Before we get into
Matthew five, we're going to make it through the rest of the chapter.
It's going to be challenging.
It's going to push us.
You're going to be okay.
But it's going to be challenging for us.
But before we get into it, I just want to say thank you.
For some people in our church, I know Jeff McClure
and his guys have been working every morning to get stuff set up for us.
But beyond that, renovating the upstairs room
and making it really nice for our students.
Just been doing a fantastic job.
So, Jeff and your guys, thank you very much. Appreciate you.
I know, Tom, Tom Chevelle has been doing, renovation
work in multiple different suites and multiple places around here.
He's he he he's currently got a big project
with a bathroom renovation here, and then new carpet and some other rooms.
And he's really been working overtime,
to, to help improve some things in the facility.
Really appreciate him as well.
It's good for us to stop and honor these guys.
And then I know
just the the course of this week,
has been really busy for some in our church and some ministries.
I know that Michael Rondon, our next gen pastor, together with Trish
and with Ali, we've had a really busy week on them.
On Monday, they did a huge junior high Thanksgiving,
dinner event extravaganza,
followed up on Wednesday with, high school progressive dinner,
followed up on Thursday night with young adult
Friendsgiving dinner and then back at it Sunday mornings for three services.
Just really working overtime as well.
I hope you understand how many people
and how much work and man and woman hours, go into the ministries and,
and the things around here just want to honor all of these.
Added to that,
I want to introduce you
to our church planters and our missionaries,
both in the United States and around the world, in other countries,
so you can get to know them.
I they're very near and dear to my heart.
I've been with them on multiple occasions for years and years and years.
You haven't.
And so I want you to get to know them, for a couple reasons.
One, because I want you to keep them in your prayers.
I want when we mentioned what's going on in Cuba and Guatemala
and all these other places that it resonates with your mind and your heart,
but also because from now until Christmas Eve, I'm going to ask you to prayerfully
consider and then sacrifice over and above your regular tithes and offerings
and give on the app to evangelism slash church planting
so that at the end of the year, we can bless these planters
and pastors and missionaries with an extra gift.
We support them all regularly, generously.
But I want to go over and above what we normally do to be able to bless them.
And I'm asking for the church for an extra $20,000
between now and Christmas Eve, so we can bless all of these.
And I want to introduce you to as.
So every Sunday I'm going to introduce you to some of these.
And this first one I introduce to you is O'Neill and Heidi.
That is their two wives.
And, O'Neill and Heidi's new son in law.
They are our lead church planters in Cuba.
And when I first started the church planting work in Cuba
back in 2008, really ramped it up in 2015, 2016.
And in the last decade, they have, recruited, trained and,
church planters and planted 120 churches on the island in the past decade.
They're doing incredible work in extraordinarily difficult circumstances.
They love their people. They love the island.
They love the Lord. They want to see Cuba one day. Jesus.
That's one of the events they did for the children in their little community.
That church building there, we paid for,
they built it, but we we paid for that to, to do that.
They're they're putting it to great use.
It's another picture of some of the ministry
that they've been doing there on the island.
And a place called
Trinidad few hours outside of Havana.
Feeding the kids. Tell them about Jesus.
They're just doing incredible work.
And so we just want to make sure that we continue to be able to bless them.
So keep Heidi and O'Neill in your prayers and the ministry
that is doing there and support them generously.
You got it.
Yeah.
Hey, Matthew five, we're going to I'm going to start in verse 17.
We're going to make it all the way through verse 48.
So I'm going to go fast.
Last week we talked about the Beatitudes,
these statements that Jesus said, blessed are you when you.
And he started with blessed are those who,
those who are poor in spirit, who realize the poverty
of their own spirit because there lead them to mourn over sin.
And so you followed up with, blessed are those who mourn, for they'll be comforted,
bless those who hire and thirst for righteousness.
And he went through those beatitudes.
We get to this place in
verse 17 after the Beatitudes,
where he's he's going to flesh out, for us,
and he's really going to push us on what it means
to live this kingdom ethic.
And so in verse 17, I'm just going,
I'm going to read big chunks and then we'll talk about them,
about these church.
But let me just read verses 17 through 20.
Jesus says,
do not think that I've come to abolish the law or the prophets.
I have not come to abolish them, but to fulfill them.
For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota
nor a dot will pass from the law until it is until all is accomplished.
