Beware of Hypocrisy

Series: The Sermon on the Mount

Speaker: Pastor Justin Wheeler

Scripture: Matthew 6:1-4

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I’m going to need your help with something this morning. I need you to help me define a term that we are all familiar with. It is a term that is used quite a bit within the church and it is used by the world to describe the church. It is a term that always carries a negative association, no one wants to be called out by this term. But it is also a term that describes all of us at one point or another. The term is hypocrisy and there are several different ways that it is commonly used.

One way this term is used is when those outside the church use it to complain about Christians. We are called hypocrites when we fail to live up to the cultures standard of what a Christian is supposed to be like. A skeptic might claim…

“I have to doubt any religion that has so many fanatics and hypocrites…There are so many people who are not religious at all who are more kind and even more moral than many of the Christians I know.”[1]

In this case, hypocrisy is being defined by not living up to certain expectations or cultural standards and there is some truth to this.

Another way the term is used is when a high profile Christian leader is exposed in a scandal involving sin. When this happens, the first thing out of people’s mouth is, “Hypocrite!” They are calling this person a hypocrite because while they were leading people in Christian ministry they were also leading a double life. Their day job as a minister was hiding some secret sin and that sin has finally caught up with them. They are hypocrites indeed.

There’s another way this term is being used. Some Christians have begun to use this term as an assessment of their own personal relationship with Christ. Kevin DeYoung writes:

It’s common (today) to think of hypocrisy as the gap between your actions and your feelings. So, if I do something without having my “heart” in it then I’m a hypocrite. Evangelicals are especially sensitive to this charge because we believe (quite rightly) that Christianity is more than “just going through the motions.” We believe faith must be sincere (otherwise it is hypocritical).[2]

There is some truth here as well. In this case, hypocrisy is being defined as doing religious things without having appropriate religious feelings. We’ve all been in this position. We come to church and don’t feel like singing, or like giving; but we do it anyway and we pray that our hearts will catch up with our actions. I’m not so sure we should call this hypocrisy, maybe we should call it maturity. There are plenty of times in our lives as Christians when doing what is right doesn’t always feel good.

So, which one of these do we think is the right definition of hypocrisy? Is hypocrisy the failure to live up to cultural standards? Is it living a double life? Is hypocrisy simply going through the motions without engaging the heart? Or is there another definition that we need to consider? I think there is.

Transition…

Jesus used the term hypocrite more than any other person in Scripture and He used it as a way to confront a certain group and their approach to religion. He also used it to teach His followers how to live or better yet, He used it to teach us how not to live.

Matthew 6:1 “Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven. 

2 “Thus, when you give to the needy, sound no trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may be praised by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. 3 But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, 4 so that your giving may be in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you. 

Jesus began this sermon by describing the essential elements of Christianity. The Christian faith is not simply the result of accepting certain theological truths, nor is it simply adhering to certain religious practices. At its core Christianity is religion in the heart. It begins when we are brought face to face with the reality of who God is and with the reality of who we are in contrast.

In Matthew 5, Jesus took us on a journey through a series of Biblical laws and each one of them was aimed to show that deep down the biggest problem we face is the problem of sin in our heart. He wanted to teach us that true religion must begin in the heart. Now moving into chapter 6, Jesus wants to teach us that true religious practice must also begin in the heart.

Sermon Focus…

I. Beware of Hypocrisy (V. 1)

Matthew 6:1 “Beware of practicing your righteousness…

In this verse, Jesus is warning us about something that is common and once again it is primarily an issue of the heart. He tells us to beware. He wants us to be in a state of focused awareness about how we live out our religious devotion. Jesus is not warning us against practicing religious behavior, in fact, all of chapter 6 is about the practice of religious behavior.

In this chapter, Jesus is going to teach us about giving, prayer and fasting. He is going to help us understand how to truly serve God and how to faithfully trust God while worry and anxiety are trying to take over. This chapter is about how we live our lives out of a sincere relationship to God. But the warning here in verse 1 is aimed to show us that there is a way that we can carry our religious behaviors and they be completely worthless.

It all comes down to our motive. It all comes down to the state of our heart.

Matthew 6:1 “Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven. 

So, this is what we need to know in order to define what it means to be a hypocrite. According to Jesus, a hypocrite is someone who carries our religious practices merely to be seen by others. They do the right thing but with the wrong motive. They are trying to appear deeply religious/pious but in reality, they are phony.

John MacArthur tells the story of a holy man from the middle east. Every day the man would come and sit in a prominent street corner in the city and he would cover himself in ashes as a sign of his humility and devotion to the practice of asceticism. Tourist would often come to the city and see this man and ask permission to take his photograph. The old man would reply, “Just a moment, let me rearrange my ashes.” He wanted to make sure that people would see just how humble and devoted he was to his religion, so he would quickly get into costume.

The kind of hypocrisy that Jesus is describing is nothing more than rearranging our ashes. It’s the art of getting into costume so that the people around us will think that we are serious about God, serious about our religious devotion, serious about spiritual things; but in the end, it’s all a game. Hypocrites are little more than actors in their own stage play and they are surrounded by an audience of men and women.

The Greek word for Hypocrite (v. 2) refers to a stage actor, someone who wears a mask and plays a role. An actor wears a costume and memorizes lines so that they can portray a character, but it’s all a show. The whole business is to act the part in order to be seen by the audience in a way that is believable and draws you into the story being portrayed. In other words, the religious actions of a hypocrite are nothing more than a performance designed to impress those who are watching.

But notice that Jesus doesn’t just warn us about those hypocrites, he warns us about being a hypocrite. Beware of your own empty religion. That is how Jesus opens the middle section of His Sermon on the Mount. Beware! Now why does Jesus need to tell us to beware of being or becoming a hypocrite? Because sometimes we just don’t see it coming.

Culturally speaking, there are these games that we play in the Bible Belt. Everybody here is a Christian, no matter what they believe or what they don’t believe. We are Christians down here because we are American, which is Biblically ridiculous but culturally normal. What this really means is that we have adopted a mask of Christianity and much of the religious practices that go along with that, but for many it’s all a show. As long as life is easy, and no problems arise, folks maintain their mask and keep going about their religious performance.

But the reality is that these people are just playing a game or playing a part. They have no intention of actually submitting to Jesus, they just want to make people believe that they are. They have no intention of trusting in God’s Word, or repenting from sin or adopting a Biblical worldview, they just want to be lifelong worship attenders. They are treating church as a hobby and Christianity as a game and if we aren’t careful we can be made to believe that the game is the real thing.

The Pharisees certainly didn’t see themselves as hypocrites or actors. They thought that their religion was pure. They thought of themselves as the guardians of true religion. They were the ones that took the law seriously. They were the ones who weren’t afraid to point out other people’s sins. They were the ones that God would reward in the end…or so they thought.

But Jesus came to show them that they were playing a game. He came to reveal that their religion was nothing more than an outward show and that God was concerned with the heart. God is concerned with humility, mercy, and sincerity that flows out of a heart that had been changed by the gospel of grace, but the Pharisees were whitewashed tombs. Pretty on the outside but full of dead men’s bones and they had no idea. They were blind to their own hypocrisy.

But Jesus has come to warn us against following their lead. He has come to show us what life with God is really like and to help us understand this life with God, Jesus gives us some real-world illustrations. Let’s look at the first one.

II. What Not to Do (V. 2)

V. 2 “Thus, when you give to the needy, sound no trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may be praised by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward.

This first example has to do with giving money to the poor. Now, this is not the same thing as giving your tithe on Sunday although the principle still applies. In Jesus day, it was common and considered essential to true piety for people to give food, money or clothing to the poor. In a time when there was no such thing as government assistance, the needs of many were met by the people of the community. This was not only the custom of the day but also the instruction God gave to Israel.

Deut 15:7 “If among you, one of your brothers should become poor, in any of your towns within your land that the Lord your God is giving you, you shall not harden your heart or shut your hand against your poor brother, 8 but you shall open your hand to him and lend him sufficient for his need, whatever it may be…11 For there will never cease to be poor in the land. Therefore, I command you, ‘You shall open wide your hand to your brother, to the needy and to the poor, in your land.’ 

Once again, we see that Jesus is teaching an already established Biblical truth. He is not doing away with giving to the poor, but the emphasis that He wants to make focuses on the heart of the giver. He wants us to check our motives. He wants us to ask the question, “Why am I giving?” And to press this question into our hearts he gives us an absurd illustration.

He says, “When you give, sound no trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do, that they may be praised by others.” Now, it doesn’t appear that this was something that actually happened. There is no evidence to suggest that Jews were accustomed to blowing a trumpet when they gave to the poor. Jesus’ point is to show how ridiculous it would be to seek attention in this way for doing what was right. It reeks of the kind of self-centered sinful attitude that God rejects.

When we give money to others in order to be recognized and praised, our motive is not to help the poor it is to please ourselves. Our real desire is not to please others, but to make them think better of us which is ultimately about our own self-gratification. This is pride plain and simple. This is self-exaltation and God doesn’t reward sin.

Luke 18:14 everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.” 

The only reward that comes to the hypocrite is the fact that he/she impressed a couple of people, but God was not impressed. What pleases God is humility. What pleases God is a sincere concern for the needs of others. What pleases God is sacrificial giving because that is how He gives.

For God so love the world that He gave His only begotten Son…

God gives with grace and His giving is a sacrifice. He gives the best He can give, and He gives it to those who don’t deserve it. This is the essence of the gospel and it is the model for how God wants us to give as well.

Now, you will notice that we don’t have a trumpet set up here at Cornerstone for when you give; but that doesn’t mean we are immune to this type of selfish giving. There are many trumpets that people use today and there are other selfish motives propelling people to give.

I’ve served in a church where members would refuse to give because they didn’t like a decision the pastor made, and they wanted him fired. The pastor hadn’t committed sin it was just that this guy didn’t like him and wanted to put pressure on the deacons to get the pastor out. It’s like he saw himself as a shareholder and he wanted to use his money not for praise but for influence.

There is another reason why some people give, and it isn’t to influence the church nor to win the praise of men. Sometimes people give because they think they can influence God. They think that when they give money they are somehow going to earn spiritual favor from God. But salvation can’t be bought, no matter what the Pope tells you.

In Acts 8, we read about a man in Samaria who was a magician. When he saw the power of the Holy Spirit in the life of the apostles he offered them money in the hopes that he could secure the same power for himself.

Acts 8:20 But Peter said to him, “May your silver perish with you, because you thought you could obtain the gift of God with money! 21 You have neither part nor lot in this matter, for your heart is not right before God. 22 Repent, therefore, of this wickedness of yours, and pray to the Lord that, if possible, the intent of your heart may be forgiven you.

Money can’t buy you love and it can’t buy you salvation either. All it can do is impress the world. But there is a type of giving that God rewards.

II. How to do what God Rewards (Vv. 3-4)

3 But when you give to the needy,

Now, I want to point out that Jesus doesn’t say if you give but when you give. There is a certain expectation that as the people of God we will use our money in ways that God commands. Throughout the Scriptures we learn that God doesn’t need our gifts because He is entirely self-sufficient. But our gifts are intended to meet the physical and spiritual needs of others.

The Bible teaches that giving is an act of worship and it is done when we gather to praise God. Giving is an act of joy because God loves a cheerful giver. Giving is an act of mercy aimed at meeting the needs of others. Giving is an act of ministry as it is used to support the work of the church and to fuel the spread of the gospel. Giving is a personal responsibility because God doesn’t want us to give under compulsion but as each man had decided in his heart. Giving is an act of faith because we are trusting that God will provide for us even when we give sacrificially.

Here in Matthew 6, Jesus also teaches us that giving is an act of secret devotion from the heart.

V. 3 do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, 4 so that your giving may be in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you. 

What does it mean to give with your right hand but not to let your left hand know about it? Jesus is using another metaphor here of one side of the body doing something while at the same time not announcing what it has done in order to gain recognition. IOW, he is telling us to give in a discreet way that avoids self-promotion. This doesn’t mean that you should be sneaky when you put your offering in the plate, it means that you give with the desire to glorify God, not to glorify yourself.

If your giving comes from a heart of humility and love for God. If your giving is done with a sincere desire to obey God’s calling to care for those in need, to spread the gospel, and to support the church; If your giving is done as an act of worship to God and not for the influence or praise it might bring us, this is what God rewards. This is the type of giving that pleases God.

The hypocrite craves the praise of men and thinks little of God, so he gives for his own gain. The Christian seeks the glory of God and thinks little of man’s praise, so he gives generously to help those in need.

John Calvin, commenting on this passage, writes, “By this expression (Jesus) means that we ought to be satisfied with having God for our only witness.” As Christians we don’t live for the clapping of men, nor do we live so that we can pat ourselves on the back; we live for God. We live for the one who rescued us from ourselves. We live for the one who gave His life for our freedom. We live for the One who knows the secrets of our hearts and still loves us.

Conclusion…

So, what are the big ideas that God wants us to understand from this passage?

1. Going through the motions of religion alone will get you nowhere with God. External religion alone will earn you nothing with God. Salvation by works is a complete lie. God wants our religious devotion to be fueled by integrity in the heart. He wants to have a relationship with us that changes us from the inside out. He wants our religious devotion to be fueled by love for Him and that results in love for others.

2. I love this quote from Martyn Lloyd-Jones, “There is no reward from God for those who seek it from men.” If you are seeking the praise of men through your religious life, then the praise of men is all you can ever hope to gain. The root of man’s longing for the praise of others is pride and God opposes the proud, but He gives grace to the humble. If you do what you do for the admiration of the crowd, you have your reward.

3. The reward of sacrificial giving cannot be measured. The motivation for us to give sacrificially is surely tied to the fact that Christ gave sacrificially. He gave His life to meet our need. He drained the storehouse of his wealth to buy our freedom. God did not hold back His Own Son but gave Him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things.

The hypocritical life is nothing but smoke and mirrors, attempting to earn a reputation that is undeserved. But deep down the hypocrite knows that it’s all an act that he/she uses to hide the shame and guilt in their heart. The only real escape is to be exposed by Jesus, and why not, He knows the truth already. He’s not fooled, and He never will be.

Jesus knows our hypocritical games too well and He is not only willing to call us out on them, but He also offers us freedom from the guilt and shame that we are so desperately trying to hide. He will give us a new identity in Him and will allow us to live without the mask.  

Let’s repent of our hypocrisy. Let’s go to Jesus for forgiveness and cleansing. Let’s go to His Word and let it teach us, humble us, grow us and make us more like Him.

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[1] Tim Keller The Reason For God (pg. 51)

[2] https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/kevin-deyoung/what-is-hypocrisy/

Love Your Enemies

Series: The Sermon on the Mount

Speaker: Pastor Justin Wheeler

Scripture: Matthew 5:43-48

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It is well known that love is at the heart of the message and vision of Christianity. There is perhaps no more popular New Testament verse in the world than John 3:16, where we come to understand that God loves the world and in His love He gave His Son to us so that all who believe in Him will not perish but will have eternal life. The Father’s love for unlovable sinners, like us, is at the very heart of the Christian message.

But that is not the end of Christianity’s vision of love. The love of Jesus is a huge part of that vision. Jesus told his friends that there is no greater love in this world than the love that would cause a man to give his own life in order to save his friends and that is exactly what Jesus did. He died in our place. He took our place and sheltered us from the judgment of God and He did this because of His love. Jesus’ love for undeserving sinners, like us, is at the very heart of the Christian message.

But still, this is not the end of Christianity’s vision of love. In the NT gospels, we see Jesus teaching all of His disciples that we too are to be people of love. We are to love God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength. We are to love our neighbors as ourselves. We are even commanded to love our enemies and to pray for those who persecute us. Christians are commanded to love. We are to love others, even those whom we might naturally dislike and this too is at the very heart of the Christian message.

The Christian vision of love is incredible and it gives us the idea that God wants love to fill the earth and fuel all of our emotions and actions.

Transition…

As followers of Jesus we are called to love. We are called to love God in a way that resets our heart and enables us to love others in an extraordinary, unnatural and radical way. This morning we are going to learn three ways that Jesus wants us to understand the call to love: 1. Love your neighbors (V. 43), Love your enemies (Vv. 44-47) and Love like God (V. 48).

Matt 5:43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. 46 For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? 47 And if you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? 48 You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect. 

Sermon Focus…

I. Love your Neighbor (V. 43)

v. 43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’

This statement is difficult in a way that the previous ones are not. For the most part, the previous statements that Jesus has made in the Sermon on the Mount are easily found in the OT and Jesus’ point is to remind his audience of those OT laws and then to help them understand the deeper purpose of them. The law was given to teach God’s people how do what is right, but it was also given to show them the sin that dwells in their hearts.

The law does two things: it points out what we are supposed to do but it also shows us that our natural inclination is to do what we are not supposed to do. The law shows us how to live but it also shows us our sin.

Here in Matthew 5, Jesus wants to let the law do its thing with us, but in each case he has to address the fact that religious teachers had made a mess of how the people understood the law. In some cases, the religious leaders had softened the law, in other cases they had expanded it out to the point of absurdity. But here in verse 43 it appears that they have done two things: they took out a few words in order to limit their responsibility to their neighbors and then they completely added their own man-made law about how to treat their enemies.

The first part of the verse, “You shall love your neighbor…” is found in the book of Leviticus..

Lev 19:18 You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord. 

This verse comes at the end of a section that is meant to teach God’s people how to interact with one another. God gave them clear instructions that they ought to care for one another, not to steal from one another, not to lie to one another, but to be fair and just and sincere. Then as a summary statement God says, “just, love one another.” The point is that if you love your neighbor you will not be tempted to take advantage of them, or to cheat them, or to overlook their needs. This is how God commanded His people to treat their neighbors.

By quoting this, Jesus is reminding the Jews that their relationship with each other is to be defined by love. But notice that a critical part of Leviticus 19 has been left off; the part about loving your neighbor as yourself. They decided that they would just leave that part of the verse out. The Jews in that day had reduced the command of God from “love your neighbor as yourself” to simply, “Love your neighbor.”

It might seem like a small thing, but if you think about it those two words make a world of difference. Those two words define the quality of our love, they set a standard that is incredibly high. Do you love your neighbor? Do you love your neighbor the way you love yourself?

Not only had they chipped away at God’s command but they also added a second command when they taught the people to “hate their enemy.” Now where did this come from?

If you do a search for the term hate in the Bible you will find it show up quite a few times. Sometimes it refers to the hatred that personal enemies feel toward one another, sometimes it refers to how people feel about the wicked, the idolaters, or those who stand opposed to God.

You’ll find that God hates certain things. He hates divorce, He hates empty hypocritical religion, He hates evil, corruption and injustice. In Amos 5 God tells His people to hate evil, specifically the evil in their own hearts.

But, none of these statements command God’s people to hate their enemies. And yet, this feeling has become so engrained in the thinking of God’s people that they treat it like its a command. Some believe that this problem arose because of the Jews misunderstanding of the command to love their neighbor. Since their neighbors were fellow Jews they decided that the command only applied to the people of God. So, in their minds they were required to love their fellow-Jews, but they were free to hate non-Jews, especially those who were their political enemies.

To be honest, who could blame them? They had been oppressed for years. First by the Egyptians, then the Assyrians, then the Babylonians and now the Romans. It may have been that hatred for enemies had become a mark of patriotism for Israel. Hating one’s enemies came to them naturally, but this is not what God had called them to do. The truth is that God had instructed them to care for their enemies.

Prov 25:21 If your enemy is hungry, give him bread to eat, and if he is thirsty, give him water to drink…(Paul quotes this in Romans 12, which we read last week)

So, this man-made command to hate your enemies had grown up like a rogue weed. It was a parasitic growth that had endured for years and was now widely accepted as the duty of faithful Jews and Jesus wants to confront this hatred in the hearts of His people, even in our hearts.

Our own world is filled with this type of hate. Jews still hate Palestinians. Muslim terrorists still hate the west and Americans most of all, and Americans hate them right back. Racism is alive in our country once again, or to be more honest it never truly left. Racism is a particularly ignorant form of hatred coupled with pride, which makes it doubly sinful. This is not true in all cases, but it is true in some that Republicans hate Democrats and vice versa.

We may think that as 21st century Americans we are beyond the type of petty hatred that Jesus is confronting in this passage, but I just don’t think so. You may think that I’m overstating things, but I think we’ve come to the point where hatred is growing in this country. What most disturbs me about this is that in some cases the church has fallen in lock step with the culture when it comes to this type of hatred.

In this passage, Jesus is confronting our tendency to embrace the natural hatred that flows out of our hearts toward people who are not like us and He is calling us to live radically different lives than the rest of the world. He is calling us to love our enemies.

II. Love your Enemies

v. 44 But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,

The context of what Jesus is saying here has to do with religious persecution and those who oppose us on the basis of our faith. IOW, what makes someone our enemy is the fact that they are persecuting us for our faith in Christ. The Jews had been teaching that love should be limited to people like us, who believe like us, but Jesus is calling His disciples to not just love other Christians, but to love even those with whom we strongly disagree about God. He is calling us to love our persecutors.

Jesus is commanding us, that when our enemies insult us to our face we should retaliate with love. When people mock us for our faith we should pray for them. When people want us dead and we should want them to be saved.

Now, before we begin to think that this might just be pie-in-the-sky religious idealism, let me point out a few of the examples of this type of love that we see in the NT starting with Jesus himself. Jesus on the cross in Luke 23…

Luke 23:33-34  And when they came to the place that is called The Skull, there they crucified him, and the criminals, one on his right and one on his left.  34 And Jesus said, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do."

Stephen in Acts 7:60…

Acts 7:58-60 Then they cast him out of the city and stoned him…  59 And as they were stoning Stephen, he called out, "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit."  60 And falling to his knees he cried out with a loud voice, "Lord, do not hold this sin against them." And when he had said this, he fell asleep.

This is uncommon love. This is radical love fueled by a profound understanding of gospel realities. The gospel teaches that despite God’s goodness toward mankind, all of us have rejected Him in our hearts. We suppress the truth about Him and we seek to live as though we belong in God’s place. But despite our rebellion against God the gospel tells us that He loves us. Before the foundation of the world, He chose to love us and even while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

We don’t deserve His love, but that doesn’t stop Him from loving us and when this truth takes hold of our hearts, it will begin to change the way we view everyone, even our enemies.

Pray for those who abuse you…

When they make fun of us for our faith in Christ, we approach God and ask that He show them their need of Christ. I don’t know about you but I’ll just be honest and let you know that this is not my natural disposition toward those who make it their aim to persecute me. My natural response is to defend myself, retaliate and turn away from my enemy. But Jesus simply will not let us run away from our enemies, He calls us to love them.

This is not “keep your friends close and your enemies closer.” This is not a self-serving ethic, this is not an appeal to proper social order, nor is this virtue for the sake of virtue. Jesus is calling us to love our enemies the way that He loves His enemies, with a divine and unconditional love that looks beyond the shame of this world and toward the glory to come.

Now, where are we going to get the resources that we need to love like this?

