Live by the Standard

What would you do if money came raining down on you? This very thing happened to a poor neighborhood. On the highway above the slum, an armored truck wrecked and turned over. The collision caused its rear doors to open and spill out hundreds of thousands of dollars. As the money floated to the ground below, the people acted like human vacuum cleaner. No bill or coin was left behind. The street was clean. Not a trace of the money was found by the time the cops responded to the accident.

After the confusion had died down the owner of the money asked people to return what they had collected. few people brought back a few dollars, but the majority of the people who had taken the money refused to give up their “blessing.” In fact, several people who were quoted by the media said that “God caused the truck to wreck and that money was a gift from Him.” These people had no problem with seeing God as a good God who provides for His people. But they were blind to God’s law against stealing and greed.

Our passage today is of critical importance. It is Christ explaining the law of God. Jesus has been accused of destroying and minimizing the law of God. As a result, many felt less obligated to follow God’s law, feeling that if they kept the law in the back of their minds, they had the Christian liberty to interpret behavior as they saw fit.

Christ pulls no punches and comes straight to the point:

Matthew 5:17 a

Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets:

Christ is not just speaking of the first 5 books of the Old Testament but of the whole Old Testament.

This morning we are going to look at what Christ teaches about the Word of God.

The true disciple of Christ lives by the standard of the Word of God.

As the people in the story, we don’t just pick and choose what we want to obey or not. Because of the attitude of the religious leaders of Christ’ day, He brings up this important topic.

Christ points out three things for the true disciple. Christ confirms the truth of God’s Word, He warn us to keep His Word, and calls us to be genuine with God’s Word. First, Christ confirms the Truth.

Christ Confirms the Truth of God's Word

Matthew 5:17–18 KJV 1900

Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.

Jesus, while speaking to His disciple was laying the groundwork for some of the heavier things He was about to talk about. He was calling to His authority on the topics ahead.

The religious leaders of their day, decided that God’s Word was not clear enough so they “added to the law.” They made a “oral law,” that they placed over God’s law. Jesus was about to say somethings that would strike the minds of the religious like a sledgehammer.

He would sound to them as if He was anti-law. He would insist that the law could do nothing for them but to define sin. It cannot save them, even if they would keep it perfectly.

Many, any even today say that you can earn your place in heaven by living to a “standard” of good works. They say do this or that and you will have a home in heaven. But we know that you cannot get to heaven by works.

Ephesians 2:8–9 KJV 1900

For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast.

This type of “works” was what the leaders taught. Jesus was about to flip that on its head with grace.

Grace is the unmerited favor. Imagine you are half a million dollars in debt. Someone comes to you and writes out a check for $500,000, saying, “This is all for you, to cancel your debt. You don’t have to do anything but reach out and take it, and it’s yours.” So you take the money and pay your debt. You are now debt-free and totally in the clear. You received grace—nothing more, nothing less. You were impoverished; you received riches from another person. The fact that you are now debt-free is a hundred percent due to your benefactor, zero percent due to you.

But Jesus assured His Jewish listeners that He was not at all anti-law. On the contrary, He was going to fulfill it. That is, to both keep it and explain fully its original intention.

Grace does not contradict the Old Testament it fulfills it.

The Word fulfill means “to fill out, or expand.” It does not mean to bring to an end. Jesus was not taking away from the law or the Bible, nor was He adding to it. He was clarifying its original meaning. After all, He was its author. Christ confirms that He was not contradicting God’s Word - not as it was “commonly understood”, but as it was originally intended.

Christ was making it clear that the Word of God would stand.

Matthew 24:35 KJV 1900

Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away.

Christ Warns to Keep God's Word

Matthew 5:19 KJV 1900

Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.

Just because we have are under grace does not mean we can live the way we want without consequences.

Jesus kept and taught the standards of the Bible perfectly. He was without sin, right? The true disciples are to understand the Scriptures in the same way Jesus did. We are not to note just how Christ did this, we are to emulate or follow His example.

