Matthew 5:21-48 (Teaching)

[0:00] Even. Even. I can Matthew 5 again. Last week, we finished up in verse 20.

[0:13] And as we go through these next several verses, we need to keep that in mind. Because verse 20 leading up to these, it's critical that we continue to think on verse 20, which says, For I say unto you that except to a righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the Christ of Pharisees, you shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.

[0:40] We briefly spoke on that last week saying that we here in 2023 have a better understanding of that as Christians as believers on Christ.

[0:51] Because we understand that our righteousness doesn't come from within. It doesn't come from self. It comes from Jesus Christ. But Jesus was speaking to a mainly Jewish audience here that this would have kind of been a foreign notion to them.

[1:08] Because really, while they had God and they had the Old Testament, they had the Old Testament Scriptures, and they had the law, really and truly the way that they saw it was they had to depend upon their righteousness, their keeping of the law in order to be a decent or standing with God.

[1:29] So, and everyone saw these Pharisees and these scribes and the chief priests and all these other people. They saw them as the most righteous. So for Jesus to say, you know, your righteousness has got to exceed the righteousness of these, this would have given them a case of what we would call the butterflies nowadays.

[1:51] How in the world can we do that? How can our righteousness exceed that of the Pharisees, exceed that of these that keep the law to a T? And Jesus is about to explain that to these people.

[2:03] He's about to explain it, not only to his disciples. Remember when we started this study of the Sermon on the Mount, we talked about how Jesus had set himself upon a hill or upon a mount as rabbis did in that day, and his disciples were around him as an inner circle.

[2:18] Then there were other people all gathered around. And I don't doubt a bit myself that there were a couple of Pharisees that would have been in that congregation. There were some scribes that would have been in that congregation of people.

[2:30] And there were all kinds of different people that were surrounding Jesus at this point. So he says, except your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and the Pharisees, you will not enter into heaven.

[2:45] Then he goes on to explain some of that here. So we'll pick up in Matthew chapter five, starting in verse 21. Jesus says, you have heard that it was said by them of old time, thou shalt not kill.

[2:59] And whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment. But I say unto you that whosoever is angry with his brother without a call shall be in danger of the judgment.

[3:10] And whosoever shall say to his brother, Raqqa, shall be in danger of the council. But whosoever shall say thou full shall be in danger of hellfire. So we'll stop reading right there for just a moment.

[3:23] So back up to verse 21, you have heard that it was said by them of old. In other words, in the Old Testament scriptures is what Jesus would be referring back here to. You've heard it said from the law, thou shalt not kill.

[3:37] Whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment. But he says, but I say unto you that whosoever is angry with his brother without a call shall be in danger of the judgment.

[3:49] So Jesus here saying these scribes and these Pharisees and really anybody saw it as a righteous act that they had never killed anyone.

[4:01] They had never committed murder, in other words. They had never gotten angry and shot somebody, stabbed somebody, beat somebody. Whatever the case is. And people saw themselves as righteous for doing that.

[4:14] But Jesus is pointing out just how unrighteous not only the scribes and not only the Pharisees, but everyone that was around him is. Because all of us at some point in our lives, you know, whether we were children, whether we were teenagers, whether we've been adults, whatever the case is.

[4:29] Every one of us has had hate in their heart at some point in their lives. Hate toward another person. Hate toward someone else who bore the image of God just as we do.

[4:40] And this, in the words of Jesus Christ, is the same as murder. So Jesus here is showing them that you're not as righteous as you think you are. And the next six things that Jesus covers all the way through the end of this chapter, that's exactly what he's showing these people.

[4:58] Is you are not as righteous as you think you are. He's telling that to the scribes and the Pharisees. And he's telling the other people that are around them. Those the scribes and the Pharisees are not as righteous as you think that they are.

[5:10] But nevertheless, your righteousness must exceed theirs. And Jesus Christ is the only way that we can have such righteousness. He's the only way that we will ever get into heaven is through Jesus Christ and through his blood and through the sacrifice that he made.

[5:28] But Jesus says, by saying to you that whosoever is angered with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment. Whosoever shall say to his brother, Rock, shall be in danger of the council. Here he's talking, he's, well first in verse 22, he says, without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment.

[5:46] Then whosoever shall say to his brother, Rock, shall be in danger of the council. In other words, being taken before the council, being taken basically to court. But then he goes on to say, but whosoever shall say thou full shall be in danger of hellfire.

[6:02] Now, a lot of people take this to extremes and say, you shouldn't call anybody a fool because the Bible says you're going to hell if you do. Well, folks, I ain't what Jesus is saying here. What Jesus is saying and the Greek word that was used here for full is the word morose, which is where we actually get our English word moron from, believe it or not.

[6:23] But what it's saying is not that you're calling someone stupid, that you're calling someone ignorant, but you were calling someone an unbeliever in God. You were calling someone an unbeliever in the Scriptures if you were calling them a fool.

[6:38] Think back to the Psalms, the fool that said in his heart that there is no God. And this is what Jesus Christ was getting at. He was saying if you're going to those measures to call someone that, but remember at the beginning of this, he started out with brother.

[6:54] He's talking about brothers. He's talking about people that have a relation to some kind, not necessarily a blood relation, but a spiritual relation. All the Israelites have a spiritual relation.

[7:07] Yes, they're all related from Abraham on up, but they have a spiritual relation. God, when he created the Jewish people, he not only created, he created a race of people, but he not only created that for them, he created a religion for them, and he also created a culture for them, and he done all these things through the law.