The power to love like Jesus flows in the veins of those who have been born again by the Holy Spirit to believe the truth of the gospel. Our very real human effort to love our enemies is the result of God’s grace in us, not the other way around.

Eph 5:1 Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. 2 And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us,

The Spirit of God works within us to make us more like Jesus. The primary motivation for us to love our enemies, is going to come when we remember that we were once the enemies of God. But in Christ He loved us. 

The resolve we need to love our enemies will be found at the foot of the cross; where God’s love put an end to our opposition to God. Our capacity to love our enemies will be directly linked to our understanding of the love of God.

A. The Love of God

v. 45 so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.

Notice that God makes his sun to rise on the evil and the on the good. It’s His and that means that He can do with it what He pleases. He can make the sun shine on Israel while darkness falls on the rest of Egypt. But each day His sun rises to give life to all. We call this common grace but it is anything but common. This is a form of divine love and this is what Jesus is calling us to demonstrate to others.

Christian love, is not normal in any sense of the word, it is radical. He is calling us to view love for others as infinitely more valuable than our own comfort, our possessions, our reputation and our rights. He is not calling us to follow the whims of our emotions, but to consciously choose to serve rather than to demand.

He is calling us to a standard of love that is far more radical than anything that the world of religion, ethics or philosophy have ever developed. Jesus is calling us to love the way God loves. He is calling us to imitate the divine love of God, a love that is most clearly and profoundly seen in the gospel of our salvation.

The One who is here calling us to love radically is also the One who radically loves us.

How does Jesus’ love for us compare to the love found in the world?

B. The Love of the World

v. 46 For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? 47 And if you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same?

To love those who love you is the baseline of love that should undergird any society and before we can feel the force of Jesus’ teaching we have to come to grips with the fact that we start out failing even to love in common ways.

Husbands ought to love their wives and wives ought to love their husbands, this should not be exceptional. Families ought to love one another, siblings ought to love one another, and friends ought to share a mutual love and respect for one another. But instead we see the opposite in most cases.

We hear of spousal abuse and infidelity on a daily basis. Much of our energy at home is spent breaking up arguments between our children. Friends and neighbors go to war with one another and in the evening their story ends up on the nightly news. This is simply the world we live in.

The type of love that Jesus calls common is often viewed as exceptional in our day. But Jesus expects this to be common among His followers. We ought to love one another, but much of the time even this is a struggle.

So what must we do? Our only response is to repent before the lord, seek forgiveness from Him and those we’ve failed to love, and then to learn from Christ what true love looks like in our lives. To love those who love you is good, right and true and as believers in Christ we should set the example for the world in loving those who love us. This is what our lives, families and churches should look like every day. We should be filled with love to the point of overflowing.

Love based on the principle of, “I’ll scratch your back if you scratch mine” is not an example of Christian love. Jesus wants us to give without strings attached. He wants us to love without selfish motives. He is calling us to pour our hearts out for others, for our enemies. This is amazing love.

Christ is calling us to love in a way that is out of place in this world, an alien love.

In a blogpost from 2014, Jared Wilson asks, “What if we looked at 1 Corinthians 13:4-8 from the reverse angle? Here is what we would read:

Impatience and unkindness is hatred.
Hate is envious and ego-centric.
Hate is arrogant and rude.
Hatred is insisting on one’s own way;
hatred is irritable or resentful;
it celebrates sin, and it mocks what is true.
Hate is whiny and thin-skinned,
thoroughly skeptical,
always pessimistic,
a born quitter.

But hatred ends . . .[1]

Now let’s turn things around and learn what it will look like for us to love like God.

1 Corinthians 13:4 Love is patient and kind; love is not envious or boastful; love is not selfish and rude. Love does not insist on its own way; it is not short-tempered or bitter; it does not celebrate sin, but celebrates the truth.  Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.  Love never ends.

Our love is to imitate the perfect love of God, not the hatred of men.

III. Love like God

v. 48 You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect. 

Some teachers will say that this verse is teaching that sinless perfection is the goal of the Christian life. But if that were true, it would put this verse at odds with the rest of Jesus’ sermon and the whole of the NT. The perfection that Jesus is calling for here relates to the perfect love of God that is merciful and gracious. The Love of God is selfless love. It is love characterized by 1 Corinthians 13. It is perfect love and this is the type of love that we are called to show.

At the end of the day Jesus is calling us to imitate the love of the Father in how we interact with everyone, from family and friends, to fellow believers, and even to strangers and enemies. He calls us to love, to do good, to lend with no strings attached. God is the standard of how we are to love others, and God’s love is perfect.

There is not a time when we are more like our Father than when we love our enemies unconditionally.

Conclusion…

If we stand up for what is right, if we take our stand upon the Word of God and upon the gospel especially; we will have enemies. Those enemies will want to silence us. They will work to marginalize us. They will be hostile toward us in every way imaginable and Jesus tells us to surprise them with love.

As human beings, we should love our families well. As reasonable people, we should love those who love us. As peace-loving people, we should love our neighbors. As forgiven sinners, we ought to love unbelievers. As beloved children of God we are called to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us. Let’s do that now.

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[1] https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/jared-c-wilson/1-corinthians-13-reversed-reveals-much/

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Retaliation and Grace of God

Series: The Sermon on the Mount

Speaker: Pastor Justin Wheeler

Scripture: Matthew 5:38-40

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What I want to do this morning is to call us again to the foot of the mountain to hear from Jesus as He continues to preach the Sermon on the Mount. In this sermon, Jesus is teaching us what it takes to enter His Kingdom and what it looks like for us to live as citizens of His Kingdom. He wants us to know how to become His disciples and how to live as His disciples.

He kicked things off with a list of beatitudes, statements about happiness and how to find it. But each statement takes our natural sensibilities and turns them upside-down. Jesus tells us in verse 3 that happiness comes to those who are poor in spirit; happy are the spiritually bankrupt. Then He tells us that happiness comes to those who mourn. IOW, happy are the sad. Then happiness is ready and waiting for those who are meek and hungry for righteousness. Happy are those who are starving for righteousness.

What a paradox. What does this mean? These beatitudes are aimed at changing our behavior, they are aimed at changing our heart. What Jesus is showing us here is the heart attitude of those who enter into His Kingdom. Our Journey into following Christ starts with brokenness, a brokenness that occurs when we see God for who He truly is and by contrast we will see ourselves as truly bankrupt before Him. The opening portion of the Sermon on the Mount is not a code of ethics that we must follow in order to become the people of God, but rather it strips us bear to make us understand that if we are to have peace with God it won’t come from us.

No good work on our part can save us from our sin. A lifetime of works can’t save us from sin. We need forgiveness and that only comes as a gift of God’s grace. We don’t simply need to change our behavior, we need a new heart and He is the only One who can truly give us a new heart. This is where our journey in the gospel begins; it begins with true brokenness before God that reveals just how sinful we are and this will cause us to mourn over our sin, and to long for a Savior who will forgive us and lead us to God.

This is the first part of what Jesus wants to teach us in this sermon, how to enter into His Kingdom. The second part is what do we do once we are in? How are we to live as members of His Kingdom? So let’s read our text for today.

Matt 5:38 “You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ 39 But I say to you, Do not resist the one who is evil. But if anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. 40 And if anyone would sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well. 41 And if anyone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles. 42 Give to the one who begs from you, and do not refuse the one who would borrow from you. 

Transition…

What Jesus is calling for in these verses (and the section that follows) is the pinnacle of Christian conduct. He is calling for us to respond to evil with humility, patience, mercy and grace. He is calling us to live in complete contradiction to our natural instincts, which means that we must be made new before we can hope to live like this. Jesus is not imposing this way of life on the lost kingdom of this world, but He is calling for His born-again people to live like this.

In order to live like Jesus, we are going to learn three things: Justice is Good, Mercy is Better, and Grace is Best.

Sermon Focus…

I. Justice is Good (V. 38)

V. 38 “You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’

This verse comes straight out of the OT law of Moses and it is referred to as the law of retaliation or Lex Talionis. This law was even recorded in the Code of Hammurabi (Babylonian) as the foundation for justice in the case of person to person interaction. The point of this law was to regulate the human urge to retaliate by legally demanding that any punishment handed down must fit the crime.

Ex 21:22 “When men strive together and hit a pregnant woman, so that her children come out, but there is no harm, the one who hit her shall surely be fined, as the woman’s husband shall impose on him, and he shall pay as the judges determine. 23 But if there is harm, then you shall pay life for life, 24 eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, 25 burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe. 

Lev 24:19 If anyone injures his neighbor, as he has done it shall be done to him, 20 fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth; whatever injury he has given a person shall be given to him.

Justice is about balance and this law was given to ensure that the scales were even on both sides. The rule of lex talionis has the double effect of defining justice and also restraining revenge; it was designed to prevent severe retribution and vigilante justice. But from our own experience we know that laws alone are no match for our human desire for revenge.

Have you ever heard the phrase, “Revenge is a dish best served cold?” The meaning of this devilish saying is that the most satisfying approach to exacting revenge is to take your time, to plan out your vengeance at a time when no one suspects you and then to savor the moment of revenge as you would a fine meal. I was in middle school when I first read a short story by Edgar Allen Poe, which captured this spirit of intentional vengeance in a very disturbing way.

The story begins like this,

The thousand injuries of Fortunato I had borne as best I could; but when he ventured upon insult, I vowed revenge. You, who so well know the nature of my soul, will not suppose, however, that I gave utterance to a threat. At length, I would be avenged; this was a point definitively settled— but the very definitiveness with which it was resolved, precluded the idea of risk. I must not only punish, but punish with impunity (without the possibility of being punished for what I planned to do). A wrong is unredressed when retribution overtakes its redresser. It is equally unredressed when the avenger fails to make himself felt as such to him who has done the wrong.[1]

Montresor had received a wound from Fortunato, an insult that in his heart he believed demanded revenge, but not just any revenge would do. He would proceed quietly and would plan it out in such a way that he would not get caught. His revenge would be a private matter, beyond the reach of the law, but it would leave a final impression on Fortunato. What began as an insult ended with murder. Montresor’s vengeance was a secret hidden deep in the catacombs and walled in with brick and mortar.

This story is one of a countless number of revenge stories that have captivated audiences for ages. Each of these stories shows us in painstaking detail just how deep our desire for revenge goes. In our hearts we long for vengeance, not justice but vengeance. Our natural instinct is not just to hit back but to hit back even harder and this has been the natural instinct of humanity as far back as Lamech in Genesis 4 who boasted, “I have killed a man for wounding me, a young man for striking me.”

God gave this law as a way to restrain our natural sinful inclination toward revenge and retaliation and as such these laws are aimed at establishing justice in society. But Jesus wants us to understand that there is more to this law than the letter. Below the surface, at the heart-level Jesus wants us to see the root of the problem. The law was given to curb our behavior, but it was also given to reveal the corruption in our hearts and that is what Jesus wants us to see.

II. Mercy is Better (V. 39)

At the heart of adultery is the sin of lust. At the heart of murder is the sin of anger. At the heart retaliation is the sin of vengeance, to be the self-justified distributor of justice.

There is a righteousness greater and more beautiful than self-justice— letting God be the judge and righteousness maker, the one who puts the world to right. This is a consistent theme in the Old Testament regarding interpersonal relations— do not take your own vengeance but let God be the one who sets things to right.[2]

1 Sam 24:12 (David said to Saul) May the Lord judge between me and you, may the Lord avenge me against you, but my hand shall not be against you.

IOW, Revenge is a dish best not served, because vengeance belongs to the Lord. God has established the means by which justice is meted out and it doesn’t look like Batman or the Punisher. He has established the state, flawed though it is, as the societal institution where justice is handed down. Then beyond the state there is the promise that God Himself will judge all the earth and render to every human being what they deserve for their crimes and sins.

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus is not rejecting the rule of law with regard to the state’s role to seek justice (retribution) but he is teaching us not to take vengeance into our own hands. In fact, he is telling us to fight against the heart impulse of vengeance by showing mercy to people who would seek to take advantage of us.

V. 39 But I say to you, Do not resist the one who is evil.

I actually think this verse is better understood to read, “Do not set yourself against the evildoer.” The idea is that we don’t take vengeance into our own hands, but in the next verse Jesus takes our understanding further. He says, “When someone insults you with a backhanded slap across the face, don’t lash out to get revenge but instead give that person a chance to double the insult.” This is the first of four illustrations that Jesus uses to teach us about personal restraint.

To turn the other cheek is to reject revenge, to be humble and gentle even when the other person doesn’t deserve it. To turn the other cheek is to show mercy and this is what Jesus calls His disciples to do in the face of an insult to our dignity.

He also tells us to be willing to give away our coat and the shirt off our back. In this case, the law could not demand that a person give away their coat and their shirt, but they could be willingly given. Jesus is calling for His disciples to go above and beyond what justice requires in order to show mercy to others.

In the third illustration, He tells us to go the extra mile. Roman law gave soldiers the right to force a civilian to carry his gear for one mile. This law was designed to give soldiers relief while on active duty. This seems like a fair trade-off for those risk their lives, but don’t forget that the Jews were occupied by Rome. This law forced the Jews to carry the weapons that their oppressors would use against them. But Jesus says, “When they take away your freedom and force you to serve for a mile, show them mercy and go an extra one.”

Finally, Jesus calls us to give to the one who asks and not to refuse the one in need. Now, wisdom would require us to think carefully before giving money to a fool, or a drunkard, or an addict. “If a man is not willing to work, let him not eat (2 Thess 3:10).” In each of these cases we don’t abandon wisdom. The command to turn the other cheek does not imply that we refuse to rescue someone who is being abused or attacked. The point here is that we deny the selfishness in our heart that would cause us to refuse to help someone in serious need.

Jesus wants us to understand that this law of retaliation can help to establish justice within society, but it also reveals that deep down we have a serious problem in our heart.

His teachings in these verses are a call to a way of being in the world that teaches us to look inward and become a different kind of people, (He is teaching) a vision of truly Christian virtue. A radical reorientation to our way of thinking that would have us see justice as good but mercy as better.[3] This is a vision of Christian values that rebukes our flesh and confounds the world. This is a vision for the Christian life that is more concerned with righteousness than personal justice.

By the way, Paul understood this teaching and he restated it for us in Romans 12.

Rom 12:17 Repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do what is honorable in the sight of all. 18 If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all. 19 Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.” 20 To the contrary, “if your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink; for by so doing you will heap burning coals on his head.” 21 Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.

Justice is good and right and it has been established by God. He has appointed the law to govern our behavior, He has appointed the state to govern our society and in the end, He will judge all men according to their actions. Justice if good, but mercy is better.

Mercy is better in that it teaches us to deny ourselves and to fight against the sinful impulse of selfishness. Jesus demands of us that we let mercy, not justice, be the motivating ethic in how we interact with others. Mercy means that we reject revenge, that we deny ourselves and that we seek the good of others, even when they wrong us.

Justice is good, mercy is better, but lastly, I want us to see that grace is best.

III. Grace is Best (1 Peter 2:21-24)

Jesus called His disciples with this invitation, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross and follow me.” As believers in Christ, His way is our way. His path is our path. His fate is our fate. His example is ours to follow.

The Apostle Peter heard Jesus invitation and He followed. He gave up everything to surrender his life to Jesus’ teaching and to follow Jesus example. Yes, Peter stumbled along the way just like we do, but in the end, Peter knew that following Jesus would lead us to Heaven.

Listen to Peter explaining how we too are to follow Christ.

1 Pet 2:21 For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps. 22 He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth. 23 When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly. 24 He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed.

There is a principle at work here that we don’t come to naturally, and it’s that God values meekness and humility. He values self-sacrificial love and He not only calls His people to embrace it, He embraced it Himself. The greatest display of selfless love (Grace) that this universe has ever seen was when Christ gave His life in our place.

Brothers and sisters, what Jesus is calling us to do with regard to not resisting those who do evil is exactly what He did Himself. When they came to arrest Him on trumped up charges, He didn’t fight back. When they accused Him of blasphemy He didn’t answer their charges. When they struck Him in the face He didn’t fight back. When they mocked Him in the barracks He didn’t defend His dignity. When they crucified Him He didn’t work to free Himself even though He could have done so.

He could have called down angels to free Him and destroy His enemies, but He chose to stay on the cross because love is the only thing powerful enough to overcome our sin. Jesus knew the power of mercy and the beauty of grace so He told the angels to stand down as He took our place on that cross. He didn’t deserve it but He denied Himself and took up the cross.

In His flesh, Jesus bore the penalty for the sins of all His people, all those who would believe. He absorbed the wrath of God that we deserved so that we could go free. With infinite dignity, matchless self-control and amazing grace; Jesus refused to retaliate.

1 Pet 2:23 When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly.

Conclusion…

It’s not about what our flesh wants, it’s about what the soul needs.

Our calling is to follow Christ’s example. We do not follow His example in order to be saved, but because we are saved by grace and through faith we follow His example. Jesus is first our savior and then our example but it is our calling to follow in His steps.

(Illus... The word example is used of children who trace over the letters of the alphabet in order to learn how to write their letters correctly. When we follow Christ, our lives are tracing over the lines that He drew with His own hands and feet.

When the gospel takes root in our hearts it changes everything. When the love of Christ anchors itself into our heart the calling upon our lives is to walk so closely with Him that we put our feet in his footprints. When we open our mouths, His word is what we hear. When we are mistreated we respond with grace, love and truth. When injustice comes against us we entrust our souls to God.

When suffering comes through persecution or the mistreatment of unjust men and women we know that we are living in the same story as our Lord. We are walking where He walked.  This is our calling to follow in His steps.

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[1] Poe, Edgar Allen The Cask of Amantillado (https://www.ibiblio.org/ebooks/Poe/Amontillado.pdf)

[2] Pennington, Jonathan T.. The Sermon on the Mount and Human Flourishing: A Theological Commentary (p. 196). Baker Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

[3] Ibid, pg. 197.

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To Tell the Truth

Series: The Sermon on the Mount

Speaker: Pastor Justin Wheeler

Scripture: Matthew 5:33-37

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What is the weirdest thing you’ve ever seen happen in church? Now, I know that this is an odd question and that your response will largely be influenced by the church tradition that you grew up with. I also know that for many of us the strangest thing that we’ve seen in the church doesn’t really make headlines, because it was an argument over the color of the carpet or something like that. But some of us have seen some really shocking things.

For me the strangest thing I’ve seen happen within the church gathering is a toss-up between my visit to a charismatic church with my friends and the church revivals that I witnessed as a child. In both cases I saw things and heard things that were extremely odd and not even close to Biblical. I’ve seen a church auditorium of 400 people go from what I would consider normal and orderly worship to out of control and unbiblical expressions of “spiritual gifts.” I’ve also seen “evangelists” say and do things that may or may not have been true, but they certainly produced results.

As I’ve gotten to know many of you, I’ve heard some strange stories about your experiences. I’ve heard things that were just plain weird and things that make me sad about the state of the church in our country. But there is a story in the book of Acts about what took place in the early church that easily tops anything I’ve ever seen.

In Acts 5, we read the story of Ananias and Saphira, a couple who owned a piece of property and sold it giving some of the proceeds to the church. But apparently, they weren’t honest about their intentions. The couple decided that they would keep some of the money and give the rest to the church, which was fine; but instead of being honest about it they lied to the Apostles about what they were actually doing.

When the husband came and gave the money, Peter said to him, “Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the holy Spirit and to keep back for yourself part of the proceeds of the land…why is it that you have contrived this deed in your heart? You have not lied to man but to God.” When Ananias heard these words, he fell down dead and then a few verses later his wife died as well.

Transition…

Can you imagine walking into church and seeing a husband and his wife being carried out dead; all because they lied. Do you take lying that seriously? Do you put a premium on speaking the truth and nothing but the truth?

The first lie occurred in the Garden in Genesis 3 and from that point forward lying is a sin at the very heart of our fallen human nature. Jesus called Satan the “Father of lies” in John 8:44 and Psalm 116:11 tells us that, “All men are liars.” Our God is a covenant keeper who never lies, but we are covenant breakers who lie naturally and treat it like it is no big deal.

But Jesus wants His followers to be men and women who speak the truth.

Matt 5:33 “Again you have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not swear falsely, but shall perform to the Lord what you have sworn.’ 34 But I say to you, Do not take an oath at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God, 35 or by the earth, for it is his footstool, or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King. 36 And do not take an oath by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black. 37 Let what you say be simply ‘Yes’ or ‘No’; anything more than this comes from evil. 

In this passage Jesus is talking about oaths and vows but the real matter at hand is that He wants us to be people who tell the truth. So this morning I want us to look at three thing related to this passage: The Instruction of Moses, The Ongoing Corruption, and The Simple Truth.

Sermon Focus…

I. The Instruction of Moses (V. 33)

V. 33 you have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not swear falsely, but shall perform to the Lord what you have sworn.

Here in this verse, Jesus is not quoting from one OT passage, but rather He is combining a handful of passages that are each aimed at teaching the same thing.

Exo 20:7 “You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.

Lev 19:11 “You shall not steal; you shall not deal falsely; you shall not lie to one another. 12 You shall not swear by my name falsely, and so profane the name of your God: I am the Lord. 

Num 30: 2 If a man vows a vow to the Lord, or swears an oath to bind himself by a pledge, he shall not break his word. He shall do according to all that proceeds out of his mouth. 

Deut 23:21 “If you make a vow to the Lord your God, you shall not delay fulfilling it, for the Lord your God will surely require it of you, and you will be guilty of sin. 22 But if you refrain from vowing, you will not be guilty of sin. 23 You shall be careful to do what has passed your lips, for you have voluntarily vowed to the Lord your God what you have promised with your mouth. 

The intention of these verses is to instruct the people of God to be people who speak the truth. God wants His people to be people of integrity, to be people that others can trust. He wants us to be truth-tellers who say what we mean and mean what we say. In other words, God wants us to be like Him and He never lies (Titus 1:2).

But Moses’ instruction is necessary because by our fallen nature we are not like God, when it comes to speaking the truth we are far more influenced by the one who has been lying from the beginning.

The crowning work of God in creation was the marriage of Adam and Eve. God was pleased with all that He had made and He declared that it was good. But He was so pleased in the creation of Adam and Eve the He declared it was very good. There was a measurable increase in goodness.

Then Satan entered the story as a serpent and his aim was not to corrupt creation from the bottom up but from the top down. Satan focused all of his malice upon the intimacy of the man and woman. But how would he bring down God’s crowning creative achievement? How is Satan going to bring down the pinnacle of God’s creation? By Lying.

In Gen 3:1 - Satan said to the woman, “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?”

The simple answer is “No, that is not what God said”; but Satan isn’t interested in facts. He asks this question as a way to cause Eve to doubt what God had said. Eve had never had any reason to question if God had told her the truth about the fruit on the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. She had never considered the possibility that God was not telling her the truth, nor that He was limiting her experience of life in any way. But now she is, because of Satan’s lie. Satan is a liar and he wants to destroy all trust in God and God’s Word.

