies under his hand, he shall surely be punished.

Notwithstanding, if he remains alive a day or two, he shall not be punished, for he is his property. If men fight and hurt a woman with a child, so that she gives birth prematurely, yet no harm follows, he shall surely be punished accordingly as the woman's husband imposes on him, and he shall pay as the judges determine.

But if any harm follows, then you shall give life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe. If a man strikes the eye of his male or female servant and destroys it, he shall let him go free for the sake of his eye.

And if he knocks out the tooth of his male or female servant, he shall let him go free for the sake of his tooth. This is the word of the Lord. Let us pray. Father, we are so thankful that your word is so clear, and your word teaches us what kind of God we serve, and your word teaches us how we ought to act righteously with each.

Other.

Father, we pray that your Spirit would help us understand what you have to say to us this morning. In Jesus' name, amen. Last week, we talked about what God's people must do when there is an intentional murder and also unintentional murder.

This week, we will talk about what justice requires when there is harm done. Now, I bring up this word justice knowing that so many people use justice in however way they want. Unfortunately, justice gets misused to mean whatever I feel is right, whatever I want to happen.

Sometimes that could be right, but oftentimes that is wrong. Because in the end, justice does not start from who we are as individual, but what God expects of us. And the earlier we know that justice comes from God and who God is, the better off we are.

When I first started seminary a few years ago, my seminary, which was becoming more and more liberal, was going through chapel message on social justice. And one of the messages talked about how white people need to repent of the guilt of their ancestors, American slavery.

And that struck me because I've never heard that concept before until seminary. And I was deeply troubled because it didn't make sense because why would people who did not commit sin need to repent of sin that they didn't commit?

It had a whole huge implication of salvation. Well, as I was troubled, I went to one of my Old Testament professors and I asked him, well, is that right that we need to repent of the sins of our ancestors?

And he said, I have my own sin to worry about. Where does it stop? Why stop at the 18th century? Right. And that that was really clear. And I asked him, OK, then how do you define justice? What is justice?

Right. People use it for anything and they use it to manipulate other people to do things they want. That's not just that's not justice. Right. You have to pay more. That's not justice. Well, what is justice?

He said justice is the right relationship with God. And right relationship with each other. Really simple. But so profound, that's what justice is. Justice cannot be obtained without the right relationship with God.

Justice cannot be obtained when there's no right relationship with each other. It's both. This morning, we take a look at one glimpse of what justice looks like when there is intentional injury done to one another.

So the main point of today's text is that justice requires complete compensation for any offense. Justice requires complete compensation for any offense. The first point is that justice requires proper compensation for intentional injuries to the victim.

Justice requires proper compensation for intentional injuries to the victim. Verse 18 starts with a unique scenario. If men contend with each other and one strikes the other with a stone or with his fist and he does not die but is confined to his bed.

Right. This scenario is when the argument goes wrong, they're contending, they're verbally fighting, right? They're arguing, but it escalates. And unlike the previous case laws, it does not deal with homicide, the victim does not end up dead.

Here, a person is injured by an intentional violent act of another. Right. When a fist, when a punch is thrown, that is an intentional act, right? It's not a reflex. The brain tells the hand to move. It's an intentional act to hurt someone.

Now, verse 19 tells us what must be done when there is an intentional injury. If he rises again, that's the victim, and walks about outside with his staff, then he who struck him shall be acquitted. He shall only pay for the loss of his time and shall provide for him to be thoroughly healed.

The offender here must completely compensate for the victim's loss. Not only the full medical treatment that would require for the injury to completely heal, but also the time that the victim did not get to work needs to be compensated.

Right. And this is because the law of God did not only care for the life of the victim highly, but also his livelihood. Right. The law required the victim to be provided for. Even when he is injured by the offender who caused the injury.

The goal of the law was more than just a financial penalty to tell the offender, don't do it again, but to compensate for the injured so that he may be restored. It is other centered compared to the law system we have where there might be financial compensation or there might be imprisonment.

But sometimes the victim doesn't get fully compensated for the injury that's caused. It might be just the punishment of the offender, which is right. But sometimes the victim doesn't get the full recovery that he or she needs.

