Love Like God

Introduction:

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

Leviticus 19:34 – You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the LORD your God.

I Love My Enemies... (Matthew 5:43–48)

1. ...because of WHO I AM. (Matt 5:45a)

2. ...by WHAT I DO. (Matt 5:45b)

3. ...because I Am CALLED TO BE DIFFERENT. (Matt 5:46–47)

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

Small Group Discussion
Read Matthew 5:43-48

1. What was your big take-away from this passage / message?
   

2. What does it mean to be persecuted? When Jesus said we must pray for those who persecute us, what / how exactly should we pray?
   

3. Can you genuinely love your enemy if you don’t really feel like it? Why or why not?
   

4. Explain Romans 12:20. How exactly does loving your enemy lead him to repentance? See also Romans 2:4.
   

5. What did Jesus mean in verse 48 when He said we “must be perfect”?

Breakout
Pray for one another.

• AUDIO TRANSCRIPT

  Open up those Bibles to Matthew chapter 5.

  As we go through our series, the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew chapter 5 verse 43, Jesus

  said, "You have heard that it was said."

  Stop there for a second.

  This whole section that we're in right now, if you've been following this series at all,

  I'm sure you've noticed that that has come up.

  What is it like?

  Six total times pastor?

  Like, "You have heard that it was said, but I say to you."

  What Jesus is dealing with here is correcting some garbage beliefs.

  And I've shared with you before, that's my biggest concern for this church is the area

  of discernment.

  We live in a day that there is so much bad teaching out there.

  And thanks to the Internet, we have access, right?

  And look, I'm not saying it's all bad, but I'm saying probably for every good teaching

  you can find online, you can probably find ten other garbage teaching online.

  And my concern for the church is people not knowing the difference.

  And it gets back to what did Jesus actually say?

  It's the issue that He was dealing with in His day, lack of discernment.

  Last week we saw Jesus said, "You've heard that it was said, and I for an eye."

  And Jesus said, "No, no, no, no, no, no."

  Jesus, as I say to you, I'm paraphrasing, He says, "Do not retaliate."

  You can walk away from last week's message and say, "Got it.

  Don't retaliate."

  So I'm just going to ignore the people that I can't stand.

  Well, let's keep reading.

  Verse 43, "You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbor and hate your

  enemy.'

  But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you."

  Oh, no, no, don't ignore your enemies.

  You have to look for ways to be good to them.

  You're like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

  You're saying that I not only don't get to get even with them, but I have to proactively

  love them?

  Yeah, that's what He said.

  All right?

  It's a hard word.

  So I think we should just stop and pray right now, shouldn't we?

  I'm going to ask that you would pray for me to be faithful to communicate God's word,

  accurately and clearly, and I will pray for you to have a heart open to receive what our

  Lord is teaching us in this part of His Sermon.

  All right?

  So let's pray.

  Father in heaven, as we go through this sermon from our Lord, it's just wave after wave of

  things that really confront our selfish, sinful, fleshly tendencies.

  And I don't know of one that's bigger than this one.

  I'm asking, please God, please, by the power of Your Word, Father, by the power of Your

  Spirit that You would change our minds today, Father, change our hearts and that we wouldn't

  just leave here knowing some things, but we leave here deeply convicted and moved to do

  some things.

  For Your glory and honor, Father.

  We pray in Jesus' name.

  And all of God's people said, Amen.

  All right, let's break this down here.

  Jesus says in verse 43, "You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbor

  and hate your enemy.'"

  You have heard.

  You have heard.

  That's what we've seen in this series.

  The scribes and the Pharisees in Jesus' day did what's still happening today.

  They twist verses in the Word of God to justify whatever it is they want to justify.

  For them, Jesus called them out.

  They were justifying their lust.

  They were justifying their hatred.

  They were justifying their getting even with people.

  He calls them out again.

  You've heard that it was said, "You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy."

  That's what the scribes and the Pharisees said.

  And you're like, "Well, was that in the Old Testament?"

  Well, the first part was, kind of.

  Here's what I mean.

  Here's what's actually in the Scripture.

  Leviticus 19-18.

  Look at this.

  "You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people, but you

  shall love your neighbor as yourself.

  I am the Lord."

  So you see, with the way that they sort of restated that, they ran into four problems.

  Four problems.

  The first problem is the scribes and the Pharisees left out the "as yourself" part.

  Did you notice that?

  Well, I love my neighbor, but as myself, that's a bit too much.

  Let's keep it vague.

  Because if we keep love vague, then whatever we do, we can just say it was love, right?

  So keep it vague.

  God never kept it vague.

  That was their first problem.

  Second problem is the scribes and the Pharisees redefined neighbor.

  And their definition of neighbor was, "Those I choose to love."

  That was their definition.

  So do you realize...the reason I'm laughing is, do you realize what that made the command?

  God's command is, "Love those you choose to love."

  That's convenient.

  Third problem, the scribes and the Pharisees totally added the "hate your enemy" part,

  right?

  Totally added that.

  You're not going to find that anywhere in the Old Testament.

  My vague love is for my Jewish neighbors.

  What about the foreigners?

  Hate them.

  And that leads us actually to the fourth problem.

  Because that whole love your neighbor as yourself, that was in Leviticus 19, 18.

  But if you go down a few verses to verse 34, it says, "You shall treat the stranger who

  sojourns with you as the native among you.

  And you shall love him as yourself."

  For you are strangers in the land of Egypt.

  I am the Lord your God.

  See the scribes and the Pharisees, they thought that they were honoring God by hating foreigners.

  And we get asked this question a lot.

  "Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait."

  In the Old Testament, didn't God tell the Israelites to exterminate the nations that

  were living in the Promised Land?

  And don't we have all these imprecatory psalms?

  Like what's up with that, huh?

  Well, it's like the eye for an eye thing that we talked about last week.

  The scribes and the Pharisees took a thing that was designed for Israel as a nation and

  they turned it into a personal thing.

  So the whole exterminate the enemies in the Promised Land.

  Yeah, absolutely.

  Israel's wars weren't personal vendettas.

  They were commanded by God to wipe out those nations because those nations did horrible

  things.

  And God says, "You are not going to pollute my nation Israel."

  So Israel, you're going to wipe them out.

  And if you have a hard time with that, I would just like to lovingly remind you that God

  is allowed to make those calls because vengeance belongs to Him.

  Okay?

  And God's whole purpose in that was to protect Israel as a nation in that land.

  That's why when you turn to your New Testament, you don't see any imprecatory language in

  the New Testament.

  It's for Israel.

  And individually, we're talking about personally now, what about the people that hate me?

  What about the people that are my enemies?

  Love them.

  Love them.

  Look at verse 44, Jesus says, "But I say to you," pretty clear, isn't it?

  Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.

  You see the whole loving your neighbor command includes everyone around you, including your

  enemy.

  Now breaking this down, when He talks about enemy, He's talking about your personal enemy.

  Okay?

  It's not this collective group idea.

  It's somebody who personally hates me.

  And Jesus says our response is to love them.

  That's the word agape.

  That is the highest form of love.

  That's self-sacrificing love.

  That's the kind of love that we should have for our enemy.

  And the verb tense here is constant.

  It's continually.

  You need to continually love your enemies.

  And you're like, well, who is my enemy?

  Who is it that hates you?

  Who is it that you know that if you tried to call them, they wouldn't answer the phone?

  If you sent them a text, they wouldn't reply.

  Or vice versa?

  Who is it that has been slandering you, making accusations against you?

  Jesus says we not only love our enemies, but you notice He ratchets it up even more when

  He says pray for those who persecute you.

  Those who persecute you.

  Those are your worst enemies.

  Where Jesus is speaking about your enemies who they don't just hate you.

  They actively hate you.

  These are the people that make an effort to show you how much they hate you.

  And as we've been going through the Sermon on the Mount, we see that a true believer

  in Jesus Christ is someone who is defined by the Beatitudes.

  And if you were here for the Beatitudes here, do you remember what the last one was?

  The highest rung on the ladder of following Jesus Christ is when we're persecuted.

  And here's the part where we stop and ask, are we persecuted?

  Are we really persecuted?

  Because here's the thing.

  I think for a lot of us our knee-jerk reaction to that would be I'm not persecuted, but the

  reality is you probably are.

  But you just haven't realized it.

  Here's what I mean by that.

  Here's what I mean.

  Persecute doesn't just mean somebody physically attacks you.

  Somebody murders you.

  Somebody gets you arrested, thrown in jail.

  Yes, that is persecution, but those are the most graphic manifestations of persecution.

  The word "persecute" literally means to pursue.

  That's what it means.

  And listen, listen to this.

  Persecute means somebody is chasing after you to constantly criticize and condemn you.

  So I imagine most of you are being persecuted right now according to the true definition

  of persecution.

  Think about it this way.

  Was Jesus persecuted?

  If you're like, "Oh yeah, when He was crucified."

  Of course!

  But He was persecuted His entire ministry because what were they constantly doing?

  The proper definition.

  They were constantly - read the Gospels.

  They were constantly pursuing Jesus.

  They were - how would we say it?

  They were out to get Him.

  That's what persecution means.

  I mean, read your Gospels.

  They were constantly looking to criticize Jesus and assaulting Jesus, accusing Jesus.

  "You did this in the Sabbath and you shouldn't be doing healing this way and your disciples

  didn't wash your hands and what's up with the fasting?"

  They were constantly, constantly, constantly after Him.

  That's what persecution means.

  And if you really follow Jesus, you have people pursuing you in that way too.

  Don't shout out any names.

  But do you have somebody at your workplace, for example, that's always watching you,

  always looking to get their little remarks in, get their little digs in,

  always looking to criticize anything you say or anything you do.

  That's persecution according to the proper definition.

  They're pursuing you.

  Maybe you have that family member.

  Never approves of a thing you do.

  The bum just can't do anything right and they're always vocal about it.

  Getting their little shots in, their little passive aggressive comments, they're always

  out to get you.

  That's persecution.

  Maybe it's on social media.

  You know anything you post.

  You know that person is going to show up with their snarky little comment.

  That's pursuing.

  That's persecution.

  Jesus says we need to pray for the people to do that to us.

  The people that are out to get you.

  Jesus said pray for them.

  So when was the last time you did that?

  I don't know about you but I have a list of people that I regularly pray for.

  When was the last time that you loved your enemy?

  And you're like, why in the world would I do that?

  Well let's keep reading.

  Jesus says in verse 45, "So that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven."

  Why would you love your enemy?

  Why would you pray for people that are constantly out to get you?

  It's not because of who they are.

  It's because of who you are.

  That's the sermon that our Lord gives.

  That you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven.

  It's not because of who they are.

  It's because of who you are.

  We just confess that so much of our lives, our attitudes, our moods are determined by

  other people, good or bad.

  People have a way of just like governing our lives.

  Here's what I mean.

  Your service, you go over to a giant eagle and you run into an old friend that you haven't

  seen in years.

  "Oh, that puts you in a good mood.

  Oh, it was so great catching up."

  That's going to put you in a good mood for the rest of the day, right?

  Or somebody makes a really jerky comment to you at work intentionally wanting to get

  under your skin.

  Then that's just like wreck your day and you're in a bad mood for days over one jerky comment.

  And I would bet if you had a bad day last week, if you could point to a day last week

  or like, "Oh, that was a bad day," I would be willing to bet that it had something to

  do with people.

  You're laughing because it's true.

  And Jesus here is saying, "My people don't react to people.

  My people act according to the Word of God."

  So let's unpack this for a few moments, shall we?

  When you're outlining, I want you to jot some things down.

  I love my enemies.

  Can you say that?

  You're like, "Not now."

  You will in a few minutes.

  I love my enemies.

  Number one, we already touched on this.

  We're going to drill a little deeper here.

  Number one, I love my enemies because of who I am.

  Look at this again.

  This is Jesus' whole rationale.

  Why would I love my enemies, Jesus?

  Lord, why would I pray for the people that are constantly out to get me?

  So that You may be sons of Your Father who is in heaven.

  This is where Jesus starts Your identity.

  You love Your enemies not because of who they are, but because of who You are.

  Jesus is in essence saying, "You love Your enemies because..."

  It's a family tradition in our family.

  You have family traditions.

  You have family traditions.

  You know what I mean?

  Every family has on brand things that they do, right?

  Like some families, they're like, "We're campers.

  We go camping."

  Yes, we have a house, but for a while we like to pretend that we don't.

  That's just what we do in our family.

  We live in a canvas enclosure in the wildlife.

  Okay, but that's your family thing.

  For some families, it's like, "We're beach people.

  We love the beach."

  Our family loves the beach.

  We love the beach.

  That's our family thing, right?

  Some families are sports families like, "Oh, we're baseball.

  We're a baseball family.

  We love the box and we're on the church softball team."

  And we're like, "We love baseball."

  Every family's got their thing, right?

  I mean, I remember growing up, our family.

  Our family had our thing.

  I remember when we were teenagers, Aaron actually came over to our house for Thanksgiving.

  And they had the stuffing out and the turkey and all the dressing and all that stuff.

  And I just remember our family was passing around the table a bag of funyons.

  And I just remember Aaron sitting there going, she looked like she saw a ghost.

  I'm like, "What's the matter?"

  She goes, "Why are you passing around a bag of funyons?

  It's Thanksgiving."

  And I'm just like, "What's Thanksgiving without funyons?"

  Like, "We're not the weird ones here."

  And then I got older and realized that we were.

  Every family's got their thing.

  That's what Jesus is saying here.

  Like, "Hey, hey, hey, we're in God's family."

  He said, "You know what we do in God's family?

  Do you know what we do?

  We love like God."

  And God loves His enemies.

  You're like, "Who are God's enemies?"

  Everyone.

  Do you realize that?

  Literally every single person on the planet is an enemy of God until they are reconciled

  to God in Jesus Christ.

  That's what Paul said in Romans 5, right?

  "If while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son."

  See that's the glorious reality of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

  When you receive Jesus Christ by faith, when you believe that He died to take away your

  sin, when you believe that He rose from the dead to give you eternal life, when you turn

  from your sin and receive Him, God changes you from an enemy of God to a child of God.

