“You have heard that it was said to those of ancient times, ‘You shall not murder’; and ‘whoever murders shall be liable to judgment.’ But I say to you that if you are angry with a brother or sister, you will be liable to judgment; and if you insult a brother or sister, you will be liable to the council; and if you say, ‘You fool,’ you will be liable to the hell of fire. So when you are offering your gift at the altar, if you remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother or sister, and then come and offer your gift. Come to terms quickly with your accuser while you are on the way to court with him, or your accuser may hand you over to the judge, and the judge to the guard, and you will be thrown into prison. Truly I tell you, you will never get out until you have paid the last penny.
“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart. If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away; it is better for you to lose one of your members than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away; it is better for you to lose one of your members than for your whole body to go into hell.
“It was also said, ‘Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.’ But I say to you that anyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of unchastity, causes her to commit adultery; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.
“Again, you have heard that it was said to those of ancient times, ‘You shall not swear falsely, but carry out the vows you have made to the Lord.’ But I say to you, Do not swear 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 swear by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black. Let your word be ‘Yes, Yes’ or ‘No, No’; anything more than this comes from the evil one.
Matthew 5:21-37
When I looked at the Lectionary for this, the Sixth Sunday after Epiphany, my first thought was maybe I’ll preach on the Epistle instead of the Gospel.
For one thing, the Gospel lesson is long but long as it is, it’s incomplete – Verses 21-32 begin with Jesus saying, “You have heard it was said to those of ancient times . . .” and then he proceeds to recall three different passages that echo themes from the book of Deuteronomy.
But the last section of today’s Gospel lesson begins with, “Again, you have heard that it was said to those of ancient times . . .” Then Jesus recalls three more passages from the Old Testament, but this time from Leviticus. For some reason, the Committee on Common Texts decided to only include the first of the Leviticus related passages for this Sunday, leaving the other two for another day I suppose. I’ve tried to figure out why that may be, but in the end decided to just focus on the context of what Jesus is saying in connection with all of these “You have heard . . . but I say to you . . .” passages.
So, if we’re going to talk about what Jesus means, we have to include the other two Leviticus related passages as well –
In verses 38-42 he says:
“You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I say to you, Do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also; and if anyone wants to sue you and take your coat, give your cloak as well; and if anyone forces you to go one mile, go also the second mile. Give to everyone who begs from you, and do not refuse anyone who wants to borrow from you.
And then, in verses 43-48 he concludes with:
“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, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous. 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 and sisters, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.
Be perfect? Really?
Are you serious, Lord?
To begin to understand this, we have to back up a bit to understand the context. Immediately before this series of six “But I say” passages, Jesus proclaims that he hasn’t come to abolish the law or the prophets but “to fulfill.”
In verse 18 he says, “For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished.”
And then, in verse 20, he says, “[U]nless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”
We can’t have this – Jesus can’t really mean what Matthew has recorded him as saying here, can he? So, we come up with all sorts of ways to interpret these challenging passages. For instance:
Jesus was teaching that righteousness through the law is impossible, setting up the need for justification by grace; or
Jesus was speaking just to his disciples, not to us; or
Jesus was talking about goals that we should aspire to even though they’re impossible to achieve. By trying to live up to them we’ll be the better for it.
The problem is that when you read on through the Gospel you don’t find support for Jesus talking about these “but I say to you” challenges as a way to let us off the hook. He means it when he says he hasn’t come to abolish the law.
Some commentators don’t refer to the “Old Testament” for this very reason. They use the term “First Testament.” God hasn’t done away with the First Testament as all, which is why we include it in our Bibles.
One of the heresies that arose in the first centuries after Christ was one that did away with the Old Testament altogether. Saint Augustine recalled his struggle with this in his Confessions, in which he wrote of his experiences with sects such as the Manichaeans, who like many Gnostic cults, held that moral law did not affect their spiritual lives.
Similar beliefs arose during the early days of the Protestant reformation in which the belief in salvation by faith alone – sola fides – gave rise to what scholars call Antinomianism (against the law) which Martin Luther rejected. Even today, there are some folks who think that we’re freed from obedience to the law, when in fact we’re freed “for joyful obedience” when we confess our sin before Holy Communion.
