But I Say - Part 2

Today on Fellowship in the Word, Pastor Bill Gebhardt challenges you to become a fully functioning follower of Jesus Christ. Let me put it this way. Here's the kind of things we say. Look, look, I swear on my mother's grave.

What are you saying? You didn't have to believe me up till now, but now you do. You see, you didn't have to believe me, but now I swear by all that's holy.

What are you doing? See, you're trying in a sense to say you should believe me now. Jesus, like that's nuts. That's crazy because the Beatitudes say we're to be pure of heart, but he goes on and he says, let your statement be yes, yes or no, no. Beyond that, it's evil.

Just say yes or no. If you're pure of heart, you don't have a problem with that, do you? Thank you for joining us today on this edition of Fellowship in the Word with Pastor Bill Gebhardt. Fellowship in the Word is the radio ministry of Fellowship Bible Church located in Metairie, Louisiana. Let's join Pastor Bill Gebhardt now as once again he shows us how God's word meets our world. A religious person could say, look, I've been married for a long time and I never committed adultery. And that makes it sound pretty good.

OK, but Jesus put it to a standard that makes it a lot more difficult. If I've ever looked at any woman with lust just like adultery, I'm already an adulterer in my heart. Now, I hope you start feeling uncomfortable because I think you start thinking, wow, that's me. You see, that's me.

Yes. See, what's his point here? The point is your issue.

Is there inside of you? Your issue is that you're poor in spirit. Your issue is that you're dead in sin and no amount of externals will ever stop this. You can't stop it with external religiosity.

It's never going to work. He goes on after that and says something kind of interesting. He says, if your right eye makes you stumble, tear it out and throw it from you. And it would be better to lose one of your parts of your body than your whole body be thrown into hell. And if your right hand makes you stumble, cut it off, throw it from you, for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body than your whole body to go in hell. Now, I've read all kinds of bizarre stuff about this verse, none of it true, but pretty bizarre.

But the point of it is, what's going on here? First of all, he's speaking in hyperbole. There's no doubt about that. He's not advocating tearing out your eyes and cutting off your hands. By the way, religious people would do that, though. Take Islam, even today. If I get caught stealing, it'd cut off my hand.

I'll talk about that in a few moments. But the point is, Jesus is saying something that the Jews understood. The Jews would use this term to say what's best of you. What's best of Bill was my right eye and my right arm. You see, my right eye gives me the vision for life, and my right arm represents all that I do physically in life. Right eye and right arm meant a lot to the Jewish people. And it's kind of an interesting thought from their point of view.

It sort of represents everything about me. And Jesus says, let me explain to you how serious sin is. You'd be better off with one eye and one hand than to sin in your heart.

That's what he means. Sin has to be radically dealt with, which is exactly what the cross is. See, it's radical. Why does an innocent man have to climb on a cross and die for the sins of the world?

That's radical. But he does. God doesn't change his standard. You see, Jesus met the standard. He justified it. God was propitiated.

God was satisfied with the sacrifice that took place. He moves on then and says, it was said, whoever sends his wife away, let him give her a certificate of divorce. But I say.

Now, that looks pretty benign, but it's not. I've said this before and you probably have heard it, but the Jews of Jesus Day. Had every bit as bad or worse a view of divorce than we do today.

And it's probably more rampant. Jewish men could divorce Jewish women for any reason. Any reason. I don't like the way you look. I don't like the way your mother talks.

I don't like the way you cook. Out you go. Jewish women, by the way, could almost not divorce their husbands for any reason. Talk about a set up here.

Why is that? How would a Jewish woman support herself? She can't. So it was totally, totally a male dominated society. And what they came up with by the time of Christ was it's OK to divorce your wife as long as you legally give her a certificate.

No, she's divorced. That's what they said. And Jesus is like, wow. See, the whole problem with religiosity is you've got to find loopholes. You know, you've got to find loopholes that deal with your own sins. So you make up things that are loophole.

And there's a loophole. I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except for the reason of unchastity, which is poronia, we get the word pornography from or fornication, except for that reason. Jesus gives the exception. It's not God's ideal, by the way. God's ideal for you for no reason. But the law allowed for unchastity because the one flesh was broken. The one flesh relationship was broken so you could divorce. But Hosea and Gomer teach God's ideal. And was was Gomer unchaste? Absolutely. And did Hosea forgive her and take her back every time?