[7:29] So what he was saying here was when you call your brother a fool, you're saying that he's an unbeliever in me, in God. And this will be what puts you in danger of hellfire.

[7:44] Verse 23 says, therefore, now all these things we just went over, we got to remember those things going into this next verse or two, because he says, therefore, in other words, everything I just said leads up to this, therefore, if thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there, remember that thy brother hath ought against thee, leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way, first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift.

[8:11] So he says, keep these things in mind, keep in mind that I just told you that if you've ever hated your brother, it's the same as murder. Keep in mind that I just told you that if you've ever called your brother a fool, that you're in danger of hellfire.

[8:25] And he says, therefore, if thou bring thy gift to the altar, what would this gift be? Folks, this gift would have been brought, at this time, it would have been brought to the temple. In earlier times, it would have been brought to the tabernacle, but it was a gift to God, it was a gift being brought to God and for the service of God.

[8:41] But what did they go to the temple? That was the main reason they went to the temple for, it was to worship God. They went to the temple to worship God, and he says, therefore, if thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there, remember that thy brother hath ought against thee, leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way, first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer my gift.

[9:02] In other words, don't have hatred in your heart for a brother, don't have hatred in your heart for a sister, don't have ought with any of them, and try to worship me because it will never happen.

[9:13] This is what God is getting at there. When we come to church, and a lot of people will do that, a lot of people will have bad thoughts toward a brother or sister, they'll have something going on, whatever the case is, and they will try and mask how they're feeling with worship to God, but God will not accept that as worship.

[9:35] He won't even recognize that as worship when we have ought with a brother or a sister when we try and worship God. So God says, if you bring your gift to the altar, and you recognized in, or you remember then, it's brought to your remembrance, or you realize that you have ought with a brother or sister, you leave that gift there, you go and make things right with them, then you can come and worship me.

[10:01] When you're right with your brothers and your sisters, you have to be right with your brothers and sisters before you can worship Almighty God. Leave there for that gift before the altar, go that way, first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer that gift.

[10:18] That word reconciled here, it's very important. God's saying, you're wanting to worship me as a God of reconciliation. God is the ultimate picture of what reconciliation is.

[10:31] God cast off man in the garden. He cast off the entire human race. He put the entire human race under a curse. He put the earth under a curse. But God threw Jesus Christ, reconciles man back to himself.

[10:45] He's saying, you're wanting to worship me, the God of reconciliation, the God who invented reconciliation, who thought of reconciliation. You need to be reconciled to your brother or to your sister before you can come and worship me.

[10:59] First be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift. Verse 25, agree with thine adversary quickly, whilst thou art in the way with him. Lest at any time the adversary deliver thee to the judge, and the judge deliver thee to the officer, and thou be cast into prison.

[11:16] Verily I say unto thee, thou shalt by no means come out thence, till thou hast paid the uttermost farthing. So he says, agree with thine adversary quickly.

[11:27] Now, a lot of people will take this to extremes as well, and say, regardless of what your adversary says, regardless of what your adversary does, you need to agree with him.

[11:40] Folks, that's just not true. I mean, if my adversary calls me something, or accuses me of something that I haven't done, or that I haven't been, or that I am not, should I agree with that?

[11:55] That makes me just as much a liar as they are, does it not? So we can't take that to extremes, and say in every situation we need to agree with our adversary. What are we talking about here?

[12:07] If we have truly offended a brother, if we've done something to cause a brother or a sister to have ought with us, ought with a brother or sister, or sister especially, in those cases, then we need to agree with them.

[12:25] But folks, we need to be the ones that persevere in that. If we recognize it, we need to be the ones that try to make amends. Now, whether amends are made or not, the Bible isn't real clear on that.

[12:39] The Bible is clear, though, that we need to make every possible effort to make amends with an adversary, whether it's a brother or sister, or whatever the case may be. But he says, agree with our adversary quickly.

[12:51] In other words, don't let it hang around. Don't say, I'll wait till tomorrow, or I'll wait till next week. Thanksgiving's coming up. We're going to be seeing some family members that we ain't seen in a year.

[13:02] We're going to be seeing some family members around Christmas we ain't seen in a year. Have we had ought with any of those brothers or sisters for that year's time? And have we made any effort at all to reach out to them and say, look, I'm sorry, or this is stupid?

[13:17] I mean, that works sometimes when you just say, this is stupid the way we're acting. We've had this ongoing issue since we were 12 and 15 years old.

[13:28] And here we are in our 40s or 50s or 60s or whatever the case is. Why are we still arguing over this? Why every time we gather, will we not talk? Will we not even look in each other's ways?

[13:39] This is stupid. Folks, that's agreeing. If they agree to that, that's agreeing. But the thing is, God makes it plain in His Word. We are the ones that need to persevere in that.

[13:52] We are the ones that need to reach out. If we recognize there's a problem, we need to be the ones that try to make a solution to the problem. God, nowhere in His Scripture promises that there will be resolution in any of these matters that we're talking about right now.

[14:07] But He makes it very plain that we are to seek that. And back to the first night of going through the Sermon on the Mount, of going through the Beatitudes, what it was to be meek.

[14:18] Think about that. A meek person is the one that seeks that. Who inherits the kingdom of God? The peacemakers.

[14:30] This is seeking peace, isn't it, Nod? You're seeking peace. You're being meek so we can go all the way back to the Beatitudes and consider this. He just preached these before.