  And now we are a child still living among enemies of God, child of God.

  Ephesians 4, spilling over to Ephesians 5, says, "Be kind to one another, tenderhearted,

  forgiving one another as God in Christ forgave you.

  Therefore be imitators of God as beloved children."

  This is what we do in our family.

  We love like God.

  And as His children, we imitate our dad.

  Do you ever notice that kids love to imitate?

  Do you ever notice that?

  Kids loved to imitate adults.

  It was made painfully aware to me, oh, many, many years ago, a couple decades ago at this

  point we had foster kids.

  Before we had any of our own kids, we had foster kids.

  And I remember, one little boy, he was five years old, his name was Walter, and we'd be

  playing the PlayStation.

  We were sitting there, playing the PlayStation, and look, I was a perfect gamer back in the

  day.

  But sometimes the stupid game would glitch or something, and my guy would get killed.

  And when that happened, I remember I'd put the controller down, and I'd be like, "Oh,

  for Pete's sake!"

  Well Walter would be playing video games with me, and I remember he'd be playing a video

  game, and he'd just randomly throw his controller down and go, "Your pee stinks!"

  Like no, no, no, no, no, no.

  No, it's for Pete's sake.

  But he was...

  It never clicked with him.

  He was constantly commenting on the smell of urine.

  Your pee stinks.

  Why did he do that?

  He was just imitating me.

  Right?

  Kids love to do that.

  And as a child of God, we naturally, we supernaturally want to imitate him.

  So when that guy at work is constantly out to get you, and you love him, and you repay

  his nastiness with kindness, and then somebody else comes in and says, "Well, what are you

  doing?

  You love that guy?

  That guy's a real jerk to you!"

  And your response says, "Yeah, I get that from my dad."

  You see, I see people as dad-season.

  Lost.

  Blind.

  Slave to sin.

  Heading to hell.

  You know what my heavenly dad taught me?

  He taught me that I don't need to retaliate.

  And my heavenly father taught me I don't need to ignore them.

  My heavenly father taught me that people like that need compassion.

  And I know right now somebody's thinking, "Yeah, I love your enemies.

  I see it.

  I hear it.

  Pastor Jeff, you don't know what this person said to me.

  You don't know the horrible things that they said to my face.

  You don't know the horrible things they said behind my back.

  Pastor Jeff, you don't know this person for years has been just out to get me."

  Look.

  You're right.

  They don't deserve it.

  You're right.

  They've been miserable.

  But you, you love them not because of who they are, but because of who you are.

  You're a child of God.

  And your heavenly father, he loves his enemies.

  Right?

  So I love my enemies because of who I am.

  Secondly, number two, write this one down.

  I love my enemies by what I do.

  I love my enemies by what I do.

  And you might be sitting here going, "Ah, yeah, this love your enemy thing.

  I ain't feeling it.

  I ain't feeling it."

  And I would say, "That's okay.

  You don't have to feel it."

  But you do have to do it.

  Because look, when the Bible talks about love, agape love, it's not an emotion.

  Listen, you don't have to like them.

  But you do have to love them.

  And biblically, love is an action.

  Here's what I mean.

  Love is an action.

  First, John 5.3 says, "For this is the love of God that we keep His commandments."

  Jesus said the same thing.

  What is it?

  John 14, 15.

  Jesus said, "If you love Me, you will keep My commandments."

  John 15, Jesus said, "Abiding in Him is keeping His commandments."

  Notice the Bible never calls us to stir up some kind of emotion.

  Loving God is a choice.

  And yes, we worship God with our emotions in song and worship, yes, but that is the

  fruit of a choice to love God.

  The proof that you love God isn't based on your feelings.

  The proof that you love God according to our Lord is based on your actions.

  And listen, church, love works the same way with your enemies.

  You are not called to love your enemies by conjuring up gushy feelings.

  You're called to love them by your actions.

  You're called to love them by actively blessing them.

  Why?

  Because that's what God does.

  Look at verse 45, the rest of it.

  He says, "For He makes His Son rise on the evil and on the good and sends rain on the

  just and on the unjust."

  God is so kind to sinners.

  Did you ever stop and think about that?

  Have you ever stopped to just marvel at the glorious truth that somebody can live their

  entire life and completely ignore God?

  And they can still have a pretty good life on the earth.

  Isn't that astounding?

  Isn't it amazing that somebody can live their entire life hating God, speaking against God,

  speaking against God's people, speaking against God's truth.

  They can live their whole life and do that, and they can still have a good life on the

  earth.

  In God's kindness, He still lets them have sun and rain and a million other good things.

  You can hate God, still have food and friends and laughter and family and health.

  And yeah, the heart hearted may refuse to be thankful or acknowledge this, but regardless,

  God does it anyways.

  God's kindness says little about them, but it says much about Him.

  And Jesus says, "Take note, children of God, you show love for your enemies by what you

  do for them.

  You show love for enemies by actively seeking their good."

  Like, well, what does that look like, Pastor Jeff?

  What does that look like?

  Okay, so you've got a nasty, older family member who's always hated you.

  Go do your yard work.

  You got a jerk co-worker always looking to get their little shots in on you?

  Look for ways to sincerely and genuinely compliment their work.

  You got a nasty neighbor?

  Find out what they like and treat them.

  Hey, I saw your garden, and the other day I was at the store and I saw that there was

  this magazine about gardening, and I picked it up for you.

  I thought you might be interested.

  I don't know.

  Just get on your face and ask God to show you how you can show kindness to your enemy.

  Romans 12.20, Paul quotes from Proverbs 25.

  He says if your enemy is hungry, feed them.

  If he is thirsty, give him something to drink.

  For by so doing, you will heat burning coals on his head.

  When I was a young Christian, when I read this, I had this idea that if you do good

  to people that aren't good to you, like if you meet their needs, they're going to have

  this like mini Sodom and Gomorrah experience on their head.

  Like I'm going to be nice to you, and it's going to rain lava on your head.

  I'm burning!

  Like that will show them.

  And then I learned that that's not what that means at all.

  It was actually an Egyptian symbol that they would put hot coals in an insulated pot and

  carried around on their head.

  It was a sign of repentance.

  See, Israel had the sackcloth and ashes.

  Israel had the pot of coals on their head.

  And that's what God's Word is driving us to.

  Because no one's ever been one to Jesus because a Christian matched their pettiness.

  No one's ever been one to Jesus because a Christian just flat-out ignored them.

  It's kindness that leads to repentance according to Romans 2-4.

  Show love to them.

  Actively show love to them.

  Why would I do that?

  Because it's not about who they are.

  It's about who you are.

  And one more.

  I love my enemies because of who I am by what I do.

  In Romans 2-3 we get to another because I love my enemies because I'm called to be different.

  Look at verses 46 and 47.

  Jesus says, "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

  than others?

  Do not even the Gentiles do the same?

  Stop there.

  If you're like, "You know what?

  I love the people that I like.

  I love the people that I like."

  Well, then you do what people who don't even know Jesus do.

  And our Lord here is saying, "What's so special about that?"

  Oh, so you think you're great because you do what's normal.

  Well hang on a second.

  Let me shine up your participation trophy.

  Why is it that we want applause for doing what's expected?

  Here's an example.

  Well Aaron and I, we always look at each other and kind of laugh.

  When we hear a dad say, "Yeah, I had a baby sit my kids last Monday."

  Do you hear somebody say that?

  You're not going to say it anymore.

  I had a baby sit my kids last Monday.

  I believe that's called being a father.

  You didn't baby sit your kids.

  What did your wife pay you $10 an hour?

  Like look, I'm not giving you a cookie because you did what was expected.

  That's what our Lord is saying here.

  You're expected to be different because Christians have something that no one else in the world

  has.

  Do you know what that is?

  Like the Bible?

  Not everybody has that.

  Like compassion?

  No, a lot of people have that.

  Christians have something that nobody else in the world has.

  You know what that is?

  God living in them.

  In other words, you should be different.

  I mean, anybody can go one mile.

  That was the law.

  That's expected.

  Anyone can give up a shirt that they lost legally in a lawsuit.

  That's expected.

  And here our Lord is saying, "Anybody can say hi to their friends."

  That's expected.

  But God expects and empowers us to do more, to be like Him.

  So do you do what the world expects?

  Or do you do what God expects because God's called you to be different than the world?

  Do you have a heart like God?

  We'll find out.

  We'll find out because it's revealed not in how you treat your friends, it's revealed

  in how you treat your enemies.

  You love them.

  Not because of who they are, but because of who you are.

  Oh yeah, there's one more verse.

  One of the most deeply convicting and challenging verses in the whole Bible.

  Jesus says, "You therefore must be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect."

  In the context of this teaching, obviously, he's talking about the way we love, right?

  You must love perfectly the way your heavenly Father loves perfectly.

  That's what Jesus is saying here.

  And look, you and I, we look at that verse and we say, "I failed.

  I failed."

  We all have.

  And actually, remembering the beatitudes, step one and two of the beatitudes was recognizing

  that you failed.

  And you're like, "Man, I'll never be perfect."

  But God says you must be perfect.

  You know what that means?

  It means I always have room to grow.

  And today we're talking about loving your enemies.

  And maybe right now you're saying, "You know, I knew that.

  I knew that, but today I'm encountered by this calling in a fresh way and I realize

  now I need to grow.

  I want to grow in this area."

  It's grace.

  It's grace.

  God has made us perfectly righteous in Jesus Christ.

  God has adopted us as His children, and He is constantly changing us.

  We don't deserve anything, but God has given us everything, even though we were His enemies.

  It's grace.

  You get that?

  Then like your Father, give it.

  In just a moment, we're going to be gathering around the Lord's table as a church.

  And it is the Lord's table that reminds us that we are grace people.

  Because in essence, what we are remembering, what we are celebrating, what we are declaring

  when we take the Lord's supper together is the Lord is saying, "I saved you."

  Not because of who you are, but because of who I am.

Thou Shalt Not Resist

Introduction:

How Do You React... (Matthew 5:38–42)

1. ...When you are INSULTED? “Eye for an Eye” or REFUSE RETALIATION? (Matt 5:39b)

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

2. ...when people are HEARTLESS? “Eye for an Eye” or GRATUITOUS GRACE? (Matt 5:40)

   Romans 12:21 – Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.

3. ...when forced to OBEY? “Eye for an Eye” or DOUBLE Your DUTY? (Matt 5:41)

   1 Peter 2:16 – Live as people who are free, not using your freedom as a cover-up for evil, but living as servants of God.

4. ...when someone wants your STUFF? “Eye for an Eye” or RELEASE Your RESOURCES? (Matt 5:42)

   1 John 3:17 – But if anyone has the world’s goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God’s love abide in him?

   Philippians 2:5–7a – Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant...

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

Small Group Discussion
Read Matthew 5:38-42

1. What was your big take-away from this passage / message?
   

2. Tell of a time you were offended and retaliated. Why did you do what you did? What would you do differently if you had another chance?
   

3. Why do you think “eye for an eye” (revenge) is our natural default response?
   

4. Why do you think how you react is a good gauge of where your heart is?

Breakout
Pray for one another.

• AUDIO TRANSCRIPT

  And before we dig into God's Word together, let's just pause.

  I'm going to ask you just take a moment and please pray for me to be faithful,

  to clearly communicate God's Word.

  And I will pray for you to have your heart open to receive what it is

  that the Lord wants to teach us today. Let's pray.

  Father in heaven, your Word challenges us and convicts us and we thank you for that.

  We didn't come in here today looking for a stamp of affirmation on how we already are.

  We've come in here to encounter you and allow your spirit and your Word to conform us into the image of your Son.

  That's why we're here.

  So Father, I pray to that end you would open our hearts.

  Your spirit would speak to every heart, the wisdom that you have recorded in your Word.

  That we walk out of here different people than how we were when we walked in.

  Thank you Father for the promise of your Word.

  We pray in Jesus' name.

  And all of God's people said, "Amen."

  I have a nonverbal Son, as many of you know.

  But years ago, I was with a group of pastors and one pastor was commenting on the fact that I had a nonverbal Son.

  And he said, very compassionately, he said,

  "It must be very difficult for you to not have a conversation with your Son."

  And I said, "It is."

  But the way I look at it, we'll have all of eternity to catch up.

  And a different pastor said, if he's elect,

  and I said, "I feel like you're predestined to take a weapon."

  And I was a prophet that day.

  Okay, I made that last part up.

  But I still think about that.

  I still think about retaliation.

  Getting even.

  Why are we like that?

  Why are we like that people, that there's something in all of us that makes us demand respect?

  Hey, you can't talk to me that way.

  You know I am?

  You can't treat me like that.

  There's something in us that we demand our rights.

  We say things like, "I don't get mad. I get even."

  And you're not going to get away with this.

  You're going to pay for what you did.

  Our hearts are naturally, sinfully retaliatory.

  I was listening to a sermon about a month or so ago from one of my favorite preachers, Ron Don.

  It was a sermon on meekness.

  And he reminded me of something that I loved when I was a kid.

  He was a little comic book.

  Do you remember the Charles Atlas ads in the old comic books?

  Do you remember those?

  It was a little one page, it was a little comic strip in the book.

  Well, in this little comic strip, there was this little weakling, like a little skinny guy,

  on the beach and this bully was like kicking sand in his face.

  And all the girls were like, "Tee hee hee hee."

  And the kid takes Charles Atlas course.

  The skinny kid.

  And in 90 days, he was kicking sand in the other guy's face.

  And there's something innocent.

  We're like, "Yes! Yeah!"

  We love that stuff, don't we?

  Don't we love that revenge stuff?

  Oh, come on.

  Don't you leave me up here.

  Don't we love that revenge stuff?

  The getting even stuff?

  Yes, you do.

  Yes, you do.

  There are many of the plot lines of movies.

  Like, and your soap operas and your westerns and your superhero movies.

  I was thinking about this this week. It's everywhere.

  That's what Popeye is.

  Popeye is nothing but a cartoon about a guy that gets even.

  We love that stuff.

  We love the guy that is not going to take it.

  Payback.

