Talk about dealing with sin in radical ways. But that's what Jesus calls for because if we're going to be able to do that. If we don't destroy sin, sin will destroy us. If we don't deal with it ruthlessly, it will deal with us. ruthlessly.
And that's how God has always called us to deal with sin. You don't make compromises with the devil or with the flesh. If you do, it will destroy you. Thanks for joining us, friends, on the line of fire. This is Michael Brown.
Welcome to the broadcast. If you're enjoying our new podcast, as we're focusing on the words of Jesus, first going through the Sermon on the Mount, if you are enjoying this broadcast, share it with a friend, give it a good rating and review. Again, this just helps get it out to more. people. We continue in the Sermon on the Mount.
Matthew 5. Beginning in verse 27. Jesus said. said you have heard that it was said You shall not commit adultery. Lotin af.
and the Ten Commandments. You shall not commit adultery.
So adultery is sexual sin committed by married people. But I tell you, This is how he's taking the law to its full meaning. I tell you. that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. And obviously adultery of the heart and adultery of the eyes is something rampant.
And Steve Hill, preaching in the Brownsborough Revival, would talk to Christmas. Christians who thought they were so righteous and hey, it's all the bad people out there, and they were unaware of their own sin. And he'd say, hey, how you feel if we put your thoughts for the last week up here on the big screen and put your name on it? how many would run out the door. How many men are guilty of this very thing just even in the midst of a church service?
So this is serious. It's for men and for women. All of us recognize the ugliness of sin. I shouted out with you the ugly, destructive nature of sin. How many of us, and all of us have fallen short one way or another, wish we could redo things, wish we could undo things.
Sin is never, ever worth it. Sin is never ever worth it. And when you've learned your lesson, you shout it out all the more loudly. And all of us, every one of us, knows the mercy of God in our lives, knows there go I but by the grace of God.
So I take these words as seriously as anyone on the planet.
So what does Jesus say now? If your right eye causes you to stumble... Gouge it out. and throw it away. It's better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell.
And if your right hand causes you to stumble, cut it off, and throw it away, it is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to go into hell. We also have this in Matthew 18. We also have this in Mark 9. One of them adding if your foot caused you to stumble, cut it off, throw it away. And This is prompted New Testament scholars to say Jesus must have said this a lot.
He must have talked about this a lot, to have it repeated three times in the Gospels, twice in Matthew and once in Mark. You say, but is he actually literally telling us to do that, to gouge our eye out and to cut our hand off? Is that what he's actually telling us to do? He's making. a spiritual point.
He's using exaggerated speech. To make a spiritual point, which is that we must deal with sin radically, we don't cut it back. We cut it off. Let's say for example that that you struggle terribly with alcohol. And you've fallen into drinking.
over and over and over. And now you go through a Christian rehab program and you spend months learning new habits and things like that. One thing you learn is you don't cut it back, you cut it out. You don't just say, well, okay, I won't drink as much. No, that is poison to you.
For you, that's poison, and you know you can never have a drink again. When God helped me to make radical changes in my lifestyle with diet in August of 2014, so over 11 years ago now as I'm recording this broadcast. When I made the radical changes, I understood once God was helping me. I can never eat some of the old stuff that I ate again. That for me was it's off limits.
It could easily open the door to that which is wrong.
Now, one of the arguments that was raised hundreds of years ago against having the Bible in English. or the Bible in a language that was accessible to the people. is that people will misunderstand passages like this. that they're actually going to go and cut their eye out, gouge it out, or cut their hand off because of passages like this.
Well One of the rebuttals that was given Uh this is a dialogue that took place in England centuries ago. One of the dialogues was written was like, we have the Bible in English and you don't see people all over with their hands cut off and with their eyes gouged out. And we understand that our right eye The physical eye does not cause us to sin. The eye does not have the power to do that. The eye has no moral capacity or choice-making capacity.
It simply does what the brain tells it to do. The same with the right hand. My hand made me punch the person. No, your hand didn't make you do anything. You're in that make you punch anybody.
The brain made the hand punch someone.
So we understand he's using a figure of speech here. And we understand also at the resurrection that we won't be resurrected missing an eye or missing an arm. If we were injured or something like that, you get maimed in a car wreck. You're not going to be resurrected maimed. We understand that.
He's making well so what's the point he's making? Deal. ruthlessly with sin. Don't Give it an open door. Give it an inch.
That's why the Israelites had to deal so radically with the Canaanites in this one-time event of wiping out these who were in deep sin and wickedness in the land. If you let them live among you, then you're going to get seduced by them. If you let them live among you, you're going to intermarry with them and end up worshiping their gods and committing their sins. Therefore, you have to deal with them ruthlessly. It's just like a surgeon having to amputate someone's arm as gangrene is spreading.
Well that's radical.
Well you you if you save the arm you lose the body. Because that gangrene is going to spread through your whole body and it cannot be stopped. The only way to save the body is to cut off the arm. That's a radical physical example.
So it's imperative for us. When there is sin and when you look in the past, in your own life, how did I open the door? What did I do wrong? As I look at my past, and all of us can examine our own lives and our own past, it's the little things. You open the door here, you open the door there, you give too much space to this.
We cannot do, you can't play with fire. If you play with fire, you will get burned. And every one of us, in one way or another, something we said, something we did.
Something over the decades. We've been burned. Every one of us has been burned. We've got to learn from it. We must deal with sin radically.
So I have a colleague who struggled mightily with porn. He was in ministry. known internationally, struggled mightily with porn. He does not use a computer. It's just a trap for him.
He doesn't use a computer. Whatever happens with a cell phone, either he doesn't have access to certain things, or if it rings, he gives it to somebody else. But he uh he just said that's that's his weakness. That's his downfall. That's why you set up certain rules of conduct, and when you violate them, you open the door to trouble.
So The ones who can shout the loudest. Are the ones before we were saved, after we were saved? who've seen the mercy of God. We can shout the loudest and say, don't make the same mistakes. And in our own lives, all of us do it.
We learn: okay, don't say this, don't do this, don't open that door. Deal with sin ruthlessly, radically. This doesn't mean God doesn't forgive. It doesn't mean there's not mercy. He's talking about saving our own lives.
Here's a question to ask yourself. Which sin is worth going to hell for? Which Physical pleasure, drugs, alcohol, sex, whatever, violence. What physical release is worth going to hell for? That's what Jesus is saying.
We do not play games with sin because sin will not play games with. Us. May we take these words to heart. May we stand strong. If it means you get rid of TVs, if it means you get offline, if it means you have to make.
Radical ruthless decisions. If driving by a certain place pulls you back into sin, that's where your old friends hung out, that's where you party, so you drive a different way, well, it takes me 15 minutes longer, then you take 15 minutes longer. That's the point. If you love watching certain things, you love watching sports, but when you watch sports, you end up watching other stuff you shouldn't, well, then just don't watch. If you can't be disciplined, then just cut the thing off.
That's what Jesus is saying. Don't cut it back. Cut it off. And then when God gives you freedom, Walk in the freedom. and don't test it.
Walk in the freedom. and don't test it. And you will be. Bless.