So he asks, “Excuse me dear lady, but did I hear God actually say that there was something in this garden that you aren’t allowed to eat? How could God withhold something from you?” She had never thought that way before. Eve had always had everything she needed and everything she wanted. She had never had any reason to doubt God’s Word nor God’s generosity.

Back up at Gen 1:29 we see just how generous God was with Adam and Eve.

V. 29 And God said, “Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit. You shall have them for food.

She had a whole world of fruit to choose from but Satan’s question causes her heart to fix on the one thing that God told her not to eat. And God even gave her an explanation as to why. He told them that they were not allowed to eat the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil because, “In the day that you eat of it you will surely die.” You see God was not only being generous but also protective.

4 But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. 5 For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

“Dear lady, this fruit won’t cause you to die, in fact the real reason God doesn’t want you to eat it is that this fruit has the power to make you just like Him.” 

Satan tempted Eve by calling God’s Word into question and by lying about what God had said. God’s Word has fashioned the universe. God’s Word is purer and more powerful than anything we know. God’s Word is the foundation of all reality, but the serpent challenges Eve’s view of reality by calling God a liar. Satan lied to her and turned her heart away from God.

Satan wanted her to believe that God’s Word was a lie. He wants all of humanity to believe that God’s Word is a lie. He wants to turn the world upside-down…with a lie. From the Garden on throughout all of Biblical history we see that God always speaks the truth and that Satan is the father of lies. One of the key distinctions between the people of God and the unbelieving world is whether or not we believe the truth and speak the truth.

So, this is not just some arbitrary decision that telling the truth is good and lying is bad; being honest, being a person of integrity, and speaking the truth are tied to the very character of God. This flows out of who He is. By contrast, to be dishonest, to twist the truth and to knowingly tell lies is an echo of Satan’s influence in our hearts.

But what does all of this Biblical backstory have to do with what Jesus is talking about in Matthew 5? Let’s look at that again.

II. The Ongoing Corruption (Vv. 34-36)

V. 34 But I say to you, Do not take an oath at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God, 35 or by the earth, for it is his footstool, or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King. 36 And do not take an oath by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black.

So, the immediate context of this passage is about the taking of an oath or a vow, which amounts to a solemn promise. If you were to make a vow or take an oath, you would be making a sincere promise to carry out some task, or to follow up on some responsibility.

But the oath or vow is only as good as the integrity of the person making them. In other words, I can make promises all day but what really matters is whether or not I follow through, will I be a man of my word.

Now the Pharisees saw things a little differently. Once again, they were interested only in the letter of the law and not the spirit of the law. So long as they were careful in how they worded their vows, they thought there was no need to be so meticulous about carrying them out. So, they created a system of making vows and oaths in carefully worded ways that justified their lack of integrity.

They had trouble telling the truth consistently, just like you and I do, so in order to guard themselves against being found guilty of swearing falsely by the name of God, it seems that they had firmly established the habit of swearing by everything EXCEPT God.[1]

The Pharisees argued that what the law of Moses was really prohibiting was not taking the name of the Lord in vain but taking the name of the Lord in vain. So, they would make promises but as long as they didn’t mention the name of the Lord they didn’t think it was necessary to keep those promises. They had created a system that allowed them to be righteous in the eyes of the law even though they were dishonest in actual practice and for this Jesus called them hypocrites and blind guides in Matthew 23:16-22:

V. 16 “Woe to you, blind guides, who say, ‘If anyone swears by the temple, it is nothing, but if anyone swears by the gold of the temple, he is bound by his oath.’ 17 You blind fools! For which is greater, the gold or the temple that has made the gold sacred? 18 And you say, ‘If anyone swears by the altar, it is nothing, but if anyone swears by the gift that is on the altar, he is bound by his oath.’ 19 You blind men! For which is greater, the gift or the altar that makes the gift sacred? 20 So whoever swears by the altar swears by it and by everything on it. 21 And whoever swears by the temple swears by it and by him who dwells in it. 22 And whoever swears by heaven swears by the throne of God and by him who sits upon it. 

The main point of what Jesus is saying in both of these passages is that it doesn’t matter what verbal formula you use, what matters is whether or not you are going to keep your word. If you make a vow you are bound to keep it. If you make a promise you should do everything in your power to keep it. If we learn to be people of our word, people of honesty and integrity; then there really is no need to make a vow at all. We simply become honest and trustworthy people, like our heavenly father.

So Jesus gets around the issue of Oaths and Vows and makes it very simple for us.

III. The Simple Truth (V. 37)

37 Let what you say be simply ‘Yes’ or ‘No’; anything more than this comes from evil. 

Haddon Robinson’s comments on this passage are helpful.

“If anger was the real issue of murder, lust the real issue of adultery, selfishness the real issue of divorce, then deceit is the real issue of oaths.” He went on to add “Jesus wasn’t addressing whether or not we should take an oath. He was talking about whether or not we are truthful…. We don’t tell the truth because we have taken an oath; we tell the truth because we are truthful.”[2]

Honest people don’t need to swear by anything, they are known for their honesty and their word is enough. That’s what Jesus wants us to understand. He wants us to honest and truthful the way He and the Father are honest and truthful. Jesus wants us to follow Him and to be men and women of integrity.

Think about it, if we said what we meant and meant what we said there would be no need to make lofty promises. If we kept our word, even down to the smallest thing, it might cause us to be slow in speaking which would be a good thing, but it would also eliminate the need for solemn vows because people could simple trust us. This is what Jesus wants from his people. He wants us to live simple and quiet lives of honesty and trustworthiness.

This is something that we are going to have to think about and work hard so that we can grow. We are going to have to work hard to avoid some of the more common ways that we fall into deception and falsehood. So let’s talk about some of the ways we commonly fail to tell the truth.

1. The half-truth: you tell the truth, but not all the truth. This happens when our children get into fight and when we try to get to the bottom of what happened we only get one side of the story.

This also happens when a friend tells you about a fight they had with their spouse and when you ask what happened to cause the fight, they only tell you the terrible things their spouse did, while conveniently leaving out the terrible things they’ve done.

Abraham did this when he claimed that Sarah was his sister. She was his half-sister, but he didn’t mention that she also happened to be his wife! He was being deceitful so that he could protect himself and it happens to us more than we care to admit.

2. The “white” lie: these are the “innocent” lies that “don’t hurt anyone.” You call in sick to work when you’re really well. Just because it is culturally expected doesn’t mean that it is right.

3. The lie to cover for someone else: this doesn’t happen as much today, but before we had cell phones we had something called a home-phone. There were times when someone would call to talk to a friend who happened to be sitting right beside you, but you lied and said, “No, they’re not here right now.”

We might see this at work where a secretary would lie about her boss or supervisor not being in the office, when actually they are avoiding someone or some deadline. Whatever the circumstance we are lying to cover for someone else.

4. Exaggeration: stretching the truth to make yourself look better or to evoke sympathy for your cause. Sometimes it’s an old fish story where we want people to think we are better than we actually are. But at other times this is a form of manipulation that we use to gain people’s sympathy. Either way it’s a lie.

5. The silent lie: have you ever had a person assume something flattering about you that is clearly false, but you don’t speak up to correct it.

6. The cover-up lie: You hide your own wrongdoing with the rationalization that it would hurt the other person too much to find out the real truth.

7. The evasive lie: do you ever change the subject or conveniently dodge the truth by not answering directly. [3]

All of these are common and seemingly simple ways of communication, but as Christians we need to learn to see them for what they are…lies. The intention is to hide the truth, to embellish the situation, to manipulate and deceive so that we can gain favor in someone else’s eyes.

James 3:2 We all stumble in many ways. And if anyone does not stumble in what he says, he is a perfect man, able also to bridle his whole body. 3 If we put bits into the mouths of horses so that they obey us, we guide their whole bodies as well. 4 Look at the ships also: though they are so large and are driven by strong winds, they are guided by a very small rudder wherever the will of the pilot directs. 5 So also the tongue is a small member, yet it boasts of great things. 

How great a forest is set ablaze by such a small fire! 6 And the tongue is a fire, a world of unrighteousness. The tongue is set among our members, staining the whole body, setting on fire the entire course of life, and set on fire by hell. 7 For every kind of beast and bird, of reptile and sea creature, can be tamed and has been tamed by mankind, 8 but no human being can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison. 9 With it we bless our Lord and Father, and with it we curse people who are made in the likeness of God. 10 From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My brothers, these things ought not to be so.

The truth is that we will fail in our speech, but what should we do when we fail? What happens when we make a promise that we simply cannot keep? What happens when we fail to speak the truth? The first thing we must do is to confess our sin to God. Then we must confess our sin to the person we lied to and finally we must seek to make things right with genuine repentance.

Conclusion…

The Bible is filled with warnings for how our tongues can cause destruction.

Proverbs 18:21 Death and life are in the power of the tongue,

Jesus wants us to be people whose tongues give life. He wants us to be a church whose speech is trustworthy.

I want to challenge you, all of us as a church, to take this matter seriously and to work to grow in the area of telling the truth. I have provided for you a copy of 20 Resolutions on Taming the Tongue written by Sinclair Ferguson. Let me urge you to take this and open your Bible to the book of James and read through these two things together examining the common ways you speak and seeking to grow in speaking the truth in all things.

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[1] https://bible.org/seriespage/16-yes-or-no-enough-matthew-533-37

[2] The Christian Salt & Light Company [Discovery House Publishing], p. 156-158

[3] ibid

The Truth about Marriage and Divorce

Series: The Sermon on the Mount

Speaker: Pastor Justin Wheeler

Scripture: Matthew 5:31-32

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If the Bible is telling us the truth about reality, then the universe and our place within it are not accidental, they are filled with divine purpose. If the Bible is telling us the truth about reality, then we know that there is a purpose to everything, that time, matter and physics are not ultimate and that our lives and how we live them truly matter. If the Bible is telling us the truth about reality, then we know that life and death are among the most important things, that love is worth dying for, that music does make life better, that there is a time to laugh and a time to cry.

If the Bible is telling us the truth about reality, then we know that much of the popular cultural outlook is completely wrong. If the Bible is telling us the truth about reality, then we can know with certainty that God created mankind with marital romance in mind. In Genesis 2, God established Marriage as the first cultural institution and it was established before the fall as a gift to us and a profound mystery that has something to do with God’s plan for the world.

Before there was a city, a school, a hospital, or even a church; God established a home in the Garden for Adam and Eve to enjoy as husband and wife. Marriage was God’s plan and it did not come about as a social construct; rather it came down out of Heaven to occupy an exalted place in human history. This is how the Bible starts. This is how God’s story began.

At the beginning of Scripture and right on the heels of creation, God move very quickly from the creation of the universe to the marriage relationship between Adam and Eve? But why? Why does God put a man and a woman on center stage at the beginning of all things; because the story God wants to tell is a love story? It is a love story that ultimately takes shape when Jesus, our perfect groom, comes to redeem His eternal bride, the church, from the sin that drove us from Him in the first place. Marriage is a picture of the gospel and this means that there is more at stake in our understanding of marriage than we can imagine.

Transition…

For this reason, we need to take Jesus’ teaching on marriage and divorce far more seriously than many of us do. In Jesus’ day, there were some common cultural views on marriage and divorce. Those views were related to what Moses wrote in the book of Deuteronomy, but like many things, the true meaning of God’s word had been twisted to suit the desires of the day. The prevailing view at the time was that Marriage wasn’t all that important, and so long as you provided a legal document of divorce one could walk away from marriage in a “no-fault” kind of way.

But Jesus wants us to know that it is not that simple.

Matt 5:31 “It was also said, ‘Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.’ 32 But I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of sexual immorality, makes her commit adultery, and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery. 

Like most of what we have read in this Sermon on the Mount, Jesus’ teaching on the subject of marriage and divorce don’t find wide acceptance in our present day. Modern sensibilities have not only downgraded the importance of marriage (Biblical) but have also reduced the significance of divorce.

Many of you have experienced divorce either personally or through someone close to you. Many of you still bear the scars from a divorce that took place within your family. Many of you look at divorce as one of the most difficult and shaping events of your life. Because of this, it is nearly impossible to talk about divorce or to teach on divorce in a way that will shield you from the stirring up of painful memories and emotions. It is not my intention to be offensive, it is, however, my intention and calling, to be honest with you about what the Bible says and that may result in your being offended. May God show us grace as we navigate these waters together.

Sermon Focus…

I. What is Marriage?

Marriage was God’s idea from the very beginning. Marriage is not a human concept or a social construct. Marriage is not simply a legal contract for the purpose of state-recognized tax incentives. Marriage is not simply a way to propagate the human race, nor is it simply God approved mating.

According to Genesis 2, Marriage is an institution established by God and ordained by God at the very beginning of human history. God instituted marriage as the foundation for all of society. This is incredibly important for us to understand because when we see that marriage is God’s idea we must also see that He is the one who establishes the rules that govern it.

In his book, Marriage and the Mystery of the Gospel, Ray Ortlund writes:

“Marriage is not a human invention; it is a divine revelation. Its design was never part of our own made up arrangement; it was given to us at the beginning of all things, as a bright shining monument of eternal significance. We might not always live up to its grandeur. None of us does so perfectly. But we have no right to redefine it, and we have every reason to revere it.”[1]

Marriage was designed by God as a way for a man and a woman to enter into one intimate relationship that in part would allow us to experience the intimacy that each of us truly longs for and to experience the type of intimacy that is perfected within the Godhead. At no other point in nature does 1 + 1 = 1 save in the marriage of a man and woman. In no other relationship in the universe does 1 + 1 + 1 = 1 save in the divine trinity. I believe that God designed marriage as a way of allowing us, His creatures, a taste of the intimacy that He enjoys in the godhead perfectly.

But there is more to the mystery of marriage and it is that the marriage relationship between a man and woman is to be a display of the gospel to the world. In Ephesians 5 Paul tells us that marriage, flawed though it is because of sin, is to be a vivid display of the love that Jesus Christ has for His bride, and the submissive respect that the church has for her Lord

Marriage is God’s idea and is therefore governed by God’s Word. Marriage is the foundational institution upon which all of society and culture is built. Marriage is a covenant between one man and one woman in the eyes of God and for the duration of their lives. Marriage is a beautiful gift from God that beckons us to behold the sin-overcoming grace of God in Jesus.

But marriage, like everything else in this world is subject to sin. So, what happens when sin begins to affect our marriage?

II. Marriage is worth fighting for.

First, let’s understand that Marriage is not the problem, sin is. Sin is the result of our desire for pleasure, comfort or control, which overshadows our desire to please God. Sin is our natural selfish inclination to have what we want, when we want it and how we want it. When you take two people who are both plagued by this problem and you put them into the same house together, it gets messy quick.

It’s especially difficult in the first year of marriage because that year is largely about getting to know one another and getting to know yourself. Marriage is intended to produce intimacy between a husband and wife and that intimacy is not easily gained, it must be pursued and fought for. Some days you take two steps forward in intimacy, the next day you might take one step back.

But what happens when sin crowds out intimacy? What happens when a husband gets to know his wife, but he fails to learn anything about himself? What happens when desire gives way to sin and sin gives way to fighting and we haven’t learned how to fight fair? What are we to do when marriage becomes difficult?

Friends, I want to encourage you that your marriage is worth fighting for and I want to offer you 6 weapons that you need to use regularly as you battle to have a godly marriage.

1. Remember Your Vows - We don’t often make vows in life, in fact the Scriptures are going to warn us against making vows rashly. But when we make a vow before our spouse, our pastor, our family, our friends and before God; it is no small thing. And yet, how often do we simply forget the vows we made to love in sickness and in health, to love for richer or for poorer, to love until death do us part.

Often times, we make those vows with no integrity at all. What we really mean is I’ll love you as long as it’s good, because we all have the hope and expectation that it will be good. But when it gets difficult we  need to remember that we made a commitment before God to love our spouse and that is going to be difficult at times.

Loving your spouse is going to mean that you forego your own happiness at times, and that’s OK because marriage is not primarily about your happiness, it’s much more about your holiness. Marriage is one of the most powerful tools in God’s toolbox when it comes to our growth in godliness.

2. Remember the Word of God - When Leigh and I got married in 2001 we very quickly moved 9 hours away to Kansas City, MO where I was enrolled in Seminary. I had just completed my undergrad and Leigh was still working on hers when we got married and moved away from both of our families and our home church.

We had gone through pre-marital counseling and it was a big help, but nothing really prepared us for the first couple of months of being married and being alone in a place that was foreign to us. Those first few months were hard, but they were beautiful in that we had nowhere else to turn but to the Word of God and to one another in order to work out our problems.

We learned to navigate the ups and downs of married life together and with our Bibles open. I praise God for those years and for the instruction that I received from the Word on how to love my wife, how to encourage her, how to listen to her, how to wash her with the water of the Word, how to be gentle with her, how to care for her, and the truth is I am still learning.

3. Relate to your Spouse – In conflict the worst thing you can do is to wall yourself off from your husband or your wife. Talk to one another. Listen to one another and work on the problems together. But don’t wait until things get bad to try and work on your relationship. Turn off the TV, put down your phone, close your computer and simply talk to one another. Facebook can wait but your wife shouldn’t have to.

4. Repent of Your Sin – Our initial response is usually that the problem is not with me, it’s with her. But consider that the problem you are having in your marriage is not primarily about your spouse. It may be that you are the one that is most in need of growth. Most of us are really good at pointing out the faults in our spouse, but we are terrible at seeing our own.

So be honest with yourself and with your spouses. Be willing to see what the real problem is and when the problem reveals your sin or shortcoming, be the first to ask for forgiveness and to repent.

This is another place where the Word of God is going to be critical for us, but let me caution you to use the Word like a band-aid and not like a baseball bat. When my kids get a cut or a bruise a band-aid just makes it all better because it comforts the hurt, it covers the wound and it holds out the promise of healing over time. That’s how we should use the Word in our marriages, to comfort our hurts, to cover our wounds and to bring growth and healing over time.

Where truth needs to be spoken firmly, speak but check your motives before you wade into war. We need to wash each other with the word, which implies gentleness. We need to “live with our wives in an understanding way, showing honor (I Pet 3:7).”

5. Receive Godly Counsel – Contrary to our own opinion, we are not always the wisest people in the world. There are times when we need to receive the counsel of other Godly men and women, and we need to be prepared to follow it. There are two steps to receiving counsel, hearing and following. Don’t reject the counsel of another simply because it is difficult, if the council is Biblically sound and contextually appropriate, follow it. If you are not sure if it meets those criteria, then include other counselors in the process.

Proverbs 11:14 Where there is no guidance, a people falls, but in an abundance of counselors there is safety.

6. Be Reconciled to Your Spouse –We live in a day when divorce is put on the table before most other steps are taken. But the pursuit of reconciliation is the posture of Gospel people. Reconciliation can only happen when sin is confessed and forgiven. But it can happen and should happen in the lives of Christians because we are a people whose lives are defined by reconciliation.

Of all people, Christians should be those who champion confession of sin and the forgiveness that follows, because we are those who have confessed our sin and found forgiveness in Christ. We should be those who wait patiently for and who fight for reconciliation because we have been reconciled to God, many of us after years of sinful rebellion.

Now, that we have talked about what marriage is and some ways that we can fight for our marriage, let’s talk about the other side of this passage in Matthew 5.

III. What is divorce?

Matt 5:31 “It was also said, ‘Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.’ 32 But I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of sexual immorality, makes her commit adultery, and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery. 

Jesus addresses the issue of divorce in all of the gospels and when he does he is not only addressing divorce itself but also the current controversy that was taking place between the rival rabbinic schools of Hillel and Shammai. You can see the debate much more clearly by reading Matthew 19.

Matt 19:3 And Pharisees came up to him and tested him by asking, “Is it lawful to divorce one’s wife for any cause?” 4 He answered, “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, 5 and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? 6 So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.” 7 They said to him, “Why then did Moses command one to give a certificate of divorce and to send her away?”

In Deut 24, Moses allowed for a man to divorce his wife if she found no favor in his eyes because he found some indecency in her. Shammai taught that the indecency Moses referred to was adultery, but others broadened their interpretation. Some rabbis such as Hillel, taught that if a wife spoiled dinner a man had a right to divorce her. Another named Akiba, allowed for divorce if the man found a woman that was prettier.[2]

The actual phrase in Deuteronomy refers to a scandalous act of sexual misconduct, which means that these latter interpretations are not only wrong, but they are mocking the sanctity of Marriage. They are using the letter of the law as a way to justify their sinful desires. Jesus clearly sides with the more conservative school on this issue, but He's going to go even further than that.

8 He said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so. 9 And I say to you: whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery.” 

Notice that the Pharisees say that Moses commanded divorce, but Jesus points out that Moses allowed for divorce. God allowed for divorce as an act of grace intended to cover the shame of sin within us and within our marriage. But divorce is never commanded and it is only permitted in very specific circumstances.

Jesus’ teaching on divorce is clear. He restricts divorce in every circumstance but sexual immorality (adultery) and desertion by an unbeliever.

Matt 5:32 But I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of sexual immorality, makes her commit adultery, and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.

Matt 19:9 And I say to you: whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery.”

1 Corinthians7:12 To the rest I say… that if any brother has a wife who is an unbeliever, and she consents to live with him, he should not divorce her. 13 If any woman has a husband who is an unbeliever, and he consents to live with her, she should not divorce him… 15 But if the unbelieving partner separates, let it be so. In such cases the brother or sister is not enslaved (Is Free). God has called you to peace.

So there are three principles we need to understand and follow from these passages when it comes to divorce.

1. Divorce is permitted, but not required, on the ground of sexual immorality.

2. Divorce is permitted, but not required, on the ground of desertion by an unbelieving spouse.

3. When the divorce was not permissible, any subsequent remarriage (to someone other than the original spouse) results in adultery.

But what about those whose divorce was permissible? When the divorce was legitimate, I believe, a person is free to remarry. I believe that when Jesus uses the exception clause in Matthew 5 and 19 which allows for divorce that it also gives that person the freedom to remarry. At the same time, I believe that Paul is supporting this idea in I Cor 7:15 when he says that the Christian who was abandoned by an unbelieving spouse is “free” or “not enslaved.”

There are some guys whom I greatly respect who would disagree with me on this. Some would agree that divorce is permissible in the case of those two exceptions, but that remarriage is not. And it really comes down to what Paul means by “free” in I Cor and whether or not Jesus’ exception applies to both divorce and remarriage. I think free means free from covenant responsibilities and therefore free to remarry. I think the exception modifies both.

But how would Jesus’ audience understand this teaching? Here’s a pretty strong statement on that issue from Kevin DeYoung…

“All scholars on every side of this divorce and remarriage debate agree that it was a given for first century Jews that remarriage was a valid option after a valid divorce. To be granted a legal separation meant de facto that you were no longer bound to anyone and thus free to remarry. No one in Jesus audience was thinking that remarriage wouldn’t be an option.”[3]

In situations where the divorce was permissible, remarriage is also permissible. This does not mean that you should run out and be married again, but I believe that it is permissible for you to do so.