  Because the guy that gets the sand kicked in his face

  and belittled and humiliated and he just takes it.

  Well, that guy is a coward, right?

  Weak.

  It's like, dude, punch that bully in the trot.

  Don't take it.

  Right?

  There's biblical precedence for this, isn't there?

  An eye for an eye.

  Right?

  An eye for an eye.

  Oh, I like that.

  Because that's in the Bible.

  You know what that is?

  Eye for an eye.

  That is biblical permission to get even.

  No, no, no, no, no. I'm sorry.

  That's a biblical command to get even, isn't it?

  Well, the scribes and the Pharisees thought so.

  And many people sitting here even and watching this

  and listening to this podcast later, still believe

  that an eye for an eye is our biblical mandates to get revenge.

  Well, let's see, shall we?

  Look at verse 30.

  Why don't we say verse 38? Yes.

  Jesus continuing the Sermon on the Mount.

  He said, "You have heard that it was said,

  an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth."

  Yeah, that's a real Old Testament quote.

  Yes.

  100%.

  And it's also one of the most misinterpreted

  and misused verses in the entire Bible.

  Because the scribes and the Pharisees

  and we take this verse way out of context.

  Is an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth?

  Is that our charge to get even?

  No, it's not.

  All right, then what does it mean?

  I'm so glad you asked.

  Let's get biblical, shall we?

  Mark and I shows up three times in the Old Testament.

  Three times.

  It's in Exodus 21, it's in Leviticus 24,

  and it's in Deuteronomy 19.

  Don't look now, but you look later,

  and you're going to see in every one of those passages,

  every single one of them,

  the context of that verse are

  it's God's instructions for Israel's courts and judges.

  Eye for an eye, that was for Israel's courts,

  not for personal vendetta.

  And eye for an eye was a guideline for Israel's judges,

  not for Batman, okay?

  So what's the purpose?

  Eye for an eye.

  What does eye for an eye mean?

  Eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth.

  What does that mean?

  It just simply means this.

  The punishment should fit the crime.

  In court, justice demands being fair.

  So judges in court, God's instruction for Israel,

  when you punish someone,

  the measure of punishment should fit the measure of the crime.

  That's what eye for an eye means.

  And God is saying an eye for an eye

  must be determined by the courts.

  The courts determine that. Why?

  Why did God leave that up to the courts?

  Why? I'll tell you why.

  Because when we're wronged,

  we, by nature, want to retaliate

  way beyond the level of the offense.

  Here's what I mean.

  Our mindset is this.

  You dinged my 93 Toyota.

  You owe me a new car.

  Fair is fair.

  We take it way too far.

  We say things like,

  "Hey, we were messing around.

  We were playing basketball

  and you accidentally elbowed me in the mouth

  and broke my tooth.

  You owe me a set of grills."

  Justin, do the kids still wear grills?

  Do they still wear a thing?

  The cool ones.

  You are right.

  You could not be righter.

  But that's the point.

  We take it too far.

  You owe me way more than

  you should have to pay.

  So God's like, "No, no, no, no.

  Leave that to the courts."

  So here it is. Here it is.

  If a crime has been committed against me,

  if I've been wronged in any way,

  I'm not going to take the law into my own hands.

  I'm going to take the courts to be fair

  in the way God commanded the courts to be fair,

  which is an eye for an eye.

  A tooth for a tooth.

  Be fair.

  So in Jesus' day, the ascribes and the Pharisees,

  and again us, we take this way out of context

  and we take it out of the courts

  and we take it as our command,

  our personal responsibility to get even.

  But look at verse 39.

  You probably saw this coming.

  Jesus says, "But I say to you,

  do not resist the one who is evil."

  Do not resist. What does that mean?

  It literally means this.

  When someone wrongs you,

  when someone offends you,

  when someone is against you,

  Jesus says, "Do not set yourself against him."

  Now let's be clear.

  Jesus is not saying,

  He is not saying,

  "Do not protect yourself.

  Do not protect your own."

  He's not saying that.

  If you break into my home,

  my dog will shoot you

  and my wife will bite you.

  Wait.

  No, no, that's right.

  He's not saying, "Don't protect yourself."

  He's not saying, "Don't protect your church."

  Jesus isn't preaching passivity here.

  Like, "Okay, go ahead.

  Go ahead. You can sin,

  and you can abuse me all you want.

  I don't care because Jesus said not to resist."

  That's not what He's saying.

  He's also not saying,

  "Don't confront sin."

  He's not saying that.

  Because the Bible is clear that sin must be confronted.

  It must be addressed and dealt with in the church.

  Here's what Jesus is saying

  by this statement.

  And it's going to be crystal clear

  because Jesus actually illustrates

  what He's teaching here.

  But here's what Jesus is saying.

  He's saying,

  "Don't start a feud.

  Don't try to get even.

  Don't try to get even.

  If you think that your rights were violated,

  you don't need to fight about it."

  That's what Jesus is saying.

  We are not to be a people

  whose knee-jerk reaction

  is to be retaliatory.

  That's what Jesus is saying.

  In the Sermon on the Mount,

  we've seen it over and over.

  Jesus is saying, "My people are different."

  My people are different in how they act.

  They're merciful. They're hungry for righteousness.

  They're salt and light. They're influencers.

  They reconcile with broken relationships.

  They cut off lust and they take marriage seriously.

  And they keep their word.

  My people act differently.

  Because when Jesus Christ enters us,

  when you receive Christ,

  when you turn from your sin and believe

  that He died for your sin

  and He rose from the dead to give you eternal life,

  when you believe that the Bible says

  God's Holy Spirit lives within you.

  And when God's Spirit lives within you,

  you are called to something greater.

  And you demonstrate that you belong to Christ

  by how you act.

  God wants your heart.

  And your heart is revealed by how you act.

  But perhaps more so,

  your heart is revealed by how you react.

  You can show me what a man is made of

  by how he acts.

  And I can show you what a man is made of

  by how he reacts.

  So let me ask you,

  how do you react?

  How do you react when you have been personally offended?

  How do you react when you've been insulted?

  How do you react when you've been disrespected?

  Do you react in kind?

  As your mind said immediately,

  "No, no, no, no, no, no, no.

  You're not getting away with this.

  I'm getting even."

  As your mind said,

  "An eye for an eye."

  Wrongly interpreting it like the Pharisees.

  Or do you not resist?

  As our Lord said,

  do you refuse to emotionally react

  and retaliate in the flesh?

  And I'm sure there's somebody here,

  self-deluded, that's like,

  "Oh, my pastor's got to hang it along with everybody."

  I never respond negatively when I'm offended.

  I just bake them muffins.

  Okay.

  But I think there's something here for the rest of us.

  Because Jesus elaborates

  on how His followers should react

  to difficult people

  and difficult situations

  by giving four scenarios.

  So that's what we're going to ask ourselves today,

  a little self-examination.

  We're going to ask ourselves, "How do you react?"

  How do you react?

  Number one, how do you react

  when you are insulted?

  When you are insulted, how do you react?

  Eye for an eye?

  Or do you refuse retaliation?

  Look at verse 39.

  Jesus says, "But if anyone slaps you on the right cheek,

  turn to him the other also."

  Stop there.

  To the Jews,

  this was the absolute most insulting thing

  to be slapped.

  In fact, I read this past week that a slave in those days,

  a slave would rather be whipped than slapped

  because a slap was utterly humiliating.

  And you know the worst was the backhand slap.

  That's why Jesus said, "Right cheek?"

  Sorry about that.

  That's why Jesus said, "Right cheek?"

  Because when you get a backhand with a right hand,

  it's going to hit you in the right cheek.

  That was the worst insult in their mind.

  We get it.

  Nothing's really changed there. We get it.

  If somebody walks up to you and just...

  That's just total disdain.

  It's like you're nothing to me.

  You're not even worth arguing with

  because you're nothing.

  It's just a complete, complete insult.

  And all the moment I'm insulted,

  I want to retaliate.

  Eye for an eye, right?

  Oh, okay, now I get to slap you.

  And I bet I can slap harder.

  Wait, wait, wait, wait. What does Jesus say?

  He says, "Turn to Him the other also."

  You're like, "Aha, okay. That's very gracious."

  He gets two slaps in on me and then it's go time.

  No.

  If you're believing that,

  then you completely missed the point that Jesus was making.

  Because here's the thing.

  It's not even about the slap.

  It's about being insulted.

  That's the point.

  How do you respond when you're insulted?

  Because look,

  unless you're Chris Rocket and Smacked by Will Smith,

  you're probably not going to get a slap.

  You probably are not.

  But you're going to be insulted in other ways, aren't you?

  Verbally.

  How about social media?

  All these keyboard warriors out there?

  Because they know they won't get slapped in the teeth.

  They're real strong and brave throwing out their insults at you

  from behind their keyboard.

  Maybe that nasty text or email that you get,

  you're going to be insulted.

  It's all the same application here from our Lord.

  At the same point, Jesus says, "Turn to Him the other."

  He's saying, "You're insulted?

  Have you been grossly insulted?"

  Jesus says, "Let Him do it again."

  You.

  You refuse to retaliate.

  Like, "I shouldn't be insulted.

  Don't you know who I am?

  I should be respected."

  Yeah.

  I agree.

  You should be respected.

  But you won't be.

  Someone is going to insult you.

  So you can react the world's way.

  "I" for an "I"?

  Like, "Oh, you're going to insult me?

  I'm going to go full-dawn wrinkles on you."

  You have brought a knife to a gunfight, my friend.

  That's "I" for an "I."

  Or you could respond the kingdom way,

  which is refusing to retaliate.

  And right now, somebody's sitting there going,

  "Oh, okay.

  So you're saying, when people insult me,

  I should just take it?"

  Now you're thinking like Jesus.

  Because 1 Peter 2, 23, he says,

  when He was reviled,

  He did not revile in return.

  When He suffered, He did not threaten,

  but continued in trusting Himself to Him,

  who judges justly.

  How do you react when you're insulted?

  Number two, how do you react when people are heartless?

  How do you react when people are heartless

  and "I" for an "I"?

  Or gratuitous grace?

  Look at verse 40.

  Jesus said, "And if anyone would sue you

  and take your tunic,

  let them have your cloak as well."

  Okay, Jesus isn't saying,

  "Everybody consume me for everything."

  Now, He's obviously,

  He's talking about being sued

  where there is some justification in the lawsuit.

  That you went to court and legally,

  you were sued and lost your tunic.

  Like, what's a tunic?

  Well, in those days,

  the tunic was the long undergarment.

  It was like a long, basically, the shirt.

  It was your shirt.

  And look, they didn't have a closet full of them

  with a bag of them for the good will sitting in the garage.

  Most of them would have had one or three at the most.

  And this was more than just your shirt.

  It was also your blanket.

  That's the thing that kept you warm at night.

  So I think this is quite a shocking thing

  for our Lord to say that someone

  would sue you for the shirt off your back.

  And look, in court,

  if someone sues you for the shirt

  that's on your back that you're wearing,

  that's a little more than I for an I, isn't it?

  That's pretty heartless.

  The reality is, people do sue heartlessly.

  It's like suing a Christian school.

  Like, why would you do that?

  Unless there was a real egregious crime going on.

  But a lot of times, it's just spite.

  And I believe that's what Jesus is saying here.

  Perhaps Jesus was being hyperbolic,

  like saying even if somebody sues you

  for the shirt that you're wearing.

  Well, you could react the world's way, couldn't you?

  Like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

  I'm not giving you the shirt that I'm wearing.

  That's unreasonable and it's unfair.

  And I will fight you all the way up to the Supreme Court

  over my shirt.

  Or you could react the kingdom way,

  which is, did you lose your shirt in a lawsuit?

  Well, show them you're really sorry for whatever the offense was.

  And give them your coat too.

  You know, it's an interesting way that Jesus worded this

  because in Jewish Old Testament law,

  you were not allowed to sue a man for his coat.

  That was illegal.

  Do you think Jesus is making a point?

  Hey, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.

  Okay, so you're saying it was illegal to sue a man for his coat.

  So if somebody sues you for your shirt

  and you give them your coat,

  that would be awfully gratuitous.

  Now you're thinking like Jesus.

  Romans 12-21 says, "Do not be overcome by evil."

  But overcome evil with good.

  Don't retaliate.

  Show them that you're willing to give even more than they asked for.

  So how do you react?

  How do you react?

  Number three, when forced to obey.

  Eye for an eye or double your duty?

  Look at verse 41.

  Jesus, next illustration.

  He says, "And if anyone forces you to go one mile,

  go with them two miles."

  Now the Romans had a law.

  And that was actually a variation of an old Persian postal law.

  But here is the Roman law.

  An official could on the spot recruit a citizen

  for official duty to perform a task.

  You know the most famous example of this?

  This commissioning Simon of Cyrene to carry our Lord's cross.

  That was law.

  Specifically here, what Jesus is referring to was legally,

  legally a Roman soldier could recruit a citizen

  to carry his pack, his gear, one mile, and no further.

  You think about it from a Jewish standpoint,

  that's, hmm, hmm, hmm, hmm.

  You mean my enemy, a Roman soldier,

  is going to make me carry his stuff for a mile?

  So Jew, that would have been very degrading and disgusting.

  I think here our Lord is speaking to man's natural resentment

  towards the demands of the government.

  Does anybody remember COVID?

  Well, you can react the world's way.

  Right?

  You can react the world's way.

  You can act the way you want.

  You can act the way you want.

  You can act the way you want.

  You can act the way you want.

  You can act the way you want.

  You can act the way you want.

  You can act the way you want.

  You can act the way you want.

  You can act the way you want.

  You can act the way you want.

  You can act the way you want.

  You can act the way you want.

  You can act the way you want.

  You can act the way you want.

  The entire way.

  Give me your stuff.

  Baby shark doo doo doo doo doo doo.

  Baby shark doo doo doo doo doo doo doo.

  Never mind, I'll carry it myself.

  That's the world's way.

  Or you can react the kingdom's way.

  What's according to our Lord is what?

  Go two miles.

  Did you carry his stuff for a mile and you're like,

  "You know what? I'm just getting limber.