But the law made sure that there's both. Right. There is penalty on the person who offended. But that penalty serves to restore the person who is injured. Now, the next two verses apply this case law to the most vulnerable of God's people, the servants, the slaves.

Verse 20. And if a man beats his male or female servant with a rod so that he dies under his hand, he shall surely be punished. In ancient Near East, slaves were beaten physically as a physical discipline.

However, unlike the surrounding nations. Israel restricted how severely a slave can be beaten. This law shows that if a slave is beaten to death, the master will be put to death. And this concept is found nowhere else in ancient Near Eastern laws.

After all, in those regions and countries and nations, slaves were treated as tools. When a tool breaks, you can't use it anymore. You just get a new one. Not so among God's people. Only in God's law do we see the invaluable worth of human life despite their low social status.

Their low social status does not define their worth. Their low social status does not define who they are. And if the master beats his slave to death, the master was put to death. It was not enough that the master would lose financially.

But he had to lose his life because he failed to honor the life of his own slave. God viewed a slave's life as equal in importance and worth as the slave's master's life. That is shocking. And the surrounding nations would have seen a glimpse of this about God's people and God when they heard this law and seen the law enforced.

Wow. These people honor the lives of the lowest. Their God protects the most vulnerable among them. What kind of God must he be? Now, what happens if the slave does not die immediately but dies later?

Verse 21. Notwithstanding, if he remains alive a day or two, he shall not be punished, for he is his property. Verse 21 makes sure that there is an intentional causal link between the physical punishment by the master and then the death of his servant.

This is important because the servant, the slave, could have died for any number of reasons that are totally different from the physical discipline he received a day or two ago. After all, in ancient Israel, diseases or work accidents could just as well take someone's life.

In such a case where you could not make a causal link or prove malice a forethought, right? Oh, you beat him to death because you wanted him dead, right? You can easily prove that if someone is beaten to death.

The master would not be put to death. Here, the law protects the master from losing his life without evidence. Justice requires evidence of evil intention and evidence of cause. Justice revolves around the truth of the matter because justice comes from God who operates only on what is true.

And this is relevant today because our society screams out compensation before ever hearing the case. So many news media report a tragic violence before having a complete picture. This gets the public all riled up.

But when all the facts come in, the picture looks totally different than how it was first portrayed.

Right?

Oh, he had his hands up. No, he didn't. Oh, he was running away. No, he was charging. Oh, he didn't have a gun. No, actually, he did. Oh, one example of that is Nick Sandman from Covington Catholic High School from a few years ago.

From one snippet of the video, he is standing tall in front of a Native American and he's a tall guy compared to the Native American who's drumming. The mainstream media and celebrities portrayed him as all sorts of things.

They accused him of aggression, white supremacy and racism, and some even threatened the high school kids with physical violence and some even death publicly. How traumatic that could have been to a high school student when the whole nation's against you.

And what happened when the facts came out? When the full video clip became public, it was clear that Nick was innocent of all of these charges. There was no hatred. There was no racism. There was no aggression.

He was peacefully remaining calm and smiling. As the Native American activists confronted the group of high school students, this is because our culture has lost the value of assessing all the evidence before charging anyone with injury.

We have lost the biblical worldview of justice, how to handle justly. And we want compensation according to our standard, according to our time and according to our judgment. Not so under God. Compensation is based upon truth of the matter and proper to each scenario.

Although most of us will not be in any judicial position to carry out judgment. We all have a choice to keep ourselves quiet until all the facts come out. We all have the duty to keep our keyboards cool until the facts come out.

A wise course of action, of course, is not to bring it up unless you are directly involved. Don't get into the mess. And this also has a theological dimension, just as God does not hold anyone culpable for injury that they didn't cause.

Because God does not hold you culpable for sin that you did not commit. In our culture, there is a lot of toxic shame for being who you are. It might be based upon skin color. It might be based upon socioeconomic status.

Right.