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.
Here's verse 20.
We talked about this a couple weeks ago,
for I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes
and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.
We start in verse 17 when Jesus says, I have not come to abolish
the law or the prophets.
But I've come to fulfill them.
What he's saying here is the Old Testament.
All the commands and all terms that are still legit,
didn't come to do away with them.
I didn't come to supersede them.
I didn't come to say, hey, that's the Old Testament.
Doesn't matter anymore.
They're they're they're they're stable. They're firm.
They're eternal. No doubt.
I didn't come to destroy them or cast them off.
I came to fulfill them.
And when he says fulfilled, he says it means I will complete them.
And so Jesus is going to complete
all of the commands in the Old Testament in his own life.
He is the fulfillment of all the commands of God.
And he says, you need to understand this.
The Old Testament is legit.
It's stable, it's sturdy, it's eternal, and it is all fulfilled in me.
We can't do away with the Old Testament,
but I'm going to fulfill it.
And so he makes us do.
And then he says this not one iota or dot some translations.
Or maybe your footnote says not one jot or tittle will pass away from the law
until all is accomplished, when he uses those words, a jot or tittle
a jot was the smallest letter in the Hebrew alphabet.
A tittle was like the dot of an eye or the crossing of a t.
And so what he's saying here is the law of God.
Even the smallest, most, my nudist point of it
will all be fulfilled and it's fulfilled in me.
You can't bypass a single little thing
of God's immutable law.
It's all going to be fulfilled.
And he says, when you, when you, when you know
these, when you do these, when you teach these,
that's a good thing.
And then verse 20
he says, and we talked about this a couple of weeks ago,
unless your righteousness exceeds that
of the scribes and the Pharisees, you don't get into the kingdom.
All these commands are legit.
They're all eternal. They all remain.
Not one of them is going to pass away
unless your righteousness in obeying them exceeds the scribes and Pharisees.
You don't get in.
Those of you who were here a couple weeks ago, we talked about that.
That was a pretty tough thing.
And we and we started to understand what his intent was behind that.
If you weren't here a couple of weeks ago, you need to listen to that message.
But that's the standard in verse 20
that are righteousness according to the law
exceeds that of scribes and Pharisees.
But that, of course, in verse 20, that's the standard.
And now in verse 21,
he'll walk us through six illustrations
of what righteous living is, and Matthew 522 standard.
And then in verses 21 through 47, our six illustrations
that should serve to show one proof
that were guilty of breaking the standard.
Secondly, that all outward
bad begins with inward bad.
It's just not about what we do.
It's about our motivations.
And thirdly, that we judge by outward acts, but God judges
by inward motivations.
And so these next six illustrations are going to prove.
There Jesus proved to these three things
that every one of us
guilty of breaking the standard.
That though we look at what people
do, God looks at the intents of the heart,
and all the outward bad is simply result of inward bad.
First.
And so
here we go.
You ready?
Yep. Okay.
I got about seven yeses.
I'm keeping track of you. Who?
Here's.
Here's the danger as we go through this,
your am I tendency will be
to make excuses for ourselves
and to explain things away
and to say, well, I realize that's what that says,
but my story is different.
See, what was going on for me is
and we're going to be tempted
to put up some walls and some barriers.
And so that might be true for other people or not,
or that's not really what he meant,
because what we're going to see here is going to threaten
our self-sufficiency,
and it's going to threaten our own self righteousness.
And that's the point.
And it's not going to be easy.
It's not going to be fun.
But understand.
That the bad
news of the law has to be first, so that the good news of grace
can be beautiful.
And so with that.
Verses 21 through 26,
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.
So if you're offering your gift at the altar and there, remember that
your brother has something against you,
leave your gift there before the altar and go first.
Be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift.
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 of the guard,
and you be put in prison.
Truly, I say to you, you will never get out until you've paid the last penny.
The first thing he deals with is anger.
And I love the way Jesus said.
He says, you've heard it said to us, but I say,
what he's saying here is, I have a 40.
There's no other teacher until before Jesus.
That said,
this is what this is what you you know, this is this is just return irritation.
But I'm telling you, nobody's ever said that before.
So Jesus steps in and says, I have authority
because I am the fulfillment of the law.
So though you may have heard, I'm telling you
because he's the fulfillment of it
and the first thing he starts with is this issue of anger.