[14:41] Jesus just preached these before He gets into what we're into right now. So we need to do this quickly, though. I agree with that adversary quickly, whilst thou art in the way with Him. Blessed be He, at any time the adversary deliver thee to the judge and the judge deliver thee to the officer, and thou be cast into prisons.

[14:57] Now Jesus is using some legal terminology here in a legal setting to paint this picture. But He's saying do this quickly.

[15:08] I don't know if you recognize these things might happen now. If you're still mad with your brother or your sister or sibling or anybody else that you know because of, you know, they stole your wiffle ball back when you all were kids or something.

[15:26] And we're still mad about that. There ain't no way to really do anything about that quickly if 30 years has passed. But once you recognize it, that's when you act on it quickly.

[15:37] And that's not anything they're going to take you to court for either. I would hope not. You know, people have been taking to court for a lot less. I mean, we live in a very Sue happy society, do we not? I could sue any one of you in here right now just for sitting there breathing if I wanted to.

[15:52] I literally could. I could have you taken to court. That's not to say I would win the case. But I could sue for that. But this is, that's the picture that Jesus is paying here. He says, I say under thee thou shalt by no means come out thence till thou hast paid the uttermost farthing.

[16:10] He says, truly, I say this to you, that you need, basically he's reiterating, you need to do this. You need to do this because the payment later that you're going to have to make would be a whole lot greater than if you took care of it right now.

[16:30] It's in a nutshell what Jesus is getting at there. Verse 27, now this next section we're getting into, for whatever reason, this is a very touchy subject inside the church.

[16:42] It's a touchy subject outside the church for that matter. People don't like to talk about it, especially in this general area of the Bible Belt that we live in.

[16:53] People don't like this section of scripture and different people don't like it for different reasons. But anyway, we'll start reading the verse 27. He says, you have heard that it was said by them of old time, just like up in verse 21, you've heard that it was said of them by old time.

[17:11] So he's referring back again to the Old Testament scriptures, to the Old Testament prophets and to the law. You have heard that it was said of them by old time, thou shalt not commit adultery, but I say unto you that whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart.

[17:28] So Jesus, once again, not only setting the scribes and the Pharisees in place here, and we'll get a little bit further into that in just a moment, but he's again letting those other people that are gathered around there, he's letting them know that the scribes and Pharisees aren't nearly as righteous as you think they are.

[17:49] Because he says, whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her, whosoever, doesn't matter if you're a scribe, doesn't matter if you're a Pharisee, doesn't matter if you're a peasant, doesn't matter who you are, what you are, whosoever does this thing.

[18:04] And this is one of the things I love about Ray Comfort, if any of you, however, watch his YouTube videos and how he witnesses to people. He always presents the law first. I mean, folks, if people don't know that they're sinners, they see no reason that they need to be saved.

[18:20] And the only way they'll know that they're sinners is to present the law to them and show them that they have broken the law, just as you've broken the law and I have broken the laws of God. We've broken the moral laws of God, but they need to be shown that he says, you have heard it said of them, old time, thou shalt not commit adultery.

[18:38] But I say to you, whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her, hath committed adultery with her already in his heart. So that excludes none of us, every one of us.

[18:50] You women too, every one of us are guilty of this. Just because it's talking about looking on a woman to lust, that doesn't mean Jesus is speaking exclusively to men.

[19:04] Every one of us are guilty of that. All of us have done it at some point in our lives. We have looked on someone in lust. And therefore, according to the Scriptures, it is sin.

[19:15] It is adultery in the eyes of Almighty God to do that. Now, what makes this so significant is these Pharisees had taken the laws that were presented in the Old Testament, namely in Deuteronomy chapter 24.

[19:33] And they had said that, well, it was a commandment of Moses that we divorce our wives, that we get rid of them, if we found any out with them. And the King James Version says that there was any uncleanness found in them.

[19:48] But they had so taken this, and they made it basically into a commandment that Moses had given, supposedly from God, that if they found anything wrong with their wives, they could get rid of them.

[20:01] There were two different schools at this time, two different rabbinical schools at this time. One of them was what we would call nowadays a conservative school, and one of them was a liberal school.

[20:14] And the liberal school was called the School of Hillel. And this was the thought patterns that were going along at this time. By the time 200 or so AD, by the time the mission was compiled, there were pages, literally pages, of reasons in the mission that a man could divorce his wife.

[20:35] Now, God put the laws of divorce in the Old Testament, and Jesus reiterates those laws in the New Testament as a protection to the woman, because women had no rights back in these days.

[20:47] They had no rights. I mean, if a woman was divorced, she was left on her own, just as she was if her husband died. She was left on her own. She had no choice but to remarry if she wanted to survive.

[21:00] She depended on a man. She depended on children. But she depended on these things just to keep bread in her mouth. So those laws were designed really to protect the women of the day.

[21:15] But as I said, by the time the mission was compiled, there were pages upon pages. A Jewish man could divorce his wife because he didn't think her nose was big enough.

[21:26] I'm not lying. You all can go home and Google this stuff yourself. Or because he thought her nose was too big. He could divorce her because he didn't like her hair color, because she was too dark-complected, because she was too light-complected.

[21:42] All these things, I mean, there were pages upon pages upon pages. And they got this from the idea that Moses and Deuteronomy 24 said that if a man found uncleanness in his wife to write her a bill of divorcement and to give it to her and to send her out her way, that's the words in Deuteronomy 24, but they had taken it to an extreme.