So, the idea that Jesus was demonstrating that righteousness was impossible and that we could ignore the law and simply respond to the grace of God, is wishful thinking.
One of the alternative readings for the Old Testament lection this Sunday is from the deuterocanonical book Sirach in which it is written:
“He has not commanded anyone to be wicked,
and he has not given anyone permission to sin.”
But maybe when Jesus said, “I say to you . . .” he was only talking to his disciples.
Sorry, but no.
Jesus wasn’t just talking to his disciples as some sort of special humans who would be granted superhuman powers. They were humans just like us.
If you haven’t watched any of episodes of The Chosen, I recommend it.
Some of the people in my Sunday School class and Men’s Bible Study have complained that the series starts off slow, but if you stick with it the episodes bring the disciples to life.
The series does take liberties with things not found in Scripture, such as Simon Peter being a debt-ridden gambler, or Nicodemus trying (and failing) to exorcise demons from Mary Magdalene and Thomas being the wine merchant in the miracle at the wedding at Cana.
But these liberties don’t detract from the main message of Scripture but serve to use drama to humanize the disciples.
Paradoxically, by taking away the “saintliness” of the disciples we find that we’re not allowed to do away with our own call to “saintliness”.
So, if Jesus wasn’t setting up an argument demonstrating the impossibility of living within the law or being as saintly as the first disciples, was he saying that we were off the hook as long as we at least aspired to an impossible righteousness but didn’t have to actually achieve it?
Not for us Methodists. We believe that we are called to move on toward perfection. That doesn’t mean aspiring to impossible standards but striving to achieve them.
Wesley wrote:
“God well knew how ready our unbelief would be to cry out, This is impossible! And therefore stakes upon it all the power, truth, and faithfulness of God, to whom all things are possible.”
So, what does Jesus mean when he says that we are to be perfect just as our heavenly father is perfect?
I believe that what he is saying is that we are to “put on Christ.”
Let me reference three other passages to explain what I mean.
First, there is Matthew’s recounting of Jesus’ parable of the great banquet that ends with people, both good and bad, being invited to the feast after the original invitees have declined to show up. You’ll recall that one of the new guests is found to be without the appropriate wedding attire and is bound hand and foot and thrown into the outer darkness.
We’ll come back to this seemingly unfair outcome.
Then there is the Paul’s second letter to the church at Corinth, in which he writes in chapter 5, at verse 16,:
“From now on, therefore, we regard no one from a human point of view; even though we once knew Christ from a human point of view, we know him no longer in that way. So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new!”
Note that Paul is saying that we regard “no one” from a human point of view. This is consistent with Jesus saying that we must be reconciled with those with whom we are angry and that we must love even our enemies. To do this is to be perfect as our heavenly father is perfect.
But again, you object and say this isn’t possible. To which Paul replies in the same passage that we are able to regard no one from a human point of view by saying,
“All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us. So we are ambassadors for Christ, since God is making his appeal through us; we entreat you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”
And then, finally, the passage that was so fundamental to the experience of both John Wesley and St. Augustine. The former when he heard a sermon on the passage being expounded as he stood on Aldersgate Street and the latter when he heard the children in the garden on the other side of the wall in the place he was staying in Milan as they sang, “Tolle Lege, Tolle Lege,” and turned and then indeed take up and read the book that lay just inside in which Paul, writing to the Romans, in chapter 13, verses 12-14, urged:
“Let us then lay aside the works of darkness and put on the armor of light; let us live honorably as in the day, not in reveling and drunkenness, not in debauchery and licentiousness, not in quarreling and jealousy. Instead, put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.”
Back to the guest who was thrown out of the banquet for not being dressed appropriately. We want to object that it’s not fair. After all, he was called in off the street with others who weren’t originally invited. How was he supposed to have the correct attire?
Because God provided it.
Through Jesus. The Logos made flesh, through which God reconciled the world to himself and gives us the power to become perfect, just as our heavenly father is perfect.
Through Jesus, God abolished our lament that living up to the law is an impossibility and calls us to choose to put on Christ.
To strive to be one of The Chosen.