That's the ideal. But he says divorces his wife, except for the reason of unchastity. He makes her commit adultery. And whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.

Now, I got to believe right there, the men in the group listening all looked at each other. What is he? What? What is he saying? Now, he's not saying it's an unpardonable sin. He's saying this. It's sin.

Understand that it's sin. What's Malachi say? Last book of the last book of the Old Testament, God hates divorce. He's immutable. He hasn't changed.

He hated divorce then and he hates divorce now. You see, now we live in a culture, by the way, that is not this loose, but one of the funniest things that one of the great words, I think, in our culture is we added a word. We didn't say certificate.

We have a better word. No fault. I think no fault. We just got a divorce. Well, there's nobody fault.

We just did. That's kind of an interesting way to look at it. You know, but from our point of view, it's very common. And so the whole idea is Jesus makes them uncomfortable by saying this is wrong. Period.

This is wrong. Again, you have heard the ancients say, and this goes right together, you shall not make false vows, but you should fulfill your vows to the Lord. OK, this is a vow loving culture. They love vows. They take vows for everything. They have little vows and big vows.

I mean, they do. They have vows for everything. But you have to think something about a vow. Watch how Jesus exposes this. He says, I say to you that no oath at all, either by heaven and for it's the throne of God or by the earth. It's the footstool of his feet or by Jerusalem.

It's the city of the great king. Nor shall you make an oath by your own head, for you cannot make one hair white or black. See, why do you take a vow? And I'm not talking about the courtroom vow.

I'll say that in a minute or the wedding vow, but a regular vow. Let me put it this way. Here's the kind of things we say. Look, look, I swear on my mother's grave.

What are you saying? You didn't have to believe me up till now, but now you do. You see, you didn't have to believe me, but now I swear by all that's holy.

What are you doing? See, you're trying in a sense to say you should believe me now. Jesus is like, that's nuts.

That's crazy. In fact, notice what he does. He goes on because the Beatitudes say we're to be pure of heart. But he goes on and he says, let your statement be yes, yes or no, no. Beyond that, it's evil.

Just say yes or no. If you're pure of heart, you don't have a problem with that, do you? You're an honest person. You have integrity. See, be careful about that. We take vows, even a vow that is important in a sense of the commitment we're making. But think of this. We all take wedding vows, don't we?

Now, I noticed a lot of them, even on TV. There's a part missing in vows now and that death do us part thing is off. OK? Because how many people have taken, I'm making a vow today before God and all you till death do us part. And how'd that work out? See, somebody didn't keep their vow. So we just don't say that part.

I mean, inevitably, for a lot of people in our culture, what they're really saying is, look, I want to marry you as long as you make me happy. Stop making me happy. Out you go. You see, Jesus said, well, that'd be better, at least you're honest. Say yes or say no, but you don't have to go beyond this. See, his whole point is an external vow doesn't reveal a human heart. Yes or no reveals your human heart. So he says it.

Moves on to the next area then. After he finishes that, you have heard that it was set an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. Right out of the Bible, Exodus 21, Leviticus 24 and Deuteronomy 19, an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. Why does the Bible say that? For justice.

What do you mean? The Old Testament law was set up that whatever you do as a crime, your punishment should fit your crime. It shouldn't be more than your crime and it shouldn't be less than your crime. So an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. That's the way the punishment was. It was set up that way.

But it got a little bit distorted along the way. He says, I say to you, now, what should this change? Do not resist an evil person. From here on in, everything I tell you today is going to bother you as much as it bothered that audience. Because you're not going to like it. Why?

Because you're an American right now. This is against you. This is against the way you think. He said, do not resist an evil person. Whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn your other to him also.

Well, oh, you have to understand Jewish culture. What's the single greatest insult you can do to a Jewish person, especially a Jewish man? Slap him on his face. The only thing I can think of equivalent in our culture, spit in his face. Spit in his face. You see what a mockery that makes of him? You see how offensive that is? You see from that point of view, that's what a slap was. By the way, when they arrested Jesus, what did they do?