[22:04] And we laugh at those thoughts and we think, my goodness, that sounds ridiculous, but folks, we here in the West, we've gone a step further than that. At least they had those reasons. However silly and stupid those reasons were, but we here in the West, we have no fault divorce.

[22:20] We just say, well, I just don't want to be married to him. Period. So we can't look down our noses at those rules that these Jews had made, but they had made them for their own benefit.

[22:33] And that's what Jesus is getting at here. He says, if you've even looked on a woman in lust, you've committed adultery with her. See, these Pharisees, they didn't have to commit adultery.

[22:46] All they had to do was go home and say, I don't like the way you look. You burnt my meal. You did this or you did that. Here's your bill of divorce. Get out the way. And they go and they find another woman and they marry her.

[22:58] There was no reason for adultery. So these Pharisees thought that they had never committed adultery. And that's exactly what Jesus Christ was getting at here. And it wasn't just the Pharisees. I mean, it was men in general were taking advantage of what they thought was a commandment from God, but they didn't see the commandment fully.

[23:20] I mean, even in Matthew 19, even in Matthew 19, they come to Jesus and they ask Him, why did Moses then give a commandment to write a bill of divorcement if we weren't allowed to do this thing?

[23:33] And Jesus says, from the beginning it was not so. He said, have you never read that a man should leave his father and his mother and he should cleave to his wife? And they twain shall become one fled.

[23:45] He says, this is the way that it was from the beginning. But praise God, He goes on to say, Jesus there in Matthew 19, He goes on to say, for the hardness of your hearts, for the hardness of your hearts did Moses give that commandment.

[23:59] In other words, that wasn't God's original design. God never intended for marriage to be that way, but God knew that it would be that way. God is all knowing, is He not?

[24:11] God is omniscient, is He not? He knows it all. He knows the end from the beginning. He knows the beginning from the end. He's often omniscient. He knows all of these things. And He knew what man would turn marriage into.

[24:25] He says, and Jesus said, for the hardness of your heart, Moses gave that commandment. In other words, God knew you were going to commit that sin. Is divorce a sin? Absolutely.

[24:36] Absolutely. I mean, I stand here before you as a divorced and remarried man. And yes, I committed sin in the eyes of God. And some people will go back on that and they'll say, well, this is something I did before I was ever saved.

[24:50] Hey, it was something I did before I was ever saved. I told a lot of lies before I was saved. I stole things before I was saved. I've done all kinds of things before I got drunk before I was saved. I mean, sin is sin is sin.

[25:02] It don't matter if you saved or you're not, it's still sin in the eyes of God. So that's not a cover-up to say that all this was before I was married. Divorce is sin, period.

[25:16] But praise God. Sin is forgiven, is it not? Yeah. The only sin I can read about that is unforgivable. And the entire writ of Scripture that we have is a blasphemy of the Holy Ghost, which is a complete and utter rejection of the Holy Ghost's conviction that He places on a lost sinner using the word of God, showing them you're lost and you need a Savior that you can have in God through Jesus Christ.

[25:46] And the rejection of that is the sin that cannot be forgiven. But when we accept that, when we accept Jesus Christ, when we accept His sacrifice, every sin, including the lying, including the stealing, including the adultery that we're reading about, including divorce, God says He hates divorce.

[26:06] In chapter 2, He says, I hate the putting away, and the putting away is divorce. God hates it, but He knew that man would do it, and He made provision in Jesus Christ that that sin could be forgiven.

[26:18] Hallelujah. There's a lot of people, especially in this area, that think that that's the unforgivable sin. They think that that's the sin that's a sin unto death, for some reason, but I can't find that in Scripture. It is completely and totally forgivable.

[26:31] I know it is, because I stand here before you, a born-again child of God. I know that that's a forgivable sin. But Jesus, let's reread, But I say unto you that who shall look at the woman to the lesser after her, that she may have adultery with her already in his heart?

[26:48] And if thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee, for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell.

[27:00] So Jesus here has gone from looking on a woman to lust after her, and he's talking about, then goes on about the eye, if thy right eye offend thee, cut it off.

[27:11] Well, folks, it's not our eye. It's not our eye. It's not our eye. It's not our eye. It's not our eye.

[27:23] It's not our eye. It's not our eye. Well, folks, it's not our eye that's the problem. And it's not our hand that's the problem.

[27:36] I mean, there's people that are blind that have lust in their hearts. There's paraplegics that have lust in their hearts, that don't have hands to begin with.

[27:47] The problem's not in their eye, and it's not in their hand. The problem's in our heart. The problem's right here. That's what Christ is getting at in this. He says, okay, you've looked on a woman, and you've lusted after her.

[28:00] Pluck out your eye. Did he mean that literally? Did he mean go and tear out your eye? Because it's better that you go to heaven with one eye as opposed to going to hell with both of them.

[28:15] Did he mean it literally? There's a man, you read about him a lot in church history, a man named Origen. And there's a rumor, I won't say it's a fact, but there's a rumor that these verses here convicted him so badly that he rolled around naked in briars to solve this problem of lust that he had.

[28:37] And then when that didn't work, when that didn't solve the problem of lust, he physically done away with his manhood, we'll say. Now, this could have been a rumor that was started, but you find it several times throughout church history that he done this.

[28:56] Does God really want us to do that? Does God want us to self-mutilate? Does God want me to reach in my eye socket and rip out my eye or to cut off my own hand? The Old Testament speaks very much against self-mutilation.