  I'm just getting warmed up.

  I'll go another mile."

  It's like giving the cloak, right?

  Same principle.

  Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.

  So you're saying,

  "I should give more than the law demands.

  I should give double of what's required of me."

  Now you're thinking like Jesus.

  Because 1 Peter 2.16 says,

  "Citizens, live as people who are free.

  Not using your freedom as a cover up for evil.

  But living as servants of God."

  Don't just do what's demanded.

  Go beyond.

  Force them to ask,

  "Why in the world is she acting like that?"

  And then you have the opportunity to talk about grace.

  Number four.

  How do you react when someone wants your stuff?

  How do you react when someone wants your stuff?

  Eye for an eye?

  Or do you release your resources?

  Look at verse 42.

  Jesus says, "Give to the one who begs from you

  and do not refuse the one who would borrow from you."

  Oh, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

  It just got real, didn't it?

  My money?

  My possessions?

  Bless you.

  We get so...

  We get so possessive

  over things.

  Jesus is saying if somebody begs,

  if somebody wants to borrow,

  He's not talking about beggars along the side of the road.

  This implies a real need,

  a need that's known and a need that's verified.

  That's what Jesus is talking about.

  And again, we have the two options before us.

  We can react the world's way.

  Someone comes to you with a real need.

  Eye for an eye means...

  All right, look, look, look.

  I'm going to give this to you, but you owe me, okay?

  And you're... Listen, you're going to pay me back

  every cent that I'm giving you.

  Do you understand me?

  I want it in writing.

  That's the world's way.

  And when we have that attitude,

  it just demonstrates that we care more about things than people, right?

  Well, why are you entitled to my stuff?

  Go get your own stuff.

  Where you can react the kingdom way.

  Jesus, what's the kingdom way?

  He says give the one who begs and do not refuse.

  The one who would borrow.

  What's the kingdom way?

  Self-sacrificing generosity.

  He's like, "Oh, you need something that I have?

  You know what? Here, take it.

  You know what? I'll buy another one,

  or I'll learn to live without it.

  No begs, whatever. Go ahead.

  Looks like you need this more than I do.

  If God thinks I need it,

  He'll make sure I get another one, all right?

  That's the kingdom way.

  Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

  So I should just give away everything that I have?

  Now you're thinking like Jesus.

  First John 3 verse 17 says,

  "But if anyone has the world's goods,

  Jesus' brother, Anid, yet closes his heart against him.

  How does the love of God abide in him?"

  It's just stuff.

  It's just stuff.

  It's eventual garbage, right?

  Release your resources. Bless people with it.

  Look, in Jesus' four scenarios here,

  in every case, your heart is revealed.

  Not in how you act,

  but in how you react.

  And you're like, "Man, man, how can I live like that?"

  Right now, I guarantee you,

  every single person here is looking at us going,

  "I agree that this is right!"

  But I don't know if I can actually do it.

  I mean, to do this,

  I would have to not insist on my rights.

  I would have to deny myself

  and I would have to act like a slave.

  Now you're thinking like Jesus.

  Because, oh, by the way,

  not insisting on your rights and denying yourself

  and acting like a slave.

  Philippians 2.

  Have this mind among yourselves,

  which is yours in Christ Jesus,

  who though he was in the form of God,

  did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped.

  He didn't insist on his rights.

  But emptied himself.

  Denied himself by taking the form of a servant.

  He became a slave.

  When you leave here today,

  someone's going to offend you.

  Someone's going to insult you.

  And somebody's going to stomp all over your rights.

  What you need to do right now

  is decide how you're going to react.

  Let's pray.

  Our Father in Heaven,

  we thank You for Your Word,

  because this is contrary to how we think.

  There's something in our hearts

  that demands retaliation.

  That would say getting even is the way to go.

  We teach our kids that.

  When Your Son very clearly taught us

  that we're to be a people

  that act opposite the way the world acts.

  Father, I pray right now that

  decisions are being made

  as we sit in the fellowship of the congregation,

  as we sit under Your Word,

  as we're sitting in a setting of worship.

  I pray right now, Father,

  that we are making decisions

  when we walk out this door.

  We are not going to be people who retaliate.

  But instead,

  we're going to follow the example

  that Your Son gave us,

  and we're going to trust in the power of Your Spirit,

  whom You put within us.

  To Your glory and honor, Father,

  grab our hearts and minds.

  We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.

Thou Shalt Not Lie

Introduction:

The Trustworthiness Test (Matthew 5:33-37):

1. Do I Need to CONVINCE OTHERS of the TRUTHFULNESS of what I say? (Matt 5:33–34a)

2. Do I Look for LOOPHOLES to GET OUT of what I say? (Matt 5:34b–36)

   Matthew 23:22 – And whoever swears by heaven swears by the throne of God and by him who sits upon it.

   1 Peter 2:22 – He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth.

3. Do I Always FOLLOW THROUGH on what I say? (Matt 5:37)

   James 5:12 – But above all, my brothers, do not swear, either by heaven or by earth or by any other oath, but let your “yes” be yes and your “no” be no, so that you may not fall under condemnation.

   John 8:44 – You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies.

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

Small Group Discussion
Read Matthew 5:33-37

1. What was your big take-away from this passage / message?
   

2. How can you strengthen your reputation when it comes to honesty and trustworthiness? How can you weaken it?
   

3. Do you ever make excuses or look for loopholes to get out of what you say?
   

4. Do you struggle with being a “yes or no” person? How do you fail to be reliable and follow through on what you say?
   

5. What does it look like to truly repent of deception and make things right with those you have lied to?

Breakout
Pray for one another.

• AUDIO TRANSCRIPT

  Return your Bibles to Matthew chapter 5 verses 33 through 37.

  Matthew chapter 5 verses 33 through 37.

  Is it safe to say that trust is in short supply in 2025?

  We are constantly bombarded with lies, conspiracies, fraud,

  lame excuses, propaganda, cover-ups.

  With each passing year, we become less and less trusting

  as others seem less and less trustworthy.

  I was going to use an object lesson to prove this point,

  but for the sake of unity, which you'll see in a minute

  why I'm not doing this, I'm going to have you use your imaginations instead.

  Imagine with me that a bunch of images are from the screens behind me

  of famous individuals, politicians, billionaires, tech gurus, celebrities,

  social media influencers, world-renowned doctors,

  and popular preachers who you see pop up on Spotify, YouTube, and television.

  And with each image, with each person, I ask this very simple question,

  is this person trustworthy?

  And with some of these famous people, the answer would be a decisive yes,

  while others would be a resounding no.

  But some examples may prove to be a bit controversial and divisive.

  It may be a bit of a mixed reaction, which could lead to some frustration,

  heated debates, and strained relationships.

  Hence my unwillingness to show these images in service today.

  What if I were to close out this slideshow with a picture of you?

  And for the final time, I ask this very simple question, is this person trustworthy?

  What would be the response?

  What would your family members, friends, and fellow church members say about you?

  Maybe you don't want to play along with my made-up scenario,

  because you're afraid of what other people would say about you.

  But you cannot be oblivious in this area of life, because your reputation,

  when it comes to honesty and trustworthiness, is not a throwaway issue.

  Your credibility with others on the outside speaks to your integrity before the Lord on the inside.

  We've been studying the Sermon on the Mount for the past few months,

  and now this is the fourth week of our latest section, "The Heart of the Law."

  And throughout Matthew chapter 5, Jesus doesn't lessen the Old Testament law.

  He elevates it. He doesn't abolish it and throw it away.

  He digs down deep into our hearts to show how it applies at the deepest levels of who we are.

  Jesus proves that obeying God's commands and displaying true righteousness are matters of the heart.

  Jesus cares way more about the internal than the external,

  because who you are internally shapes all that you say and do externally.

  So far, we have covered what Christ commands and expects when it comes to anger,

  sexuality, and marriage.

  In Matthew chapter 5, verses 33 through 37,

  the Lord turns your attention to what he has to say about making promises and keeping your word.

  To help you gauge your own personal credibility, Jesus assigns an important test

  that you cannot afford to skip or to fail.

  And this test is the trustworthiness test.

  Before we dig into the first question, let's go to the Lord in prayer.

  Please pray that I will faithfully proclaim God's word.

  While I pray that you will faithfully and joyfully receive God's word.

  Father, we thank you for the gift of your word.

  It is a mirror that you hold up to our hearts to show us what means to change.

  Lord, this morning you're going to show us some very challenging and difficult things about ourselves

  that we do not want to see,

  but we must recognize them and we must make changes by the power of your Holy Spirit.

  So may you do the work that only you can.

  We ask all these things in Jesus' name. Amen.

  All right, who is ready for the trustworthiness test?

  Well, we're going to take it anyway. So the trustworthiness test, question one.

  Do I need to convince others of the truthfulness of what I say?

  Do I need to convince others of the truthfulness of what I say?

  Let's read verses 33 through 34.

  Jesus says, "Again, you have heard that it was said to those of old,

  'You shall not swear falsely, but shall perform to the Lord what you have sworn.'

  But I say to you, do not take an oath at all."

  This is the fourth time in Matthew chapter 5 that Jesus repeats the same verbal pattern.

  "You have heard that it was said, but I say to you."

  So let's cover what was said in the past.

  "You shall not swear falsely, but shall perform to the Lord what you have sworn."

  You will not find this exact sentence word for word in the Old Testament

  because it is a mashup of three different passages about keeping oaths.

  With the Nicos 19-2, Numbers chapter 30 verse 2 and Deuteronomy 23-21.

  In the Old Testament, oath taking was serious business.

  It wasn't something to be entered into lightly or carelessly.

  Vows were reserved for important matters.

  And God put them in place as a first line of defense against dishonesty.

  I find it helpful to view Old Testament oaths like spiritual speed bumps.

  Why do speed bumps exist?

  To cause you to slow down and keep pedestrian safe.

  Let me ask you, do speed bumps always do that?

  No, we've all seen maniacs treat speed bumps like challenges and jumps instead of warnings.

  And maybe you've been that maniac from time to time.

  Oaths were set up by God to curb the natural tendency to be deceitful and unreliable.

  They were like speed bumps.

  By taking an oath, you were saying,

  "God, you can bring judgment and cursing upon me if I do not keep my side of the bargain."

  But these spiritual speed bumps could not stop all dishonesty.

  It couldn't do away with people being deceitful.

  So vows help provide accountability, but they could not change the human heart,

  which is seen most clearly in the lives of the religious leaders of Jesus' day.

  The rabbis, the scribes, the Pharisees misinterpreted the Old Testament commands about vows

  and twisted God's word to advance their own dishonest agenda.

  They believe that you shall not swear falsely, only spoke to perjuring yourself in a court of law.

  We'll talk about this in even greater detail in a few minutes,

  but they also believe that the instruction you shall perform to the Lord what you have sworn

  left some room for coloring outside the lines when it came to keeping your word.

  If you weren't in a court setting or you didn't make vows directly to God

  and in His name there was some wiggle room to tell some lies.

  It wasn't ideal, but hey, not a big deal.

  As long as you said the right things and as long as you kept their man-made rules.

  Once again, the religious leaders are taking God's word, taking His commands

  and putting it into their own man-made box.

  Their standards were shallow and their righteousness was phony.

  But Jesus calls His followers to a greater righteousness, to a higher standard

  when He says, "But I say to you, do not take an oath at all."

  This command brings up an important question that we have to answer.

  Is Jesus saying that it's always sinful to make a promise or a vow of any kind at any time?

  Well, some Christians, some scholars and pastors certainly think so,

  but that's a really hard stance to defend from the rest of Scripture.

  The Apostle Paul kept and he made and kept a vow in Acts 18-18.

  In Revelation chapter 10 verses 5 through 6, the Apostle John records an angel swearing enough.

  In the Old Testament, God made oaths to show the seriousness of His covenant promises.

  God didn't do that because he had a shaky reputation.

  He lovingly did that to give His people a rock-solid confidence in His trustworthiness

  and the certainty of His purposes and His plans.

  God's vows were like exclamation points that highlighted His credibility

  because we so often do not trust Him even though His track record is flawless.

  The Lord established the Old Covenant with Israel and He has established a new covenant with all who believe

  in the life, death, and resurrection of His Son.

  And at its core, a covenant is an oath-bound relationship that is built upon promises being kept

  and the Bible is crystal clear that God always keeps His promises.

  And speaking of covenants, the Bible describes marriage as a covenant relationship

  which means that as a good and godly thing, you swear your devotion to your spouse.

  You know, 11 years ago, Pastor Jeff married my wife and I

  and when he asked me to repeat my vows to Kate after him, I didn't say, "Whoa, wait preacher boy,

  I don't make promises or take vows. Don't you study the Bible for a living?

  Shouldn't you know that? Pass." Did I do that? Jeff, do you remember that? I don't think I did that.

  Let's move from the marriage ceremony to the courtroom.

  I'm called to testify in a very important case and the judge tells me to raise my right hand

  and he asked me, "Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth so help you God?"

  What should I say?

  Sorry, judge. I'm a Christian. I can't do that. You may as well call the next witness. I'm out of here. Deuces.

  Is that going to go very well with the judge?

  Listen, Jesus is not condemning vows in the context of a courtroom or a wedding ceremony.

  Jesus is forbidding the practice of taking frivolous oaths and making pointless promises in everyday life situations.

  He's saying, "Do not be the kind of person who needs to swear on something or someone to be believed.

  Do not be the kind of person who needs to clarify that you're not lying.

  Who needs to clarify that you're telling the truth.

  Be so trustworthy that your word can be taken at face value without jumping through hoops.

  As a follower of Christ, you shouldn't need the spiritual speed bumps of promises, oaths, and vows to be taken seriously.

  You should be a person of such great integrity that promises are unnecessary because your past performance speaks for itself.

  Others should trust you implicitly because you have proven yourself explicitly.

  Your heart should be so full of the truth that lying doesn't even register as a valid option to choose or path to take.

  For the Christian, honesty is like breathing.

  You inhale the truth of God's word and then you exhale the truth in every situation.

  You don't tell white lies because you understand that there are no such thing as white lies.