He says, you've heard it said, don't murder,
and whoever commits murder is liable to judgment.
But let me just make this point.
Please notice that the one,
the commandment here of the Ten Commandments is about murder, not killing.
The command is not thou shalt not kill.
The command is thou shalt not murder.
And there's a huge difference.
And it so gripes me when culture talks
about the Ten Commandments and the Bible saying, thou shalt not kill.
That's not what it says.
It's a it's about murder.
And that's important for a couple reasons.
One, because in Genesis, God institutes
the death penalty for murder.
So it's not about killing, it's about murder.
Do you understand?
So let's not be ignorant with what the Bible talks about.
So whoever commits murders.
But I tell you, everyone choose anger with his brothers liable to judgment.
Whoever insults his brother are liable to counsel or says, you fool,
liable to the fires of hell.
Jesus is talking about two different things in our relationships
with each other. We get upset with each other.
Some of your Bibles might have this
this little footnote that says, whoever says to his brother Raka
during your Bible, say that, yeah, raga,
when's the last time you'll tell someone said raga?
Like it doesn't make any sense to us and it doesn't translate well.
Jesus is talking about two different things.
He's talking about one.
Insulting someone,
showing contempt for their intelligence.
You know what this is like?
Freaking idiot.
Okay.
And secondly, he's talking about showing contempt
for their character.
They have no morals.
I don't care about people.
That's what he's talking about.
He said, you think the command is just about killing, murdering somebody?
It's not about that.
It's about when you when you
so disagree with someone, your response is you're freaking idiot.
Well.
Or you just have.
No, they just don't care about people.
You have no morals.
And what amazes me
is how similar this is to our two political parties.
Because there's one
political party, they're saying you guys are just idiots.
You've lost your minds
and the other political party and so you can't.
You have no morals, you don't care about people.
Right.
And have all of our self-righteousness.
We have upheld our party line
and said of the other
people have lost their minds.
Just idiots.
Right?
Then Jesus says you're guilty of the fires of hell.
We can't live up to the standard of
verse 20.
We're guilty.
Do you understand that?
Yeah.
And our self righteousness.
I've never murdered anybody.
And Jesus says, yeah, because that's not what this is about.
Guilty.
You stand condemned.
So much so he says, look,
if you're a church and you're doing some work for the church,
and you realize that someone else has something
to get you, stop what you're doing and go be reconciled with him.
He doesn't say, if you have something to get somebody else, he says,
if someone else has some against you, stop what you're doing and go be recorded.
You know the fastest way to be reconciled with somebody
say, look, I understand that you, for whatever reason I've offended you.
I'm sorry.
Accept responsibility.
Even if you think you're in the right.
The fastest way to be reconciled to say, look, I realize that that
that I've done so.
I don't even know it. But all I need you. Look. I'm sorry.
Will you please forgive me?
Won't you even know what you did?
No, I don't, but obviously I'm guilty, so I just ask your forgiveness.
I've done this to multiple people and they don't know how to handle it.
Well, you need to understand what you did.
No, I really don't.
I just need to ask your forgiveness.
Because I'm probably guilty,
and it just so disarms them.
They don't know what to do.
They want to prove themselves right and just and righteous, like whatever.
So fine.
I'm sorry.
Forgive me.
Then they're on the hook to forgive me.
And so what? Jesus, there's.
Even if you're doing something at church, go be reconciled.
Because if you don't seek reconciliation,
he puts it in terms of the judge in prison,
if we don't seek reconciliation with people and we have this grudge,
we'll live in the prison of unforgiveness and broken relationships.
We don't get out of that until it's fixed.
So you don't think what he's saying is, don't think the good work
you do for God overrides the bad relationships with people?
That's what he's saying.
I've been around church a long time, and I see it so often.
We're husbands and wives
just are just mean to each other
and not getting along, and their marriage is in shambles.
But boy, they work hard at church.
And Jesus would say, you know, don't think that your work
at church overrides your bad relationship with your spouse.
It doesn't.
And so we're guilty.
Got it.
That's one illustration of six.
Let's look at the second one.
Verse 27, lust.
You have heard that it was said, you shall not commit adultery.
But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent
has already committed adultery with her in his heart.
If you're right, it causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away,
for it's better that you lose
one of your members than that your whole body is thrown into hell.
