In a day when the Jewish religious found themselves every ‘loophole’ they could find in the Old Testament law about making oaths and promises, in Matthew 5:33-37, Jesus made it very clear that those who were quick to make oaths and promises that they never intended to keep, were avoiding a serious issue. God does not expect His people to only tell the truth when they are forced to swear on oath. The true disciple of Jesus will be known by their honesty and truth-telling. God’s standards remain hight, but there is grace freely given to all who seek it – even to those who have failed to keep their word.

In a day when the Jewish religious found themselves a ‘loophole’ in the Old Testament law about divorce, in Matthew 5:31-32, Jesus made it very clear that the issue goes much deeper than what was popular at the time. Jesus taught that the only ‘biblical ‘grounds for divorce are sexual immorality, and that those who divorce for other reasons end up breaking the seventh commandment if and when they remarry. This is a difficult topic for many, especially when the divorce rate is so high, however God’s standards are there to be followed and we must not forget that His grace is freely given to all who seek it – even to those who have failed to keep their marriage vows.

When dealing with false and slack interpretations of the seventh commandment ‘You shall not commit adultery’, Jesus, in Matthew 5:27-30, made it pretty clear that obedience to the commandment goes much deeper than just refaining from the physical act. Jesus pointed out that the root of adultery begins in the yes and spreads to the heart. Lust is the problem! To show how dangerous this is, Jesus the proceeded to tell men to ‘pluck out their eye’ if their eye offends in this way. He was not meaning this literally, but making a point to show that we should take extreme action to avoid this sin, so that we do not end up suffering more awful consequences.

Oops…human error (mine!) means that the first few minutes are missing from this audio…so what follows here is what was said and you’re welcome to follow the audio from the end of the written part 🙂 Continue reading →

In Matthew 5:21-26, Jesus addressed the question of the right understanding of the sixth commandment, ‘You shall not kill’. While the Pharisees were content to understand that they had obeyed this commandment by refraining from the physical act of murder, Jesus took it a whole lot deeper. He pointed out that the real problem is with the root cause of anger in our hearts, which can lead to murdering people by our tongue and also having difficult and real conflict within our relationships. Thankfully Jesus died for murderers and for those who sin with their tongues too and there is grace for all who fall short!

In Matthew 5:17-20, Jesus addressed the question of where he stood in relation to the Old Testament, particularly the Law of Moses. This is a question that troubled many in his time and continues to trouble people today. Jesus said that he came to fulfill the Law, not be in opposition to it. More than that, Jesus upheld the Old Testament as being the Word of God and taught that the standard of righteousness we need in order to enter God’s Kingdom has to be greater than that of the Scribes and Pharisees – that is, it needs to be a true (not hypocritical) righteousness that comes to us by God’s grace and so is not merely outward but inward.