  Every lie, no matter how small, is a huge deal to the Lord.

  You don't embellish your stories or add on extra details to impress people because who cares what other people think about you.

  What matters most is what God thinks about you.

  And He knows what you're saying is not true.

  You don't cut corners at work because you ultimately serve the Lord of all creation who sees everything,

  not the human boss across the hall who cannot see into your heart.

  You cannot control much in this life, but you do have the ability to deepen your credibility or destroy it,

  to strengthen it day by day or to willingly weaken it.

  You have no right to be offended when someone doesn't believe you if you have a shady history of saying things that are not true

  and making promises that you didn't keep.

  You are simply reaping the consequences of what you have sown.

  You are receiving the label of untrustworthy, which is a title that you have repeatedly earned.

  The trustworthiness test.

  Move on to the second question.

  And it will not be easier than the first.

  Do I look for loopholes to get out of what I say?

  Do I look for loopholes to get out of what I say?

  So Jesus pulls the rug out from underneath the religious leaders and exposes their ridiculous schemes in verses 34 through 36.

  But I say to you, do not take an oath at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God,

  or by the 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.

  As I said earlier, the scribes and Pharisees were experts at looking for loopholes and creating escape patches to get out of what they said,

  especially if what they said wasn't made in a court setting.

  So instead of swearing in God's name, they would swear by heaven, they would swear by the earth, the city of Jerusalem, or even their own heads.

  In their minds, swearing on these things was not binding like swearing in God's name.

  This is the verbal equivalent of crossing your fingers behind your back whenever you make a promise.

  They thought they were so clever. They found their own get out of oaths free card.

  But Jesus shows them that this line of thinking is childish and dumb.

  He destroys their loopholes and he closes their escape patches.

  Let's follow his logic.

  Jesus says, "Do not swear by heaven because who does heaven belong to?"

  All right. I know it's early. I'm going to ask that question again.

  Who does heaven belong to?

  It is His throne.

  And Matthew actually reinforces this later on when Jesus says,

  "And whoever swears by heaven swears by the throne of God and by him who sits on it."

  He also says, "Don't swear by the earth because who does it belong to?"

  Once again, I'm going to try it again. Who does the earth belong to, everyone?

  It is His footstool. God is so awesome. He is so big.

  The earth is like a teeny tiny ottoman where He puts His feet up.

  The earth belongs to God, so don't swear by it.

  It's also not a great idea to swear by Jerusalem because who does it belong to?

  Great job, everyone.

  The king of Jerusalem, the king of the earth, and that is God.

  You swear by Jerusalem. You swear by the one who created and rules over Israel.

  And He also says, "Don't swear by your own head."

  It seems kind of weird, right? What does that even mean?

  Well, it means this. "If I don't keep my word, let me be decapitated."

  A modern day equivalent of this would be, "Cross my heart and hope to die. Stick a needle in my..."

  These words mean nothing and they control nothing.

  Jesus says, "You cannot make one hair white or black."

  Back in those days, people could not control their hair color with hair dye like we can today.

  Once your hair started going gray, there was no going back.

  But even today in 2025, you can't speak a change of hair color into existence, right?

  You can't say, "Let my hair be black. Let my hair be blonde again."

  You cannot do that.

  So Jesus is saying, "If you cannot even control the color of your hair with your words,

  your words definitely cannot control if you're decapitated or not."

  God is saying, "My words certainly control that."

  Which means, "I own you. I own your head. I am the one who controls all things.

  So do not swear by heaven, by earth, by Jerusalem, or your own head."

  Jesus even exposes the other things the religious leaders swore by in Matthew chapter 23 verses 16 through 22.

  They would swear by the gold of the temple instead of the temple itself.

  They would swear by the gift on the altar instead of the altar itself.

  Jesus doesn't actually commend them for their shrewd thinking and their creative brainstorming.

  He calls them blind fools who cannot see the stupidity of their own actions.

  He labels them as blind guides who have fallen into a sinful pit

  and are calling the rest of Jerusalem to join them in the darkness.

  I know what you may be thinking at this point.

  Taylor, this is an interesting history lesson at all.

  I just don't see how this relates to me.

  I haven't sworn by anything or anyone for a long time.

  I haven't said, "I swear on my mother's life. I swear on my grandma's grave.

  I swear by my life that I'm not lying."

  So how does this relate to me? I haven't done that for many years.

  Well, here's how the text relates to you.

  "Don't be a sneaky word ninja like the scribes and Pharisees.

  Do not be a sneaky person.

  Do not look for escape hatches and loopholes to get out of what you say,

  because that does not honor the Lord."

  Let me give you some examples that may hit close to home.

  Husbands, you're supposed to carry out a task for your wife, but then you forget.

  Yeah, stretch your imagination because that never happens, right?

  Then your wife calls you on it and to save face you say, "Oh, I was just about to do it.

  You didn't give me enough time. That's sneaky. So don't do it."

  You commit to a small group, but on one particular night, you don't really feel like going.

  So you call your small group leader, "Oh, man, I'm really under the weather.

  I don't want anybody else to get what I have. So I'm not going to make it tonight."

  That's sneaky. So don't do it.

  Someone texts or calls, someone texts or emails you

  and really annoying message that you do not want to respond to.

  So the next time you see that person, you pretend like you accidentally missed it.

  That's sneaky. So don't do it.

  You get invited to an event that you desperately do not want to go to.

  So what do you say? "Yeah, maybe that might work. Let me get back to my calendar and get back to you."

  You ain't getting back to them about nothing. You are going to ghost this person.

  That's sneaky. So don't do it.

  Unfortunately, you do get sucked into that event that you do not want to go to.

  Instead of biting the bullet and attending, you call that person the day of,

  "I really wanted to come, but something came up."

  But nothing came up.

  That's sneaky. So don't do it.

  And I know what some of you are saying to yourselves right now.

  "Taylor, this seems like really small potatoes in the grand scheme of things."

  Shouldn't we move on to something a bit bigger?

  I mean, come on. These kinds of excuses are harmless and they hurt no one.

  Actually, these kinds of excuses are harmful and they hurt everyone, including you.

  You are numbing yourself to the deceitfulness of sin.

  And you are paving the way to lie in bigger and bolder ways moving forward.

  Listen, no one starts out as a pathological liar.

  It starts with one compromise that you get away with.

  And then it's way easier to make another compromise.

  You cross the line, you get away with it,

  and then you make a habit out of pushing boundaries and testing the limits.

  If you keep this up, you will end up saying and doing things that you never thought you were capable of.

  Sneakiness is a way of slipping into your heart and taking over if you're not on guard against it.

  But most importantly, these kind of devious excuses are sinful and sinning against the Lord.

  And that alone should give you pause and cause you to cut this behavior out of your life.

  It is not wise, it is not right to walk in the sneaky footsteps of the scribes and Pharisees

  who rejected and murdered the Son of God.

  Instead, walk in the footsteps of the one who committed no sin.

  Neither was deceit found in his mouth.

  Jesus always told the truth even when it cost his own life.

  Jesus never made excuses to get out of his mission of dying on the cross.

  You must always tell the truth even when it gets you into trouble.

  Never make excuses even when it seems like everyone else around you is.

  The final question of the trustworthiness test.

  Do I always follow through on what I say?

  Do I always follow through on what I say?

  Jesus wraps up by showing the alternative to being an undependable and sneaky person in verse 37.

  Let what you say be simply yes or no.

  Anything more than this comes from evil.

  Well, according to our Lord, being an honest person is not a complex concept.

  Say yes if you'll do something. Say no if you will not do something.

  That's super easy, right?

  Not really.

  It is so simple, but it is also so hard to live out.

  It isn't convenient to be a yes or no person, but it is the freest way to live.

  It is so stressful to not keep your word.

  It is so stressful to have all those deceitful plates spinning in your mind

  because at some point one will come crashing down and you will have to deal with the consequences.

  It is exhausting to put on a mask and pretend to be someone who you are not.

  It is painful to not be the person who you project yourself to be.

  It is embarrassing to be unreliable

  and to have the reputation of being a constant flake and not an unshakable rock.

  When I am closing things down in my office for the day and packing things up,

  I often text my wife to let her know that I am on the way home.

  But sometimes I get distracted with other things after I send that text.

  Writing down a sermon thought that I don't want to lose,

  wrapping up a task that I forgot to complete, or talking to Pastor Jeff.

  That never happens, right Jeff?

  Several months ago I arrived home way later than I told Kate that I would.

  And I profusely apologized and I will never forget her blunt response with a loving smile on her face.

  "Oh, that's okay. I always add an extra 15 minutes to your arrival time when you text me."

  Ouch!

  That loving burn really stung my conscience.

  My wife gave me some extra wiggle room

  because she was aware that I often missed the target of my stated arrival time.

  Do people need to give you wiggle room because they know that you often missed the target of keeping your word?

  They know you'll be somewhere off on the board but way off-center,

  or maybe you'll miss the board completely.

  You mean well, you have good intentions but your follow-through fall short.

  Maybe you feel very discouraged by your unreliable reputation.

  You're thinking to yourself, "I don't want to be this way. I want to help everyone.

  I want to be there for everyone but I can't seem to keep all of my commitments."

  Well, it sounds like you have a no problem.

  You say yes to everything because you don't want to let anyone down.

  But in the process, you let everyone down because you cannot equally serve everyone.

  If you say yes to everyone, your word will not carry weight with anyone.

  And to be clear, saying no can be wrong and sinful.

  Some of you in this room say no way more than you should at home, at work, and even in this church.

  God may be calling you to step up more, not step back less.

  But at the same time, saying no can also be right and productive.

  Because you have to recognize that you are not God.

  You cannot be everywhere all the time and you cannot do everything at the same exact time.

  You are a limited person.

  You need to count the cost of what you are committing yourself to before you say yes or no.

  It takes great wisdom and discernment to say no to good things.

  So that you can say yes to the best things.

  And Jesus is so direct at the end of verse 37 and says that anything beyond being a yes or no person is evil.

  It is wicked.

  And this is recapt in James 512.

  Some translations of Matthew 537 say that this kind of behavior beyond being a yes or no person is from the evil one.

  Meaning if you live this kind of deceitful lifestyle, you are way worse off than just being like the scribes and Pharisees.

  You are also like their spiritual father, Satan.

  Listen to what Jesus says to religious leaders in John 844.

  You are of your father the devil and your will is to do your father's desires.

  He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him.

  When he lies, he speaks out of his own character for he is a liar and the father of lies.

  My kids bear a family resemblance to Kate and me.

  They have my eye color and thankfully they have her good looks.

  After service, you see them running around.

  It shouldn't come as a surprise that they belong to Kate and me because they look just like us.

  There are two spiritual families and it's obvious which one you belong to based on which father you resemble the most.

  Do you resemble Satan who lies, cheats and steals or do you resemble God who tells the truth, does the right thing in the right way and selflessly serves?

  Which father do you resemble the most?

  We've reached the end of the trustworthiness test.

  How did you do?

  Did you pass or did you fail?

  Did you stick the landing or did you crash into the runway?

  Maybe the Lord has encouraged your heart and revealed to you that you have a strong and solid reputation that is well deserved.

  If that's you, keep up the good work, keep your foot on the gas pedal and keep moving forward by the grace of God.

  Maybe you're convicted that yes, you are in the family of God, but you sure aren't acting like it right now.

  Instead of hiding away and keeping your lies a secret, be honest about your dishonesty to God and to those you have betrayed.

  It is not enough to just stop lying from now on. You also have to uncover the lies that you've already told.

  I know that's hard. I know that feels shameful.

  But remember, if you are a true believer in Christ, there is no condemnation for you.

  You can be honest about your sin and ask for forgiveness from others because the penalty has already been paid by Jesus Christ.

  We can share openly about our failures because they're no longer held against us.

  Maybe you've come to the realization that you resemble the evil one and belong to the wrong family.

  For years, you've unapologetically told bold-faced lies. You've shared half truths.

  You've led people on. You've been underhanded and you've covered your tracks so you can avoid getting in trouble.

  You may feel crushed under the weight of your own dishonesty right now.

  If that's you, please do not try to do better or be better on your own.

  Do not try to clean up your act because that will not solve the problem.

  Self-improvement and self-help are fools errands that lead straight to hell.

  Those worldly methods will not solve the problem that is truly within you, which is the problem of your heart.

  Please come clean and confess your sins to the Lord.

  Turn from your deceptive ways and throw yourself at the mercy of Jesus Christ who died on the cross and rose again to save liars like you and me.

  If you do that, the Lord will give you a brand new heart that loves the truth, that desires the truth.

  A heart that is overflowing with a desire to share the truth with everyone.

  Only the most trustworthy one in all of existence can truly turn you into a trustworthy person.

  Let's pray.

  Father, I am a man of unclean lips who dwells among the people of unclean lips.

  Lord, we have sinned against you with our deception and our lies and our half truths.

  Lord, on our own, we are so helpless. We are so hopeless.

  But we thank you for your redeeming work.

  We thank you that you have cleansed us.

  You've cast our lies away from us as far as the east is from the west.

  Lord, help us not to be sneaky anymore.

  To not be deceptive anymore. To not make untrue excuses.

  Lord, help us to be people of our word who don't need to make promises.

  Help us to be people who have a solid reputation because our reputation impacts your reputation in this world.

  Lord, there's someone in this room who does not know and love you.

  May today be the day where they finally make the most important decision of their lives

  and are transformed and changed forever.

  We thank you for your goodness. We thank you that you are unchanging even though we're constantly changing.

  We ask all these things in Jesus' name. Amen.

Thou Shalt Not Commit Adultery - Part 2

Introduction:

Two Problems Jesus Has with Divorce (Matthew 5:31–32):

1. Divorce TRIVIALIZES MARRIAGE. (Matt 5:31)

   Genesis 2:24 – Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.

