The Call to Perfection

Matthew 5:43–48 NASB 2020

43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘you Shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 so that you may prove yourselves to be sons of your Father who is in heaven; for He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. 46 For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Even the tax collectors, do they not do the same? 47 And if you greet only your brothers and sisters, what more are you doing than others? Even the Gentiles, do they not do the same? 48 Therefore you shall be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

A great deal of weight

“Perfection is a word that carries a great deal of weight.

Some when they hear it begin to think of all the ways they failed

Some when they hear it begin to think of all the ways they did not do what they think is enough

Or maybe we think what’s the point? Perfection is impossible in this world! So we turn the other direction and walk away

Verse 48 is a difficult verse. Do we really think Jesus would give us this statement without a way of understanding it?

What if we make the mistake so many do by taking a verse out of context?

What if this verse should be taken in context with all the things Jesus said starting at verse 5?

What if I told you this is not a command?

It is not in the imperative

A Greek verb in the imperative is a command.

Instead the “shall be” is about having the quality of being perfect or mature in one’s behavior

So it’s less about what we are doing and more about how we are living!

How should we live as the people of God?

This verse is in the context of the sermon on the mount.

Which is about a life lived in the Kingdom of God

Remember the blessed attitudes?

Then he moves on the the miss-interpretation of the Jewish teachers, who had missed the heart of the old law

You have heard them teach not to murder, but you are also to merciful and compassionate

You have heard them teach not to commit adultery, but having lust in your heart you have sinned already

You have heard them teach the law permits a husband to get a divorce, Jesus teaches that to treat women as objects is not in the kingdom of God

You have heard them teach not to break an oath, Jesus teaches your word is to mean something so don’t get tied in oaths

You have heard them teach eye for eye, tooth for tooth, Jesus teaches that we and our oppressors are human. Its about looking at the oppressor in the eye and recognize they are human too

Do you see what Jesus did here?

He reinterpreted and reworked what the Jews had been hearing in the synagogue from the teachers of law.

Jesus is saying it’s not about legalism it is about love!

It’s not about a list of things you do, it’s about how you live!

Love Your Enemies

When Jesus gets to the part of His sermon about loving enemies He is continuing His reinterpretation of the law for the people of God

The Jews were taught that loving your neighbor is loving those like you

Consider Matthew 5:46

Matthew 5:46 NASB 2020

46 For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Even the tax collectors, do they not do the same?

Jesus wants us to understand that we need to love our enemies too. Again seeing people as people

Do you see what happens?

Loving enemies becomes a radical notion that enemies are people too!

Loving neighbors is easy and expected.

It’s expected that we love people who are like us, have the same goals, the same faith

Loving our enemies, though is unexpected and difficult

We are actually following God who loves all His creation

It reveals a life guided by the Spirit.

The world teaches that we are expected to hate our enemies, people who are different, different goals, different faith.

This is not the case for people who are citizens of the Kingdom of God

Perfect Love

Do you see that only after teaching on loving enemies does Jesus make the statement about being perfect

The placement of the statement is strategic because the sermon on the mount is all about breaking the traditional legalistic keeping of the law.

In context perfection should only be viewed through the lens of love

You see we cannot be perfect apart from love because they are connected and cannot be separated

When we can break from letter of the law and legalism focusing instead on whom we are loving that is when we find perfection and love.

This is what verse 48 is talking about

Matthew is not teaching something we cannot find else where in the New Testament

Paul in the definition of Love in 1 Corinthians 13 uses similar words

Connecting love and perfection is at the heart of the gospel

Because love is at the heart of who are as the people of God

We see this also in 1 John 4:8-11

1 John 4:8–11 NASB 2020

8 The one who does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9 By this the love of God was revealed in us, that God has sent His only Son into the world so that we may live through Him. 10 In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. 11 Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.

How well this ties to our mission as a church to Love God and Love people “Building an authentic community of believers who Love God and Love People”

Conclusion

Focusing on the word “perfection” in a social context we can drown in it and be placing a burden on ourselves not intended by Christ

We get bogged down then in all the ways we fall short

However, the call to perfection is not an isolated one. It is a statement of Jesus about the reality of a life lived in the kingdom of God.

To live out verse 48 then is to love utterly.

Our lives then become a picture of what it means to be a child of God in this world.

This is where people see the kingdom of God in this world!

So in the midst of this Lenten season may we confess and lay down our obsession with perfect actions and pick up our call to love so that we truly find perfection in the way our heavenly father is perfect.