We are not to become relaxed with the standards of the Bible. God and His Word does not change.

Malachi 3:6 KJV 1900

For I am the Lord, I change not; Therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed.

Hebrews 13:8 KJV 1900

Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever.

Does this mean that we must follow every little food law and things like that in the Old Testament? not necessarily. We do not have to make the sacrifices like the Old Testament either. Why? Because Jesus was the final sacrifice.

Hebrews 9:9–15 KJV 1900

Which was a figure for the time then present, in which were offered both gifts and sacrifices, that could not make him that did the service perfect, as pertaining to the conscience; Which stood only in meats and drinks, and divers washings, and carnal ordinances, imposed on them until the time of reformation. But Christ being come an high priest of good things to come, by a greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this building; Neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us. For if the blood of bulls and of goats, and the ashes of an heifer sprinkling the unclean, sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh: How much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God? And for this cause he is the mediator of the new testament, that by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions that were under the first testament, they which are called might receive the promise of eternal inheritance.

Although, we are some things we don’t follow today, we don’t throw the whole thing out. There are still many things to live by and learn from in the Old Testament. A good example is the 10 commandments.

The point Christ is making here is that we are to live by the standard that is set is His Word. Living Righteously. We often see this as a bad thing. But Christ means to live in right standing with God, Not as if we are better than someone else.

A word we often use for this type of living is Sanctification.

Sanctification is the ongoing supernatural work of God to rescue justified sinners from the disease of sin and to conform them to the image of his Son: holy, Christlike, and empowered to do good works.

Romans 12:1–2 KJV 1900

I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.

Sanctification then is living freed from sin. We do this with the help of the the standard of God’s Word. That why teach and preach from the Bible. And why we encourage everyone to read and apply it to their lives.

Turn to Romans 6:1-11, we will see that Because of Christ we can be and are freed from living a life of sin.

If you have placed your faith in Christ you are freed from sin. But that does not mean with no longer sin. But we can actively chose to not sin. But only by living and applying God’s Word.

The process of sanctification can be compared to an iceberg, which is almost 90% under water. As the sun shines on the iceberg, the exposed part melts, moving the lower part upward.

In the same way, we are usually aware of only a small part of our sinfulness and need, which is all we can deal with at any one time. However, as the light of God’s work in our lives changes us in the areas we know about, we become aware of new areas needing the work of God.

Many over thousands of year have misused or misguided thoughts about Sanctification. Choosing to live “holy” outwardly. This show is not Genuine. People have not changed. Thinking we can fool God by acting. We can fool people, but not God. Christ then calls us to be Genuine with God’s Word. Not to be fake.

Christ Calls to be Genuine with God's Word

Matthew 5:20 KJV 1900

For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.

Jesus says here, that their righteousness must exceed the righteousness of scribes and Pharisees. That is to say, it must stem from within and not hypocritical. In cannot be a surface “righteousness” where one merely conforms outwardly. We must be like Christ and chose to live free from sin inwardly.

You can fool me, or pastor, or mom and dad but you cannot fool God. God knows the thoughts and intents of the heart

Hebrews 4:12–13 KJV 1900

For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight: but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do.

You cannot deceive God.

Jesus is saying here then, in order to get to heaven or live according to the standard of the Bible is must be with the heart.

The Pharisees didn’t keep the commandments, they made new ones. The misused, misinterpreted, and misapplied the commandments. They shaped the commandments to make them say whatever they wanted.

Christ is telling the true disciple to be genuine with God’s Word.

Conclusion

Many today take the Bible and make it say whatever they want. Why because they want to justify living the way they want. They like living in sin. But for the believers, the true disciple to live that way would be uncomfortable, uneasy, and a travesty. But eventually the tug of the Spirit within you will get softer. That is a dangerous place to be. Don’t get that way. Don’t allow even the smallest sin to stay in your life.

(Tree story)

Maybe today you cannot live freed from sin. But none of us can on our own, but by the grace of God. That Grace is offered through the salvation through Jesus Christ.