Conclusion…

I know that this sermon has probably raised a ton of questions in your minds. Many of these questions are difficult because they don’t fit neatly into a Biblical scenario and they are difficult because of the emotion involved. But we can’t let complexity or emotion drown out God’s Word. So, in closing I want to address 4 groups of people this morning.

1. To those who are married I want to urge you to not only stay married but also to fight for your marriage, work at your marriage, pray for your marriage and guard your marriage. Just because things are good for you right now doesn’t mean that you are not open to temptation and just because things are bad right now doesn’t mean that your marriage can’t get gloriously better. Remember your vows, remember the Word, work on your relationship, repent of your sin, receive Godly counsel, and above all seek reconciliation.

2. To those who are single I want you to know that to find a godly spouse is to find a good thing. But, both Jesus and Paul are clear that a full and godly life can be lived in singleness. Read I Corinthians 7 and meditate on its instruction. Focus on the fact that the true aim of a disciple of Christ is to be devoted to the Lord in all things. Marriage is a beautiful gift from God but your manhood or womanhood is no less intact because of your singleness.

3. To those who are divorced but shouldn’t be I want you to know that divorce is not an unpardonable sin. There is grace in Christ that is more than a match for your sin. I want to urge you to find forgiveness at the cross and let the kindness of the Lord bring you to fresh repentance and then as much as you are able, seek reconciliation. In Christ, there is always the hope of reconciliation but if that doesn’t happen, don’t seek remarriage with someone else.

4. To those who were improperly divorced and now remarried I think you should follow Paul’s instruction and stay as you are but seek forgiveness and repentance for your past sins. I would also urge you to make amends with your ex-spouse, your children, your family, your friends, and your church. I would urge you to also find the grace and mercy of Christ to be enough to satisfy the guilt of your past. But I would also challenge you to guard your current marriage with newfound wisdom, strength and purpose.

Marriage is a gift from God, but sin is still our enemy. Jesus shows us grace when he allows for divorce in certain cases, but He reminds us in these passages that this whole issue of divorce is really brought about by our hardness of heart. Marriage is supposed to be this grand thing that gives us a taste of true intimacy. It is also the grand theme of the story of redemption that God is writing for all the world to see.

That gospel story is ultimately a story of reconciliation. It is the story of how an infinitely patient and loving God has pursued and won back His often adulterous and wayward bride. If you are a believer in Christ today then you are the product of God’s reconciling work and you have the promise of His Word that He nothing can ever separate you from His love, He will never divorce you.

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[1] Ray Ortlund, Marriage and the Mystery of the Gospel (preface)

[2] Leon Morris, Luke (TNTC, pg 275).

[3] Keving DeYoung sermon notes What Did Jesus Think of Divorce and Remarriage? 

Lust and the Kingdom of God

Series: The Sermon on the Mount

Speaker: Pastor Justin Wheeler

Scripture: Matthew 5:27-30

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Matt 5:27 “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ 28 But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart. 29 If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell. 30 And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell. 

Is there any Christian teaching more ridiculed than Christ’s teaching on sexuality? Is there any command of God more ignored and broken than the 7th commandment against adultery? Is there a more popular sin in human history than sexual immorality? Our American culture and much of the world thinks that Jesus is crazy for what He says in these 4 verses.

We live in a culture where our entire lives are inundated with sexuality. It’s on our TV, in our movies, and on the catalogues and ads that are delivered to our door. It’s on billboards as we drive into downtown. It’s plastered across the magazine racks in high-gloss photos as we approach the checkout counter at the grocery store. And of course, it’s almost as if the internet was made for the specific purpose of pushing sexuality into our lives in every imaginable way.

This has had a huge impact on our lives and our culture. Adultery is so common that it is simply accepted as a normal part of adult life, especially for our political leaders. In fact, if a political leader takes measures to remain faithful to their spouse they are mocked as being sexually repressive. Sex before marriage is just normal and it has been this way for generations. Homosexuality has been declared a basic human right by our Supreme Court. Transgenderism and transsexualism are just this cultural moment’s examples of sexual deviance being made to look normal and God’s standards being made to look obscene.

There was a time when the Jesus’ teaching on sexuality was largely embraced as good and right, even if it wasn’t practiced. But that is no longer the case. A sexual revolution has taken place.

This revolution is now so complete that those who will not join are understood to be deficient, intolerant, and harmful to society. What was previously understood to be immoral is now celebrated as a moral good. The church’s historic teaching on sexuality in general and homosexuality in specific, which was shared by the vast majority of the culture until very recently - is now seen as a relic of the past and a repressive force that must be eradicated.[1]

Transition…

When it comes to teaching on this topic, Jesus stands in the minority. Jesus, the Son of God and the Savior of the World, says that it would be better for us to live life without eyes and hands than to embrace the sexual revolution and ride it all the way into hell. He teaches us that there are some things that our hearts are naturally oriented around that will lead us to Hell. He wants us to understand that eternal things are at stake and therefore we must do whatever it takes to kill sin before sin kills us.

But before the battle gets underway we need to learn a few things. First, we need to learn what the law says about adultery. Second, we need to learn what Jesus says about lust. Third, we are going to learn how to battle against the temptation to sin in these ways.

Sermon Focus…

I. What the law says about Adultery (V. 27)

The first thing Jesus does is to quote the 7th commandment found in Exodus 20:14.

Matt 5:27 “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’

That’s all this is. Jesus is not adding to the law or taking away from the law; He is simply stating again that this law of God still applies. He is quoting from the 10 commandments and reminding us that God’s standards for sexual purity and marital fidelity haven’t changed. God’s standard was established in Genesis 2.

From the very beginning God made it clear that He created us, male and female, and His intention was for a “man to leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife…and the two were naked and unashamed (Gen 2:24-25).” That has always been God’s designed context for intimacy. Within the context of monogamous, heterosexual marriage sex is an amazing gift of God that is to be enjoyed for pleasure, for procreation and for the joy of intimacy. Outside of monogamous heterosexual marriage sex in all its forms is sin.

Adultery is sinful because it falls outside of what God has declared good and right, but it is also sinful because it seeks to destroy what God set up as the foundation of the world He created. He created this world and designed man, “to be fruitful and multiply and to fill the earth…” This would take place as families grew and children were born, but adultery is an attack upon the family.

Last week we learned that murder is an assault upon the image of God in man and this week I want us to see that adultery is an assault upon the plan of God for man. Satan’s temptation of Adam and Eve was aimed to separate the husband and wife from their God. The temptation to commit adultery is aimed to separate a husband from his wife and a wife from her husband as a means of undermining the plan of God for the world.

Therefore, adultery is forbidden throughout the Bible and the punishment for this sin was death. But this wasn’t enough to keep people from committing this sin especially kings. The highest profile case of adultery in the Bible is that of King David and his sin with Bathsheba in 2 Sam 11. But David’s son Solomon was a serial adulterer and as a result the nation seemed to follow his lead. The prophet Jeremiah lamented the fact that, “The land (of Israel) was full of adulterers (Jer 23:10).”

But Jesus wants us to know that there is much more to adultery than the physical act.

II. What Jesus says about Lust (V. 28)

28 But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.

Last week we learned that we can commit murder with our words but here Jesus teaches that we can commit adultery with our eyes. Lust is heart adultery. It is the strong sexual desire for something or someone that is forbidden, for something that doesn’t belong to us.

The act of Adultery is forbidden in the 7th commandment and lust is actually forbidden in the 10th commandment.

Exodus 20:17 “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male servant, or his female servant, or his ox, or his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor’s.” 

So here in Matthew 5, Jesus is bringing these two commands together to show that they are connected. One of the things that God’s commandments show us is that we can commit sin without ever committing the act. When a man looks at a woman (not his wife) with strong sexual desire in his heart or when a woman looks at a man (not her husband) with strong sensual desires in her heart, Jesus says that you are guilty of adultery and sexual immorality. Let’s make this more personal, Jesus is saying that when you look at another person other than your spouse and you entertain lustful thoughts about them, you are committing sin in your heart.

Lust alone is enough to defile us before God.

Matt 15:19 For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander. 20 These are what defile a person.

Those childhood/teenage crushes that so many think are innocent, those wild fantasies that we never discuss, those emotional romance novels that our culture has grown to adore, the pervasive spread of pornography; all of these things have caused us to consider lust a common and respectable sin. But Jesus says that any of these is enough to condemn us before God. And just so we’re clear, any and every sexual practice which God declares immoral in deed is also immoral in thought.

The fact that we live in the 21st century does nothing to change, altar or undo God’s command for sexual purity. C.S. Lewis wrote this in 1952 in the culture of Great Britain and it is true of our culture today.

Chastity is the most unpopular of the Christian virtues. There is no getting away from it; the Christian rule is, either marriage, with complete faithfulness to your spouse, or else total abstinence. Now this is so difficult and so contrary to our instincts, that obviously either Christianity is wrong or our sexual instinct, as it now is, has gone wrong. One or the other. Of course, being a Christian, I think it is the instinct which has gone wrong.[2]

I agree with his conclusion about where the problem lies. It is not Christianity that is the problem it is our sinful sexual instinct that is the problem.

Human sexuality was created by God as a pleasurable gift to be enjoyed, as a means to build families, and as a way to strengthen intimacy/unity between a husband and wife. But the sin in our hearts has the power to corrupt the best of God’s gifts.

In a world filled with sinful people we find a world filled with sexual immorality. In every way imaginable humanity has explored the scope of sexual sin and the result is more serious than we might want to think. In Romans 1 as Paul is teaching on the pervasiveness of sin in the world he tells us that the root of the problem is that mankind has, “exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images of man and beast…mankind has exchanged the truth of God for a lie…mankind has exchanged what is natural for what is unnatural and the result is that the Wrath of God is ready to be unleashed against mankind.”

The vertical dishonoring of God (exchanging of God’s glory) is ultimately what has led to the horizontal idolatry of man, beasts, and sex.

When you exchange something, you express your preference. You express your greater desire. And if you prefer God’s creation over God, then you find God less desirable than what you prefer…if you see anything as more beautiful, more attractive, more desirable than God, you are in the dark and not seeing reality for what it is…This exchange of God’s glory for other things - this preferring human glories over God’s glory – is the root of disordered sexuality.[3]

In other words, sex is about worship. Our sinful heart’s refusal to worship and submit to God is what gives rise to the sexual immorality and idolatry in our hearts, our lives, our homes and our culture.

So at this point the question is, “What hope do we have to see real change in our lives when it comes to sexual sin?” Well let’s start with what Jesus says here in Matt 5 and then think about what Jesus did on the cross.

III. What must we do about Lust and Adultery (V. 29-30)

29 If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell. 30 And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell. 

Now, most of our world disagrees with this and many of us may as well. Jesus says it is better to go through this life without a hand or an eye than it is to indulge in sinful pleasures and go to hell. Our world lives like this statement from Jesus is a lie. But Jesus isn’t trying to take our joy and pleasure away from us. He is trying to lead us into the deeper and greater joy that He made us for.

We don’t like to entertain deep thoughts like this but the truth is that intimacy with God is eternally more enjoyable than a one-night stand or lustful thoughts. That’s what Jesus is saying here and if he were able, that is what King David would tell us.

(Illus…David looked upon a beautiful woman and desired her, so he had his guards go and get her and then he sinned with her. The sin in his heart led to sin in the bedroom and then it spilled out into his army when he orchestrated the death of one of his own mighty men, Uriah.

If he were here, David would tell us that Jesus is right and that we should make war with our flesh rather than to give into the temptation to sin with our eyes or our bodies.

But what about this command to cut out our eyes and cut off our hand. Notice that he says to eliminate the right eye and right hand. He is not speaking literally as some throughout history have supposed. Jesus is speaking metaphorically and using dramatic figures of speech to show us that sin must be dealt with radically. The value of the right eye and hand as the most important or valuable part of us shows that “in order to avoid sin one is to give up everything, even what is most important and most treasured” (Luz, Matthew 1– 7, 247).[4]

So one step in our approach to battling sin and temptation is, “If our right eye causes us to sin…don’t look.” Behave as if you had actually plucked out your eyes. That is what mortification is all about. It is taking real and drastic measures to battle against sin and temptation. For some of us that means you need to put filters on your computers and home network. For others, this means that you need to stop reading the books you’re reading. For others, this means you need to delete your social media accounts, or stop watching the movies or HBO and Netflix shows you enjoy so much.

Yes, I’m sure that your friends will say, “What are you talking about? You’re not going to know how this end. If you’re not going to watch this new show or read this new book…you won’t be as culturally educated as you could be.” That may be true, but it is better to be culturally maimed and preserve your purity. The question is whether you are willing to go to this extreme to battle sin and temptation.

Jesus says that it is better to live life culturally maimed, to avoid certain experiences in this life, than to risk final destruction in the life to come.

Now, in many ways, this approach to change is good But this approach is not enough because this approach doesn’t address the root of our problem. This approach is simply not complete because it focuses on the outward behaviors only and the root of our problem with sexual sin is the heart. Behavior modification alone will not solve this problem of our hearts. Only Jesus can solve this problem.

Now, one of my deepest Christian convictions is that the gospel is so much more than simply the minimal doctrine that one must affirm in order to go to Heaven. The gospel is the power of God that saves us from sin’s guilt and sin’s control and turns the entire world upside down.

The gospel is so powerful that it can turn an enemy of God into a worshipper of God. It is so powerful that it can change your eternity as well as your life here and now. The gospel changes us at the very core of who we are. It reorients our heart around the weight of God’s glory and when the gospel takes root in our hearts it begins a process of reorienting all of life around our growing love for God over our love for sin.

As believers in Christ our identity as gospel people is going to propel us into battle against sexual sin. Jesus doesn’t command us to embrace a Biblical sexual ethic in order that we can be saved, but instead as the born again people of God he calls us to embrace a God-honoring view of sex. Obedience to God flows out of a renewed relationship to God.

Conclusion…

I think that our battle against sexual sin begins not with what we need to do but with something we need to believe…

Our identity is in Christ, not our sexuality. The culture says, “You are your sexuality.” The culture says that to deny our sexual urges is to deny our humanity. The culture wants us to believe that If we reject its views of sexuality and the practice of those views then we are rejecting what it means to be human.

But the Bible teaches us something else about sex?

a. The Bible teaches us the context in which sex is a gift. Within the context of monogamous, heterosexual marriage sex is an amazing gift of God that is to be enjoyed for pleasure, for procreation and for the joy of intimacy. Outside of monogamous heterosexual marriage sex in all its forms is sin.

b. The Bible teaches us that sex and romantic fulfillment are not the keys to life. They are gifts but they are not the ultimate point of life. Jesus was celibate and lived the fullest and most God-glorifying life ever lived. Therefore, Jesus teaches us that the key to a full life is not intimacy with another person but rather intimacy with God.

In American culture, we have completely distorted this. Our culture promotes the pursuit of sexual pleasure first and foremost and then in the context of our sexual enjoyment we are to then find religious teaching that affirms and supports our sexuality.

But Jesus wants us to pursue our relationship with God first and foremost and then in the context of that relationship we are to enjoy God’s gift of sex in a way that glorifies Him.

Trusting Christ with our sexuality is hard because it goes against the grain of what culture says and in many ways, it goes against the grain of what we feel and want. Our natural predisposition is to sin. It is to go against God’s glory, Gods rule, and Gods word.  We are dead in sin, we are enemies of God, we are blinded to God’s glory and through the gospel Jesus calls us out of this and into a life with God that is going to be hard.

But I want us to remember something about Jesus as we seek to navigate through this issue. In His life, Jesus dealt with a lot of sinful people, even those caught up in sexual sin. But something you will notice is that He never seems to want to push those people away. No matter the issue, Jesus invites people in close so that He can talk to them and offer them grace. Even when He encountered people who were involved with deep sexual sins we see that Jesus draws near to them and offers them grace, He is honest with them about their sin, but then He looks them in the eye and He says, “Now, come and follow me.”

Friends, I want you to know that Jesus doesn’t push us away because of our problems with sexual sin; He invites us to come even closer. He offers us grace, He calls us to repent, but He also offers us a place at His table. So let’s draw near to Him and let His grace and truth guide us.

Transition to the Lord’s Supper…

In a few minutes, we are going to put our Bible’s down and we are going to take up a small piece of bread which reminds us of the broken body of Jesus and a small cup of wine or juice that reminds us of the blood of Jesus. And like we have done many times before we will think about these elements, pray over these elements and then eat and drink them together.  Now when we do this the historical and theological facts of Jesus’ death will be swirling around in our heads and that is the way it should be. 

In that moment, we remember that Christ commanded us to do this for the sake of remembering. He told us to engage our minds and remember His loving sacrifice. But when the Holy Spirit opens up our hearts and pours the reality of God’s love into us, that’s when our obedience becomes an act of worship. That’s when our faith in Christ becomes true spiritual food for our souls.

So as we ready ourselves to eat this Lord’s Supper and to feast upon Christ’s provision for our redemption I would ask that you ready your hearts by clinging with all of your might to the love of God. We have a great need for a Savior and in Christ we have a great Savior for our need. Surrender your life to the love that God has shown us in Christ. Build your life upon Him. Trust your soul to His steadfast

love and pray with me that we would experience this love more and more through the power of the Holy Spirit.

If you are a believer in Christ, meaning that you trust that Jesus is the Son of God who died to take away your sin and was raised to secure your salvation. If you are trusting in Christ alone as your Savior and Lord then we welcome you to join us in observing the Lord’s Supper this morning. As the plates pass you will see clear cups filled with grape juice and purple cups filled with wine.

If you are not a believer and have not come to trust in Christ then we ask that you simply let these plates pass by you. But I would urge you to think deeply about the state of your soul. I would urge you to consider your sin and its offense to God. I would urge you to look to Jesus as your only hope of rescue and to put your trust in Him alone for salvation.

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[1] Al Mohler We Cannot Be Silent (Pg. 4)

[2] C.S. Lewis Mere Christianity: Sexual Morality (pg. 95)

[3] John Piper Living in the Light of Money, Sex and Power (pg. 34-5)

[4] Pennington, Jonathan T.. The Sermon on the Mount and Human Flourishing: A Theological Commentary (p. 207). Baker Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

Anger and the Kingdom of God

Series: The Sermon on the Mount

Speaker: Pastor Justin Wheeler

Scripture: Matthew 5:21-26

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Matt 5:20 For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. 

21 “You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not murder; and whoever murders will be liable to judgment.’ 22 But I say to you that 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.

23 So if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, 24 leave your gift there before the altar and go. First be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift. 25 Come to terms quickly with your accuser while you are going with him to court, lest your accuser hand you over to the judge, and the judge to the guard, and you be put in prison. 26 Truly, I say to you, you will never get out until you have paid the last penny.

Of all the sins that Jesus could have chosen to start with to make his point, He chose murder. He could have started with something simpler and less offensive, but He comes out of the gate with one of the most grievous sins known to man. But if you think about it, it makes sense for Him to start with murder since man’s first crime was murder.

In Genesis 4 we read about the very first sin committed outside the Garden of Eden. Cain and his brother Abel prepared their offerings to the Lord. The Lord received Abel’s offering but not Cain’s and,

“So Cain was very angry, and his face fell…8 Cain spoke to Abel his brother. And when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel and killed him.

Now, Jesus’ audience would have been very familiar with this story about the first act of murder and the other stories of murder that follow. They would have remembered the story of Lamech who boasted about his two wives and that he had killed a young man. Perhaps Jesus’ audience would have been familiar with the first prohibition against murder from Genesis 9:6, “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, for God made man in his own image.”

Don’t miss the fact that we are 9 chapters into the Bible and we have already seen murder become so prevalent on the earth that God gave Moses this divine law in order to forbid it. Murder is a serious crime in the eyes of God and it demands a serious punishment. Murder is an assault upon the image of God in man. Human life is not cheap, it is precious to God and when it is taken, God demands justice.

The act of murder is a grievous sin and its effects can be seen throughout the Bible and throughout the history of humanity. Murder is a terrible crime, a terrible transgression of God’s law, which demands swift and balancing justice, but murder has a root that goes deeper than the act itself.

The Scribes and Pharisees trusted in themselves that they were righteous. They trusted that since they hadn’t committed the act of murder that they had kept God’s law, but Jesus shows here that God’s law requires much more than we might think. God’s commandment teaches us that envy, anger, and even insults are forbidden.

Transition…

Anger is one of those respectable sins and when we get angry we don’t think it’s a big deal, at least it doesn’t seem like big deal to us. We get angry all the time with people who don’t drive the way we want them to. We get angry with our children when they run around the house making noise instead of going to bed like we asked them to. We get angry with our spouse when they forget something, or do something that annoys us, or when they fail to do something the way we wanted them to. We get angry when our favorite team doesn’t win. We get angry when someone posts something we don’t agree with online…We get angry all the time and for a lot of reasons

I think it is safe to say that we have an anger problem and Jesus wants us to know that this is a VERY BIG DEAL. We just read what Jesus said, “Everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment.” Jesus is talking to us this morning and He wants us to avoid the error of the Pharisees. He wants us to understand that our sins have roots that go way deeper than just the physical acts.

Sermon Focus…

I. Murder is terrible, but it is not the root of the problem (v. 21-22)

21 “You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not murder; and whoever murders will be liable to judgment.’ 22 But I say to you that 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.

Now, it has been 3 weeks since we have looked at the Sermon on the Mount together and if you are anything like me then you could probably use a reminder of what we learned a few weeks ago. In verses 17-20 we learned about Jesus’ relationship to the Old Testament in general and to the law of God in particular. We learned that Jesus has not come to do away with the Old Testament law, nor has He come to establish a new law. Ultimately, He has come to fulfill the demands of law and to accomplish salvation for His people. But He has also come to faithfully teach on the law so that it would accomplish its purpose in the hearts of God’s people.

The people needed both of these things and so do we. They definitely needed a Savior who would take away their sin but they also needed a faithful teacher of the law because the Scribes and Pharisees had made a real mess of the Old Testament. They had confused and manipulated the law by adding their own interpretations of it and the result is that the people had been taught to look at their relationship with God as little more than a system of superficial rules. They had been taught that salvation could be earned by keeping all the rules.

(Illus…Martyn Lloyd-Jones suggests that the condition of the Jews in Jesus’ day was much like the people of the world just prior to the Protestant Reformation. They had popes and priests teaching them that salvation could be earned through a system of religious practices. The people were ignorant about what God’s Word actually taught and as a result they had been completely led astray by their teachers. But the reformation placed the Word of God in the hands of the people and they began to see for themselves that salvation was a gift of God’s grace, not the result of man’s work.

In a similar way, Jesus has come as a reformer to make the Word of God clear. He has come to make clear what God’s Word says and to show what God’s Word reveals about the real condition of man’s heart. Jesus is concerned with the letter of the law (v. 18) but He is also concerned with the spirit of the law because the Kingdom of Christ is first and foremost internal not external, it is spiritual and moral, not physical and political.