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 bodies go, your whole body go to hell and to hell
again.
This is what you think it is,
because I'm the fulfillment of it.
Let me tell you what it really is.
This obviously seems to be directed at men. Men?
Do you look at a woman lustfully?
You've already committed adultery. Let me just say this.
Let me stop right there. Let me.
Just let me make this clear.
When I was growing up
in church, high school kids, we all.
You always wonder where the line is.
Like how close you're going to get to the line and still be okay.
Right?
Like how close to the fire before I get burned?
How close to the edge, like fall off the cliff?
How close can I get?
And we would look at passages like this and the idea behind it was, okay. So
if thinking
lustful thoughts about a girl is same as doing it, and I'm guilty
for thinking I might as well do it because I'm guilty anyway, right?
Does that make sense to anybody like you?
Fine.
If I'm guilty for thinking it, and without the fun,
I might as well be guilty and have the fun.
So that's not what he's saying.
It's always worse to do it, okay?
Being angry at someone is not as bad as killing someone.
Please don't make that assumption.
Thinking lustful thoughts is not as bad as committing adultery.
It's not as bad.
And this is this is where some intellectual people
have a difficult with because they don't understand.
And this is where some ignorant people really misrepresent scripture.
They're not the same.
Killing somebody is much worse than someone.
Rather, the.
Committee in adultery is much worse.
Like someone said, you can't keep birds from flying over your head,
but you can keep from building a nest in your hair.
But actually doing it is a lot worse.
So. So let's just be clear about that now.
They both break God's standard, but humanly one's a lot worse than the other.
And he's saying men,
when you lust after someone like you haven't done it,
but in your heart you've separate yourself from your spouse.
But just so that I'm an equal
or gender offender,
that sounded really bad.
Just so I offend everybody.
Women understand
when you look at that other man
and wish man, I wish my husband was more understand.
I wish they communicate like that.
I wish they were more hand. I wish they were more sensitive
women.
You've left your husband.
You've lusted after the character of another man.
And so we have to be careful that we understand
Scripture.
Men lust sexually, women lust
for a better character.
And Jesus says, you've left.
A guilty.
And he says these words that are just they're shocking.
If you're right, it causes you to sin.
Poke it out
your right hand. Cut it off.
Listen, he's not talking about self-mutilation, mutilation.
He's not talking about that. And here's the problem.
Because self-mutilation doesn't go far enough.
It's not extreme enough
because you can pluck out your eye
and cut off your hand and still sin.
Early church, father name origin,
brilliant theologian.
Incredibly smart,
who suffered from sexual lust
and had himself castrated
because he took this so literally.
The problem is, it doesn't go far enough.
When Jesus says, you're right eye, your right hand.
Here's here's the point in that culture, the right was the treasured thing.
It was the like the son of my right hand.
It was the favored thing.
It was the strong thing.
And what he's saying is, even if that thing is your favorite thing,
your treasured thing, and it keeps you from living
righteously, get rid of it.
That thing that is most valuable to you.
The thing is, you can't live without.
If it keeps you from being righteous, get rid of it.
I wonder.
If that thing that is so valuable.
The right hand that we can't live without.
Causes unrighteousness.
Amen.
To follow here.
Yes, this is what Jesus is talking about.
And he says, listen, you're you're guilty.
You stand condemned.
You broken the standard.
You're not living up to the standard of the scribes
and Pharisees.
You okay?
Yeah. This.
There's two of the six.
Let's go to number three.
It was also said
whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.
But I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife,
except on the ground of sexual immorality, immorality, makes her commit adultery.
And whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.
This is not a popular passage in this culture.
And yet Jesus addresses it.
He says, you've thought about one thing.
I'm telling you.
Part of the difficulty in in this day
when Jesus was was preaching this message, there were two schools of thought.
There were two religious schools of thought, two teachings.
One was from Rabbi Hillel and one was from Rabbi Shimei.
And they were the the teachers of Israel.
They were called.
And Rabbi Hillel.
His interpretation of God's law was very liberal, very generous.
And so in his liberality and generosity
he said that when the Bible talks about a woman
displeasing or being immoral, that could be any number of things.
So vast was his reasons.
Allowances for divorce.
He thought that if a woman overseas and the food or burnt the bread
that was immoral and you could divorce her,
it's like woman
I said
paprika, not garlic.