Slap them over and over again in his face. They're insulting him. You see, they're insulting him at that level.

They are attacking his dignity as a human being. Oh, by the way, what did Jesus do? He slapped him back, didn't he?

No, he didn't, did he? What did he yell back at him? Nothing. Nothing.

Wow. His honor was attacked. He goes on and says, if anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, let them have your coat also. Now, this is a lawsuit.

And in this case, a little bit opposite of ours, those two words are a little bit interchangeable. The coat's an inner garment. The shirt's the outer garment. In a court of law, if you didn't have anything, they could take your shirt. But they couldn't take your coat.

Or the other way around. Whatever your inner garment was, no court could say, take that off. Jesus said, if someone sues you and they win your outer garment, give them your inner garment. What? See, what in the world does that mean?

How does this work? You see, only a beatitude person would do this. You see, if someone was doing that to you, would you do something extra?

You see, this is really hard. Even the idea of the slap on the face. Remember, Paul addressed this in Romans 12.

If someone does something terrible to you, all the Bible says is you're to forgive them. Wow. OK. And what else?

He says vengeance is mine. Don't you do it. Let me do it.

You see, let me do it. Jesus never uttered a word. Let's think about this in God's big plan. He never uttered a word. They crucified him.

That's about as bad as could happen. Did God exact any kind of justice on Israel? Well, yeah, in 70 AD, the Romans kicked them out of the land.

They were distributed around the world for 2000 years. I'd say that's a pretty just punishment. God said, I got this. You see, but from our point of view, that's not the way it is. You slap me, I'll slap you. You insult me, I'll insult you.

You sue me, I'm going to give you the least I can. This is how I see it. We just don't operate this way. This is the way we think.

He then goes on and says, he says, whoever forces you to go one mile, go two. That's a direct response to Romans. Roman soldiers occupied the land. Roman soldiers had the right to any citizen of the land that if they were marching from one town to another town or city, a Roman soldier could come up to you as a Jewish person and give you his armor and say you carry it for the next mile. And you had to. Jews hated that.

They hated being bears for Romans, who they hated in their land. So Jesus said what? If he says you've got to go a mile, what do you say to him? I'll go two. Now, you start thinking, who can do this? Who can do this? Jesus, he did it. Jesus can do this. Oh, people who fulfill the Beatitudes can do this.

They can do this as they follow Jesus. Notice then, he goes on after that and says, give to him who ask of you, do not turn away from him who wants to borrow from you. Wow. Someone wants to borrow? Sure.

Wait a minute. They could take a deal with me. They could steal some of my money. But if you think of the rest of the Bible, whose money is this anyway? You see, it starts becoming a more problematic issue. Only someone who follows Christ, only Christ can do this.

I hope you come away with this. I can't do these things. I don't think that way because that's part of the poverty of spirit.

I can't do this. I'm not righteous enough. Then he goes on and he says, you have heard it was said, you shall love your neighbors and hate your enemy. It does say in Exodus 23, you're to love your neighbors. It doesn't say you hate your enemies.

They added that. They added that because they hated the Gentiles. So that's what our tradition teaches us to love and hate. You see, that's what tradition can do. It's an amazing thing.

It doesn't ever go away. I mean, if you read like Fox's Book of Martyrs, it's an amazing thing. But it's hard to understand when you read the New Testament that for hundreds of years, especially through the Middle Ages, that if you didn't agree to the tradition of the Roman Church, they killed you. They executed you. Where would you find that in the New Testament?

Nowhere. But our tradition says that's what you do. If they don't agree with you, we'll kill them. I mean, it's the whole thing behind the Crusades. The theology of the Roman Church and the theology of Islam were the same when it came to that. And that's why they're fighting over Jerusalem. See, it's the same idea.

It's just the way it works. He said, but I say to you, love your enemies. And love, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.

There you go. We have enemies? Yes.

We have enemies in this country? Yes. Are we going to be persecuted more in the future or less? A lot more. It's coming.

See, a lot more. OK, what does Jesus say about that? We're going to stand up and fight and take it back for ourselves. Jesus said, love them, pray for them. That's kind of against our natural fiber, isn't it? Now, the advantage we have is as long as there's a political process, we can get engaged in that and vote.