The gospel of Jesus and this sermon are not about external conformity to a pattern of dead religion. Jesus wants nothing to do with that. He doesn’t want blind obedience; He wants our lives of faith to be fueled by love for God that flows from hearts that have been spiritually changed and drenched in God’s grace. The kind of righteous life that Jesus outlines for us in this sermon is first a matter of the heart. His words are aimed at our hearts.

That’s why here in verse 21, Jesus doesn’t stop with the letter of the law but He probes deeper to help us understand what the law reveals about the root of sin that lies in our hearts. The letter of the law promises judgment for the sin of murder but the spirit of the law shifts our focus from the outward act to the inward state.

Now why might this be an important point for Jesus to make? How many of us have read the 10 commandments and thought, “Well at least I haven’t committed murder?” The Pharisees did the same thing. They looked at the pursuit of righteousness simply in terms of what they had and had not done, but Jesus says our behavior is only part of the equation. The key to understanding the deeper purpose of God’s law is to understand what it reveals about our hearts and in our hearts, we commit murder all the time.

It is easy to see that anger is what leads to the act of murder, especially if we look at the story of Cain and Abel. But here Jesus wants us to know that the anger in our hearts is just as dangerous and deserving of condemnation as the act itself.

Jesus wants us to know that God cares when we commit sinful acts, but He also cares about the sinful condition of our hearts. The acts themselves are produced in the heart and the attitudes and emotions of the heart are enough to defile us.

Matthew 15:18 But what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this defiles a person. 19 For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander. 20 These are what defile a person.

Can you remember the last time you were really angry? Angry enough to raise your voice? Or angry enough that you would need to repent of what was actually on your mind? Angry enough to mumble under your breath an insult or angry enough to shout that insult in the direction of another person? In the direction of your brother?

In the eyes of God this anger is enough to defile us. It is not enough that you have kept yourself free from the sin of murder; the unrighteous anger in your heart cries out against you. It may not lead us to murder but it shows itself in our angry thoughts and even the insults that we speak to others. Jesus tells us that this unrighteous anger makes us liable to judgment, which means that anger itself is a transgression of the law.

But wait a minute, is all anger sinful? Some say so, but I think the Bible gives us a category of righteous anger that God displays and He calls us to share. Righteous anger is anger that is directed toward sin, and I’ll share some examples from Scripture. In Exodus 4 we read that the Lord’s anger was kindled against Moses for his insecurity and lack of faith. This phrase is a common one in the OT and it shows that there is a type of anger against sin that is holy.

Later in Exodus 32, Moses himself gets angry when he sees the sin of the people and he throws the 10 commandments to the ground. This type of human anger against sin is connected to the anger that God feels toward sin, but God warns us against giving ourselves over to it completely.

In Psalm 4:4 we read, “Be angry, and do not sin; ponder in your own hearts on you beds and be silent. Offer right sacrifices and put your trust in the Lord.” Paul quotes this Psalm in Ephesians 4:26 when he says, “Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and give no opportunity to the devil.” From these and other passages, I believe that it is possible to be angry and it not be sinful; but only when our anger is directed toward sin.

Jesus showed this type of anger toward the corruption of His Father’s House and His anger was directed toward the sins of men. But I suspect that much of the anger that we feel is not directed toward sin. We get angry because things aren’t going our way. We get angry when we aren’t getting what we want. We get angry when people let us down or when they disrespect us or when our kids annoy us or disobey us for the 10th time; and this anger reveals the sin that still resides within our hearts. This is what Jesus wants to confront us about.

James 4:1 What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you? 2 You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel.

James, the brother of Jesus, wants to follow His Lord’s example and probe to the root of our sin. He points out that the fighting and disunity that breaks out and ruins our relationships is really about the sinful desires of our hearts. We want control and when people don’t let us get our way we get angry. We want peace and when people make too much noise we get angry. We want people to recognize us and our accomplishments, but when they recognize others instead we get angry

This type of anger is selfish, prideful, jealous and idolatrous. This type of anger wreaks havoc in the church. It turns our family holidays into uncomfortable meals that lead to harsh words, hurt feelings and broken families. This type of anger causes bitterness between a husband and his wife and leads to greater sins.

You may have been a believer for years but this type of anger is still lurking in your heart. So, what do we do about? But what do we do about our anger? In the next few verses, Jesus gives us a couple of examples on what to do about our anger.

II. Don’t mask the sin in your heart with external religion (v. 23-24)

Matt 5:23 So if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, 24 leave your gift there before the altar and go. First be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift.

Now this is something that I think most of us are guilty of. What Jesus is warning us against here is attempting to cover up our sin by going to church and participating in religious ceremony. We may be standing in the church building singing in worship, and the whole time we know that we have sinned against someone who is standing on the other side of the room. Perhaps, You are standing next to your spouse whom you sinned against on the way to church and Jesus is saying, “Put your hands down. Put your checkbook away. Humble yourself and go to your brother or sister and ask for their forgiveness.”

Jesus wants us to know that everything is not fine just because we came to church. In fact, this seems like an echo of what God told Israel through the prophet Isaiah.

I have had enough of your burnt offerings…I do not want the blood of bulls, lambs and goats…I cannot endure iniquity and the solemn assembly. (Isaiah 1:11-13)

When we overlook our sin against a brother and we think that it will all be fine if we just go and pledge our love to the Lord at church, Jesus tells us that we got the order all wrong. He tells us to stop attempting to worship Him, to leave our gift at the altar and go to seek reconciliation with our brother and then come back to worship.

Jesus wants us to realize that unity and love between Christians is more important to God to God than our tithes and our singing.

Remember that this is a sermon about Jesus’ Kingdom and His Kingdom is different than every other Kingdom. He commands His people to love one another and when anger or hate, which is the opposite of love, gets in the way; He calls us to stop everything and pursue the restoration of love.

Now, some of you men are uncomfortable with this because this isn’t hypothetical for you. You might be at odds with someone right now. Some of you men are thinking, “That’s just not how men handle these sorts of things.” But this is how all of us should handle these sorts of things as members of the Kingdom of God.

We should be quick to confess our sin. We should be quick to seek the forgiveness of those we’ve wronged, quick to reestablish our relationships with our brothers and sisters in Christ. And once we’ve done that, then we should give thanks to God in worship.

1 Sam 15:22, “Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice…

Don’t use religious ceremony as a mask for your sin, that’s what the Pharisees would do and our righteousness must exceed theirs. Our righteousness must come from the heart.

But what about our relationship to those outside the church? Do we have a responsibility to them as well? In verse 25, Jesus gives us an illustration of what would happen when a person had an unpaid debt. At least that seems to be the scenario that Jesus is using.

In Jesus’ day if a person had borrowed money and then refused to pay it back at the agreed upon deadline, the person who loaned the money could take up the matter in court. If the borrower is proven guilty then they would be thrown in jail. Here is what Jesus says we should do.

V. 25 Come to terms quickly with your accuser while you are going with him to court, lest your accuser hand you over to the judge, and the judge to the guard, and you be put in prison. 26 Truly, I say to you, you will never get out until you have paid the last penny.

This verse is connected to the previous one in that in both cases there is something standing between us and another person. In the first case, we did something against our brother and in this second case we have failed to pay our debts. The point of this is that when something stands between us and another person we should be urgently seeking to make things right.

Whether we owe them money or an apology we should take immediate action to be reconciled to our brother and even to our debtor. We are to be people of integrity in all walks of life because we are concerned with serving God from the heart. We do what’s right, not to be seen by others, but because it honors God. So, if we owe a debt, we should work hard to pay that debt off as soon as possible but if for some reason we are unable to meet the terms, we should be honest, go to that person and seek to make things right. We are to make every effort we can to mend relationships with others.

Conclusion…

1. Murder is terrible, but it is not the root of our problem. The root of the problem is the sinful desires of our hearts which are in themselves enough to condemn us. But empty religious rituals aren’t enough to solve our problem.

2. Don’t try to mask the sins of your heart with external religion.  This was the lifestyle of the Pharisees and Scribes; it failed for them and it will fail for us.

God wants us to humble ourselves and seek reconciliation. He wants us to value integrity more than comfort. He wants us to let go our pride and then pursue peace, unity and love. He wants us to do what’s right not just to be seen by others but because He sees our hearts.

Let every one of us examine our hearts right now. Is there someone that we need to seek out today? Is there someone in this room that we need to seek forgiveness from? Maybe that person is standing next to you. Don’t hold on to your pride, turn to them and confess your sin. Go to them and seek to make it right. If there is something that you can or should do to seek peace with your brother or sister then do it at once.

Then come back to God who stands over His children ready to pour out new grace.

James 4:6 God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.” 7 Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. 8 Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. 9 Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. 10 Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you. 

He will forgive. In fact, that is why He sent His Son into the world. Jesus paid the price to make us free. He cancelled the debt of sin that we owed…and He didn’t wait until we asked Him. He came deliberately and while we were still enemies of God. He humbled Himself, made Himself the object of man’s scorn, He let His enemies gloat over Him but He fulfilled His mission.

He came to save His people, to give us new hearts, to lead us into His new Kingdom and He calls us to follow Him.

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The Righteousness of the Kingdom (2 of 2)

Series: The Sermon on the Mount

Speaker: Pastor Justin Wheeler

Scripture: Matthew 5:18-19

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This week we are jumping right back into the middle of a section where Jesus is addressing how He and His ministry relate to the Law and the Prophets. We spent our entire time on this last week and we discovered that Jesus did not come to abolish the law and the prophets but rather He came to fulfill them. He didn’t come to throw down the law but to uphold it, to teach us the true and deeper meaning of it, to fulfill its prophecies and to execute its demands with perfect obedience.

So, If Jesus came to fulfill the law and to establish a new covenant community upon His fulfillment, then what does that mean for the citizens of this new community? If Christ came to fulfill the law then in what way does the law affect my life as a believer?

Transition…

Matt 5:17 “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. 18 For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished. 19 Therefore whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. 20 For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. 

Sermon Focus…

I. The Permanence of the Law (v. 18)

18 For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished.

First, I want us to recognize the significance of the phrase, “Truly I say to you.” Jesus uses this phrase all the time and when He does He is drawing our attention to His authority as a teacher. Do you remember the phrase that the Old Testament prophets used? When they spoke a word of prophecy to the people they would introduce it with the phrase, “Thus saith the Lord” and this drew attention to the fact that they weren’t speaking on their own authority, but they were speaking on the authority of God. God was speaking through them.

But Jesus uses a different phrase, “Truly, I say to you…” He is speaking on His own authority as the Son of God. He uses this phrase 28 times in Matthew, 25 times in John, 19 times in Luke and Mark combined; and each time He is asserting Himself as a faithful witness to the truth of God because He is God in the flesh. He doesn’t simply speak for God, He speaks as God. It seems like a subtle thing but in the overall picture, Jesus is declaring to us the very Word of the Lord.

But what does the Son of God say to us about the Law in this verse? He is stressing the fact that the law of God is permanent and that it will not be brought to an end until heaven and earth are brought to an end.

“Until Heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass…”

Now what does this mean? The passing away of Heaven and earth represents the end of time as we know it. It is a reference to the time to come when Christ will return to this earth to judge the world and when He comes it will set off what the Scriptures call, The Great Day of the Lord.

2 Peter 3:10 But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed. 

On that day, Jesus will return to judge and to make war. Heaven will open and Christ will come forth on the white war horse of Heaven and He will come to “tread the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty (Rev 19:11f).” On that day Christ will step into His role as Conqueror and He will Captain the armies of Heaven to bring judgment upon Satan and the sin of mankind.

Now, that day has not yet come and until it does, Jesus wants us to know that the Law of God will stand. Not even the smallest letter or stroke of a letter will pass from the law until that day until all is accomplished.

But that brings up another question: If Jesus has come to fulfill the law (V. 17) then how is it still functioning? What part does it still play in our lives today?

Remember last week when we talked about the 3 parts of the law (Judicial, Ceremonial and Moral)? The Judicial law that governed Israel as a nation has been set aside. Israel rejected and crucified her Messiah, the temple was destroyed and the nation under God’s Old Covenant came to an end. In that sense, Jesus’ coming fulfilled that portion of the law.

The Ceremonial law that governed Israel’s worship has also been fulfilled and brought to an end. Christ was the sacrifice to end all sacrifices and to make this fulfillment clear, the temple of God, where the sacrifices were made, was destroyed in 70 AD. When Christ was upon the cross the veil of the temple was torn in two which means that by His sacrifice all who believe in Him have access to God in the Spirit. Jesus fulfilled the Ceremonial law.

But what about the Moral law the 10 Commandments? Jesus fulfilled the Moral law, not by adding to it or even by simplifying it, but by keeping it. Jesus fully obeyed the moral law of God and when we turn from our sin and receive Christ, the righteousness He earned through obedience to God’s law is credited to our account before God.

We call this Justification, an act of God’s grace where He pardons our sin and accepts us as righteous in His sight, not based on the works we do, but based on the perfect obedience of Christ that is credited to us by faith.

2 Cor 5:21 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. 

But Christ has done more than to obey the law for us. As Christians, we are no longer under the penalty of the law but we are still guided by the law in our pursuit of righteousness. The moral law of God still functions in our lives, not to condemn us for our sins, but to direct us in our obedience to Christ.

Now, we love to talk about how the law cannot save us and that it was never intended to save us. We are bold in our rejection of salvation by works and of the legalism that reminds us of the Pharisees, and we are right to do both. But from these verses Jesus wants us to learn that the moral law of God still has a purpose in our lives today.

One of the reasons that we know this to be true is from the Sermon on the Mount as a whole. In this Sermon, Jesus is giving us a deeper explanation of the 10 Commandments or the moral law. He teaches us to reject the corrupt teaching of the Scribes and Pharisees and then He expounds on them to give us the true and deeper meaning of each one. Jesus wants us to know that the law is permanently bound to heaven and earth but He also wants us to know the role of the commandments within His Kingdom.

II. The Commandments and the Kingdom (V. 19)

19 Therefore whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven.

Notice the shift in Jesus’ language from the term law to commandments and that it is not subtle at all. I think this is a shift from the law in a general sense to a more specific focus on the 10 commandments or the moral law. Also, notice the term therefore at the beginning of verse 19. It is there to show that there is a connection between the law of God and the Kingdom of God.

Follow the logic of these verses with me…Because Jesus has not come to abolish the law but to fulfill it, and because not a single stroke of the law will pass away until all is accomplished, therefore greatness in the Kingdom of God is going to in some way be measured by our faithfulness to the law. If we relax the law because of God’s grace then we will be called least in the Kingdom of Heaven.

For many of us this can be confusing. We know that we are not saved by our keeping of the law but rather that we are saved by believing the gospel and within reformed theology (Lutheran theology) there is often a sharp distinction made between the law and the gospel. In Luther’s view, there should be no law in the gospel and no gospel in the law but on this point, I don’t think Luther was right.

We do need to be careful not to confuse God’s moral demands with His saving grace, but I think it is more faithful to Scripture to understand that the law is a gift of God’s grace intended to function in our lives in very particular ways.

First, the law has a civil function within society in that it serves to limit and restrain evil (Roman 13:3-4). Second, the law has an evangelical function in that it shows us our sin and drives us to Christ (Gal 3:10). Third, the law functions to guide us as believers to know the will of God and to live a faithful Christian life.

I John 2: 3 And by this we know that we have come to know him, if we keep his commandments. 4 Whoever says “I know him” but does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him, 5 but whoever keeps his word, in him truly the love of God is perfected. By this we may know that we are in him: 6 whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in the same way in which he walked. 

In His book, The True Bounds of Christian Freedom, Puritan Samuel Bolton wrote:

The law is abolished as a covenant for our justification, but it remains a rule for obedience. We are not under the curses, but we are under the commands of it. We are not under the law for justice, but we are under the law for conduct. The law no longer has the power to condemn us, but it still has the power to humble us and to build us up for our greater good.[1]

As we continue to study this SotM, Jesus is going to help us understand how we obey the law from the heart. He is going to teach us how to grow to be more like Him. He is going to show us how to be doers of the Word as well as hearers.

Now, look back to verse 19, where I want you to see that there is a connection between the word “abolish” and the term “relax.” The root word in both of these is the idea of casting something aside or throwing it down. And since Jesus has not come to cast the law aside and neither shall we, His disciples. If we relax or cast aside the law then we aren’t treating the law the way Jesus did and Jesus gives some really strong warnings about this.

Matt 18: 1 At that time the disciples came to Jesus, saying, “Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” 2 And calling to him a child, he put him in the midst of them 3 and said, “Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. 4 Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. 

5 “Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me, 6 but whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin (break the moral law), it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea. 

Jesus is not soft on the law. He is completely opposed to the legalism of the Pharisees but He is equally opposed to the type of antinomianism that would relax the law of God or seek to overthrow it altogether.

What does it mean to be called least in the Kingdom? If we relax one of God’s laws it’s like we are saying that this law really doesn’t matter. We are treating it like it is the smallest of the laws and Jesus says that our title in the Kingdom will be, “Really doesn’t matter.” Our status in the Kingdom of Christ will be consistent with the status we gave to the law in our lives and in our teaching.

But if we learn the proper purpose and value of the law and we are faithful to teach it and to do it, then we will have an honorable name in the Kingdom. Our name will be Megas or Great.

First, Jesus wants us to know that the law is permanent. Second, He wants us to understand that the law of God still functions within His Kingdom. Finally, He wants us to know that our obedience to the law had better be greater than that of the Scribes and Pharisees.

III. The Christian and the Law (v. 20)

20 For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. 

It’s no secret that Jesus didn’t get along with the Scribes and Pharisees and a huge part of their disagreement had to do with the law. Jesus rebuked them over and over for their corruption of the law, for the fact that they added to the law and even made their human traditions more important than the law of God.

They were supposed to be experts in the law and the Jews had a saying, “If only two people go to heaven, one will be a scribe and the other a Pharisee.” They were revered in their day for their thorough knowledge of the law and for their rigorous adherence to it, but there were some big problems with their views on the law.

Their law was entirely external –

 Matt 23:25 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you clean the outside of the cup and the plate, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. 26 You blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and the plate, that the outside also may be clean. 

They were only concerned with external conformity and not to the real heart change that Jesus came to bring. They didn’t care about their motives or the condition of their heart. Which means that they could lust all they wanted so long as they didn’t act on it. They could hate all they wanted as long as they didn’t go through with an act of murder.

They thought that external obedience was enough to earn the righteousness of God and by believing this they reckoned that God’s holiness was cheap. But Jesus teaches us that God looks on the heart and that true religion flows from a new heart.

Their law was hypocritical –

Matt 23: 27 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but within are full of dead people’s bones and all uncleanness. 28 So you also outwardly appear righteous to others, but within you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness. 

8 different times in Matthew, Jesus directly calls them hypocrites. Their religion was nothing but an act, a hypocritical external wrapping that hid the reality of spiritual death. Of course, they couldn’t see that this was true. They believed that they were right and so they kept spreading their teaching as far as they could and the result was that they were actually spreading falsehood, not truth.

Their law was a Corruption of God’s Word –

These guys were serious about the law, so serious that they gradually added their own interpretations to the law in order to expand on it. Instead of the 10 commandments that God gave on Mt. Sinai, they expanded the law to contain 248 commandments and 365 prohibitions. Let me give you an example of how they corrupted the law of God.

Take the Sabbath. What began as a command to rest from your work and enjoy the provision of God became an absurd attempt to regulate everything from how far you could walk to how much you could carry in your pockets. Here is a list of rules on the Sabbath from a section of the Talmud called the Mishna; and remember, according to the Pharisees and Scribes your entry into heaven depends on this.

You could travel no more than 3,000 feet from home. Unless on Friday before the Sabbath you had planted food at the 3,000 foot point and then you could go 3,000 more because you constituted that point as a home because your food was there. Now if you lived down a long narrow street and you might have been a few hundred feet down from the end of the street or the end of the alley, you could take a piece of wood and put it across the end of the street or alley or you could take a piece of rope and put it across the end of the alley, or you could take a piece of wire and string it across the end of the alley and that would, in the eyes of God, turn it into a doorway and you could consider that the front door of your house so you could go 3,000 feet from there.

You couldn't carry anything on your person that weighed more than a dried fig. But you could carry half a fig two times on the Sabbath.

You couldn't eat any forbidden food larger than an olive. And if you put an olive in your mouth and spit it out because it was bad, the Talmud said you couldn't replace it with a good one because your palate had tasted the flavor of the first one.

If you threw an object in the air, you could catch it with the hand that you threw it with, but if you caught it with the other hand, it was sin because there's less work in doing that than...that.

If you were in one place and your arm stretched to reach for food and the Sabbath overtook you, you had to drop the food rather than bring back your arm or you had carried the burden and sinned.

A tailor couldn't carry his needle. A scribe couldn't carry his pen. A pupil couldn't carry his books. No fire could be lit. No fire could be put out. Cold water could be poured on warm, but warm couldn't be poured on cold. An egg couldn't be boiled even if you buried it in the hot sand, which is how they would boil an egg in the desert. You couldn't take a bath for fear that the water would flow off you and wash the floor. You couldn't move a chair since it might make a rut and that would be too much like plowing. Women could not look in a mirror or put on any jewelry. If she were to find a white hair, she had to resist the temptation to pull it out.[2]

And the list goes on and on for 24 chapters. Today if you go into Jerusalem on the Sabbath you will encounter something called the Shabat elevator which is an elevator that automatically goes up and down stopping on every floor so that Jews will not break the Sabbath by pushing the button. What started as a gracious command of God has been corrupted and turned into a terrifying day where the slightest mishap might doom you to Hell.

Remember that Jesus said that our righteousness must exceed theirs if we hope to enter the kingdom of Heaven. Does this mean that we must keep all of the 240 commandments and 365 prohibitions? No! Christian righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the Pharisees in type not in degree. The righteousness that is pleasing to God is the inward righteousness that begins in the heart and then faithfully seeks to live out the law in life.

We call this sanctification and it is an ongoing work of God’s grace where God’s people are, over the course of their lives, transformed more and more into the image of Christ. God enables us by His Spirit and His Word to grow in faithfulness more and more and to turn from sin more and more. This process starts when we are born again and it continues throughout our lives as a fulfillment of the promise that God made in Ezekiel 37.

Eze 37:26 And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. 27 And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules. 

If you are a born-again believer in Christ then you have the Spirit of God within you, but that doesn’t mean that you can dispense with the law, because the work of the Spirit is to give us new hearts, to write God’s law on those new hearts, and to enable us to walk in obedience to God.

Conclusion…

Jesus is not interested in empty, superficial, hypocritical religious practice. Religion is a word that has the ability to conjure up both positive and negative ideas when it is used. The term religion, when used in a negative sense, refers to the empty religious rituals and formalities that are devised by man and are sadly so prevalent in the church. Behind the negative use of the term is the belief that religious practices are sufficient for us to earn the favor of God. Religion says, “I obey the rules so that God will accept me” and when this idea is full blown it teaches people that in order to be saved we must simply keep all the rules.

But this is a lie and this is not the gospel of Jesus Christ. The gospel says that “God accepts me on the basis of Jesus ‘works and in response to this grace, I obey (Eph 2:8-10).”