Now get out.
That's how broad.
And so women had no protection whatsoever? No.
The school of Shimei was very conservative and strict.
And he said the only reasons for divorce,
the only allowances for divorce, is for sexual morality, with witnesses.
So they had to be witnesses.
And so the women were stuck in this place of like,
I have no protection.
And Jesus says, listen, we got it.
We have to understand the sanctity of marriage
biblically.
The Bible says God hates divorce,
and every divorce at the seed of it
is the result of sin.
And so God hates it.
Now God gives one allowance for divorce,
not as a command that if this happens, you must.
But the Bible says because of the hardness of man's heart,
because they will not allow reconciliation or repentance and change.
There's one allowance and it's the case of sexual immorality.
The difficulty when Jesus uses these words is sexual immorality is so broad.
It could be it's so broad.
It's not specific.
There was one
thought that even if one is married, there's two couples married,
and then one finds out that one did something before they were married.
It's immoral.
And so you can retroactively divorce them.
And so what Jesus is saying here is, look, marriage is sacred
and it's supposed to be permanent.
So here's the thing, my dear friend, if you are in a marriage
now, stay in it.
Stay in it.
Don't think that.
Well, I married a divorced person. Now it says are committed to like marriage.
Will get divorced now.
No, don't do it a second time.
Keep holy and pure the sanctity of marriage.
It's not to be trifled with.
It's not to be entered into lightly.
God hates divorce.
And here's, here's, here's let's just go a little deeper level.
There are some who have not been divorced.
They're still married, but they're living a divorced life
in their marriage.
Completely separated from each other.
Emotionally, physically, relationally,
spiritually.
And that is not the intent of the father
to understand.
And so he's he's just like, look at this, you guys.
You're you're just guilty.
Here's the fourth thing.
Oaths.
Again, you've heard that it is said to those of you shall not swear falsely,
but shall perform to the Lord what you've sworn.
But I say to you, do not take an oath at all, either
by heaven, for it is the throne of God, or by earth, for
it is his footstool, or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King.
And do not take an oath by your head, for you cannot make one
hair white or black, apparently, or even make one hair grow.
Let what?
You gotta keep up with me.
Let what you say be simply yes or no.
Anything more than this comes from evil.
Here's what he saying when he says you've heard it.
It was said, you shall not swear falsely, but before him to the Lord.
What you've sworn, what the practice was.
They can make any oath or promise.
As long as they didn't promise to the Lord, they didn't have to keep it.
And so all these promises and contracts, an oath that they would take
if they didn't say in the name of the Lord, they weren't liable for them.
And so you had all these shysters and everybody looking for loopholes.
There's a way to get out of my commitment.
I tell people all the time,
be careful about your commitments,
because it's easier to get into one than out of one.
And what Jesus is saying is, quit being hypocritical.
Quit looking for loopholes.
Quit looking for reasons why you don't have to keep your word.
You should be such people
of integrity and character that all you have to say is yes or no.
And everybody believes you and everybody trusts you.
That's character.
That's a righteous life.
You understand?
You know,
and I don't know if there's anybody here that has lived
such a life of integrity and righteousness from day one to now,
that everything we say
is 100% truthful and believable.
And so you and I
are guilty.
We cannot pull the standard of verse
20 exceeds the righteousness. Wow.
Look at this in verse 38.
You have heard that it was said, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.
But I say to you, because I'm the fulfillment of this whole thing,
do not resist the one who is evil.
But if anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.
And if anyone would sue you and take your tunic,
let him have your cloak as well.
And if anyone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles.
Give to the one who begs from you, and do not refuse the one
who would borrow from you. This is tough.
An eye for an eye.
Tooth for a tooth.
Someone slaps you on the right cheek.
Give me the other.
Also.
When Jesus says if someone slaps you on the right cheek, give your other cheek.
He's not talking about physical assault.
In that culture, this was an insult.
It wasn't a physical thing.
It was like,
so what?
He he's not talking about someone
takes a baseball bat to your ribcage, give him your back.
It's only when someone insults you,
get over it.
Accept it.
Let him insult you.
The backhanded slap is equal to an insult.
It wasn't a physical attack.
And so, dear friends,
when someone offends us and insults us.
Why do we?
Why do we feel like we have to?
