Daily Journey: January 4th

Genesis 9:1-11:26, Matthew 4:1-17

Thought from Today’s Old Testament Passage:

The only valid basis for any law is a previously existing morality. We see this in the institution of capital punishment in Genesis 9:6. Here government is given the right to take the murderer’s life on the basis that the one killed was “in the image of God” and that the act was therefore an offense to God.

At best, government will express in laws and enforce by its inherent power the sense of morality already present (or absent) in its citizenry. But the morality itself must come from another source. What can that be? … [I]t must be the morality of revealed religion working its way into national life through those citizens who know and sincerely desire to please God. … This means that your convictions in these and other areas and your forthright expression of them are more important in the ultimate analysis than the laws that may be forthcoming. (J. M. Boice, Genesis, an Expositional Commentary, Vol. 1, (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1982), pp. 308-309)