Here in the Sermon on the Mount we see Jesus does not give us a new law but boldly claims that He has come to fulfill the law and on the cross, that is what He did. But He has also come to faithfully expound on the law that was already given.

The people’s view of the law had been obscured by the teaching of the Scribes and Pharisees, but Jesus has come to make it clear and to call His disciples to understand it’s ongoing function, not to save us, but to guide us as we follow Him.

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[1] Beeke and Jones A Puritan Theology (Pg. 562).

[2] List of items extracted from John MacArthur sermon titled Jesus the Divine Truth Teller. This list was originally taken from Alfred Edersheim’s book The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah which details the Talmudic traditions of Jesus day.

The Righteousness of the Kingdom (1 of 2)

Series: The Sermon on the Mount

Speaker: Pastor Justin Wheeler

Scripture: Matthew 5:17-20

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Throughout the ministry of Jesus there was no shortage of controversies, accusations, questions and even objections to His identity, His message and His mission. At the forefront of most of these controversies stood two religious groups, the Pharisees and the Scribes.

The Pharisees were the separatists and they were called this because their specific observance of the Law of Moses separated them from the mainstream religious teachers. They were the religious fundamentalists of their day who sought to practice their brand of religion in a very particular and demanding way. But the real force behind the Pharisees were the Scribes

The Scribes were the leading experts in the law of Moses. They were the legal scholars who wrote the books and the Pharisees took their teaching and put it into practice. These two groups were among the most influential religious leaders in Jesus’ day and from the very beginning of our Lord’s ministry He had their attention.

Why? Because, by all accounts Jesus was an unusual man. Ok, maybe Jesus wasn’t as unusual as John the Baptist who lived in the woods and ate bugs; but Jesus stood out for other reasons. The first thirty years of His life were mostly private. His mother and father would have remembered the miraculous events surrounding His birth, but it’s unlikely they shared any of that with others until much later. He grew up in Nazareth as the son of a carpenter but when He came to the Jordan River to be baptized by John, that’s when things changed.

At that point, He began to teach but He had not been formally trained. He had no formal education. He also didn’t join the Scribes, Pharisees or Sadducees, which was very unusual for that day; He was unaffiliated at a time when affiliations were key. He did not come into His position as a teacher in the customary way. Normally, a person would go through an education process, then they would become a disciple to a well-known rabbi and somewhere down the road they might get their start. Jesus skipped that whole process and instead began teaching in the synagogues and in the marketplaces, all on His own.

He was calling disciples to follow Him. He was training them on an understanding of the Kingdom of God that no one had ever heard before. He knew the Scriptures, better than anyone else, but He interpreted them on His own which wasn’t common for that day. Most teachers relied on the oral tradition of old rabbi’s known today as the Talmud, but Jesus relied on no authority but His own. This made people very suspicious of Him.

Then there was the fact that He was healing people, casting demons out of people, and telling people that their sins were forgiven. The stories of His works were spreading all over the place and causing people to try and learn more about Him. When they got close to Him they realized something else that was a bit concerning. He spent most of His time with the kind of people that other religious groups had a tendency to reject.

Jesus had called a group of uneducated laborers to be His disciples. His disciples consisted of fisherman and even a tax-collector (Matthew). Then when He wasn’t teaching He was spending His time with social outcasts. His audiences consisted of the crippled, sick and poor; even those known to be living in sin. He ate with tax-collectors and even went to parties in their houses. His larger group of disciples consisted of a few former prostitutes who contributed money to His ministry. He spent most of His time teaching the gospel and the Kingdom of God to societies prodigals.

Transition…

This last bit alone was enough to make the religious people of that day stand up and take notice. But it also caused them to wonder about Jesus’s view on certain things like the law. Did He believe the Old Testament? Did He follow the law of Moses? Did He come to do away with the traditions of the elders? These were the questions on people’s minds and here in Matthew 5:17-20 Jesus is going to address those questions head-on.

And these questions are important for us today as well. How has Jesus’ ministry affected our relationship to the law of God? What role does the law play in the lives of those who follow Jesus? Let’s see what Jesus has to say about it.

Matt 5:17 “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. 18 For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished. 19 Therefore whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. 20 For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. 

Sermon Focus…

Up to this point Jesus has been declaring to us the character of His kingdom in the beatitudes. Then He talked to us about how the world was going to react to His kingdom with persecutions and how we should respond. Last week, we looked at the influence that Jesus’ Kingdom is to have in the world. But today we are going to learn what is the relationship of Christ’s Kingdom to the law of God? What role does righteousness play in the Christian life?

I want to break this up into two parts: I. Jesus and the law and II. The Christian and the law.

I. Christ and the Law (v. 17-18)

Matt 5:17 “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.

Notice that the way Jesus begins this statement suggests that He is responding to a common concern about Him. The people are talking and forming their opinions but Jesus comes right out and says, “Don’t believe what you are hearing. Don’t think that I have come to abolish the law or the Prophets…” Now, that phrase “law or the prophets” is important and it is referring to basically the whole of the Old Testament.

Jesus upholds the law…

The use of the term law generally refers to the writings of Moses but more specifically it refers to the law of God that was given through Moses. This is a reference to the 10 Commandments or the Moral law. We also understand that this phrase would cover the other aspects of the law, like the Judicial law which contains the specific laws that governed Israel as a nation. This also included the Ceremonial law that dealt with the sacrifices and rituals that governed Israel’s worship.

The reference to the prophets would include all the prophetic books in the OT. In other words, Jesus is affirming his commitment to all of the Old Testament. The people were wondering of Jesus was going to try to do away with the law and the prophets, but He makes clear that He has no intention of abolishing God’s Word. In fact, He will take better care of God’s Word than Moses did

There is something interesting about Jesus’ use of the term abolish. It can be translated as “throw down” or “to turn loose” and I think this is a subtle reference to Moses. When God gave Moses the 10 Commandments He carved the words by His own finger on two stone tablets and then gave them to Moses.

Moses then took those tablets down the mountain and when he came to the bottom he saw God’s people worshipping a golden calf. When Moses saw their sin, he became angry and threw the tablets down onto the ground. At the sight of the people’s sin Moses threw down the law and at the sight of the people’s sin Jesus fulfilled the law on their behalf. Jesus is saying I have no intentions of throwing down the law. Jesus is saying that He will take even better care of the law than did Moses.

Jesus reveals the depth of the law…

Jesus doesn’t abolish the law, instead He reveals a depth to the law that the Pharisees and Scribes never dreamed of and that is saying something. The Pharisees and Scribes were supposed to be the experts in the law. They knew it front and back, they followed it with painful accuracy and they taught the people how to follow it as well…but their whole view of righteousness and the law was flawed.

Their view of righteousness and the law is illustrated in the parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector in Luke 18. In the parable, the Pharisees are described as those who trusted in themselves that they were righteous. They looked at the law and assumed that by following it they could earn the righteousness needed to be at peace with God. In other words, they believed that through their good works they could earn salvation.

Now, it’s crazy that they believed this because more than 2000 years of Biblical history proved the opposite. Every generation of God’s people have proven that it is impossible for man to achieve the righteousness of God through obedience to the law. Moses himself pointed out at the end of his life that the people weren’t able to obey God in the law because the problem was their corrupt and sinful hearts. The law can’t change the heart.

In time, other prophets would point out the same problem. No man can please God by keeping the law because the heart of man is so corrupt that it is not possible. This is why God promised Ezekiel and Jeremiah that He was going to establish a New Covenant. He was going to send His spirit to change men’s hearts and write God’s law on their hearts. That’s what Jesus has come to do and that is why He can say,

18 For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished.

While heaven and earth stand, the law will remain. He hasn’t come to do away with the law and the prophets, He has come to uphold them. This means that the Old Testament is just as true, trustworthy and important for us today as it was to Jesus. This also lets us know the permanence of the law. Jesus’ ministry and His cross have not nullified the law. (we will look at this in more detail next week.)

Jesus fulfills the law…

But let’s go back to what Jesus said in verse 17 that He has come to fulfill the law and the Prophets. This is a huge claim. How do you fulfill the whole of the Old Testament? For starters, He has come to complete the law, to carry it out because, unlike us, Jesus can actually obey the law. His heart hasn’t been corrupted by our sin. He is sinless, tempted in every way that we are but He is without sin.

Jesus has come to carry out everything that is required in the law and everything that has been stated in the prophets.

J. C. Ryle summed it up like this: “The Old Testament is the Gospel in the bud, the New Testament is the Gospel in full flower. The Old Testament is the Gospel in the blade; the New Testament is the Gospel in full ear.”

At the end of Jesus’ earthly ministry, just after His resurrection, Jesus came and spent some time with His disciples and on that night, He reminded them of something He told them years earlier.

Luke 24:44 He said to them, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.” 45 Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures,

This might be hard for us to grasp but ultimately, the Bible is not about you and me; it’s about Jesus. The point of all Scripture is to direct us to Jesus as the fulfillment of the law, the perfect atoning sacrifice and the Savior that brings us to God. If we don’t understand this then the Bible will crush us. It will crush us because we might assume that we must fulfill the law in order to be saved. But when we come to understand that the entire Bible is not about us fulfilling the law, but Jesus fulfilling the law for us, that’s when we’ve grasped that the Gospel is Good News.

Jesus is the thread holding the entire Bible together. Jesus is the main theme of all Scripture. He is the hero in all the stories. He is the fulfillment of all the prophecies. He is the substance, the reality behind all the mysteries.

The Bible is not simply a collection of moral stories aimed to help you live a better life so that God will love you and accept you. The Bible is the story of God’s plan to love a people who are completely unlovable. The Bible is the story of How God will draw sinful people into a relationship with Him, into His very family, not because of the wonderful things they do, but because of the wonderful work of Jesus on the cross.

The whole Bible is about Jesus and the work that He accomplished as the Son of God and the Savior of the World. Every promise finds it’s fulfillment in this; that God became a man and humbled himself to the point of death even death on a cross in order to settle our debts in the eyes of the Father. Where imperfect men have failed to rise to the standard of Holiness that God demands, Christ came to succeed

Jesus is the skull crusher from Genesis 3 who has come to put an end to Satan’s reign.

Adam failed in the Garden and his corruption and guilt were credited to us, but Jesus is the true and better Adam who passed the test in the garden and whose obedience is credited to our account.

Abraham obeyed God leaving the comfort and familiarity of home to become the father of God’s people, but Jesus is the true and better Abraham who answered the call of God to leave the glory of Heaven and come down into the brokenness of earth to create a new people of God.

Isaac was the child of promise who was offered up and nearly sacrificed on the altar in obedience to God’s command, but Jesus is the true and better Isaac who was not just offered up by his father on the mount but was truly sacrificed for us.

Jacob wrestled with God and was wounded but Jesus is the true and better Jacob who wrestled and took the blow of Divine justice that we deserved, so we, could receive grace to wake us up and guide our lives.

Jesus is the true and better Joseph who, at the right hand of the king, forgives those who betrayed and sold him and uses his new power to save them.

Jesus is the true and better Moses who stands in the gap between the people and the Lord and who mediates a new covenant.

Jesus is the true and better Job, the truly innocent sufferer, who then intercedes for and saves his stupid friends.

Jesus is the true and better David who did more than win a victory for Israel’s army; He became our victory for all eternity, and we never lifted a stone to accomplish it ourselves.

Jesus is the true and better Jonah who was cast out into the storm so that we could be brought in.

Jesus is the real Passover Lamb, innocent, perfect, helpless, slain so the angel of death will pass over us. He’s the true temple, the true prophet, the true priest, the true king, the true sacrifice, the true lamb, the true light, the true bread.

The Bible’s really not about you—it’s about him.[1]

The overwhelming trajectory of Biblical and world history concerns a movement by God towards man. The Father sent the Son. The Word became flesh. To save us, God did not come in the fullness of His glory, but rather he came in the humility of a man who would be condemned to die as a criminal upon a cross. Jesus hid his glory, shouldered our burden and walked to the cross in our place.

Jesus took the form of a slave. He became one with us, sharing in our limitations, our sorrows and bearing our burdens. He experienced the temptations that we know too well, only he remained sinless to the day of his death. And in his death, he atoned for us, paid the price for our sins and unites us to God.

Then to show that His work was finished and complete, God raised Him from the dead. Jesus Christ lives today never to die again and He holds out the promise that all who trust in Him, who believe in His name, they are given the right to be called the Sons of God.

This is the climax of world history. This is the hinge upon which eternity hangs and this is what Christ has come to do. He hasn’t come to throw down the law, like Moses, in the face of the people’s sin; He has come to uphold the law, to fulfill it so that we can be freed from our sin and truly have peace with God.

Conclusion…    

The people want to know what Jesus will do with the Law of Moses. They want to know what His coming into the world will mean in light of all that the Prophets have written. They want to know if Jesus has come to tear down the Old or to uphold it. He has actually come to do even more, He has come to fulfill it all.

1. What does God want us to understand/think?

He wants us to understand that Jesus did not come to do away with the law of God. He did not come to remove it from existence, not to remove it completely from our lives. He came to fulfill the law on our behalf. Jesus lived a lived a life of perfect obedience to God and to the moral law. He also perfectly fulfilled the promises made about Him in the prophets. We have all fallen short of God’s glorious standard, but Jesus upheld it and fulfilled in our place.

And this is great news for us. He has become our peace. He has secured our place in Heaven with God. He and He alone has accomplished our redemption.

2. What does God want us to believe?

God wants us to believe that Jesus is focal point and climax of redemptive history. There is salvation in no other name than the name of Jesus. Before Him all heaven and earth will bow down to declare that He is Lord. There is no other prophet, there is no other way, there is no other hope than Jesus. This too is good news!

3. What does God want you to do?

God has supplied what our souls need most, a savior. Have you received Him? Have you confessed your sin to Him and asked for His forgiveness? Have you turned from your sin and surrendered to Him as Lord?

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[1] Adapted from Tim Keller, from class lectures on Preaching Christ in a Post-Modern World. 

The World's Response to the Kingdom

Series: The Sermon on the Mount

Speaker: Pastor Justin Wheeler

Scripture: Matthew 5:10-12

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Matt 5:10 “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 11 “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. 12 Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you. 

There are some things that we will face in this life that are worth suffering for. There are some reactions that will result from our love for Jesus that are worth enduring. There are some truths that we should never deny, that we should never back off from, and never avoid no matter the threat we face. And Jesus wants us to face those threats with the knowledge that He not only has our back, but will reward us for standing for Him.

Study the New Testament and you will be forced to create a category in your mind for persecution. Study the history of the church and you will see the wicked creativity of mankind dream up ways to torture Christians. The persecution and suffering of Christians has often been a demonstration by the kingdom of this world that they won’t tolerate a rival kingdom, especially one so subversive as the Kingdom of Christ.

But the persecution of Christians is not just a thing of the past, it is still happening today at alarming rates. According to Opendoorsusa.org, each month this year 322 Christians will be killed for their faith, 214 church or Christian properties will be destroyed, and 722 forms of violence will be committed against Christians, such as: beatings, abductions, rape, arrest and even forced marriages. North Korea is ranked as the most oppressive place in the world to be a Christian. The country of India, that we have sent missionaries to, is ranked 15th on the list.

But is persecution happening in America today? Compared to the countries at the top of this list, the church in American hasn’t seen a fraction of the persecution that our brothers and sisters worldwide have seen. We aren’t being beheaded. It’s not illegal to be a Christian. It’s not illegal to preach the gospel or to become a convert to Christianity. We should be thankful for all of these things. But there is a cost to being a faithful follower of Christ, even in the U.S.

“Martyrdom is a special category set aside for a select number of Christians (Rev. 6:8-11), persecution is the normal experience of every Christian everywhere. From stiff fines, to family shame, to being kicked off college campuses, to laws against sharing our faith, to unjust trials, to public mockery and scorn, to arrest and brutality, if we faithfully follow Jesus in this world we all will face persecution at some point in our Christian discipleship. Even American Christians--if they are really Christians--will have crosses to carry (Kevin DeYoung).”[1]

Transition…

This morning, we are going to let Jesus teach us more about the persecution that we will face as we follow Him. We are going to learn 4 things about the persecution that accompanies His Kingdom. We are going to look at the Cause of Persecution, the Response to Persecution, the Reward for the Persecuted, and the Company of the Persecuted.

Sermon Focus…

This is the final Beatitude and notice that Jesus gives us a double dose of it; first in a more general way (blessed are those…) and then in a more specific way (blessed are you…). It is important for us to understand that this final beatitude is as normal to the Christian life as the rest of the beatitudes. Jesus is teaching us that being persecuted, despised, mocked, slandered, and rejected for your faith in Christ is just as much a part of the Christian experience as being a poor in spirit, pure in heart, mercy-filled peacemaker.

Every Christian is broken down and then built back by Christ in the gospel; this is how we enter into the faith. And every Christian is called to live out the gospel in the way we interact with others. And every Christian should expect that when we live our lives for Christ we will experience opposition from the world.

But why? Why does persecution come to those who live for Christ?”

I. The Cause of Persecution or Why the persecution comes

10 “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake…11 “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.

Jesus uses two phrases here to describe the cause of persecution. It comes on account of righteousness and on account of Jesus (himself), and both of these phrases are referring to the same thing. They are referring to the life that has journeyed through the rest of the beatitudes. This journey begins with our being made to see our unrighteousness.

On our own we are poor and needy before God and we are moved to grieve over our sin. This produces humility because we recognize that we have nothing to boast about, nothing to offer to God. Then, when we come to feel our spiritual emptiness we long to be filled and Jesus satisfies that need. He fills us with His grace and love. He forgives our sin and gives us new life.

Then we begin to live out this new life showing mercy to others. We begin seeking to live honest and pure lives before others and before God. We pursue peace and seek to help others find peace with God through faith in Christ. This is what it means live for righteousness’ sake. This is what it means to live our lives on account of Jesus and this is the cause of the persecution that Jesus is talking about.

Jesus is not talking about a person who is being persecuted because he is a jerk who has a knack for getting on people’s nerves. Jesus is not talking about the type of persecution that you bring on yourself because you love to get in other people business and gossip about it. We are often the cause of our own suffering and it has nothing to do with our seeking to live a godly life in Christ.

1 Pet 4:15 Let none of you suffer as a murderer or a thief or an evildoer or as a meddler. 16 Yet if anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in that name. 

The type of persecution that Jesus is talking about here is caused by our living like Jesus. True righteousness flows only out of a relationship with Christ and it reflects the values of a different world.

John 15:18 “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. 19 If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. 20…If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you.

Think about this: Jesus did amazing things to help people, to heal people, to love people; and the world responded with two options. They either wanted to use Him to get what they wanted or they were going to have to kill Him to get Him out of their way. If we seek to live like Jesus we can expect the same treatment and I don’t care what the health, wealth, and prosperity folks say.

For us to pursue righteousness means to live our lives repenting from sin, self and Satan’s influence. For us to follow Christ means we are going to stand for things the world hates and we are going to stand against things they love. For us to follow Jesus we are going to speak truth to people who don’t want to hear it in the hopes that they will be saved. We won’t live perfectly, but faithfully as followers of Jesus seeking to honor and obey Him till the very end, no matter what it may cost.

You might think that such a life would be admired by others, but that is not the case. So, we need to ask the question, why is righteousness persecuted? Showing mercy to others doesn’t seem offensive. Seeking to be an honest and transparent person might rub someone the wrong way but why should this bring persecution?

Jesus explains it this way:

John 3:19 And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. 20 For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed.

Persecution is caused by the clash of light with darkness. Unbelievers will find our hunger for righteousness distasteful. They will find our pursuit of mercy an unwanted path. Persecution is the result of the clash between two irreconcilable kingdoms.

On the one hand, you have a kingdom filled with men and women who love Jesus. They love something that is pure and true and eternal; and their love stands in confident opposition to every other kingdom. On the other hand, you have another kingdom that is filled with men and women who love something that is evil and untrue and they want their love to be justified, accepted and celebrated by all. In order to justify their love, they must oppose the other kingdom so they mock Jesus and all who follow Him. They seek to silence Jesus and all who speak His Word. They seek to destroy Jesus and all who call Him Lord.

Sadly, as we look into the past we see that persecution came from the world and at times even from the church. We see this today as well in that many claim to know Christ and want the blessings He offers, but they want nothing to do with His Word or His narrow path of life. Their ideas about Christianity are at odds with Scripture and they persecute those who stand upon the Word.

John Piper helps to put this in perspective:[2]

•         If you cherish chastity, your life will be an attack on people’s love for free and devious sex.

•         If you pursue self-control, your life will indict excessive eating, spending, partying, etc.

•         If you live simply and happily, you will show the folly of luxury.

•         If you walk humbly with your God, you will expose the evil of pride.

•         If you speak with compassion, you will throw callousness into sharp relief.

•         If you are earnest, you will make the flippant look flippant instead of clever.

•         And if you are spiritually minded, you will expose the worldly-mindedness of those around you.

In other words, “All who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus, will be persecuted (2 Tim 3:12).”

If we put our trust in Jesus and seek to live like Jesus we can expect persecution. But, what are we supposed to do about it?

II. The Response to Persecution or What we do about persecution

Jesus says, “Blessed are those who are persecuted…Blessed are those who are reviled…Rejoice and be glad…” This is hardly the type of response you would expect to show to persecution, but once again Jesus is turning our world upside-down. Jesus doesn’t tell us to retaliate. He doesn’t tell us to simply grin and bear it either. He tells us to rejoice, be glad and be happy.

This is the type of response that we read about in Acts 5 when the Apostles were arrested by the High Priest and called to stand before the Jerusalem Council.

Acts 5:40 When they had called in the apostles, they beat them and charged them not to speak in the name of Jesus, and let them go. 41 Then they left the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer dishonor for the name. 42 And every day, in the temple and from house to house, they did not cease teaching and preaching that the Christ is Jesus. 

This is the type of response that we see in Paul and Silas when they were chained up (wrist to ankles) in the inner part of the prison in Philippi. They had been attacked earlier in the day. Their clothes had been ripped off and they had been beaten with rods in the middle of the city and then they were thrown in prison. But at midnight they began to pray and then started singing hymns to God. Their long and painful day of persecution led them to a night of rejoicing and singing to the Lord.

Now what is going on in these two passages? How can these men be happy to the point of singing while suffering in pain from persecution? On one hand, they counted it an honor to suffer alongside Jesus. It was a validation of their faith, a mark of the genuineness of their walk with Jesus. But even more, it made them rest their hope completely in Christ and not this world. The aim of the Christian life is not a long, care-free existence with only minor hiccups along the way. The aim is to serve the Lord faithfully until the end and then go to be with Jesus.

Let’s remember that the type of blessedness or happiness that Jesus is talking about here in Matthew 5 is not dependent on the circumstances of life. He is not telling us to be happy that we are undergoing persecution; we aren’t masochists who enjoy being mistreated. Our happiness is rooted in the fact that this world may be taken away from us but we are citizens of the world to come. Our rejoicing is rooted in the fact that we may not see our name written in lights but our names are written in the book of life.