They say you're oh, you're guilty. You need to do this. You're guilty of this. You need to confess this. According to this text, if there's no evidence of that guilt, God doesn't hold you culpable. If God doesn't hold you culpable, then you don't have to hold yourself culpable.

You yourself are not guilty no matter how loudly the world screams at you. God cannot forgive sin that wasn't committed. It's an oxymoron. Sin cannot be forgiven that is not committed. You can't confess sin that you didn't commit.

And that goes back to the introductory story. For white people, that means you can't repent of sin, of slavery, because you didn't have.

Slaves.

But you ought to if you do have slaves.

Right.

It's based upon truth, not feelings. Second, justice requires an appropriate penalty for the offense done to another. Justice requires an appropriate penalty for the offense done to another. Verse 22 gives us another scenario.

If men fight and hurt a woman with child so that she gives birth prematurely, yet no harm follows, he shall surely be punished accordingly as the woman's husband imposes on him, and he shall pay as the judges determine.

Now, this verse is a loaded verse. This verse is wrongly used to push for the wicked abortion agenda. The situation here shows the two men physically fighting and there are unintended victims, a pregnant woman and her baby.

Now, the mother is harmed by one of the men, and this causes the baby to come out prematurely. The abortion activists assume that the baby dies and only the fine is imposed on the man who caused the violent act and the fine is imposed.

The fine is determined by whatever the husband finds sufficient. And then the judges agree upon that. Therefore, they would argue that the baby inside the womb is less than a born human.

Right.

Naturally born human outside the womb because only a fine is imposed. There are many problems with this argument. First, for the argument's sake, let's take their interpretation. It's sometimes it's a it's a good strategy to take their interpretation to show where it's going and show that it's utterly false.

So let's take their interpretation and say that the baby died, even though the text doesn't say.

It.

First, 22. We cannot directly apply abortion to this case because here the baby was killed unintentionally. Unlike this scenario, abortion is an intentional act of murder of a baby inside the womb. It is planned out beforehand.

And it's done in a gruesome manner. This is not the case here. The man who harms the pregnant woman did not mean to hurt her. He was fighting her husband. Maybe she got in the way, but the baby was not the intended victim here.

In abortion, every case the baby is the intended victim. Second, the law of God would not have executed this man for unintentional homicide. Well, verses 12 through 14 from last week make it clear because they actually make a distinction between unintentional and intentional homicide.

The unintentional homicide does not lead to execution of the person who committed homicide. But the intentional one does. Since the man did not intend to kill the baby in the womb, he cannot face capital punishment, right?

Moreover, we would not argue a person who died from accident is less in worth just because death penalty is not carried out. Therefore, the fact that the man is not executed is actually in accordance to the law of God.

The absence of death penalty does not say anything about the worth of the human baby in the womb. Third, if we still assume the baby died in verse 22, the fact that God's law fines the man who caused the death shows that God views the loss of baby's life as evil.

It's not good. If the baby's life is not a life, as many abortionists would argue, why would God require a fine? Even if we take their wrong interpretation, the text still shows the baby's life as worthy and valuable.

Now, let's take a look at the text correctly. The most wooden translation, most direct translation of the Hebrew text here is, if men struggle and hit a pregnant woman and her children come out, very simple, if men struggle, hit a pregnant woman and her children come out.

And the following arguments come from doctors John and Paul Feinberg, their book on ethics, Ethics for a Brave New World, A Great Buy, Worth Its Weight in Gold, Thick. And it goes over all sorts of scenarios of ethical problems you'll face today.

Euthanasia, homosexuality, abortion, capital punishment, so many. This is what he says. First, there is no word for miscarriage here. In order to read miscarriage, you have to read it from your own cultural lens.

You have to bring it to the text. The text doesn't bring it to you. Second, the word used in verse 22 is children rather than fetus. The word for fetus, who lacks recognizable human form, right? Undeveloped, underdeveloped human being, is actually found only once in the whole Old Testament and that's Psalm 139, 16.

NASB, a wooden Bible translation, renders it formless substance. It's a different word than children, right? Third, there is a different word for a stillborn child, yet it is not used here. Job 3, 16 actually uses it when Job is lamenting, right, grieving.