[29:11] Once again, folks, our eyes, our hands, our feet, these aren't the problems. The problem is in the heart. We get the problem with the heart solved.

[29:23] I won't say you solve the problem with your heart because you can't solve it. Only Jesus Christ can do that. But we get the problem with our heart solved and our eye will quit wandering.

[29:34] Our hands will quit wandering. And we won't have to... And every time that lust comes in, every time an offense comes in, whatever the case is, every time that happens, what do we do?

[29:47] We go to God. We go to God. We say, help me with this. I mean, folks, listen, it's natural for a heterosexual woman to look at a good-looking heterosexual man and vice versa.

[30:02] It's natural for that to happen. But where the problem is, is where the glance becomes a glare. It becomes a stare. It's just like... I may have used the example here before. I know I have in the past.

[30:14] At other times, if I'm driving down the interstate and I look up and I see a billboard with a woman with a bottle of beer, she's got nothing more than a bikini top on. She's got that water dripping down her neck onto her chest.

[30:25] And I see that. Have I sinned? No. I didn't put it up there. I didn't ask anybody to put it up there. But when I take that second look, knowing what's up there, when I do that, that's when it becomes sin.

[30:41] That's when it's sin. When I know that it's there, when I know what I'm going to be looking at, when I look in that direction, that's sin. Just to see it is not sin, but to want to see it.

[30:54] That's lust. That's lust and that is sin. That's sin. So Jesus is not saying for us to self-mutilate ourselves in these verses.

[31:07] What Jesus wants is not our eye to be clean, not our hand to be clean or heart to be clean. If our heart's clean, I mean, once again, folks, you can go back to the Beatitudes.

[31:21] Once again, Matthew 5 and verse 8, bless it on the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Amen. It starts in our heart. It all starts in our heart. So if we've got a pure heart, which can only be done by God Almighty making it clean through the blood of Jesus Christ and God taking out that stony heart and putting in a heart of flesh, if we've got that pure heart, these other things should be no problem for us.

[31:46] It's not to say we won't be tempted. It's not to say we want to do certain things or want to look at certain things or act certain ways, or whatever the case is, but when that temptation comes, praise God, when we're a born-again child of God, and that temptation comes, we can go to God.

[32:03] And if we have sinned, if we have turned a glance into a glare, or whatever the case is, we can repent of that. And when we repent of that, we say, God, I'm sorry, I shouldn't have done that. I shouldn't have looked for that long. I shouldn't have looked for that.

[32:16] Or whatever the case is, I shouldn't have done that. God forgive me. God forgives His children. And I thank God for that. In verse 31, it has been said, whosoever shall put away his wife, let him give her a writing of divorcement.

[32:31] But I say unto you that whosoever shall put away his wife's saving and that whosoever shall cause a fornication calls with her to commit adultery. And whosoever shall marry her that has divorced commit adultery.

[32:42] This goes back to what I was talking about before, especially the Pharisees. The Pharisees were the worst in the religious elite. But really, anybody, any Jewish man could practice this if he wanted to just write his wife a to build divorcement for whatever the case was, anything that he found wrong with his wife.

[33:00] Or for that matter, anything that he found to write with his wife. He could divorce her for whatever the case is. But Jesus says here, but I say unto you that whosoever shall put away his wife's saving for the cause of fornication calls with her to commit adultery.

[33:16] In other words, all you guys that have divorced some women left and right, you're causing adultery everywhere. Sin will cause more sin.

[33:28] Adultery causes more adultery. Pornography causes more pornography. Pornography wouldn't be the multi-billion dollar industry that it is right now if there wasn't such a demand for it.

[33:40] And that goes for anything else you could. I mean, there's a reason that there's liquor stores everywhere. It's cause of the demand for it. If the demand goes away, those things go away.

[33:52] But there is a demand for these things because the thought of men is continually evil, just as it was in the days of Noah. Noah, God flooded the entire world.

[34:03] It wasn't the God thought that he messed up when it says that it repented him that he even made man. God's never messed up ever. Not in all of eternity has God ever messed up or made a mistake.

[34:16] But he'd done it because the thoughts of men were evil continually. And folks, it's no different now. It is evil. It's evil everywhere. But Jesus here, he lays this in these people's laps.

[34:28] He says, you're divorcing your wives and causing them to commit adultery. And not only causing them to commit adultery, but whatever man they go out and marry afterward, because remarriage is assumed, as I said before, because women couldn't survive on their own in these days.

[34:50] It was almost an impossibility for that to happen. But so remarriage was assumed, but he's saying you're not only causing her to commit adultery, but you're causing her husband that she marries to commit adultery.

[35:03] So there's adultery everywhere, and it began with you because you're the one that give her that writing of the Bill of Divorcement. He's saying her sin is your fault, in other words, is what Jesus is getting at.

[35:16] Now listen, I ain't telling you that if I go out here right now and tell a lie that I can come back and blame you for it. Folks, I'm telling you what the Scripture here plainly says though. This ain't what Spencer is saying.

[35:27] This is what Jesus Christ himself is saying, that those that divorce their wives cause their wives to commit adultery. And any man that they marry has committed adultery as well.

[35:39] It's sin. It is sin. Divorce is sin, and it causes more sin, and it causes more sin, and it causes all kinds of problems. It causes family problems. It causes social problems. It causes problems all over the map.

[35:52] And that's one of the reasons we've got so many problems nowadays. I mean, you can trace several things back to the height of divorce, or when divorce started getting really popular in the U.S., which was late 60s, early 70s.

