Posted on 07/28/2016 5:53:56 AM PDT by Gamecock
“You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not murder; and whoever murders will be liable to judgment.’ 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” (vv. 21–22).
- Matthew 5:21–26
The twenty-first-century church faces many challenges, not the least of which is widespread misunderstanding of the ethics of Jesus. Popular portrayals and understandings of Christ see Him in the mold of one who had a “live and let live” attitude, who made no real moral demands. According to these portrayals, Jesus certainly had nothing to say about human sexuality, and He never would have been so narrow-minded as to preach that salvation is available only for those who trust in Him.
Regrettably, these depictions of Jesus have shaped the thinking of too many Christians, leading them to believe that our Lord opposes law with love. Contributing to this problem has been misinterpretations of texts such as today’s passage. On our first reading, at least, Jesus appears to be correcting the law of God, which implies that the Mosaic legislation is not a sound guide to making ethical decisions.
Dr. R.C. Sproul often notes that we must read the text of Scripture carefully and give it the benefit of a second glance. When we do that with Matthew 5:21–26, we realize that Jesus was not “correcting” God’s law at all. Jesus introduced the principle He was correcting with the statement, “You have heard that it was said.” Why is this significant? First-century Jews prefaced their citations of Scripture with the phrase, “It is written.” Jesus Himself followed this practice (Matt. 4:4), and we also see it in the Apostles’ writings (Rom. 1:17; 1 Peter 1:16). “You have heard that it was said” identified the Pharisees’ oral tradition, the body of unwritten interpretations of Scripture that the rabbis passed down from one teacher to another. Matthew 5:21–26 records not Jesus’ correction of Scripture but His correction of the Pharisees’ misinterpretation of Scripture.
Our Lord, in truth, taught an ethic grounded firmly in God’s law. No one statement can say everything, so we understand that the commandments are elliptical statements. They include certain aspects that are tacitly understood. Every commandment has both negative and positive aspects, not all of which are stated explicitly. Negatively, the law against murder proscribes unjustfied killing and it also proscribes the unjustified anger at the root of every murder. Positively, the law against murder enjoins the safeguarding of innocent lives. Christ’s teaching in today’s passage reveals the depth of the commandment against murder, thereby emphasizing, not diminishing, the importance of God’s law for Christian ethics.
Coram Deo
Christians are ambassadors of Christ, representatives of His sovereign reign over creation. As such, we have a special responsibility to represent our Lord’s actual teaching. The only way we can do that is through careful study of our Savior’s words. Sitting regularly under the preached Word of God, personal Bible study, small-group Bible studies, and other such things are how we will grow in our understanding of the words of Jesus.
Passages for Further Study
Psalm 119:96 I have seen a limit to all perfection, but your commandment is exceedingly broad.
Isaiah 48:17 Thus says the Lord, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel: “I am the Lord your God, who teaches you to profit, who leads you in the way you should go. 18 Oh that you had paid attention to my commandments! Then your peace would have been like a river, and your righteousness like the waves of the sea; 19 your offspring would have been like the sand, and your descendants like its grains; their name would never be cut off or destroyed from before me.”
Mark 7:1 Now when the Pharisees gathered to him, with some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem, 2 they saw that some of his disciples ate with hands that were defiled, that is, unwashed. 3 (For the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they wash their hands properly, holding to the tradition of the elders, 4 and when they come from the marketplace, they do not eat unless they wash. And there are many other traditions that they observe, such as the washing of cups and pots and copper vessels and dining couches.) 5 And the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, “Why do your disciples not walk according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with defiled hands?” 6 And he said to them, “Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written,
“‘This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me; 7 in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’ 8 You leave the commandment of God and hold to the tradition of men.”
9 And he said to them, “You have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to establish your tradition! 10 For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother’; and, ‘Whoever reviles father or mother must surely die.’ 11 But you say, ‘If a man tells his father or his mother, “Whatever you would have gained from me is Corban”’ (that is, given to God)[d]— 12 then you no longer permit him to do anything for his father or mother, 13 thus making void the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down. And many such things you do.”
1 Corinthians 7:19 For neither circumcision counts for anything nor uncircumcision, but keeping the commandments of God.
Ping!
Now, that's scary. I am often guilty of anger and using insulting language, especially towards people on the Left.
Which is why you (and everyone else) needs a savior. The Sermon on the Mount shows what the Law truly requires and convicts us that none can or ever has lived up to its demands. "Be perfect just as your Father in heaven is perfect". The Sermon on the Mount clearly shows that all fall short of the glory of God and are doomed if they think they can enter the Kingdom of Heaven on the basis of their own efforts. This is why we need the rock of Jesus Christ.
“Be perfect just as your Father in heaven is perfect”.
That small passage crushes me every time I read it. I can’t do that. I worry about those who seen to say “OK! I’ll do that!”
Yep. When I first read the Sermon on the Mount I was horrified because I immediately realized that I’ve never lived up to this a single day of my life - nor can I.
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