   Deuteronomy 24:1–4 – When a man takes a wife and marries her, if then she finds no favor in his eyes because he has found some indecency in her, and he writes her a certificate of divorce and puts it in her hand and sends her out of his house, and she departs out of his house, and if she goes and becomes another man’s wife, and the latter man hates her and writes her a certificate of divorce and puts it in her hand and sends her out of his house, or if the latter man dies, who took her to be his wife, then her former husband, who sent her away, may not take her again to be his wife, after she has been defiled, for that is an abomination before the LORD. And you shall not bring sin upon the land that the LORD your God is giving you for an inheritance.

2. Divorce RESULTS In ADULTERY. (Matt 5:32)

   Ephesians 5:24–25 – Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands. Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her...

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

Small Group Discussion
Read Matthew 5:31-32 & Mark 10:2-12

1. What was your big take-away from this passage / message?
   

2. What are some beliefs you’ve heard Christians believe about divorce and remarriage? How do these line up with Scripture?
   

3. Explain what Jesus meant in Matt 5:32, how someone’s divorce even leads to other people committing adultery.
   

4. How exactly would you counsel a trusted Christian friend who is considering divorce?

Breakout
Pray for one another.

• Audio Transcript

  Matthew chapter 5, are you there?

  This section we are in on the Sermon on the Mount is about the heart of God's law.

  And we saw that Jesus said, "I didn't come to abolish the law or destroy the law."

  That's what we would call the Old Testament.

  Jesus said, "I didn't come to do away with the Old Testament."

  He said, "I came to carry out everything that was said in it."

  It's not irrelevant at all.

  And through this section you're going to see, as we've already seen many times, Jesus says,

  "You have heard that it was said, but I say to you."

  And when Jesus says that, what He's saying is, "You've lowered God's standard."

  And Jesus is correcting them, and He's correcting us when we take the Word of God and just make

  it purely external.

  God wants your heart.

  God wants your heart.

  That's what we saw a couple of weeks ago.

  Pastor Taylor taught us, Jesus said, "Murder isn't just the physical act of killing someone.

  It's a heart issue."

  We saw last week adultery is not just the physical act.

  It's a heart issue.

  And in these verses we're looking at today, Jesus is continuing His teaching on the destructiveness

  of adultery.

  And today we're going to talk about divorce.

  And look, there's so much controversy on this topic.

  And if we're going to be honest, the controversy doesn't come really from God's Word because

  the Bible is clear.

  The reason there's so much controversy is because if you are a divorced person, this

  gets very personal and it gets very painful.

  And look, I've done so many weddings over the past 20-some years, so many weddings.

  And I can tell you emphatically that nobody gets into marriage wanting a divorce.

  That doesn't happen.

  I've never seen the wedding ceremony where the vows include something like, "I can't

  wait to be done with you."

  Or "I love you today, but in six months I will hate you more than anybody on the planet."

  Nobody thinks that.

  Nobody expects that.

  And when divorce happens, it's always, it's just always so painful.

  And we get through a passage like, "Look, I know some of you are going to be tempted

  to tune out because you're going to think, 'Well, you know what, Jeff, you don't know

  my circumstances.'

  And you're right.

  I don't.

  I don't know your circumstances."

  And I'm certainly not trying to be dismissive of the pain that you've gone through.

  And I'm certainly not trying to be judgmental for what brought about your divorce if that's

  your situation.

  And I'm also keenly aware that I cannot exhaust everything that the Bible says on the subject

  in just one sermon.

  What I want us all to do, it's nothing new.

  I just want us to do what we do every week.

  We're just going to take a giant step back and we're going to see what our Lord says

  on the subject.

  And we're going to see Jesus speaks on divorce here.

  And I can't undo anything that happened in the past, nor can you as much as we might

  want to.

  It's gone.

  But I'm hoping with this message that we can prevent any future pain and hurt that comes

  from divorce.

  So let's look at Matthew chapter 5, looking verses 31 and 32.

  Jesus says, "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,

  makes her commit adultery and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery."

  What is going on in these verses?

  Well, first of all, look at verse 31.

  Jesus says, "It was also said," what?

  Jesus gives a quote, "Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce."

  You're like, is that what the Old Testament says?

  Ish.

  Here's the problem.

  This statement was used by the scribes and the Pharisees as a gross misrepresentation

  of a passage in the Old Testament.

  So does the Old Testament say that?

  Yeah, it kind of does, but they took a direction that the Lord never intended it to go.

  The scribes and the Pharisees took a passage from Deuteronomy, we're going to look at here

  in a few moments, and they twisted it for their own purposes.

  Jesus says, "But I say to you," and this is one of the most difficult verses in your

  Bible.

  Jesus says, "I say, everyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of sexual

  immorality, makes her commit adultery, and whoever marries a divorced woman commits

  adultery."

  So here's the short version.

  See the scribes and the Pharisees, as I said, twisted this passage in Deuteronomy, and they

  reduced it to this.

  Look, divorce and remarriage is okay as long as it's legal.

  As long as you do the paperwork, it's fine.

  It's just fine.

  It is just fine.

  And I think it's obvious that Jesus did not agree with their assessment because He said

  divorce leads to adultery.

  That's the short version.

  So let's unpack that a little bit today.

  On your outline, excuse me, we're just very simply calling this "two problems Jesus has

  with divorce."

  All right, let's look at these two verses very intently, and we see there's two problems

  that Jesus has with divorce.

  Number one, write this down, divorce trivializes marriage.

  Divorce trivializes marriage.

  That's the problem.

  Quick review, marriage was defined once and for all to the first two people that God created,

  Adam and Eve.

  And I know there have been attempts to redefine marriage.

  It doesn't matter.

  God defined marriage once and for all.

  With the first two people that He created, Adam and Eve, and the most important verse

  in your Bible on marriage is Genesis 2.24.

  It says, "Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his

  wife, and they shall become one flesh."

  That's the most important verse in the Bible about marriage.

  And I can say that emphatically because when Jesus was asked about marriage and divorce,

  this was the verse He quoted, Matthew 19, Mark chapter 10, when the Apostle Paul was

  writing about marriage and divorce and husband and wife issues, this was the verse He quoted,

  1 Corinthians chapter 6, Ephesians chapter 5.

  God's plan in marriage is two people turning into one person.

  That's the plan.

  There's not a relationship on the earth like that.

  Not a business partnership.

  Not members of a sports team.

  There's nothing like the marriage relationship.

  This was God's intention of marriage in the very beginning.

  I want two people to turn into one person.

  And when you study Genesis, you'll see divorce was never part of God's original design for

  marriage.

  Like, "All right, well, if it wasn't part of God's plan, where did divorce come from?

  Where did this idea for divorce come from?"

  So allowance was made for divorce in the Old Testament law.

  I want you to look at this.

  We're going to put this passage on the screen.

  I want you to look at it very closely because this is the passage that's in question here

  where Jesus is confronting the scribes and the Pharisees.

  This is from Deuteronomy chapter 24.

  Because, again, Law of Moses here, when a man takes a wife and marries her, if then

  she finds no favor in his eyes because he has found some indecency in her and he writes

  her a certificate of divorce and puts it in her hand and sends her out of his house and

  she departs out of his house and she goes and becomes another man's wife and the latter

  man hates her and writes her certificate of divorce and puts it in her hand and sends

  her out of his house.

  Or if the latter man dies, who took her to be his wife, then her former husband, who

  sent her away, that's husband number one, may not take her again to be his wife after

  she has been defiled for that as an abomination before the Lord.

  And you shall not bring sin upon the land that the Lord your God is giving you for an

  inheritance.

  Now listen, it's a tough passage but we're going to get through this together.

  Here's what Moses was saying.

  Divorce had to have a cause.

  And here it's defined in the Law as some "indecency."

  It could have been a natural or a moral or a physical defect or whatever.

  It had to be something that they categorized as unclean, whatever that is.

  This limited the possible reasons for divorce.

  This was the purpose, understand.

  The reason Moses wrote this Law was so that a man couldn't just divorce his wife for any

  reason whatsoever.

  Just make up some excuse, something frivolous.

  I'm just divorcing you because I feel like it.

  I don't like the meatloaf you made or I don't like your new haircut or those shoes look

  horrible.

  You can't just willy nilly divorce your wife.

  Moses is saying, "Look, there has to be a reason for the divorce."

  So this was actually to emphasize the importance of marriage.

  Like, well why would he allow the divorce then?

  Why go through this?

  Don't miss this.

  The purpose of divorce in this case in Deuteronomy 24 was to protect the woman.

  You see, when you give her the certificate of divorce, that woman had legal proof that,

  listen, she was dismissed from the marriage but it was not because she was unfaithful.

  You see that certificate for the woman showed, "Look, I did not have an affair.

  My husband found something wrong with me and dismissed me but it wasn't because I was

  unfaithful."

  That's what's going on in Deuteronomy 24.

  But I want you to see here, listen, because this is where the Pharisees and the scribes

  missed it.

  In Deuteronomy 24, there is not a command to divorce.

  That passage is just simply describing a scenario.

  In that passage, if we're going to boil it down, we would say this, they were told to

  write a certificate of divorce if there was a divorce.

  The only command that you see in this passage, the only one in that passage is this, if you

  divorce your wife, you cannot take her back if she's rejected by her next husband.

  Or if he croaks, you cannot take her back.

  Again, the reason for this was to protect the woman.

  It was to keep women from being used and discarded.

  It was to keep men who are hogs admittedly, it's to keep men from saying, "You know what?

  I'm going to try out women."

  But you know what?

  My first wife was better than this one.

  So I'm going to get rid of her and I'm going to take the first one back because I preferred

  her.

  That's a horrible, horrible way to treat a woman.

  See, that's the heart of the law here.

  Like God's like, "No, no, no, no, no, you're not going to treat women that way, men.

  This isn't a high school relationship, boyfriend, girlfriend, on again, off again.

  No, no, no, no, no, no.

  We're not treating women like that.

  Marriage is a very serious covenant and you're not going to just have a woman on a leash

  where you let her go and you anchor back and let her go and you anchor back.

  No, you are not allowed to do that."

  That's the heart of the law here.

  Deuteronomy 24 was intended to stop divorce from happening willy-nilly.

  Everybody on board with me now.

  Okay, because now I want you to see how the scribes and the Pharisees twisted it.

  Look at verse 31 again in Matthew chapter 5.

  Jesus quotes them.

  He says, "It was also said, whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of

  divorce."

  What the scribes and the Pharisees did was through their twisting this passage, they

  actually made it say the opposite of what God intended.

  They used this passage to justify easy divorce, that you can get a divorce for any reason

  at all so long as the paperwork is done.

  That's what they reduced this to.

  Like, well look, you studied the Old Testament, it tells you very plainly.

  If you get a divorce, make sure that all the documents are filled out appropriately.

  That's really all that matters, right?

  That's all that matters.

  Just that we signed on the right line and we crossed our T's and we dotted our I's.

  That's really what matters.

  As long as you do the paperwork, as long as the divorce is legal, hey, everybody's good

  with that because everything's above board then, right?

  I mean, I'm not like one of those illegal divorcers, right?

  You know, that I get some janky, unofficial, illegal divorce document from online, from

  the dark webs.

  I'm not like that guy.

  You better be sure that when I get a divorce, it's done right.

  That was their mindset.

  The Law of Moses commands divorce to be done legally, so make sure that you do it right.

  And see, that's Jesus' problem with their attitude.

  He says your attitude about divorce trivializes marriage.

  And you have justified in your mind the mistreatment of women in the name of making sure the paperwork

  is filled out properly.

  That's not what the Law is about, Jesus is saying.

  Now, over the years, I have heard all kinds of unbiblical justifications for people wanting

  a divorce.

  And I don't even have time to get into all that today.

  And we're going to get to the biblical reason for divorce in a moment.

  But we need to stop here and say, listen, marriage should not be taken so lightly among

  God's people.

  The scribes and the Pharisees were so diligent to make sure that the divorce was done right.

  We church should be so diligent to make sure that the marriage is done right.

  So that's the first problem Jesus has with divorce.

  You trivialize marriage.

  You trivialize marriage.

  Not on board with that.

  But here's the second problem Jesus says I have with your attitude towards divorce.

  Scribes, Pharisees, church in 2025, divorce results in adultery.

  Look at verse 32 again.

  Like I said, this is a difficult verse.

  But this is what our Lord said.

  Jesus said, but I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground

  of sexual immorality, makes her commit adultery.

  And whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.

  So Jesus is saying, listen, with divorce, even when the paperwork is done properly, divorce

  leads to nothing but more and more adultery.

  And I think one of the troubling things about this passage is I could see in my mind that

  I make choices that cause me to be guilty and suffer consequences for my own choices.

  But it's very clear here in verse 32, Jesus is saying that a choice for a divorce results

  in other people being guilty of sin.

  That's a tough pill to swallow, but that's what He said.

  What does He mean?

  In Deuteronomy 24, that passage we just looked at, when the woman was divorced for something

  less than sexual immorality, which by the way, sexual immorality breaks the bond of marriage,

  but in the Deuteronomy 24 case, she was divorced for something less than that, right?

  Jesus said, even when you divorce for less than sexual immorality, that still makes for

  an adulterous situation.

  Jesus said the divorced wife moves on, she consummates a new union when there was no

  grounds to break the first one, and if you do that, if you divorce like that, you are

  now guilty of adultery, and whoever marries that woman is guilty of adultery, and whoever

  marries you is guilty of adultery.

  And Jesus is saying when you unbiblically break the marriage covenant and people go

  off and get remarried, He says now we've resulted in more and more adultery happening in other

  people.

  That's what He said.

  He says now everybody's guilty.

  So what Jesus is saying to the scribes and the Pharisees is that you could sit here and

  say, "Oh, I'm not an adulterer.

  I have never slept with another man's wife.

  I have never committed adultery."

  Jesus says you shouldn't think that way.

  Actually, you've made adultery worse because you have such a shallow view of divorce.

  Jesus said you lowered God's standard because all you're focused on is the external.

  I didn't commit adultery.

  Jesus said you did.

  You commit adultery when you look at a woman lustfully.

  It proves that you already had adultery in your heart.

  And furthermore, when you divorce without biblical grounds, which Jesus says is sexual

  immorality, Jesus said you have committed adultery and you've made her and you've made her new

  husband commit adultery too.