[36:11] You can see a severe decline in the morals of America and in the West in general when you see the divorce rates start going up.

[36:26] I've seen some graphs that are rather astounding. But anyway, Jesus here, once again though, all these things considered, everything considered that we've read up to this point thus far.

[36:40] The problem is certainly not in marriage. I mean, once again, we talked about a little while ago, we're talking about a God of reconciliation.

[36:52] What's God's desire for marriage? Even in cases of adultery, God's desire is reconciliation.

[37:03] God's desire is for one spouse to forgive another one and for them to move forward. If that happened though, how many of us could do it? How many of us could have that much of a forgiving heart?

[37:14] How many of us could be that meek? How many of us could be that pure and hard? How many of us could be like that? It'd be difficult, folks. It'd be difficult.

[37:25] But Jesus is telling us how it should be. Remember, we're talking about kingdom people all throughout the gospel or all throughout the sermon on the mountain here. We're talking about kingdom people.

[37:36] We're talking about kingdom people. You've heard it just a little bit. What's Jesus saying?

[38:10] What's Jesus saying here in a real quick nutshell? He's saying, well, he just said it, let your Yabba and let your Nabinae. In other words, kingdom people, born again people, Christians, we shouldn't have to do that.

[38:27] We shouldn't have to say, you know, I promise or I swear, you know, I pinky promise.

[38:38] I'll bring along those lines, promise somebody that if we're not telling them the truth, we'll stick a needle in our eye like we used to when we were kids. We shouldn't have to say any of those things. People should be able to take us at our word.

[38:49] We should be truthful and we should be honest with everyone. And if we are truly kingdom people, we will be that way. We won't be out here telling lies.

[39:00] We won't be out here deceiving people about ourselves. I mean, I've said many times about many different situations. I've never claimed to know everything and I've never tried to fool anybody into thinking that I know everything.

[39:16] I've had people come up to me and they'll say, Spinter, I wish I knew the Bible as well as you do. I wish I knew the Bible as well as they think that I know the Bible. I mean, you know, and I'm not saying that bragging about me, but, you know, I'm just Spencer.

[39:31] But we should not have to justify what we say. If it comes to a point where we have to do that, where people are doubting, we need to look in the mirror at ourselves.

[39:43] And I'm not talking about a glass mirror. I'm talking about the mirror of the Word of God. We need to look in this mirror and compare it with our own lives. Why are people doubting me? Why do people think that I'm lying?

[39:55] Why are people, you know, not taking me at my word in other words? That's the gist of what Jesus is getting at in those verses that we just read.

[40:08] Verse 38, you have heard that it has been said, and I for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, but I say unto you that you resist not evil. Folks, that's a hard pill to swallow right there.

[40:19] I say unto you, you resist not evil. Is Jesus saying that if an evil person comes to us and picks a fight with us, or berates us, tells lies about us, wherever the case is, that we're just to stand there and let them do it?

[40:39] Is that what Jesus is saying? Listen folks, we have a biblical right. We have a moral right for one. We have a biblical right to protect not only ourselves, but our families as well.

[40:51] And I remember using this as an example when I used to teach over at Boone's Creek. I say, Missy and I are at home one night, we're in bed, we've been sleeping for a few hours, three o'clock in the morning, I wake up and there's some dude going around the foot of the bed making his way towards Missy's side of the bed, me being a Christian.

[41:11] I'm supposed to turn the other cheek, we ain't got there yet, but we're getting there. I'm supposed to turn the other cheek, ain't I? I'm supposed to resist not evil. So do I just let him go over there and have his way with my wife?

[41:23] No. I've got a moral and biblical obligation to protect my wife. I've got a moral and a biblical obligation to reach in my nightstand, pull out a 9mm and do something about this situation.

[41:38] I've got an obligation to do that. She is my wife. I must do that. And not only that, but I need to protect myself as well. You can go a step further with that.

[41:50] What about murder? You just killed this guy. Well, it wasn't premeditated. It wasn't something that I set up all night and pondered about all day. Well, if so-and-so breaks in my house tonight, I think I'm just going to shoot him.

[42:04] We're talking about protecting ourselves and protecting our families and doing that. But Jesus says, you've heard that it had been said, an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.

[42:18] A lot of people just like to leave it right there. But what was that law put in place for if you go back to the Old Testament? Where we read that? What was it put in place there? In other words, and once again, this is talking about a legal setting here.

[42:33] You take somebody to a court. You take somebody to the city gates, which is where court was held back then. You take somebody there, you can get out of them what they took from you.

[42:44] They take an ox, you get an ox. They take a donkey, you get a donkey. They take an eye, you get an eye. But you could not go for more than that. That's why that law was put into place.

[42:56] Not only for that, but it was to protect the people in general. But you have heard that it's been said, an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. But I say to you that you resist not evil, but whosoever shall smite thee on their right cheek, turn to him the other also.

[43:11] And if any man will sue thee at the law and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also, and whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with them twain, give to him that asketh thee, and from him that would borrow thee, turn thou not away.

[43:25] So whosoever shall smite thee on their right cheek, turn to him the other also. Somebody just walks up to me, just Wally walks me across my face.

[43:38] What am I going to do? I know Spencer. I know Spencer better than any of you do. And I know how Spencer is probably going to react in that situation. Jesus is telling us how we should react, how kingdom people should react.

[43:52] Now, what Christ is getting at here in this, He's talking about someone smiting you for the humiliation of it. And we can say that because of the perfect example we have in Scripture of Jesus Christ.