But Jesus’ give us even more reasons to be happy and rejoice.

III. The Reward for the Persecuted

10 “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 11 “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. 12 Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven,

Suffering for Jesus doesn’t earn us the Kingdom, only the blood of Christ has the power to secure our eternal life. But in a very real way, suffering persecution validates that we are genuine followers of Christ. Many who hear the message of Jesus rejoice when they first hear it and they appear to jump on board, but when persecution arises they fall away. Others hear the message of Jesus and they are ready to sign on the dotted line, but over time the cares of the world choke out their shallow faith.

Still others will hear the message of Jesus and it will take deep root in their soul. They weather the storms of temptation, they endure the heat of persecution and they grow to produce fruit for the kingdom. Their lives and the fruit of their lives show evidence that the gospel is firmly rooted in their hearts. So, in a sense, persecution is a mark of those who are faithfully following Christ and it gives evidence that we are members of the Kingdom.

But notice that Jesus actually uses the term reward here and it means recognition for our faithful action. The picture that this verse paints is that when we stand before God in Heaven, He will recognize/reward us for having endured the persecution of this life. The recognition is itself the reward and this reward is great. The reward will more than make up for the service rendered.

Perhaps, like Stephen, those who receive the sufferers reward will see Jesus stand at God’s right hand in order to acknowledge our sacrifice and to show His proud support of our faithfulness.

And finally, that brings us to the last point in this passage.

IV. The Company of the Persecuted

12 Rejoice and be glad, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you. 

When we suffer persecution for our faith and faithfulness to Christ, we join the line of faithful men and women who have gone before us. The prophets who spoke the Word of God were not perfect men but they were faithful and they faced opposition. Some of them were killed by the very people that God sent them to. But their reward was secure and so is ours.

In Hebrews 11 we read,

32 For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets— 33 who through faith conquered kingdoms, enforced justice, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, 34 quenched the power of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, were made strong out of weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight. 35 Women received back their dead by resurrection. Some were tortured, refusing to accept release, so that they might rise again to a better life. 36 Others suffered mocking and flogging, and even chains and imprisonment. 37 They were stoned, they were sawn in two, they were killed with the sword. They went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, afflicted, mistreated— 38 of whom the world was not worthy—wandering about in deserts and mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth.

The world was not worthy to stand alongside these men and women, but persecuted believers are. God’s grace sustained them and it will sustain us as well.

Conclusion…

1. What does God want us to understand from this passage? Our natural instinct is to see persecution as a bad thing. Normal human beings don’t enjoy suffering, but there is a type of suffering that is right. There is a type of suffering that shows us that we are following Christ. So let’s remember what Jesus told us:

John 15:20 ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you…all these things they will do to you on account of my name,

2. What does God want us to believe? The happiness that our faith in Christ brings goes deeper than the wounds of the world. We can find our joy in Christ despite our circumstances. We can even rejoice and praise God when suffering comes our way. “There is no pit so deep but Christ is deeper still.” – Corrie Ten Boom

3. What does God want us to desire? Christ wants us to desire the Kingdom more than personal comfort. He wants us to set our hearts on the truth and be willing to endure hardship to allow its fruit to be borne in our lives. He wants us to desire righteousness more than the praise of men and to seek to glorify God more than to live a life of worldly pleasure and ease.

4. What would God have us do? Be bold and faithful. He would have us live out our faith with passion and sincerity. He would have us stand for truth against the tide of our worldly culture. He would have us speak the gospel into the lives of others. To be faithful evangelists in a world that needs the gospel. He would have us joyful endure the plundering of our property because we know that we have a greater and more lasting inheritance with Him.

12 Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven

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[1] https://blogs.thegospelcoalition.org/kevindeyoung/2017/03/29/four-thoughts-on-persecution-in-america/

[2]  Piper, J. (2007). Sermons from John Piper (1980–1989). Minneapolis, MN: Desiring God.

The Character of Christ's Kingdom

Series: The Sermon on the Mount

Speaker: Pastor Justin Wheeler

Scripture: Matthew 5:7-9

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“Dead in our trespasses and sins;” that is God’s description of the natural condition of man’s heart, our heart. Mankind’s chief problem is not ignorance, it is not faulty upbringing, it is not bad philosophy, nor is it flawed morality. All of these are problems, for sure, and there are more; but the chief problem for the natural man is the deadness in our hearts.

This deadness is the result of sin. It is the result of our rebellion against our Creator God. It is the natural condition of our heart because our first parents (Adam and Eve) sinned against God and the consequence of their rebellion was death, spiritual death. This death, this inherited deadness has spread out to all of mankind and it is the root cause of all the problems that we face in the world.

This deadness was on display over the past week as the new reports rolled in from Las Vegas of a man in his 60’s opening fire on a crowd of music fans. His attack killed 59 and injured more than 500. His actions were evil and they originated from his corrupt and sinful heart; a heart that God says is “dead in trespasses and sins.”

Throughout the Bible, we can read God’s description of the condition of man’s heart.

·       Gen 6:5 The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.

·       Jer 17:9 The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?

·       Matt 15:19 For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander. 20 These are what defile a person.

The Las Vegas massacre that took place last week was a terrible tragedy and an act of pure evil; and God wants us to understand that the sinful heart of man was at the root of it. The man responsible for the crime will be held responsible for his actions by the Judge of all the Earth and at this point he is beyond redemption. He will answer to God for the sin that flowed out of his wicked heart.

But I want us to understand something about ourselves from this. By God’s grace we will not all commit such monstrous crimes, but our hearts are far more sinful than we care to admit. The engine that drives the kingdom of this world is the sinful heart of man. It is capable of doing amazing things but it is also capable of doing unthinkable evil.

But there is another Kingdom at work among us and it requires that the heart of man be changed. This Kingdom requires a heart that recognizes its deadness and emptiness. It requires a heart that grieves over sin, that is humbled by its own corruption and that longs to be made new.

Transition…

This is the heart that Jesus is announcing to the world in the Sermon on the Mount and this new heart is what He has come to give us.

Matthew 5:3 “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 

4 “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. 

5 “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. 

6 “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied. 

7 “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy. 

8 “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. 

9 “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God. 

Sermon Focus…

Looking back over the past few weeks, we have seen that the first four Blessings are not only aimed at the heart but they follow a progressive logic. Each step leads to the next but the whole process begins with recognizing that we are poor in spirit, our hearts are bankrupt before God. Next, we are moved to the point of mourning over our sin. We grieve the fact that our hearts are so corrupt.

Thirdly, our recognition and grief over sin makes us humble. We are made to see that we are no better than any other man, in fact, we may be worse and this produces meekness. Finally, now that we have seen ourselves truly as with the eyes of God we now know that our deepest need is righteousness. I can’t produce it on my own but I hunger for it and thirst after it so that I can be right with God and free from the sin in my heart.

The first three beatitudes/blessings are concerned with our need and our own awareness of that need. The fourth deals with how God satisfies our need. He fills us with the righteousness of Jesus and satisfies the deep need of our soul. But as we move forward starting with verse 6 we are going to see the result of that satisfaction. God has changed our hearts and filled us with the righteous love of Christ and now our lives will put the fruit of our salvation on display.

This begins with a display of mercy.

I. Happy are the Merciful

7 “Happy are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy. 

To be merciful is to show compassion to those who are in need. It is to be sympathetic to others. A lot of times when we think of mercy we think of it alongside its companion, grace. And when we think of mercy and grace we tend to think of God the Father. He is a merciful God and a full of grace toward His people. But what do these terms actually mean?

“‘Grace is especially associated with men in their sins; mercy is especially associated with men in their misery.’ In other words, while grace looks down upon sin as a whole, mercy looks especially upon the miserable consequences of sin. So that mercy really means a sense of pity and a desire to relieve suffering.’”[1]

What Jesus is calling for here is not simply to feel merciful toward someone but to act with mercy toward someone who is suffering. It is to take the time to help those in need even though it will cost you.

Jesus illustrates mercy for us in the Parable of the Good Samaritan. He tells the story of a man who was travelling from Jerusalem to Jericho when he is attacked, robbed and left for dead on the side of the road. And the question is who will show him compassion by helping him.

A priest is the first on the scene but he avoids the helpless man and keeps walking. Next, a Levite comes by and once again he avoids the man and keeps walking. But then another man comes and he goes out of his way to show mercy.

Luke 10:33 But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion…

1. 34 He went to him – this alone was more than the other two men.

2. He bound up his wounds – And likely tore his own clothes in order to make the bandages.

3. He poured oil and wine on the man’s wounds – The wine would act as a mild disinfectant while the oil would work to soothe.

4. Then he set him on his own animal – which meant that he would have to walk the rest of the way. 

5. He brought him to an inn and took care of him – He didn’t just bring him there and drop him off, he stayed through the night to tend to the needs of this stranger that he met on the road.

6. 35 And the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper, saying, ‘Take care of him, and whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I come back.’

This is mercy. This is what it means to be merciful. It means that we care for the needs of others and are willing to do something about those needs even though it will cost us.

Now it’s one thing to show mercy to someone you know and care about, but Jesus is telling this story to a group of Jewish men who would have seen Samaritans as their natural enemies. You mean to tell me that Jesus’ kingdom is one where we show mercy to our enemies? Yes. The way of this world is not to show mercy but to be merciless. It is to take what you can and give nothing back.

Jesus knows this better than we do so He’s not just trying to encourage us to alter our behavior, don’t forget that this teaching is aimed at our hearts. He wants us to be merciful toward others because we ourselves were in need and He showed us mercy at the cost of His life.

Jesus was full of love and compassion when he came to us and found us lying on the side of the road. He bound up our wounds by tearing up his own rich garments. He anointed us with wine that cleanses and with oil that soothes. He placed us upon his back and he bore the burden of our sin. He paid our ransom price on the cross when He died in our place. He has also promised that even though He has gone away He will return and settle our account once and for all.

Because we have been forgiven, our Savior calls us to forgive. Because we have been shown mercy, He leads us to be merciful. So, here’s the question that we need to ask before we move on, “Are you merciful?” Have you been moved to show compassion to those around you in need? When people come to you for help do you help them? Has your need of mercy and Christ’s supply of mercy to your heart, resulted in you being merciful? This is the way of Christ’s kingdom.

Happy are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.

II. Happy are the Pure-Hearted

V. 8 “Happy are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. 

What does Jesus mean by “pure in heart?” Some have used this verse to suggest that sinless perfection is what God requires for salvation. The Pharisees of Jesus’ day would have believed something like this. They would say that you must achieve total ritual and moral purity in order to see God. But this interpretation doesn’t fit with the rest of the NT teaching, such as that found in 1 John 1:8. “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”

The NT also teaches that by the works of the flesh no man can change the condition of his heart. Heart work is God’s work. A leopard can’t change his spots, nor can man change his own heart. The Christian is one who has come to understand that if I am to have a pure heart then God must do this and He does this by the Holy Spirit.

I want to let A.W. Pink help us to understand how the Spirit does this.

The heart of the Christian is made pure by a fourfold operation of the Holy Spirit. First, by imparting a holy nature at the new birth. Second, by bestowing a saving faith which unites its possessor to a holy Christ. Third, by sprinkling him with the precious blood of Christ, which purges his conscience. Fourth, by a progressive and life-long process of sanctification so that we, through His aid, mortify the flesh and live unto God. The result it that the believer has a sincere desire not to sin against God in thought or word or deed, but to please Him in all things.[2]

By faith in Christ, our hearts are washed clean from the guilt and power of sin. Before God, our hearts have been, “sprinkled clean from an evil conscience (Heb 10:22).” When we believed in Christ and turned from our sin the Holy Spirit was at work in us cleansing and purifying our heart by faith…that is the theological side of this phrase.

But there is also a practical side to this and it is that we are to live now not simply putting on an external show of religion, but to serve Christ with a purity of heart, with a sincere and undivided desire to honor and serve God.

1 Tim 1:5 The aim of our charge is love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith.

I don’t want to love others simply as an outward show, I want to love them with a pure heart. This means that we aren’t living and acting so that men will praise us but we are serving with joy in order to honor God. We want our service to be pure worship to God.

2 Tim 2:22 So flee youthful passions and pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace, along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart.

I don’t want my turning from sin and obedience to simply be an outward performance, I want to turn from my sin and obey Christ because He has changed my heart and set me free from my slavery to sin. I want to glorify God in my life.

And listen, I know I will fail. I know that even when I succeed and do the right thing there are often impure motives inside. If we are honest we can all confess that our motives are less than pure much of the time. Out of all these beatitudes this one seems to be the most impossible of them all. It seems to me that the longer I walk with Christ and the more I learn from His word, the more convinced I am that my sin is deeper than I ever imagined. But as I go on in life I am striving to live out what Christ has put in me, a pure heart.

I trust that when I recognize the impurity of my heart (my sin) and confess that to God, that He will be “faithful to forgive my sin and to cleanse my heart from all unrighteousness (1 John 1:9).” My hope is that “God, who began this good work in me, will bring it to completion at the day of Christ (Phil 1:6).” I will strive with all His might to live and serve with a pure heart trusting that by His grace I will see God.

What about you? Are you serving the Lord out of an undivided desire to honor the One who loved you and gave His life for you? Are you serving for your glory or for His?

Happy are the Pure in Heart, for they shall see God.

III. Happy are those who make peace

9 “Happy are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God. 

This statement would have been hard to swallow for the Jews of Jesus’ day. They weren’t looking for a peaceful Messiah, but one ready to lead an army. Sure they would have accepted peace once the battle was won and once their freedom from Rome had been secured. But on the front-end, they wanted a deliverer, a military conqueror like David who would defeat their enemies and secure their borders once more.

But, Jesus came to make peace and that peace came at a cost. In Ephesians 2, the Apostle Paul explains how we should view the work of the gospel from Heaven’s perspective. He says that we were once alienated from God but now in Christ, we have been brought near by virtue of His redeeming blood. Based on what Christ has done on the cross, we who were separated from God and from one another have been brought together into a state of divine peace. Jesus is the global peacemaker.

Colossians 1:19 For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, 20 and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross. 

In other words, the only begotten Son of God paid the ultimate price of His life in order to usher us into a relationship of peace with God and with one another. We are the recipients and beneficiaries of divine peace and Jesus was the peacemaker who made it all possible. No wonder we are called to be peacemakers.

Did you know that as a Christian you are called to be a peacemaker? The desire to make peace flows out of a heart that wants to serve the Lord purely and show mercy to others, but the calling to be a peacemaker is actually connected to the purpose of Christ in the gospel.

The NT teaches that we are to pursue peace, to be at peace, to seek for peace, to pray for peace, and even to strive for peace with everyone, so long as it depends on us. In Colossians, we are told to allow the peace of Christ to rule in our hearts. Christ gives to His disciples His peace, which is unlike anything the world has seen and we are to trust our troubled lives to God and rest in the peace that He gives which passes all understanding. Peace is not just something we do it is the state of our Christian lives.

But what does it mean to be a peacemaker? Peace is a state of harmony between two parties and a peacemaker is someone who works to establish peace between two people who have been separated by some disagreement. A Peacemaker is one who labors to bring reconciliation.

Ken Sande has written an excellent book titled The Peacemaker and in the preface, he explains the role of a peacemaker in this way.

Peacemakers are people who breathe grace. They draw continually on the goodness and power of Jesus, and then they bring His love, mercy, forgiveness, strength, and wisdom to the conflicts of daily life. God uses them to dissipate anger, improve understanding, promote justice and encourage repentance and reconciliation.[3]

I really like Sande’s book and recommend it to you; but let’s make sure that we are clear on what forms the basis of this peace, it is the truth of God’s Word. To be one who seeks to extend the peace of God means that this is not peace at all costs. This is not cheap peace but true and lasting peace that seeks to glorify God by honoring Christ and the Word. This means that we will not always be able to make peace, but we can always seek it.

We will not always be able to reconcile people to one another but we must try and sometimes it will cost us dearly, but true and lasting peace is a costly treasure. Peace means faith and repentance. Peace means confession and forgiveness. Peacemaking is not a simple labor but it comes with great reward.

Happy are the peacemakers for they shall be called sons of God.

Conclusion…

“The Christian faith is not something on the surface of a man’s life, it is not merely a kind of coating or veneer. It is something that has been happening in the very center of his personality. That is why the New Testament talks about being born again (MLJ).” Becoming a Christian is primarily a work of God in our hearts and this change of heart results in a changed life. All of our Christian activities are the result of our new nature.

If you read these blessings and see them as a to-do-list that you must follow in order to earn God’s love then you have misunderstood the gospel. The Christian gospel, the good news, of Jesus Christ is not about what you and I do for God in order to earn salvation; it’s about what Christ has done on the cross to save us though we were dead in our trespasses and sins. The message of Christianity is not do, but done.

Our hope is in Him and His work. Our confidence before God is that Jesus has paid the price for our sins. Our song in this life is that, “Jesus paid it all, all to Him I owe; sin had left a crimson stain, He washed it white as snow.” And now, in our gratitude for what He’s done and with a desire to bring our Savior glory, we display to the world what He has done in our hearts.

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[1] Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Studies in the Sermon on the Mount (Pg. 99)

[2] Pink, Arthur W.. An Exposition of the Sermon on the Mount (Arthur Pink Collection Book 22) (Kindle Locations 600-604). Prisbrary Publishing. Kindle Edition.

[3] Ken Sande, The Peacemaker (Pg. 11).

The Character of the Kingdom

Series: The Sermon on the Mount

Speaker: Pastor Justin Wheeler

Scripture: Matthew 5:4-6

Manuscript PDF

Manuscript

When Jesus took His seat on the mountainside and began to speak to the crowd the last thing people would have hoped for was a warning, but in a sense, that is what they received. The sermon on the Mount is an announcement of the Kingdom of God, an exposition of its character, it’s ethics and its reward. But at the same time, it was a warning. It was a warning to those who thought that they knew what the Kingdom of God would look like.

Those who saw the kingdom as chiefly political were put on notice that they were in jeopardy of missing the Kingdom altogether. Those who thought the kingdom was chiefly to be obtained through military conquest would have been shocked by Jesus’ opening statements. Those who thought the kingdom was already in their grasp on account of their moral behavior (Pharisees) were warned that they would never gain entry.

This sermon was a warning to those who presumed to have a handle on all things related to the Kingdom. It was a warning to a whole generation of people who had convinced themselves that they didn’t need a man like Jesus to bring them into the Kingdom and the scary thing is that I fear we need this warning today even more than they did.

Living in the American Suburbs can be one of the most hazardous things to your soul. The spirit at work in the suburbs has a tendency to overwhelm the spirit of Christ’s Kingdom. Living in the suburbs can be like a real-life game to see how much we can drown out the deep need of our soul. The message of the suburbs is that everyone is fine, that having more and newer stuff can really make you happy, and at the center of it all is the you.

The values of the suburbs are convenience, abundance and comfort. Out here you can have it all and you can even get it value sized for just 50 cents more. This spirit can be toxic to Sermon on the Mount because out here we aren’t made to feel the need that Jesus wants us to feel. Out here we can stop thinking, turn on the TV, warm up some food and relax on the couch until it’s time to go to bed.

Transition…

I know you’ve felt this before. You’ve felt the tension between the comforts that surround you and the message of Christ’s kingdom…or maybe it’s just me. But, I believe that now more than ever we need Jesus turn our assumptions upside down in order to teach us what matters the most. We need Jesus to turn our hearts right side up and that is what He does in this sermon.

He has taken His seat on the Mountain so let’s focus our hearts on what He has to say to us this morning.

Matt 5:2 And he opened his mouth and taught them, saying:

3 “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

4 “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.

5 “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.

6 “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.

Sermon Focus…

I. Happy are the sad

4 “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.

Let’s remember what we learned last week about his word blessed. It is the Greek term μακαριοσ and it means fortunate, blissful or happy. You could substitute the term happy each time you see the word blessed. So you could read this, “Happy are the poor in spirit, happy are those who mourn, happy are the meek who hunger and thirst for righteousness.”

But remember also that this term is not referring to shallow emotion but rather to the distinctly Christian joy that comes from having a share in the salvation of the Kingdom of God. It is not shaken by the fears and pains of this world. It is a deep seated happiness in God that turns our natural evaluation of life upside down.[1]

So let’s read verse 4 again, “Happy are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.”

Let’s be honest, its hard to make sense out of this statement. Happy are the sad. Happy are the unhappy. How can happiness result from sadness? In my day-to-day experience, the thing being promised here (happiness) does not normally come from what is being required (sadness). This doesn’t seem to make sense, in fact all of these statements are paradoxical, which means that they seem inconsistent with our normal human experience.

These statements seem upside-down. They seem absurd, but that is part of Jesus’ point. There is something about His Kingdom that defies our experience of life in this world. To understand this we have to get underneath this sadness and learn something about it to understand how this statement can be true. So here’s the question, what does it mean to mourn?

Of all the Greek terms used to convey sorrow in the NT (9) this is perhaps the strongest and most severe. To mourn means to feel deep grief. It means to experience severe sorrow and sadness. This is that bitter mourning that comes over the unexpected loss of a loved one. This term is used to describe the mourning of Jesus’ disciples after the crucifixion and before they knew that He had been raised from the dead.

This is not benign sadness but real heartfelt grief associated with deep loss. But what it is that has been lost, what has caused this deep grief? Don’t forget that Jesus is not talking about a superficial kind of mourning but a mourning that comes from the heart. He is not talking about a type of earthly sorrow but a type of spiritual sorrow that reflects the values of His kingdom. Jesus is speaking about godly sorrow that relates to the knowledge of our sin. He is referring to the type of sorrow we feel not because we have lost a loved one but because we have recognized our loss of innocence.

IOW, happy are those who mourn over their sin. Last week, we talked about what it meant to be poor in spirit. To be poor in spirit is to know one’s own spiritual bankruptcy before God. It is to recognize that any hope of salvation would lie outside of yourself, because on your own you have nothing to offer. It is to see yourself as a spiritual beggar in the eyes of God, but this second Beatitude takes the next step.

It is one thing to confess our spiritual poverty; it is quite another to grieve over it, to mourn over it. But this is what Jesus is calling for here. Verse 4 moves us from confession of sin to grief over that sin, from acknowledgment to remorse. This is an awareness of our depravity that has moved from the mind to the heart. Happy are those who grieve over their sin.

Is it possible for someone to acknowledge their sin and not grieve over it? Yes! In 2 Corinthians 7 Paul talks about two kinds of grieving over sin. The first type is what he calls worldly grief and it is an acknowledgement of your sin that might lead to a momentary change in behavior and an apology but nothing more. It is the type of grief that we see in children who aren’t sorry for what they’ve done so much as they are sorry that they got caught.

It’s the kind of grief we see when our family pet eats a sandwich off the table and then puts their head down when you tell them they are a bad dog. But as soon as you walk away they are sniffing around for more food. It is a learned behavior.

But there is another type of grief that goes deeper and has a more lasting effect upon our soul. Paul talks about this type of grief as well.