Oh, yeah. Well.
Why? We
that insecure?
So. So let me ask you this.
What happens when someone insults your kid?
Look, about right.
Don't resist the stuff.
You want a model of this?
How about Jesus?
That's the standard.
If anyone insults you,
give him another opportunity.
You don't have to defend yourself.
All right.
Then I would take your tunic.
Give me your cloak.
So, one.
One message to go, one mouth to go with him voluntarily.
A second one,
what he's saying is be willing to suffer loss
and to get taken advantage of personally.
That's what he's saying.
Be willing to be taken advantage of.
You got it.
This is.
Two of you okay?
Yeah.
Without retaliation.
Now, he's not talking about evil.
Government's job is to restrain evil.
But Romans talks about that.
That's the job of government to restrain evil.
He's not talking about letting evil run amuck.
But he is
talking about us patiently enduring insults
and suffering.
Loss.
You look at this and you think, who can live this way?
Who can live this way?
It's an incredible kingdom ethic.
And we're guilty of breaking it.
Look at this.
You've heard that it was said, you shall not,
Or you shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.
But I say to you, because I'm the fulfillment of this whole thing,
love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,
so that you may be sons of your father who is in heaven.
For he makes the sun rise on the evil
and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.
For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have?
Do not even the tax collectors do the same?
And if you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing that others
do not even the Gentiles do the same like he sent people.
People who aren't living by the kingdom ethic, ethic are good to those
who are good to them.
So when you're good to those who are good to you, what good is that?
There's no difference.
It was taught, listen, if someone is good to you, be good to them.
But if they're bad to you, you have no obligation to be good to them.
That's what was taught.
Jesus says, that's not.
That's not my kingdom.
My kingdom is
that for your enemies.
Your enemies are still your neighbor,
and you must love your neighbor.
And for those who are your enemies, you pray for them
and you do good to them.
You don't respond with kind.
Your enemies, you love them.
Bless them.
You do good to them.
You pray for them because even your enemies
are your neighbors, and God's grace extends even to your enemies.
He makes the sun shine on the just and the unjust,
and gives rain
to your friends and your enemies.
And because his grace is common, grace
extended to your enemies, then so does
your goodness and your prayers.
A tough kingdom ethic, isn't it?
And Jesus teaches us this
so that we realize how much we've broken it,
and we stand guilty.
And then look what he does.
Verse 48,
pull up verse 48 on the slide.
You therefore
must be what?
Or faith? Wow!
As your heavenly father is, what faith?
So the first standard
was the scribes and the Pharisees.
And then Jesus goes through six things that says, you're guilty.
You can't even live up to that standard.
And now Jesus raises the standard to not of the righteousness
of the scribes of the Pharisees, but to the perfection of the father.
Now you must be perfect, just as your father is perfect.
Every one of us, no matter what you say of these six
in your self-righteousness, I have not committed any of those.
None of us can live up to perfection of the father.
And that's the new standard.
So, dear friends.
Guilty.
As much as
we would like to explain away what perfect means, and believe me,
I've heard so many teachers and so many Christians try to explain that away.
It doesn't mean perfection because God knows we can't be perfect.
What it means is completeness and you can't explain it away.
You cannot explain it away.
It means literally perfect and complete moral character.
Any of us.
And yet God says this is the new standard.
So even if you thought
you were better than the scribes and Pharisees,
you're going to sit there and say,
you have a better character than God Almighty.
How dare you!
So every one of us sit here
guilty and condemned.
Happy Sunday.
So if this is the standard, what do we do?
We need another way
to be righteous.
We need another way to be holy.
Because Jesus has just proven you can't do it.
And when you realize that this is the standard
and you realize how guilty you are, this is why Jesus started the Beatitudes.
Blessed are those who are poor in spirit,
because it will lead them to mourn over their spiritual state.
And so blessed are you when you mourn,
because you will lead you to hunger and thirst for righteousness.
That's why he started that way,
so he could get us to the place of mourning over our own unrighteousness
and admit I need another way.
And so thanks be to God
for our sake,
because I cannot be righteous.
He made him Jesus to be sin who knew no sin,
so that in him I might become the righteousness of God.
So God said, Carl, you are incapable of my standard,
and I have proven it to you time and time and time again.
You stand condemned and guilty.
You have no way to be right with me in yourself.