[44:09] When Jesus Christ was scourged, and when they were smiting Jesus, and they were saying prophesy unto us, who smote thee? Who's smiting you? Who's smacking you, in other words?

[44:20] We're talking about someone that's coming across with a backhand, and they're doing it for the sheer humiliation of it. In other words, you bear that humiliation, and you turn to them the other cheek as well.

[44:33] It's not talking about somebody just coming up to you and kicking you for no good reason. It's not talking about somebody just coming up to you and, you know, trip you down the ground, jump on top of you and start beating you, and you're just supposed to lay there and do it.

[44:45] No, it's not what Christ is getting at. He's getting, I mean, you got to take this stuff in, yes, in the context that it's in, but you look at it in a hermeneutic standpoint of the time that it was written in, the people that it was written about and written to, and what was going on in those days.

[45:07] And that's exactly what we would be talking about here. When he's talking about someone being smote across the right cheek, he's talking about a backhand, because most people are right-handed, are they not?

[45:18] Well, y'all right now, your right cheeks are on my left side, so somebody would have to come across like this to do that. It's for the humiliation of it. That's what Christ is getting at here.

[45:29] But I say to you, you resist not evil, who shall ever shall smite thee on the right cheek, turn to the other also if a man will soothe thee at the law and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also, and whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain.

[45:42] Whosoever shall soothe thee at the law for thy coat, give him thy cloak also. Well, folks, you're really not going to be out much if that's the case.

[45:53] In this day and time, you would have been. You would have been, though. Somebody sues me for a suit jacket that I've got. I'll just give them another suit jacket, you know.

[46:04] If they're that desperate for it, most of my suit jackets came from the Salvation Army anyway. I probably didn't get more in a couple of dollars for them. I'm not going to be out that much. But these people here, they would have been out more to give away their coat and their cloak also.

[46:19] But Jesus goes on to say, whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain. There's some history that goes behind this where the Jews not under oppression was not all Jerusalem.

[46:33] The whole Jewish nation under the oppression of the Roman Empire at this point. The Roman Empire said that whoever a Roman wanted to do something for them, they had to do it.

[46:45] That was Roman law. And we see this in the case of Simon the Iranian. When Jesus, when the Roman guards told Simon to carry Jesus' cross, we see this in the Gospels.

[46:57] That was something the Roman guards told him to do. He was obligated to do it because he was under those Roman guards authority to do that. Jesus is saying here that they can go a mile, which was a thousand paces.

[47:13] But he says, go with them, go with them twain. Go with them more than that. Do more than what they've compelled you, what they've asked you to do. Because if we're Kingdom people, they're going to say, why would you go that extra mile?

[47:28] That's exactly where we get that phrase from. Go the extra mile. This verse is where that saying comes from. If we're Kingdom people and we do that for people, they may have compelled us to go one mile, but they're going to wonder what compelled them to go that extra mile.

[47:48] What compelled them to do something else for us? What compelled them, if I go to their house and I ask them for a pound of bacon, what compelled them to give me two?

[48:03] What compelled them to go that extra mile? That'll get that stirred up in those people's heads. Let's try and finish this chapter off. Ye have heard that it has been said, thou shalt love thy neighbor and hate thine enemy.

[48:16] But I say unto you, love your enemies, blessed in the curse, you do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute you. That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven, for he maketh his son to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just, and on the unjust.

[48:34] So back up to verse 43 again, ye have heard that it has been said, thou shalt love thy neighbor and hate thine enemy. This was a serious misconstruence of Old Testament Scriptures where God had told the Israelites, he had told the Jewish people, I'm sending you into Canaan.

[48:54] Not only in Canaan, but even when they were out in the wilderness on their way to Canaan, he said, you're going to come across these people, but don't you worry, I'm going before you, and I'm going to smite your enemy, and when you run into your enemy, you're going to smite them.

[49:07] When you get into Canaan, you're going to smite the enemy. I mean, God's the very one that told the people, you know, when you get to Jericho and the walls come tumbling down, you go in, you overtake that city, you kill who you have to.

[49:23] And this was what was misconstrued, this among many other Scriptures was misconstrued into, love your neighbor, which these Jews would have seen as other Jews. Love your neighbor, but hate your enemy.

[49:36] He says, but I say to you, love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despise you and persecute you. Folks, this is how kingdom people are supposed to act.

[49:48] This is how we who are born again, this is how we should act. It don't matter what they call us, it don't matter how much they make fun of us, I mean, who really and truly gets offended if somebody calls them a Bible thumper?

[50:01] God forbid somebody call me that. They praise the Lord that somebody recognized. That's exactly what, if somebody calls me a Jesus freak, hey, praise the Lord. Somebody saw a lot shining somewhere.

[50:13] Who really gets offended at that? But those that despise you, those that persecute you, those are the ones that are more difficult to pray for, are they not?

[50:24] Why? Because they've heard our pride for one. If they've persecuted us, they've heard our pride. They may have humiliated us. Once again, that goes to that backhand thing that we was talking about a little while ago.

[50:37] They may have humiliated us in front of other churchgoers or in front of their own friends who are unregenerate and not born again. Any number of things. But folks, we pray for those people.

[50:49] We're praying for Israel right now, are we not? How many of us are praying for Hamas? How many of us are praying, God, somehow get your gospel into those people's ears?

[51:00] That they might hear it and see that their ways are wrong and they might come to you in repentance and belief in the gospel? How many of us are praying for those people? Yes, pray for Israel.