  Your sin not only affects you, but it affects so many more people than just you.

  And I really don't have to sell people who have experienced divorce how far reaching

  the damage goes.

  The pain is not limited to just the two people in the marriage.

  I mentioned biblical grounds for divorce.

  Biblically, now looking at the whole counsel of God, I believe that there is one biblical

  grounds for divorce and it's hardheartedness.

  Like wait, wait, wait, wait.

  How do you know when somebody is heart-hearted?

  Because it would be real easy, right?

  You're like, "I'm divorcing you because I think you're heart-hearted."

  Like how do you know that somebody is heart-hearted?

  Biblically, heart-heartedness in a marriage manifests in two ways.

  One is abandonment.

  I don't have time to get into all this today, but just jot down 1 Corinthians 7 verse 15.

  Abandonment.

  When you have a spouse who just walks out of the marriage, "I'm not willing to counsel,

  I'm not willing to reconcile, I'm not willing to consider anything, I'm leaving you, I don't

  care.

  I am done."

  Abandonment.

  My best understanding from Scripture is that is biblical grounds for divorce.

  When you've tried, but your partner is completely unwilling.

  That gives evidence that their heart is so hard, they're not willing at all to invest

  in a covenant.

  Abandonment.

  And the other evidence of heart-heartedness in marriage, well Jesus references here,

  and that's adultery.

  Your heart is so hard towards your spouse that you were willing to physically sleep

  with somebody else.

  It's evidence of a heart-hearted.

  I want you to listen very closely because even these conditions, even the issue of adultery

  does not obligate anyone to divorce.

  Because you study God's Word.

  God's Word never condones divorce and it never commands divorce.

  There is not one passage in your Bible where God says, "If this happens, I command my people

  to get a divorce."

  That it is legitimate in abandonment and adultery, but it's still not commanded.

  So if you're married, you should do everything that you can to avoid divorce.

  See the scribes and the Pharisees, they live their marriages with one hand over the eject

  seat button.

  It's like I'm not happy with you for any reason.

  I am done.

  Jesus said, "No, no, no, no, no, that's not how it should be.

  You should do everything you can to avoid divorce."

  You're like, "Well, what about abuse?

  What if I'm in a relationship where there's abuse that absolutely should not be happening?"

  And listen, if you're in an abusive situation, you need to let me know as soon as possible.

  Because we will protect you.

  We will get you out of harm's way.

  We will do everything to keep you from being abused.

  That should not be happening.

  Somebody else would say, "Well, what about neglect?

  What about detachment?

  What about my husband's a lazy bum?

  Do not be too proud to get biblical counsel.

  Because there's something else I've seen over the last two and a half decades or so.

  No marriage is beyond saving.

  I've seen couples come in hours away from filing for divorce whose marriage ended up

  in a better place than it ever has been through the result of the ministry of the Word of

  God.

  If both parties are willing, the marriage can be saved.

  And when we talk about, yes, abuse and neglect and things like that, we have to readily admit

  that there are extreme cases that require extreme action, 100%.

  But in our day, like in Jesus' day, the vast majority of divorces weren't because of that.

  The vast majority of divorces were motivated by sinful, selfish desires.

  The vast majority of divorces result from people treating people like used cars.

  Like, "Well, this one isn't working out for me.

  I thought I would like it, but I'm not really digging it anymore.

  I'm just going to trade it in."

  That's most divorces.

  And Jesus says, "Now, you've reduced the marriage covenant.

  You've trivialized it.

  You've made it purely external.

  And now, as a result, all kinds of adultery is happening because you're unwilling to take

  marriage seriously."

  That should not be among God's people.

  It's a hard passage.

  What I want us to do, just so I don't want anybody to think that this is some oddball

  passage, this is a one-off.

  Because I want you to turn to Mark chapter 10, because what I want you to see here is

  Jesus teaching the exact same thing, but in a different context.

  In Mark chapter 10, the context, you'll see they were testing Jesus.

  They were trying to trap Jesus.

  They were always trying to trap Jesus.

  And they thought, "Oh, we know how to trap Jesus.

  We'll ask Him about marriage and divorce.

  That'll get them for sure.

  Why?"

  Well, you know the story of John the Baptist.

  He objected to a marriage and divorce, and he lost his head.

  And I go, "We get Jesus on that.

  They'll get them for sure.

  We'll trap them."

  So I want you to see, now we have context, but I want you to see Jesus teaching the exact

  same thing, but in a different context.

  Mark chapter 10, verse 2, "The Pharisees came up and in order to test Him asked, 'Is it lawful

  for a man to divorce his wife?'"

  They're like, "We got them.

  We got them."

  Slam dunk.

  Because, see, if Jesus says no, we're like, "Oh, you disagree with the Old Testament,

  which tells us to get a divorce."

  If Jesus says no, you shouldn't get a divorce, rather.

  You're disagreeing with the Old Testament.

  If Jesus says, "Oh, yeah, you can get a divorce.

  Oh, now Jesus is taking marriage lightly, and we're going to get Him either way."

  You know, Jesus is disregarding the serious system of marriage, or He's disregarding what

  the Old Testament says about divorce.

  We got them.

  We got them.

  "Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?"

  I love this.

  Jesus answered them, "What did Moses command you?"

  Jesus is like, "What's the Bible say?"

  Turned it back on them.

  They said, "Look at this.

  Moses allowed a man to write a certificate of divorce and to send her away."

  Do you see?

  It's about the stinking paperwork again.

  That's all they were fixated on.

  Yeah, Moses said, "Fill out form A-27, and you're good."

  Jesus said to them, "Because of your hardness of heart," there it is, "because of your

  hardness of heart," He wrote to this commandment.

  "But from the beginning of creation, God made them male and female.

  Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the

  two shall become one flesh."

  Sound familiar?

  Genesis 2.24.

  And Jesus comments on it.

  He says, "So they're no longer two, but one flesh.

  But therefore God has joined together, let not man separate."

  Verse 10 says, "And in the house the disciples asked him again."

  That's controversial, wasn't it?

  Disciples asked him again about this matter.

  And he said to them, "Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery

  against her.

  And if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery."

  See, it's the same teaching.

  Same two points in this exchange that we see in Matthew chapter 5.

  Jesus says you've trivialized marriage, and it just causes more adultery.

  God takes marriage very seriously, especially to those who claim to be followers of Jesus

  Christ.

  Why is God so...

  Why does God seem so strict about marriage?

  Why is God seems so serious about marriage?

  It's because divorce ultimately misrepresents God.

  See God takes marriage seriously because there's a picture that's to be on display

  in the marriage.

  So when that picture is broken, God is misrepresented.

  Ephesians chapter 5 tells us what the picture is.

  It says, "Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything

  to their husbands."

  Husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her.

  See this, this is the idea behind marriage.

  The ultimate goal of marriage is the ultimate goal of everything else in the universe is

  to glorify God.

  And the way God is glorified in your marriage is by demonstrating the relationship that

  Jesus Christ has with His bride, the church.

  And in this picture, the wife represents the church following, submitting, honoring, and

  the husband is to represent Jesus loving, leading, laying His life down.

  And when you live this out, God is glorified and your marriage is blessed.

  But when you divorce, you're misrepresenting God.

  So my friends, what are we showing the world about God and the way we conduct ourselves

  in our marriages?

  Our worship team and communion servers would come up.

  It's only appropriate that we close by gathering around the Lord's table.

  Like, well, what does this have to do with marriage?

  The answer is everything.

  Because we gather around the Lord's table, we are reminded that Jesus Christ has a covenant

  love for us.

  This love that Jesus Christ has for us is forever.

  It's never going to change.

  And even when His bride fails Him, and we do.

  Oh, and we will.

  Jesus isn't going to give up on us.

  This is our reminder of what covenant love looks like.

  And this is a reminder of how covenant love is to be demonstrated in our marriages.

Thou Shalt Not Commit Adultery

Introduction:

2 Kings 18:4 – He removed the high places and broke the pillars and cut down the Asherah. And he broke in pieces the bronze serpent that Moses had made, for until those days the people of Israel had made offerings to it (it was called Nehushtan).

Thou Shalt Not Commit Adultery (Matthew 5:27-30):

1. Adultery Is a DEVASTATING SIN. (Matt 5:27–28)

   Matthew 15:19 – For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander.

   Titus 1:15 – To the pure, all things are pure, but to the defiled and unbelieving, nothing is pure; but both their minds and their consciences are defiled.

2. Adultery has DIRE CONSEQUNECES. (Matt 5:29–30)

   1 Corinthians 6:9–10 – Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.

3. Adultery requires DRASTIC MEASURES. (Matt 5:29–30)

   Romans 13:14 - But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.

   1 Corinthians 6:9–11 – And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

Small Group Discussion
Read Matthew 5:27-30

1. What was your big take-away from this passage / message?
   

2. Explain Matthew 5:28 in your own words.
   

3. What did Jesus mean by gouging out your right eye and cutting off your right hand (Matt 5:29-30)? What are some practical ways to apply this teaching?
   

4. Is Jesus saying a believer who commits adultery will go to hell? Who exactly is “thrown into hell”?
   

5. What would you say to a professing believer who confesses that they can’t break free from lusting?

Breakout
Pray for one another.

• AUDIO TRANSCRIPT

  Open up those Bibles to Matthew chapter 5.

  If you're visiting with us today, we are going through the Sermon on the Mount verse

  by verse.

  And Happy Mother's Day, the title of today's sermon is "Thou Shall Not Commit Adultery."

  I, I, um, we go where the text goes, okay?

  That's what we do.

  We go where the text goes.

  So let's do that.

  I'd like you to bow your heads please and just pray for me to be faithful to communicate

  God's Word.

  And I will pray for you to have a heart open to receive what is an extremely challenging

  passage.

  Let's pray.

  Father in heaven, we thank You for Your Word.

  We're not going to shy away from it.

  We just heard two testimonies of the way that Your Word has transformed lives.

  We're going to hear at least four more in the next service.

  That's why we, um, we just want to go after Your Word, God, because we believe that Your

  Word does Your work because that's what You said.

  And that is certainly what we've seen.

  So Father, I pray for all of us here today, all those who are going to be listening, watching

  this stream or downloading the podcast.

  Father I pray that You would bring revival in each and every heart in a way that greatly

  glorifies Your name.

  We pray in Jesus' name.

  And all of God's people said, "Amen."

  Amen.

  Matthew chapter 5, are you there?

  In Numbers chapter 21, you have Moses leading the Israelites out of Egypt to the promised

  land and Israel complained and grumbled against God, against Moses.

  And the Lord sent these fiery serpents who, and these serpents bit some of the Israelites

  and many of them died.

  Well they repented.

  And God told Moses to put a bronze serpent on a pole.

  And if the Israelites, when they were bitten by one of the snakes, if they looked at this

  bronze serpent, they would live.

  Well then fast forward, Israel in the land established and they had kings.

  Some kings were very bad and some kings were just not as bad.

  Right?

  Can you relate to that at all?

  And Hezekiah was a king who was not as bad and he brought a lot of reforms to Israel.

  Here's one.

  We put this verse up from 2 Kings chapter 18.

  Hezekiah says, "He removed the high places and broke the pillars and cut down the ashram.

  He broke in pieces the bronze serpent that Moses had made for until those days the people

  of Israel had made offerings to it."

  It was called Nahushdin.

  See what happened?

  You see what happened?

  People took a blessing that God gave them for their benefit and they turned it into an

  idol.

  That's exactly how it is with physical intimacy.

  It is a gift that God gave those in the covenant of marriage, but we have turned it into an

  idol.

  So on your outline today, this is it.

  "Thou shall not commit adultery."

  I want you to write some things down.

  Number one, write this down.

  Adultery is a devastating sin.

  Adultery is a devastating sin.

  Now just that statement alone, it's a hard sell because we are a sex-obsessed culture.

  You've taken this gift from God and we've perverted it and we worship it.

  Do I have to point that out at all?

  Look at all the homosexuality madness, all the transgender stuff.

  And you're like, "Yeah, you know what, Pastor Jeff, you're right.

  You're right.

  It's bad out there."

  And I would say, "Church, it's bad in here."

  I was reading some polls for what they're worth.

  But according to one poll, one half of self-identifying Christians believe that casual sex is okay.

  Consenting but not in a relationship.

  They believe that's okay.

  Half.

  Think that's alright.

  What?

  I read a poll about pornography use among non-Christian men.

  Non-Christian men, 65%.

  Like, yeah, that's pretty bad.

  Christian men, 64%.

  The same poll, lest you think, "Yeah, creepy men, right?

  Creepy men, same poll, 51% of women."

  And you know at this point, you could be like, "Well, look, Jeff, we're only human.

  Everyone does it.

  It's not hurting anyone."

  Well according to Jesus, it's a devastating sin.

  Look at verse 27, Matthew chapter 5.

  Jesus said, "You have heard that it was said, 'You shall not commit adultery.'"

  Stop there.

  Adultery.

  What is adultery?

  Well the technical term is defined as intercourse with another person's spouse.

  But it's become a catch-all term for relations with anyone who is not your spouse.

  And you're going to see in this passage, it's very clear that that's how Jesus was using

  the term in the most general sense possible.

  You go to Exodus chapter 20 and verse 14, you see that it's the seventh commandment.

  You go to Deuteronomy chapter 22 and verse 22, you'll see that under the law in Israel,

  adultery was punishable by death.

  And I don't have time to get into it this morning.

  We've done whole sermon series on this, by the way.

  But I just encourage you, if you're ready to just brush it off as, "Oh, church people,

  just making a big deal out of nothing," read Proverbs 5, 6, and 7 sometime.

  And you will see that adultery is a devastating sin.

  I heard one pastor this past week call it a sin for fools.

  And I think that's a very good description.

  adultery is devastating.

  I mean, it wrecks you, destroys your reputation, affects your relationship with your spouse,

  relationship with your kids.

  Oh, and the other person, what about them?

  It affects, now if they're married, it affects their relationship with their spouse.

  If they have kids, it affects their kids.

  And what has done to their reputation.

  But the devastation of adultery is way deeper than that.

  Look at verse 28.

