How Do We Look at Others?

As we continue our study of Jesus’ ministry we reflect on what we’ve considered so far. John the baptist came preaching and teaching, offering a baptism of repentance and forgiveness of sins. Jesus ministry shows that forgiveness is granted through him. That in Christ, true forgiveness is found and true repentance happens.

What is repentance? Repentance is the turning away from a certain kind of behaviour, thinking and believing, rejecting it in favour of truth. For example, suppose a child, without knowing it was wrong, decided to help himself to a cookie any time he wanted. One day, after his mom found out the cookies were disappearing at an alarming rate, caught him in the act of taking cookies. In getting caught the first time, he was told that he was not allowed to take cookies whenever he wanted, but that he needed to ask first.

Repentance means that he would never take cookies again without asking. But what the child discovered was now that he knew it was wrong, he desired to sneak cookies even more! It became a real struggle for him. It seemed like cookies were all over the place. It seemed like, now knowing that it was forbidden to do so, his mom kept putting them out where he could see them. She even put them out in a clear container which didn’t leave their deliciousness to the imagination at all.

So he began to come up with different ideas of how to avoid the temptation. He first asked his mom to hide the cookies, so he wouldn’t be tempted. But that didn’t work. He still knew they were there. Then he thought he’d avoid going into the kitchen, but that didn’t really work either. His brain started to think about the cookies, how delicious they were. He imagined he could visualise the number of chocolate chips in each cookie. He imagined the taste, the way the chocolate would melt in his mouth, how the crispiness of the outside was countered by the chewiness of the inside. In fact, he even made up a little song that he’d sing to himself, he called it “Crispy-Chewy.” His name was Hines, Duncan Hines.

But that only made his desire stronger and stronger. He was at loss as to what to do. It seemed that everywhere he went, there were cookies. He saw cookie ads. Every TV show had cookies in it. Every movie, there were people sitting around, enjoying cookies. There were even shows that had nothing but great big cookie parties. All kinds of different people enjoying cookies together.

He tried to stop watching TV. He tried to stop watching movies. But then all his friends started talking about cookies. They talked about all the different kinds of cookies. What could he do?

By now you’ve realised that I’ve been talking about something other than cookies, right? Hopefully, you’ve recognised that I’ve referred to some of the ways that we’ve tried to curb our desires. But how well do they work?

The passage Jesus is quoting from, is the Ten Commandments, specifically, the seventh commandment. You shall not commit adultery. Adultery, strictly speaking, is when a married person engages in intimate activity with someone other than their spouse.

There were a lot of people in Jesus’ day who were guilty of adultery, even though they had never engaged in intimate activity with another person. And this is true today. With the advent of the pornography industry, the internet, you can find whatever desires you can imagine, anywhere. In fact, it is now so normal to objectify and make sexually explicit, that the Super-Bowl half-time show purposely provoked such thoughts, all under the guise of the empowerment of women. We could go on into a discussion also about how the Super-Bowl event is the largest sex-trafficking day in the US. Blogger and pastor, Tim Challies has a helpful article on his website, challies.com, called “8 Sins You Commit Whenever You Look at Porn”.

So, what does Jesus teach us about this? He says, the problem isn’t limited to what you do with your physical body. If you look at someone in such a way that it makes you want to eat cookies with them, so that you imagine eating cookies with them, then you’ve already committed adultery in your heart. Jesus is teaching us here that the problem is internal.

But praise be to God! Jesus has come to fulfil the law. He kept it perfectly! He has taken our sinful heart, our stone hearts out of us, and has replaced them with hearts of flesh, true hearts that beat for truth, righteousness, love and purity.

Now, the heart and the mind are connected. They work together. Both for wicked and for good. The sinful heart, John Calvin says, is an idol factory. It is always looking for something to worship. And it, the sinful heart, isn’t content in worshipping God alone, it looks for other things, even good things to worship alongside God. So what can we do?

But praise be to God! Jesus has come to fulfil the law. He kept it perfectly! He has taken our sinful heart, our stone hearts out of us, and has replaced them with hearts of flesh, true hearts that beat for truth, righteousness, love and purity.

Mr. Hines could have tried to avoid the temptation of cookies by never choosing to eat them ever again. But that denies the inherent goodness in cookies. When used in moderation and within the proper bounds, as when his mom said it was okay, he could fully enjoy them.

