Testing the Limits

Setting Boundaries.

In this section of the sermon on the mount Jesus is setting boundaries for what life in the kingdom looks like. He makes them very clear.

Our children are at the age now where they are testing their boundaries. It is human nature to want to know how close to the line can you get without crossing the line.

In all of the you have heard it said, sections Jesus ends them by making it clear to his disciples what the limits are, and calls them to live in such a way that getting near or crossing the line shouldn’t be a concern.

Jesus in these sections sets the bar high for Kingdom living. To live as Christ is challenging his disciples and us today is what it looks like to live a holy life. Jesus isn’t replacing the old mosaic law with a new one even harder to keep. He is merely telling us what means, what it looks like to fulfill it. It’s a way of life that the disciples or us can’t live up to on our own. We need the Holy Spirit working in and through us to love and live the way Christ calls us to in the sermon on the mount. Thanks be to God that he came to fulfill the law.

Today as we wrestle with this difficult section of the sermon on the mount may the Spirit of God fall fresh on us and continue to transform our lives so they look more like Christ.

Kingdom Life

Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary: Year A, Volume 1 Pastoral Perspective

What are we to do when we find ourselves at odds with the teaching of Jesus, or at least in some disagreement with it, based on our own personal experience? This section of the Sermon on the Mount provides such an occasion.

In each of these sections on the sermon on the mount Jesus starts with, you have heard it said, followed by but I say. Today isn’t a deep dive into each of these sections but an overall common theme approach to sin whatever the sin may be.

We must view this section of the sermon on the mount with the greatest commandment in mind.

Matthew 22:36–40 NRSV

36 “Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?” 37 He said to him, “ ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ 38 This is the greatest and first commandment. 39 And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40 On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.”

Whether it’s anger, lust, divorce, revenge, or love for enemies, Jesus but I say to you allows for reconciliation.

Matthew: A Commentary in the Wesleyan Tradition In the Text

These are warnings not to let anger gain a foothold lest Jesus’ followers insult others, or it develops into murder.

Matthew: A Commentary in the Wesleyan Tradition In the Text

Not only is it insufficient not to murder, but also, one must not let the heart be overcome with anger that would lead to harmful actions in word or deed.

Matthew: A Commentary in the Wesleyan Tradition In the Text

Jesus calls for a transformed heart that loves the other perfectly and is not enslaved to a sexual desire that uses the opposite sex to gratify itself, such as in acts of adultery. “For Jesus, then, adultery defined as covetousness is the opposite of ‘loving your neighbor as yourself’ ”

Matthew: A Commentary in the Wesleyan Tradition In the Text

Jesus calls his hearers not to tolerate anything in their lives that would make room for impurity and, ultimately, the absence of love

Matthew: A Commentary in the Wesleyan Tradition From the Text

Jesus Messiah has come to fulfill the Law and the Prophets for the sake of God’s saving purposes on earth. In Matthew, Jesus makes this fulfillment possible by establishing a new covenant in his blood that is vindicated at his resurrection whereby a holy community is formed and shaped around him and his saving presence. This means that everyone who desires to follow him is enabled, through the Spirit, to live a complete and whole life characterized by love for God and others both inside and out.

How Do we Live this Life?

In this section of the sermon on the mount Jesus isn’t setting boundaries for us to test, although he makes them quite clear. Jesus is laying out how his followers are to live different. We are to live a life so consumed with loving God and others, that we’re not even worried about the limits.

We cannot live up to the level of holiness Christ calls us and his disciples to under our own efforts. If we could there would have been no reason for Jesus to come and do it for us.

Galatians 2:16–21 NRSV

16 yet we know that a person is justified not by the works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ. And we have come to believe in Christ Jesus, so that we might be justified by faith in Christ, and not by doing the works of the law, because no one will be justified by the works of the law. 17 But if, in our effort to be justified in Christ, we ourselves have been found to be sinners, is Christ then a servant of sin? Certainly not! 18 But if I build up again the very things that I once tore down, then I demonstrate that I am a transgressor. 19 For through the law I died to the law, so that I might live to God. I have been crucified with Christ; 20 and it is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. 21 I do not nullify the grace of God; for if justification comes through the law, then Christ died for nothing.

The only way to truly reconcile our lives with the life Christ calls us to in the sermon on the mount, is through the work of the Spirit in and through us.