  Jesus says, "But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has

  already committed adultery with her in his heart."

  Do you notice verse 27, verse 28?

  Jesus said, "You have heard, but I say to you," what was Jesus doing?

  Pastor Taylor talked about this last week.

  Same thing with murder.

  Same thing.

  Jesus was contrasting their definition of sin with God's definition of sin.

  Because their definition of sin in Jesus' day was all about externals.

  So when they hear adultery, they're thinking only in terms of the physical act with another

  person.

  But that, not alone, is adultery.

  And Jesus says, "No, you're not taking it far enough.

  And you're understanding.

  It's a hard issue.

  Like murder.

  You don't have to actually kill someone to be considered a murderer in the eyes of God."

  Jesus is saying the same thing about adultery.

  You don't have to physically be with another person to be an adulterer.

  Look at verse 28 again.

  He says, "I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already

  committed adultery with her in his heart."

  Now you have to understand this looking with lustful intent, it's not an accidental glance.

  This is literally in the process of continuing to look.

  It's looking in such a way that you are fueling your sexual imagination.

  When that happens, the deed's already done.

  Adultery has happened.

  Now listen, I don't want you to misunderstand because it's even worse than you think it

  is.

  Listen, Jesus did not say that looking at a woman with lustful intent causes you to commit

  adultery in your hearts.

  Jesus said looking at a woman with lustful intent means you already committed adultery

  in your heart.

  Jesus is saying that you looked with lustful intent because it was already in your heart

  to commit adultery.

  I think this is where a lot of people get this mixed up.

  It's not, "Oh, I was going about my business and I just stumbled across this woman and

  I looked at her and that is what caused me to lust."

  That's not the extent of it.

  It's this, I have an adulterous heart that's looking for a woman with lustful intent.

  See the difference?

  The look did not cause the lust.

  It is the lust that caused the look.

  You see the difference?

  Look, look, I can't, there's no way I can overstate this.

  This is a real problem.

  And this is a real problem that people sitting here have right now and are not dealing with

  it.

  You're not an adulterer because of something you do, it's who you are.

  It's a heart thing.

  You see with adultery like murder, as Pastor Taylor talked about last week, before it's

  an act, even if it doesn't become an act.

  That is what is in your heart.

  This is the heart of the law.

  Jesus said in Matthew 15, 19, "For out of the hearts, out of the heart come evil thoughts,

  murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander."

  You see that?

  The sinful acts are symptoms of a sinful condition.

  Committing the act of adultery, those are the leaves on the tree that has the root of

  an adulterous heart.

  And if you're sitting here still somehow magnanimously saying in your head, "I would never commit

  the act."

  I did not and I would never commit the act of adultery.

  But if that sin is in your mind, if that sin is constantly in your imagination, you have

  a real problem.

  That's why pornography is such a big business.

  Why?

  Because sinful hearts are literally searching for it.

  And you have to understand that if that's your issue, the sin started even before you

  got online because it's in here.

  It's a devastating condition to live in.

  You're unable to live a holy and upright life because when your heart is full of adultery,

  it perverts everything.

  And consider Titus 1.15.

  Look at this verse.

  Paul says to the pure, "All things are pure."

  But to the defiled and unbelieving, meaning your heart is full of perversion and sin,

  to the defiled and unbelieving, nothing is pure.

  But both their minds and their consciences are defiled.

  Do you know what that means?

  That means that when you're in that latter condition, you cannot look at another woman

  purely.

  You cannot see another woman as a sister, as a mom, as even just another human being.

  When this is where your heart is, every woman that you encounter, you're evaluating.

  And many become objects in your minds and hearts of fantasies.

  Lust just becomes all-consuming.

  And the people that live in this defiled state don't even see a problem.

  God's gift of marital intimacy has become an idol that you use to gratify your flesh.

  So see, Jesus is telling us out the gate, this is a devastating condition.

  And secondly, I shall not commit adultery.

  Not only is adultery a devastating sin, but adultery has dire consequences.

  Adultery has dire consequences.

  Look at verses 29 and 30.

  These two verses kind of saying the same thing, but this is some of the most startling stuff

  Jesus ever said, in my opinion.

  He says, "If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away, for it

  is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell.

  And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away, for it is better

  that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell."

  And you're like, "Man, gouge out your eye?

  Like cut off your hand?"

  Like, "Man, that seems awfully extreme."

  If that's the part you're focusing on, then you have completely missed the point.

  Because neither of those things are extreme.

  They're not extreme at all compared to hell.

  Notice twice Jesus says, "Thrown into hell."

  Thrown into hell.

  What's the obvious implication, right?

  We get it.

  We get what He's saying.

  Jesus is saying here that people with adulterous hearts go to hell.

  If you're still not convinced, Paul backs this up, verse Corinthians 6, verses 9 through

  10.

  He says, "Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God?"

  Meaning go to heaven.

  Meaning go to hell.

  He says, "Do not be deceived, neither the sexually immoral nor adulterers nor men who

  practice homosexuality nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor revilers nor swindlers

  will inherit the kingdom of God."

  Your priority in this life, more than anything, should be preparing yourself for eternity.

  Are you doing that?

  Because the Bible says your decisions in this life matter.

  And someday you're going to stand before God.

  So if lust is a problem for you, if lust characterizes you, and look, I can't answer

  that.

  I can't answer that for you.

  But you know if this sin consumes who you are.

  And if it characterizes you, there are consequences.

  As we talked about before, here and now, apparently, obviously, easily seen, there are consequences

  for adultery.

  But Jesus says there's also consequences when you take your last breath.

  Adultery has dire consequences.

  So let's talk about the other big thing in these verses.

  Number three, adultery requires drastic measures.

  Look at them again.

  He says, "If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away, for it

  is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell.

  And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away, for it is better

  that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell."

  Weren't you just blessed by the obedience of those who were baptized today?

  Didn't you say obedience is a wonderful thing?

  Awesome.

  Who's first?

  I mean, didn't Jesus just say if your hand causes you to sin, to cut it off?

  Who's first?

  We're not going to do it over the tub because we get more baptisms in the next service.

  And you're like, "Yeah, what about the other verse?"

  Well, don't worry.

  We can take care of the eye, too.

  We'll get Pastor Taylor up here.

  We'll do them both at the same time.

  You won't know.

  You won't even know what's going on when both of them are happening at the same time.

  And you're like, "Man, gouging out your eye and cutting off your hand.

  Man, that sounds drastic."

  Oh, it absolutely is.

  Maybe even more than you think.

  Because you see, Jesus was speaking to Jews.

  And the Jews viewed the right greater than the left.

  Just as a general thing.

  If you're left-handed, I don't need any hate emails.

  Okay?

  That's just the way it was, right?

  Sitting at the right hand.

  My right hand, man.

  The idea was right is better than left.

  So your right eye and your right hand and the Jewish mindset, those were the two most important

  things that you own.

  What Jesus is saying is this, there is nothing that is too important to eliminate from your

  life if it is causing you to sin.

  Adultery is destructive, it's enslaving, it's condemning.

  We got to deal with that.

  We have to deal with it.

  Do you believe that?

  Whatever.

  Listen.

  Whatever it is that feeds the lust in your heart, no matter how important that thing

  is, it has got to go.

  It's got to go.

  If you're feeding your lust through your phone or maybe a tablet, smash them up.

  And you're like, "Pastor Jeff, I have the newest iPhone.

  I spent a lot of money for that."

  It's not worth hell.

  Is it your laptop?

  Smash it up.

  Or you know, take your laptop to the kitchen and only use it around your family.

  You're like, "Oh, Pastor Jeff, my family is really nebby."

  Good.

  So glad to hear that.

  It's not worth hell.

  Maybe for some of you it's your social media accounts where you're having inappropriate

  relationships, conversations with people online or looking at things through those that you

  shouldn't be looking at.

  Delete them.

  Delete those social media accounts.

  You're like, "But Pastor Jeff, that's how I stay connected.

  Join a small group."

  You're like, "Put Pastor Jeff, the social media, that's just my leisure time.

  Take up pickleball.

  It's not worth hell."

  You know what?

  Maybe we'll just take care of all this.

  Call and cancel your internet if it's a problem.

  If it's leading you to feed this lust, Jesus says, "It has to go."

  And you're like, "Well, Pastor Jeff, I need the internet for my job.

  Get a new job.

  I will find you a job where you don't need the internet because it's not worth hell."

  Maybe for some of you as we are approaching summer, maybe it's a membership in a public

  pool.

  Like, you know what?

  I go there, Pastor Jeff, and I look at the women there, and I get to tell you what did

  Jesus say.

  You've got to get extreme here, people.

  But Pastor Jeff, my pool membership, that's just kind of our thing like we do in the summer.

  Swim at home.

  And I don't have a pool at my house.

  Do you have a bathtub?

  It's not worth hell.

  And I know people are like, "Okay, Pastor Jeff, I hear what you're saying, but I'm going

  to be honest with you."

  It's going to be kind of embarrassing to have to explain to people why I smashed my phone

  and canceled my internet.

  It's going to, I'm going to have to explain to people why I did that.

  That's kind of embarrassing.

  I'll tell you what's going to be more embarrassing than that is you not cutting off your sin,

  and someday you're going to stand before God.

  And God's going to say, "Do you remember the strangest Mother's Day sermon you've ever

  heard?"

  Why didn't you listen?

  Why did you despise my word?

  Why did you think following me was not worth cutting off the stuff that keeps you from following

  me with your whole heart?

  Why did you find me not worthy?

  Notice Jesus says it's better.

  It is better to lose your eye, lose your hand.

  It's better.

  What's better than going to hell?

  Literally anything.

  Anything you have to lose for the sake of your soul is going to be worth it.

  Romans 13, 14, same thing.

  Paul's saying the same thing.

  Maybe not in as graphic terms as Jesus, but it's the same thing.

  He says, "But put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh to gratify

  its desires.

  Make no provision.

  Take drastic measures to cut off anything that feeds the flesh."

  It's like that old story I heard, an old metaphor.

  Maybe you've heard about the guy.

  He had a white dog and a gray dog.

  And every time he put food out for them, the gray dog would whoop up the white dog, take

  all the food.

  The white dog would get none.

  After a while, the white dog, not eating, got weaker and weaker and weaker and the gray

  dog getting all the food, got stronger and stronger and stronger.

  The guy said, "I've got to do something about this."

  So he put both the dogs on a leash.

  And for a month, he only fed the white dog.

  This isn't a real story, by the way.

  Don't call it PETA.

  But he only fed the white dog.

  The gray dog barely surviving.

  But after that time of only feeding the white dog and not the gray dog when he let them

  off the leash, now the white dog was strong because it was the one that got fed.

  The gray dog was weak because it was the one that got starved.

  And I think you see the obvious application.

  The dog you feed is going to be the dominant dog.

  And the dog you starved was going to be the weak dog.

  See in this analogy, the white dog represents walking by the Spirit.

  The gray dog represents walking in the flesh.

  I think some of you are so weak because you're not feeding the Spirit, so to speak.

  You're not into Word.

  You're not worshiping.

  You're not praying.

  You're not in fellowship.

  You're not listening to good biblical podcasts.

  You're starving that.

  When instead you need to be starving the flesh.

  Make no provision for the flesh.

  Starve the adulterous heart by making no provision for whichever dog you feed is going to be

  the dog that is strong.

  And the dog that you don't feed is the dog that gets weak.

  And you're like, "Man, Pastor Jeff, this sounds impossible."

  Oh, it is.

  Absolutely.

  That's why we put Romans 13 back up there, please.

  It is impossible.

  Hence the first phrase in this verse, "Put on the Lord Jesus Christ."

  Reformation is not going to work.

  If your goal here is to just try to clean up your act, you're not going to get very far.

  You need transformation.

  You need the life of Christ in us to be able to make these choices.

  Oh, and by the way, earlier we read, well, 1 Corinthians 6, we read verses 9 and 10.

  I'd like to go back and I'd like to look at the very next verse.

  Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God?

  Do you not be deceived, neither the sexually immoral, nor adulterers, nor adulterers, nor

  men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers,

  nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God?

  Look at verse 11.

  And such were some of you that you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified, you

  were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ by the Spirit of our God.

  I just want to ask you today, are you an R?

  Or are you a Wurr?

  Because today, today could be the most important day of your life because today you can become

  a Wurr.

  Like it about your heads as the worship team makes their way back up.

  Just like it about your heads.

  Close your eyes.

  Look, this is a between you and God thing here, alright?

  There's some of you that have been trapped because you don't know Jesus Christ as your

  Lord and Savior.

  You don't have the power or resources to overcome this sin because you're living in the flesh,

  not by the power of His Holy Spirit because you don't know.

  Today can be the day that you receive Him.

  And you know what?

  We're baptizing in the next service.

  Pastor Taylor would be thrilled to be able to baptize you because you've repented from

  your sin and turned to Jesus Christ.

  But if you, heads bowed, eyes closed, if you're sitting here and you're like, you know what

  pastors, I am a believer in Jesus Christ, but I'm honestly, I'm stuck in this sin.

  I just want to ask you, Christian, stuck in this sin.

  Why in the world would you indulge in a sin that Jesus died for?

  Today Christian, you need to repent.

  Today Christian, you need to do some cutting.

  Father in heaven, I just simply ask today that you open up the eyes of our hearts that we

  don't look at this sin from a worldly perspective because the world celebrates it.

  Father, let us see this sin from your perspective.

  It's a horrible sin.

  Father, let us see the consequences that Jesus laid out for us.

  There is eternal separation from you for the heart that chooses to live in lust instead

  of walking by the Spirit.

  Father, I pray that you would give us the wisdom, you would give us the strength, and

  you would give us the faith to be able to cut some things today.

  It's ultimately going to bless us to be free from this bondage, but the end goal of all

  things, Father, is for the glory of your name.

  Father, I pray that you would glorify your name through a work of your Holy Spirit, bringing

  people to you in repentance and bringing your people back from a willing bondage to

  sin.

  Please, Father, let our life, let our very life be an act of worship in the way we repent.

  We pray in Jesus' name, amen.