But whatever the outcomes, the outcome won't matter to us. That's what Jesus' standard is. Love them. Oh, by the way, when they crucified him, what was the first thing he said on the cross? Father, forgive them. Wow.

To be mistreated like that. And by the way, if you're talking about your self-pride, does he have any reason to have a little self-pride? Let's see, he's the son of God. He's God incarnate. He's there to save them from their sins. And he says, forgive them. See, he can do that in our flesh.

This is not the way we operate. So, he says, so that you may be sons of your fathers in heaven. You want to prove you're a son of God? OK. Pray for them and love them. Oh, that's right. By the way, God loved you when you were at enmity with God.

Wow. For God so loved the world, he sent a son when we were all his enemy. So, God says, look, I loved my enemies for their benefit. Now, if you're my child, how about you love your enemies for their benefit?

See, this is hard in our flesh, difficult for us. He said, look, one of the reasons you want to do this, he causes the sun to rise on the evil and the good and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. He said, God blesses everyone. Does it only rain on the farms of believing farmers? Or does it rain on unbelievers' farms? How about in the business world? Only believers are successful in the business world. Unbelievers don't get any success. Well, they really do. Asaph said in Psalm 73, it's hard for me to look at the prosperity of the wicked. You know, that's just the way this works. God says, yeah, I bless everybody. He then says, if you love those who, I love this, if you love those who love you, what reward do you have?

Don't you mean tax gatherers do that? Oh, I just, and it is natural. I like people who like me. And I love people who love me. Notice the me word.

How do you feel about people that have let you know in one way or another they can't stand you? What do you mean? See, it's hard, isn't it? He said, look, even a tax gatherer, the most despicable person in Israel, they all love each other.

They have tax gatherer parties. See, no one else may like them, but they like each other. He said, even they do this. He goes on then and says, if you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others?

Don't even gentiles do the same? See, the whole test for us is how do we treat everybody, those of the faith and those not of the faith, those who are friends and those who are enemies. You see, it's all the same for us. And I hope you come to the point like this is really hard for me.

Well, it gets worse, the last verse. Therefore, you are to be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect. There's the standard. There's never been anything else but that with God. God's standard, perfection.

Wait, why? He's God. He's perfect. Remember the passages you probably read in Peter? You need to be holy as I am holy. What was your first thought?

You've got to be kidding. There's just not a chance I'm going to be as holy as God. God said, that may be true, but that's my standard.

My standard is perfection. Some have tried to say that's the word teleos, by the way. Jesus said it is finished on the cross, teleos. And so they said maybe that's what it means, complete, finished. One writer said it means mature. No, I don't think so, because look, therefore you are to be mature. That'd be nice, but therefore you are to be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect. Is God mature or is He perfect? See, that's what He said when He said just as. What's the point He's making? Of your flesh you can't do this.

You can't. External religion will never make you righteous enough. You'll never make it, no matter what. One sins enough to eternally condemn all of us. Our only hope is to put our trust in the one who fulfilled the law. That's what Jesus is talking about. Our only hope is to admit we're spiritually bankrupt. Our only hope is to go to God with empty hands. And God says, that's fine. You put your faith and trust in my Son. And I'll give you the gift of eternal life. It'll be filled with my mercy and my grace and my forgiveness.

And all you can do is receive it. You see, that's the point that He's making. I am sure by the end of the chapter, He's got him very, very angry.

But starting in chapter 6, He's going to make him a lot more angry. Let's pray. Father, the standard of Jesus Christ makes us all uncomfortable. But it's only because we know who we are. We know our limitations. But the important thing, Father, is we need to know who He is.

And His lack of limitations. The Apostle Paul figured this out. He said, I can do all things through Him who strengthens me. That applies to all of us. The standard that seems so remote to us, so difficult in our flesh, is a standard that Jesus Christ can readily meet within each and every one of our lives. Thank you, Father, for the Lord Jesus Christ and His words that comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable. I pray this in Jesus' name.

Amen. You've been listening to Pastor Bill Gebhardt on the Radio Ministry of Fellowship in the Word. If you ever miss one of our broadcasts, or maybe you would just like to listen to the message one more time, remember that you can go to a great website called OnePlace.com.

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