Or why was I not as a hidden stillborn child? The word for stillborn child sounds nothing like the word for children. Very different sounding words. You can't even mistake it. Fourth, the verb to come out in verse 22 is often used for ordinary normal births in the Bible.

Genesis 25, 26. Afterward, his brother came out with his hand holding Esau's heel, so his name was called Jacob. Isaac was 60 years old when she bore them. Last time I checked, Rebecca did not miscarry Jacob.

That would throw a wrench in the whole nation of Israel. Therefore, the most correct interpretation of that verse is that there's a physical fight which causes a pregnant woman to give birth to a living children or a child prematurely, so earlier than expected.

But the text tells us that there was no harm. When it says there's no harm, we must assume, since the baby is alive, we can't assume the baby's dead here, it's there was no harm to the mother and the baby.

After all, the child came out. It was a healthy birth. Now, the question is, why is the fine imposed? Well, the fine is imposed because just like any premature birth, it's still dangerous for the baby to come out earlier than expected, even if there's no physical harm.

The parents have to pay extra attention to the baby who is born premature. I mean, that's why our hospitals have a whole department for that called NICU. Right. We know it. They knew it. And they knew it, so the fine was imposed so that the baby could be taken care of even more thoroughly.

Now, verse 23 tells us the just course of action if there is harm. Now, what would happen if there is harm? But if any harm follows, then you shall give life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.

In this case. It would be correct to read the harm applying to either mom or the baby because the context allows us for that. Right. If the baby is born early prematurely because the woman is struck, then the victims are mom and the baby.

So if either the mom or the baby is hurt in any way, the perpetrator will have to appropriately pay for the injury that's caused. Now, contrary to what abortion activists claim, this passage actually protects.

And promotes the protection and value of the newborn baby and the mother. It actually views a baby who was just before inside the womb as a valid human being worth protecting under the law of God. This is not the text to use for abortion.

There's no text in the Bible to use for abortion. Now, what does eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, and stripe for stripe entail? What does that mean?

This is the famous eye for eye and tooth for tooth, and we might have heard it from the Hammurabi's Code, the ancient Sumerian law. And we, the legal people call it lex talionis. Lex talionis is a Latin phrase for the law of retaliation, the law of retaliation.

What is an appropriate way to repay when there is harm done? The penalty must be appropriate to the offense committed. The famous phrase eye for eye means the restitution must not be less or more. Then the offense.

This means the offender cannot just cripple another person and walk away happily after paying some fines. The punishment must fit the seriousness of the crime committed. That is the full justice of the Lord.

And this protects from two grossly unjust outcomes. First, the law of God did not allow cruel and overblown punishment. And we kind of have that idea in our constitution, right? No cruel and unusual punishment.

In Genesis 4, Lamech, a descendant of Cain, boasts of killing a young man. Ada and Zillah listen to me. Wives of Lamech hear my words. I have killed a man for wounding me, a young man for injuring me.

If Cain is avenged seven times, then Lamech 77 times. Lamech took justice into his own hands and murdered a young man for injuring him. This was not eye for eye, but life for a temporary injury. Lamech made himself the judge, jury and executioner and took away a life of an image bearer of God.

The lex talionis made sure that it was not two eyes for one eye or life for tooth. It protected the offender from facing an overblown personal vengeance. But rather, God, through his law, will punish the offender justly and appropriately.

On the other hand, the law of God did not allow the powerful paying the powerful paying his way out of the punishment. If a person got seriously injured by a strong individual, the full force of the law was expected and applied.

There was no slap on the wrist after violently hurting a person made in the image of God. No powerful individual could just escape justice by paying a relatively small fine. God's justice made sure the offender faced an appropriate consequence for his wicked act.

The lex talionis honored and protected everyone made in the image of God, especially the weakest and the most vulnerable. This would prevent the strong and the powerful from ever even thinking of getting away with abusing the weak.

And verses 26 to 27 give us just that, an application of God's law impartially protecting the most vulnerable. If a man strikes the eye of his male or female servant and destroys it, he shall let him go free for the sake of his eye.