2 Cor 7:10 But godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death. 11 For see what earnestness this godly grief has produced in you, but also what eagerness to clear yourselves, what indignation, what fear, what longing, what zeal, what punishment! At every point you have proved yourselves innocent in the matter.

Being poor in Spirit leads to godly sorrow and godly sorrow over one’s sin leads to repentance.

King David knew what it was to mourn over his sin. He had taken what didn’t belong to him. He had taken another man’s wife. He had tried to cover it up to hide his guilt and shame, but when confronted with the truth, David’s heart was laid bare and this was his response.

Ps 51:1 Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love; according to your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions.

2 Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin!

3 For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me.

4 Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight,

Let me ask this question: Do you mourn over your sin? Is there sorrow in your heart over the sins that you have committed but also the sinful heart that resides in your chest? Do you take your sin seriously to the point of crying out to God and to the point of sincere repentance?

Our sinful heart doesn’t want us to acknowledge our poverty of spirit and it doesn’t want to feel deep sorrow, but the Spirit of God leads us on this journey. He reveals our sin. He makes our hearts to feel. Then He turns our mourning into dancing and our sorrow into joy, because He comforts us in our grief.

Happy are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.

The Spirit comforts us when we grieve over our sin, not by telling us that it is okay to keep on sinning, but by reminding us that Christ died to remove our guilt and shame. The Spirit comforts us by bringing conviction to our hearts, which in itself is a reminder of God’s work in our lives. He comforts us by bringing us to repentance in our heart and life. He is the comforter sent out to all those who believe; to all those who recognize their poverty of spirit and who grieve over their sin.

II. Happy are the Meek

5 “Happy are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.

The history of humanity has shown that it is the powerful, the bold, the aggressive and often the ruthless who rule the earth. In the world, the more you assert yourself the more likely you are to succeed. In business, it is a dog eat dog world and the goal is to be an alpha dog. In politics, the modern practice is to employ a cut-throat scheme of maneuvering oneself to the top. Life in this world is a daily battle to climb the proverbial ladder with no concern about who you might step on along the way.

But here comes Jesus with an astounding statement that it’s the meek who will inherit the earth. We can’t help but notice that the character of Christ’s Kingdom is at odds with the kingdom of this world.

Can you imagine how this would have been received in Jesus’ day? His audience would have been eagerly awaiting the news of this would-be Messiah’s plan for how Israel was going to inherit the earth. They would have been on the edge of their seats to hear how Jesus would overthrow Rome and establish Jerusalem as the capital of the world. They wanted deliverance, they wanted independence, they wanted Israel to be a powerful nation state again. But with this statement Jesus wants them to fix their hope on a different type of kingdom, a different type of power.

They weren’t looking for a meek king who would lead His meek people to inherit the earth, but that is what Jesus promises. Meekness is not about power it is about gentleness. It is not a show of force it is a show of humility. It is not the dog eat dog mentality of the world but counting others as more significant than oneself.

But don’t forget that Jesus is aiming His words at our hearts. He is presenting the character of His kingdom which is not of this world, but of the Spirit. So don’t focus first on the external nature of this verse but on the internal. What does it mean to be meek (in spirit)?

This is where we need to see the logical connection between these different Beatitudes. The starting place is to see ourselves as exposed by the glory and holiness of God. When we see ourselves before God we can’t help but embrace our spiritual poverty and as we examine the root of our poverty we can’t help but be moved to grief and sorrow over the sin that dwells in our hearts.

But now, as we look up from our grief we look upon others and we realize something that we hadn’t before, we realize that we are no better than those around us. We see that our sin makes us equal in the eyes of God. I am a sinner through and through. I am no better than anyone in this room and I know that because the gospel has exposed me.

It is meekness that led Paul to call himself the “chief of sinners.” Meekness is seeing yourself for who you really are, a sinner whose pardon could only be supplied by the death of Christ. Our sin, yours and mine, is so great before God that Hell is a just punishment. The sin in our heart is so great that the Son of God had to give up His life to cover the debt.

How can I be arrogant toward you when I know deep down in my heart what I truly am. When we learn to see ourselves as wretched men like Paul did, we won’t see ourselves as lords among men, but beggars telling other beggars where to find food.

Has the reality of the gospel produced meekness in your heart? Let’s put it to the test. John Stott urges us to apply the test of meekness in this way:

I myself am quite happy to recite the confession in church and call myself a miserable sinner…But let somebody come up to me after church and call me a miserable sinner, and I want to punch him on the nose.

Here is the test, are you prepared to allow other people to think or speak of you the way the gospel does? Meekness begins in the heart but it doesn’t stay there, it works its way out and affects the way we treat others.

To live with humility and meekness before God and others is a reward on its own, but Jesus goes further when He says that the meek shall inherit the earth. The children of Israel had to fight to obtain the Promised Land but the Kingdom of Christ is different. In Christ, we will obtain our eternal inheritance not by might but by meekness.

III. Happy are the Hungry

Happy are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied

We all know what it is to be hungry. We know what it is to be thirsty. But these terms go beyond your run of the mill experience of waiting too long between meals. The type of hunger that Jesus is talking about is the type that puts you on the edge of death. This is the type of hunger and thirst where the need of nourishment is a matter of life and death. This is something that perhaps only a few of us have ever experienced, maybe none of us.

But we have enough imagination to see the apparent absurdity in the statement. How can a person by happy when they are starving to the point of death? The statement is meant to jar us awake from our normal way of thinking. Jesus wants to grab our attention and draw us in close so that we can understand what He means and to learn how to find the satisfaction that He is promising.

Notice again that Jesus isn’t talking about hungering for food but hungering for righteousness, this is once again about the heart. This is a type of spiritual hunger that marks the Christian life. And notice also that this is the next logical step in the progression of these Beatitudes. The man who has come to recognize his poverty of spirit will go on to grieve over the sin that put them in that state. The man who grieves over his sin will come to know the greatness of his sin and this will produce a meekness in his heart toward himself and others. So at this stage you have a man/woman who is broken, empty, humble and filled with godly sorrow.

The thing they need most at this stage is to be filled. The thing they need most is the opposite of what they have come to see in their heart. The thing they need most is to be put back together, not on their own but by God. They need God to give them a new heart. They need a forgiving Father who will embrace them, and clean them up, put shoes on their feet and a robe on their back. The thing they need most is to be fed with good things, filled with good food…so they hunger and thirst for the goodness of God to fill their lives.

Jesus is talking about the spiritual hunger for righteousness that only He can fill. Some pursue righteousness by the flesh, meaning they seek to earn favor with God by keeping the law. They are attempting to earn salvation through works. But the man who is truly poor in spirit knows the impossibility of that. So he hungers for something that He can’t attain on his own. He pursues righteousness, not by works but by faith.

A starving person has one thought, one goal and that is to find food and water. Nothing else matters. The desire for food is so strong it drives out everything else. What is the controlling desire of your life? What is the hunger that fuels you?

Some hunger for stuff and the materialism of our culture simply can’t satisfy. Some hunger for attention and praise, but how many times must we read of celebrity meltdowns before we realize that fame can’t satisfy our hearts. Some hunger for pleasure and eventually find that it too can’t satisfy the deep longing of our souls.

Mick Jagger was right, “We can’t get no satisfaction…” This world can’t make us rich in the way we need most. This world can’t take away the sin that causes us to mourn. We can’t gain the kingdom by forfeiting our soul. We can’t be satisfied, truly satisfied, by the things of this world.

But Jesus extends this promise to us,

John 6:35 I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.

Only Christ can satisfy the hunger in our soul and He does so the moment we come to Him. But notice that full satisfaction doesn’t come in this life. “They shall be satisfied.” The hunger doesn’t leave us. We know His righteousness saves us and we know in the end that His righteousness satisfies us, but the hunger doesn’t go away until Heaven. It comes on us again and again and each time we remember that Christ is the fountain of living water so we go to Him and drink deeply, but we keep coming back day after day, year after year.

What began in our hearts as a hunger for salvation becomes a hunger for sanctification. We long to be filled with more and more of Christ’s love and character.

Conclusion…

1. The Character of Christ’s Kingdom is a total reversal to that of this world. The world, and our worldly heart, wants to laugh not grieve, to be rich not poor in spirit, to be bold and assertive not meek. The kingdom of this world is attained by power, success, personal achievement and personal comfort; but the Kingdom of Christ is not achieved, it is a gift to those who’ve come to see their deep need of Christ.

2. Our Journey into Christ’s Kingdom starts with brokenness and ends in joy. Happy are the poor in spirit. Happy are those who grieve over their sin. Happy are the meek. Happy are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. This is the journey that the gospel brings us through. It is a journey of brokenness before God that changes us from the inside out. It is a journey of being emptied of self and being filled by the Spirit of God. It is a journey the turns our world upside-down.

3. Those who enter the Kingdom are concerned with holiness. Are you poor in spirit? Are you broken and filled with grief over your sin? Are you humble and meek because the Gospel has exposed you before God? Do you hunger and thirst for righteousness? What begins in the heart works out in life. Holy thinking marks the starting line, holy living is the path, and eternity the goal.

Jesus’ message is intended to wake us up from the siren song of the suburbs, let’s let it.

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[1] Theological Dictionary of the New Testament on the word makarios.

The Manifesto of Christ's Kingdom

Series: The Sermon on the Mount

Speaker: Pastor Justin Wheeler

Scripture: Matthew 5:1-6

Manuscript PDF

Manuscript

Of all Jesus’ teaching, none is more readily identified and associated with Him than the Sermon on the Mount found in Matthew chapters 5, 6, and 7. It appears in the first book of the New Testament and while it is not the first recorded statement of Jesus, it is by far the longest and most comprehensive of His public sermons. It seems clear that Matthew views this message as the foundation upon which Jesus’ life, ministry, and kingdom are to be established.

The sermon is ground-breaking on multiple levels. It is the inauguration speech of the King of the Universe. It is the sermon that broke 400 years of divine silence and at the same time, it introduced the world to the Kingdom of God in a way that it had never known before. This sermon describes what human life and human community look like when they come under the rule of God’s grace.[1] The Old Testament ended with the threat of a curse but this sermon opens the New Testament with the promise of blessings.

And yet, like much of Christ’s teaching, the Sermon on the Mount is not just widely known it is also largely misunderstood. Modern liberal theology will say that it’s not your doctrine (what you believe) that truly matters, but how you live out the Sermon on the Mount. The problem is that they don’t seem to have even read the Sermon on the Mount because no one can be perfect as God is perfect, and yet Jesus tells us in this sermon that we must be perfect like our Heavenly Father is perfect.

Many modern people are familiar only with certain lines out of the Sermon on the Mount and they quote these lines out of self-interest or an attempt to defend their sin. “Don’t judge me! Jesus says not to judge others.” Love your enemies, turn the other cheek, do unto others…how many times have we heard these quoted or used them ourselves, with no clue or connection to what Jesus was actually talking about in the sermon?

At the same time, there are many who have never heard of the Sermon on the Mount. Virginia Stem Owens was a professor of English and Literature at Texas A &M and one of the assignments she gave to an incoming freshman was to read the Sermon on the Mount and write a response paper. Most of her students were middle-class, conservative, Republicans who held to traditional American values, but she was surprised by what she read in their responses.

The first paper she picked up began,

“In my opinion religion is one big hoax.”

The second read,

“There is an old saying that ‘you shouldn’t believe everything you read’ and it applies in this case.”

One student came right to the point,

 “I did not like the essay ‘Sermon the Mount.’ It was hard to read and made me feel like I had to be perfect and no one is.”

“The things asked in this sermon are absurd. To look at a woman is adultery? That is the most extreme, stupid, un-human statement that I have ever heard.”[2]

Transition…

Some people love this sermon, some hate it, but ignoring it isn’t an option. This sermon is intended to shake things up. It takes the value system of our sinful world and turns it upside-down. It points an unflinching finger at religious legalists and hypocrites and tells them that they will have no part in the Kingdom of Heaven. But it also makes clear that not one part of the law of God will be overlooked. It tells us the way to eternal life and then tells us that the journey will cost us our very lives.

But in the end, this sermon is an announcement of Good News. A New King for God’s people has come and He is establishing a New Covenant and this is His message.

Matthew 5:1 Seeing the crowds, he went up on the mountain, and when he sat down, his disciples came to him. 2 And he opened his mouth and taught them, saying:

3 “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

4 “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.

5 “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.

6 “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.

7 “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.

8 “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.

9 “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.

10 “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

11 “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. 12 Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

Sermon Focus…

I. The Setting for this Sermon

Before Jesus begins to speak here in chapter 5, Matthew has been working to build our anticipation for what He is going to say and the significance of who He is. In chapter 1 we read of Jesus’ miraculous virgin birth and we are reminded of the prophet Isaiah’s words,

Isa 7:14 “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear and son, and they shall call his name Immanuel.

Next came John the Baptist, preparing the way of the Lord and pointing to Jesus saying, “He who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and the fire (Matt 3:11).”

At Jesus’ baptism, God the Father spoke from Heaven declaring, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased (Matt 3:17).” Even the Devil got involved and declared Jesus to be the Son of God and tried to use that as a way to tempt Him in the wilderness.

If we go all the way back to the genealogy in chapter 1 we read that Jesus is called the Messiah, the Son of David, and the Son of God. He is the promised Ruler from Bethlehem, born of a virgin, and given the title, “God with us.” He is the bearer of the Spirit of God, the second Israel who was tempted in the wilderness but did not fail.

After succeeding in the wilderness Matthew tells us that Jesus went to Capernaum by the sea and began to preach, saying “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” He taught in the synagogues and proclaimed the gospel of the kingdom. He healed the sick and afflicted, He cast out demons and by this time great crowds have begun to gather around Him.

But there is one more thing that sets our anticipation for Jesus’ first sermon and it comes by way of comparison and symbolism. I want you to think in terms of the whole of Redemptive History. There are two key events in the Bible that help us to see the redeeming love of God more clearly than any others: The Exodus from Egypt and the Ministry of Jesus. Matthew wants us to see a parallel between what took place at the time of the Exodus and what is taking place as Jesus steps onto the Mountain.

The setting for this Sermon on the Mount should fill our hearts with anticipation as we get set to hear what the Messiah and new Moses will say about the Kingdom of God and our own redemption from bondage to sin.

II. How do we read the Sermon?

How are we to understand and interpret what we read in Jesus message? To whom does it apply? What is its real purpose?

Craig Keener is a professor at Asbury Theological Seminary and he states that there are 36 different interpretations for this sermon. There is a Catholic view, a Lutheran view, a Social gospel view, a dispensational view, an Anabaptist view and much more. I don’t plan to go through them all but it is vitally important that we understand how we are supposed to read this sermon.

Is Jesus presenting a new law, like the law of Moses, that we are in some way supposed to follow in order that we can earn entry into the Kingdom of Heaven? Is this sermon outlining how we can live in order to establish the Kingdom of Heaven on earth by our own efforts? No, and No, that is not the way to read this sermon.

One interpretation says that the Sermon on the Mount has nothing whatsoever to do with modern Christians. They say that Jesus was offering the Jews of His day an opportunity to take part in the Kingdom but since they refused to acknowledge Him as their king, He went to the cross instead. In other words, the church was something of an afterthought, a plan B. Once again, No!

Let me be clear when I say that this sermon and everything in it is critically important for us today. It is a sermon meant for all Christians and it is a message that the unbelieving world needs to hear as well. This is the inaugural address of the King of kings and what He is showing us is a picture of what life is like in His Kingdom. So in order to understand this sermon, we must have some understanding of His Kingdom.

“The Jews (of that day) had a false, materialistic conception of the Kingdom. They thought the Messiah was one who was coming to give them political freedom. They thought of the kingdom in an external sense, a mechanical, military, materialistic sense…But the great purpose of this Sermon is to give an exposition of the kingdom as something which is essentially spiritual. The kingdom (at this time) is primarily something ‘within you.’ It is that which governs and controls the heart, mind, and outlook.

In other words, we are not told in the Sermon on the Mount, “Live like this and you will become Christian’; rather we are told, ‘Because you are Christian live like this.” This is how Christians ought to live; this is how Christians are meant to live (Martyn Lloyd Jones).”[3]

In John 18 as He stood before Pilate, Jesus said, “My kingdom is not of this world.” The Kingdom of Christ is first and foremost internal not external, it is spiritual and moral, not physical and political. His words are aimed at our hearts, because who we are in our hearts will determine what we do in life.

The gospel of Jesus and this sermon are not about external conformity to a pattern of religion. In fact, much of what He says throughout His ministry is aimed at correcting the teaching of the Pharisees which majored in external obedience as a way to earn spiritual favor with God. Jesus wants nothing to do with that. He doesn’t want blind obedience; He wants our lives of faith to be fueled by a love for God that flows from hearts so drenched in God’s grace that they are dripping wet.

The kind of righteous life that Jesus outlines for us in this sermon is first a matter of the heart. But that poses another problem, what if our hearts are the problem? What if our hearts are filled with pride, anger, and idolatry? What if we read this sermon, apply it to our hearts and find that we aren’t fit for the kingdom? That, I think, is where Jesus wants us to start because it means there is only one solution…we must be born again.

We cannot achieve the character of this Kingdom apart from God’s regenerating and saving grace. As He preaches this sermon, Jesus wants us to sense our deep need for God to give us a new heart. He wants us to yearn for God to write His law on our hearts by the Spirit. He wants us to come face to face with our own spiritual poverty and then He wants to build us back upon the foundation of His love and grace.

III. The Blessings of the Sermon

3 “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

4 “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.

5 “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.

6 “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.

The first thing that I want us to notice is the word blessed. It is the Greek term μακαριοσ and it means fortunate, blissful or happy. Happy are the poor in spirit, happy are those who mourn, happy are the meek who hunger and thirst for righteousness. This is counterintuitive. This is upside-down; a complete reversal of our natural way of thinking.

What does this mean? This term blessed/happy was used by the Greeks to talk about a type of transcendent happiness that went beyond care, labor, and death. This term relates to inner happiness that is not subject to earthly suffering and worry. When this term is used in the NT it refers to the distinctly Christian joy that comes from having a share in the salvation of the Kingdom of God. It is not shaken by the fears and pains of this world. It is a deep-seated happiness in God that turns our natural evaluation of life upside down.[4]

This is Hebrews 10:34 kind of happiness…

34 For you had compassion on those in prison, and you joyfully accepted the plundering of your property, since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an abiding one.

But what does it mean to be poor in spirit? The phrase poor in spirit means to be completely destitute to recognize one’s own poverty of the soul. Even in our own day, we use this term to refer to someone who leads the life of a beggar. This is someone who has no property, no money, no power, no status; someone who is completely dependent on others for support. This person is empty, with nothing to offer and they know it. But the type of poverty that Jesus is after deals with one’s soul.

The poor in spirit are those who have come to see and feel the brokenness in their heart and the bankruptcy in their soul. When it comes to righteousness, true righteousness, they are no better than a beggar on the street. Even if they had a little money in their pocket it wouldn’t come close to paying off the debt they owe to God, they are truly poor in spirit.

No one wants to find themselves in this place. Our natural inclination is to assume that we have much to offer and that our spiritual life, though not perfect, is far from a state of poverty. The Pharisees that gathered around to hear Jesus’ message would have scoffed at this opening statement. This is not what the religious people in the crowd wanted to hear, but this is the point of entry into the Kingdom of God. This is how we are made to feel when the gospel hits our ears for the first time.

The gospel does two things in us; it tears us down and then it builds us back up. The gospel shows that our hearts are so desperately wicked that there is no hope that we can overcome our past sin much less do enough to earn eternal life. The gospel holds up the law of God demanding that we keep it perfectly, and then k that we have no chance. We are utterly incapable of pleasing God on our own. The gospel puts us on our knees before God and that is exactly where Christ wants us to start because only those who have come to understand their poverty of spirit before God are fit for the Kingdom of Heaven.

To be poor in spirit means an absence of spiritual pride, an absence of self-assurance and self-reliance. It is this tremendous awareness that we are nothing in the presence of God (Lloyd-Jones).[5]

To be poor in spirit is to be like the prophet Isaiah who saw the Lord high and lifted up, but he fell to knees and cried out, “Woe is me! For I am lost…I am unclean and everyone around me is unclean as well.”

To be poor in spirit is to be like the apostle Paul who could quote a spiritual resume that would shame everyone in this room, but when he stood before Christ he came to realize that all of his religious past was worthless. Paul said, “I count it all to be loss…like nothing but rubbish (dung) in the eyes of God.”

To be poor in spirit is to be like the Tax Collector in Luke 18 who would not even look up to heaven but instead beat his chest saying, “O God, be merciful to me a sinner.”

When Jesus says, “Happy are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of Heaven…” He is making it clear that the kingdom is fit only for those who feel that their only hope of salvation lies outside of themselves because on their own they are nothing more than a beggar.

No wonder those young men and women at Texas A & M didn’t like this sermon. To be poor in spirit is foreign to the unbelieving world. The spirit of this world says that if you want to get somewhere you have to believe in yourself, you have to rely on yourself, you have to take pride in yourself. The spirit of our culture says that there is nothing wrong with you or your heart. It wants you to believe that there is nothing wrong with your choices, that there is nothing wrong with your spirit. In fact, the arrogance of our culture would say that if God is not willing to accept what you have to offer then you shouldn’t want anything to do with Him.

Conclusion…

But Jesus wants us to know that His Kingdom belongs to those who are poor in spirit. There is no one in the Kingdom of God who is not poor in spirit. It is the fundamental posture of its citizens and it is the entry point into the Christian life.

Perhaps you’ve never thought of this before, but I don’t think that Jesus just chose these w at random. There is a very specific and purposeful order to these attitudes, a logical spiritual sequence that helps us to see how the Spirit of God draws us to salvation.

He begins by showing us our need. Our journey to salvation by grace alone begins with understanding that if not for God’s grace we have no hope of being saved. We cannot be filled with God’s grace until we are first emptied of our own self-righteousness. We will not receive the riches of the Kingdom until we are able to see just how poor and needy we are.

But, it is also important for us to understand that as believers we don’t lose that sense of being poor in spirit. We still battle spiritual pride along the way and like Paul we say,

Gal 6:14 But far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.

The song of the poor in spirit is this,

Nothing in my hand I bring, simply to thy cross I cling;

Naked come to Thee for dress; Helpless look to Thee for grace;

Foul I to the fountain fly; wash me Savior or I die.

How do you see yourself? How do you view yourself in the presence of God? Are you poor in spirit? Have you come to see your own spiritual emptiness apart from Christ? Have you come to see that you are a spiritual beggar before God? If so, then listen to the words of Jesus once more.

Blessed are the poor in Spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven.

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[1] John Stott, The Message of the Sermon on the Mount (Pg. 18)

[2] http://andynaselli.com/why-people-hate-the-sermon-on-the-mount

[3] Martyn Lloyd Jones, Studies in the Sermon on the Mount (Pg. 16-17)

[4] Theological Dictionary of the New Testament on the word makarios.

[5] MLJ, pg. 50.