It is the same way with physical intimacy. The world lies and says that no boundaries are necessary. You can do whatever you want, it is your body. Jesus teaches otherwise. Jesus teaches us that each one of us is holy, each of us is the temple of the Holy Spirit. Each one of us is a member of the body of Christ, so each one of us is a bride to Christ. So, it doesn’t matter if you are single, you are married to Christ, so fornication—that is physical intimacy outside of marriage, when neither partner is married, is still adultery. Married couples have become one flesh. Therefore they cannot give themselves to another.

So when Jesus says when a man looks at a woman with lustful intent, he has already committed adultery with her in his heart. Just a second, this isn’t a problem only with men. Women are just as susceptible. It might look different though, their attraction isn’t merely physical, there is a different kind of intimacy. For them, reading material can be a very strong and lustful influence, but in our society today, there’s a huge upward trend in the consumption of porn by women. When Jesus says that anyone who looks at a person with lustful intent, you know, when they are picture eating cookies with someone either married or unmarried, they are guilty of sin.

So what is the answer? In the verses following, Jesus uses hyperbole to make his point. He isn’t telling the person who looks to literally pluck their right eye out—the left eye is just as guilty—he’s saying, obedience is costly. It takes work. But it is far, far better to deny oneself the momentary enjoyment than to spend eternity in hell.

A very helpful book I just read is “Respectable Sins” by Jerry Bridges. I highly recommend it. I wish I could tell you more about this book, but I will provide a link to it in the Beyond Sunday Blog post. Essentially, a repentant person must become self-controlled in mind and heart.

The repentant person must become self-controlled in mind and heart.

But the first step in that is embracing the truth. God is our one, true desire. No one, nothing can compare to him. The sinful heart refuses to believe this, and keeps trying to find satisfaction in anything and everything else. It even convinces the mind to try that forbidden thing, that other thing, anything again and again and again.

So, guard your heart with the breastplate of righteousness and your mind with the helmet of salvation. You see righteousness replaces the heart of licentiousness. It moves the heart to true passion: God himself. The helmet of salvation saves us from wicked, evil thoughts, and encourages us to turn our thoughts to good things.

Now then, the second step is to discipline the heart and the mind. This takes work. This takes effort. Jesus likens it to plucking out your right eye, or cutting off your right hand, or your left eye or left hand, if you are left handed. Jesus is referring to what is most preferred, skilled or valuable to us.

Have you ever considered how easy it is to sin? How easy it is to spend time doing something that is wrong, whether it is being lazy, spending time on social media, or games on your phone, or whatever?

It is much, much harder to discipline yourself to be attentive to the things you need to do.

So love God. Expend energy in getting to know God. Read this. Pray.

Get to know God. We can’t put him first if we don’t know him. Don’t merely rely on devotionals. Dig into the Bible itself! Immerse yourself in the Bible. It takes effort to get to know Jesus. Do it. But don’t expect it to happen all by itself. You have to put in effort!

Fight against your natural desires. Paul David Tripp in his August 21, 2013 Wednesday Word teaches that there are two things that we must battle against in order to

That’s what being in relationship with Jesus is like! But just as it took effort to get to know those people, it takes effort to get to know Jesus. You have to spend time reading his Word, the Bible. You have to put in time. It is worth it. Do it. But don’t expect it to happen all by itself. You have to put in effort!

So the question is, how do we look at others? We look at them as Christ commands us. We don’t look lustfully. Let us guard our hearts and our minds, taking thoughts and desires captive to Christ. When we look at others, consider everyone as a brother or a sister. Repeat that in your head, if you have to.

Two more quick things. You can’t do this alone. God put us in a congregation, not only so that we can learn grace from each other, after we inevitably sin against each other, but so that we can encourage each other, help each other, be accountable.

Related to that, is that you can’t do this by your own strength. You need God’s strength. You need Jesus in you.

The good news is that Jesus is already in you. And he is more than willing to be your strength and power. Yes, you can live the life Christ created you to live, but only in Christ alone. Amen.

Let us pray: Father in heaven, we all confess that we have sinned. We have looked at, or otherwise considered others with lustful intent. Jesus, by your life, death, resurrection, ascension you have forgiven us. Help us repent, help us turn away from lustful intent by considering carefully what we watch, where we look what we think, what our hearts and our minds desire. May you fill and fulfill all our desires.

As we sing our song of response, In Christ Alone, don’t forget that the church is Christ’s body. We can find help with all our struggles in one another, working together for God’s glory. Let’s sing.