Sermon Tone Analysis
Overall tone of the sermon
This automated analysis scores the text on the likely presence of emotional, language, and social tones. There are no right or wrong scores; this is just an indication of tones readers or listeners may pick up from the text.
A score of 0.5 or higher indicates the tone is likely present.
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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
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
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.
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