And if he knocks out the tooth of his male or female servant, he shall let him go free for the sake of his tooth. In these verses, the Lord uses the same concept, eye and tooth, here to show how it would be applied in the most serious cases, which is the weakest, the people who are weak, who cannot stand up for themselves.

Here, the victims are the slaves, and it did not matter which gender, the law protected both equally. If the slave's master physically disciplines a slave and permanently injures one of his body parts, well, she was free to go.

If the master punched his slave and a tooth came out, the master had to release his.

Slave.

The master would be financially hurt if he hurt his slave. This law protected many lives. This law honored and valued lives of the weakest and the most vulnerable. That's how beautiful this law is. Unfortunately, in our days, some actually think of eye for eye, tooth for tooth as just.

Ancient.

It's not modern. Again, it's barbaric. We are beyond that. However, eye for eye, tooth for tooth is fulfilled in Christ on the cross. When Adam and Eve rebelled against God, sin entered the world. Ever since then, we humans have constantly and consistently rebelled against God.

Instead of honoring him as creator, we worshiped ourselves and gratified our perverse desires. Instead of treating one another with the due respect that every image bearer of God deserves, we abuse and use each other for our own selfish personal gain.

And that's how wicked and sinful humans are. That's how rebellious we are to God. Every time we sin, we rebel against the sovereign Lord. Every time we sin, we offend God. We commit treason. Now, what is the just and proper penalty that we deserve?

Well, the just and proper penalty for offending the holy, eternal sovereign Lord is eternal suffering in hell. That's what we earn for ourselves. This isn't God pleased to send you to hell. It's that that's what you've earned when you sinned.

That's how holy he is. You've offended the holy God. And that's what eye for eye, tooth for tooth means for us. When we offend the eternally holy God, we deserve eternally painful suffering. But God is not only just.

But he is merciful. He is compassionate. He is love. He does not find pleasure in sending all of humankind to suffer in hell for all eternity. But how will he acquit the guilty when there's still guilt?

When there's still sin, how does he deal with that? God cannot just call someone innocent when there's when he's so guilty, that would be lying. God cannot lie. That would make God unjust. In order for God to justly forgive sinners, Christ had to fulfill the law of retaliation.

Upon himself, Christ took on the sin that we accrued and faced the retaliation that we deserved. Eye for eye, tooth for tooth was fulfilled in Christ with God, the offended party himself took on our sin and bore it on the cross.

That was the substitutionary atonement, which we heard from Jim in 2nd Corinthians 521. He who knew no sin became sin so that we would be the righteousness of God. The only way for eye for eye, tooth for tooth could be fulfilled is that God himself take on what we deserved in retaliation, what we deserved as due penalty.

He took it upon himself and he faced the wrath that we deserved himself. And Christ could only do that because he himself is God. No other human being could have taken on the retaliation that we deserved other than God himself.

And that is Christ who shed his blood for us on the cross. And that is how we are justified. That is how God can look at anyone who trusts in Christ, his death and resurrection, and say, you are righteous because you are found in Christ, not because the sins you've committed was, oh, that's just a little thing.

No, they're huge before God. You're righteous because someone else took the punishment that you deserved. Someone else took your place so that eye for eye, tooth for tooth could be fulfilled so that you may not lose your soul for all eternity.

That is how Christ fulfilled Lex Talionis. It's not some barbaric ancient law. That's how justice works. You commit the crime, you do the time. And in order for God to deliver us out of this horrible doom that was coming for all of us to face his wrath, he himself took it upon himself.

And because of that, we find forgiveness, justification, adoption, and sanctification. It's been done for you in Christ. Let us pray. Father, we're so thankful that the law shows us how just and righteous you are.

Father, I pray that you would teach us to live justly and righteously as your children, that we may reflect your righteousness to the world that is utterly confused about justice and righteousness in most ways.

Father, we pray that you would use us to be the light so that the dark world may even glimpse at what is true justice, which is found on the cross. In Jesus' name, amen.

Well, let's stand for our closing song. Take time to be holy.