And so I'm going to take my son.
I'm going to take all your unrighteousness.
I'm going to put it on him, and then I'm going to take all of his righteousness.
And I'm put on the Bible calls it imputation imputed to me.
Look what the Bible says,
so that I become the righteous, not that I become a righteous person.
I become the righteousness of God.
Perfect as he is not perfect in behavior.
But when Jesus, when God looks at me,
he sees the righteousness of His Son and releases his son.
He sees the unrighteousness of me.
The good news after the bad news.
For he has clothed me with the garments of salvation
before I wore filthy rags,
and he's covered me with the robe of righteousness.
I'm covered in it
not because of what I've done,
but because of what God has imputed to me, because of his Son.
Do you understand?
Yeah, that's good news.
Because when I look at myself,
I'm more in.
Because I understand how poor
in spirit I am.
But because of what Jesus has done.
Now God sees me as the righteousness of His Son.
And because that
transaction has taken place, my response then is this
put on Jesus.
And when you've done that, now, here's the choice.
Now make no provision for the flesh to gratify his desires.
Now, because of what I'm not, so that all be righteous,
but because I've been made righteous. Now.
I will go through my own choice
to not lust.
Do not break my vows to not retaliate.
I will make no provision
to gratify my natural sinful desires.
Not so that will be righteous, but because I've been made righteous.
Do you understand?
See, religion is man's attempt to get to God.
Christianity is God.
Coming to man.
And through that, Jesus
coming to earth, dying on the cross.
When I accept that, accept my own spiritual depravity
and accept his covering of me.
Now I stand before God, though guilty, as if.
I'm completely righteous.
And that's the good news.
Everything up to that point.
Bad news.
But we have to have the bad news of the law
to get to the good news of the gospel.
You can appear before God Almighty.
Have me completely justified
if you're sinned.
And completely righteous before him.
Because of what Jesus has done.
But you have to admit your own depravity.
Repent of your sin
and accept him as the leader of your life.
And in that
is great liberation
and joy.
Why don't you pray with me, father?
Thank you.
You are so good to us
to give us the bad news,
so that we can understand the good news.
And, father, you've made it
abundantly clear that in and of ourselves we are guilty and condemned.
And so I thank you for that realization.
It's hard. It's difficult.
We don't want to accept it, but it's the truth.
I thank you that you don't leave us in
that place.
That you've given us this opportunity to be made right with you
through what Jesus has done, what your son's done.
God, I pray that nobody here misses this.
Oh, we all accept it.
So, father, thank you that you hear our hearts.
And I hear,
I think as you hear the hearts that are going to pray right now,
if you've never accepted the righteousness of Jesus over your life,
if you've never repented of your sin, accepted him,
I invite you to do that right now and just.
Between you and the father,
would you just say, God, I admit it, I stand guilty.
You know of myself.
I'm condemned and I have no hope.
I admit it, it's bad news.
But I thank you for the good news of Jesus.
I accept what Jesus did
on the cross to forgive my sin.
I confess my sin.
I repent of it, and I accept what Jesus did
to purchase my forgiveness.
I accept it.
Jesus, I invite you into my life.
I want to follow you.
And I want to do everything I can do,
not to gratify my own natural desires anymore.
They've led me astray too much.
And this morning I'm giving myself to you.
Father,
I thank you for the opportunity you've given us to be right with you.
Because of what you've done up.
We do.
Help us live in a way that's worthy of that.
Now, in your name, I pray. Amen.
You okay?
Here's my ask.
We're going to move into a Christmas season next Sunday.
So we're going to push pause on Matthew for a little bit.
We'll come back to it.
Finish up the sermon on the Mount.
But we're going to go through these elements of of Christmas
and what it really means to have Jesus
come to earth to, to, to set in motion
all the stuff we've talked about this justification being right with God.
And so during Christmas
time, people will come to church if someone just invites them.
Okay, so understand how this works.
You're already here.
People who aren't here will come to church
if someone invites them here because you're already here.
What does that mean? That you now become?
Invite us.
And so if you know people in your huddle that don't go to church
regularly, invite them.
As we go through this Christmas series, you understand?
Yeah.
All right, I love you.
I'm proud of you.
You did a good job going through Matthew five today.
I realize it was bad news up front, but we got to the good news at the end, right?
That's the gospel. Let's sing.