[51:11] Pray for our protection. It's a commandment in the Scripture that we do so, that we pray for the peace of Jerusalem. But folks, hear it, it says to pray for our enemies.

[51:22] How many of us, and listen, anybody that's an enemy of the Jewish people is an enemy of Christian people. The Jewish people are the apple of God's eye.

[51:34] That has never changed. It has not changed and it will not change. Those are God's chosen people, the Jewish people are.

[51:45] So, if they're a Jewish enemy, they're a Christian enemy as well. But we pray for them. We pray for our enemies. Because I promise you, I promise you, they would kill Christians just as quickly as they would a Jew.

[52:03] If given the opportunity to do so. But we pray for those people. I pray for them. I mean, there's people, it's hard to pray for the rapists. It's hard to pray for a child molester.

[52:15] It's hard to pray for certain people. People who just go out and kill 30 or 40 people, just as they would say for the fun of it. Because they wanted to know what it was like. It's hard to pray for people like that.

[52:26] But God didn't say, pray for them unless it's hard to. He said, pray for your enemies. Pray for these people. I don't want anybody to go to hell. I don't care how bad they've traded me.

[52:38] I don't want anybody to go to that awful place. But he says in verse 45 that we do these things. He says that you may be the children of your Father which is in heaven. Now this is misconstrued among some people that say, well, if I pray for my enemies, those that despotfully use me, then I'll be a child of my Father in heaven.

[53:00] No, that's not what he's getting at. What he's getting at is going all the way back to the Beatitudes at the beginning of Matthew chapter 5. That's the description of kingdom people. That's the description of the saved.

[53:12] And he's saying that we pray for our enemies. We pray for them who despotfully use us and persecute us, but that you may be the children of your Father which is in heaven, that we may be seen in other words as the children of our Father which is in heaven.

[53:27] For he maketh his Son to rise on the evil and on the goodness and the reign on the just and the unjust. Folks, God's blessings are worldwide. God's blessing.

[53:38] God has blessed the people of Hamas with sunshine. He has blessed them with rain. He has blessed them with food. He has blessed them with air. He has blessed them with all kinds of things.

[53:50] Bless them with an enormous abundance of an oil supply over there in the Middle East. God has blessed those folks over there. None of them can say, God's never done anything for me.

[54:03] God has done so much. He brings rain on the just and the unjust. For if you love them which love you, what reward have you? Boy, that kicks everyone of us in the shan. It's easy to love a brother or sister in Christ.

[54:15] It's easy to come to church and to hug a brother or sister in Christ and kiss them on the head and tell them how much you love them. But folks, Jesus here says, for if you love them which love you, what reward have you?

[54:27] What reward? Then he goes on to say, do not even the publicans the same. The publicans were despised by the Jewish people. The publicans were despised all the way around.

[54:39] One of the most amazing things about the account of Levi were Matthew in the gospels. He was a publican. He was a Jewish man. He was hated by his own people because he was working for the Roman government.

[54:51] And he was hated by the Roman government because he was a Jew. They want nobody like Matthew. But one day Jesus came to Matthew. Jesus came over there where Levi was. He was the only person that seemed like on the entire planet that had anything for Matthew, that cared anything about Matthew.

[55:08] And he said, follow me. Follow me. He was hated all the way around by his own people and by the people that he worked for. But he says, do not even the publicans the same?

[55:19] Of course they do. They love them which love, they love those which love them. And if you salute your brethren only, what do you more, excuse me, more than others? Do not even the publicans so.

[55:32] This is almost like the whole book of James wrapped up in two verses. I've said many times James is my favorite book in the scripture because James just, he'll pick you up and grab you by the collar and slam you against the wall and punch you.

[55:45] And once you slide down the ground, he'll kick you around a few times and the whole time he's telling you that he loves you. That's what these two verses are doing. That's what these two verses do. He says, because Jesus is saying, it's no big deal to love them which love you.

[55:59] It's no big deal to greet those or to salute those which salute you. But to greet those that don't salute you, to greet those that have no respect for you, to treat them with respect in other words, to treat them like a human being, to treat them like a fellow image bearer of God.

[56:18] Jesus says, don't the publicans even do this? Be therefore perfect even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect. I'll never be perfect this side of eternity and you won't either.

[56:32] What is Jesus saying? Be therefore complete even as your Father in heaven is complete. How do we be complete? We can only be complete and cross Jesus.

[56:43] That's the only way we can do it and it will still never completely 100% happen this side of eternity. It's impossible. We will never keep the law perfectly like Jesus did.

[56:56] Jesus was able to do that. That's why in the book of Judas says that he is the one that is able to present us faultless and blameless. He's the only one that can do that because he is faultless and blameless himself.

[57:08] And therefore we're taken out from underneath the judgment of God. We're taken out from underneath the condemnation of all those who are under the curse of God. But it can only be done in Jesus Christ and we can only be complete in Jesus Christ.

[57:22] But he says be therefore perfect even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect. This goes right along with the Old Testament scripture which Peter also quotes in the New Testament. Be holy for I am holy.

[57:33] Folks, it's a commandment in scripture. Be holy for I am holy. We are commanded to be holy. We'll never be 100% that though here. But in Jesus Christ we will be seen as holy before God the Father.

[57:49] That wraps up Matthew chapter 5. The first stint of the sermon on the Mount. We've got two more chapters after this. Anybody got any questions or comments on any of that?

[58:05] Alright, God bless you all. I appreciate your attention.