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We're going to begin in verse number 17 this morning. The title of my sermon is Raising the Bar of Righteousness. Raising the Bar of Righteousness. That's exactly what Jesus is doing in this chapter. Let's start in verse 17. The Bible reads, Think not that I am come to destroy the law or the prophets. I am not come to destroy but to fulfill. 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. 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. For I say unto you that except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, you shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven. Now let me start out by just explaining what this passage of scripture is. This is known as the Sermon on the Mount. Matthew 5, 6, and 7 make up collectively the Sermon on the Mount as it's known. And what's interesting about this is that this is the first preaching of Jesus Christ that we really get into as we read the New Testament. And nothing in the Bible is incidental, coincidental, or accidental. The Bible is laid out the way it is for a reason. We talked about last week how Matthew 1 starts out with chapters 1, 2, and 3 laying down some really important biblical truths as we get into the New Testament. It lays some important foundations. Well the same thing is true here. There's a reason why the New Testament starts out this way. There's a reason why this particular sermon is the first sermon that we read when we start reading our New Testaments in Matthew chapter 1. And what Jesus Christ is doing in this passage is he's raising the bar of righteousness. Why? The Pharisees and the Sadducees were the people at the time that were considered to be the most righteous, the most religious, the most separated, living the most holy and godly lives. But that was not really true. That wasn't really the case. Now what's the significance of this passage? What's Jesus trying to get across? Well first of all I'm just going to kind of give it to you in a nutshell and then we're going to go through point by point and look at the six illustrations that he gives. What he's saying here in verse number 17 when he says, Think not that I am come to destroy the law of the prophets. I am not come to destroy but to fulfill. 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. The first thing he's doing is he's making it crystal clear that the Old Testament is God's word. You know as we start reading the New Testament, that's something God wants us to understand right away. The Old Testament is God's word. It's not mostly God's word. It's not a rendition of God's word or a version of God's word. No, no, no. He's saying it is perfect, every word of it, every jot, every tittle. And he's saying that the one that he had then had been preserved. That it's the same as it was before. And he's saying that no jot or tittle will pass from it until it's all fulfilled. So this is different than people like Mohammed who come along and say, oh well, the Old Testament's been corrupted. Let me tell you what God really says. Or oh, the New Testament's been changed. Here's the Book of Mormon, you know, to tell you what we should really believe. No, no, no. Jesus Christ starts out by affirming the Old Testament as God's perfect preserved word. And he points to the law of Moses and says, I'm not here to destroy that. I'm here to fulfill that. So he's going to be building upon the foundation of the Old Testament. He's not just going to sit there and discard it and come in with something totally different. So that's an important doctrine that he clears out of the way right away. Then he says, 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 shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven. So he's affirming the Old Testament law and he's affirming specifically the commandments that are given in the Old Testament. And then he says in verse 20, 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. So what he's saying there is, you have to be more righteous than the Pharisees. The people that you look at and think, they're the most righteous and holy and godly people. You have to be more righteous than them to even get into heaven. The scribes are people who spent their whole day just copying scripture. They're studying scripture. They knew the Bible or at least they thought they knew the Bible. But he's saying you have to be more righteous than them. He says otherwise you will in no case. He's saying there's not going to be a single case of a person, not even one case of a person who gets into heaven being less righteous than them. What's he saying? They're not going to heaven. Your righteousness has to exceed their righteousness in order to get into heaven. Then he says things in verse 22 like the fact that even just saying thou fool could be enough to send you to hell. If you're angry with your brother without a cause and just say thou fool, that could be enough to send you to hell. Not only that, he even says that even just looking on a woman to lust after her would be enough to send you to hell. Because he even says in verse 29 if thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out and cast it from thee. For it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish and not that the whole body should be cast into hell. That's in the context of looking on a woman to lust after her and committing adultery with her already in his heart. You see the first thing that Jesus is laying down in the New Testament is that no matter how separated you are, no matter how many hours you devote to studying God's word or separating yourself unto spiritual things, you are not righteous enough to get to heaven. Nobody in this room is righteous enough to get to heaven. And that's what he's teaching here. No one. Because there's not a man in here, or at least this would be true of 99% of men. There's not a man in here probably of adult age who's never looked on a woman to lust after her in their heart. There's nobody in this room who hasn't lost their temper for a dumb reason and gotten angry with their brother without a cause and called them all manner of names. Without cause. Without any reason. Every single person is a sinner. And remember the law is our schoolmaster to show us our need for Christ. And that's what Jesus Christ is laying down in this passage. He's establishing the law. He's establishing the law and affirming the law that he might show the sinfulness of man to understand you can't get to heaven on your own righteousness. And the Pharisees were trusting their own righteousness to get them to heaven. The Sadducees and the scribes were trusting their own righteousness to get them out. And it wasn't going to be enough. He said your righteousness has to exceed that. Or you'll in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven. Go to Galatians chapter 3. We're going to come back and expound Matthew 5. But first of all I'm just giving you the overview so that you can understand the passage. Go to Galatians chapter number 3. Galatians chapter number 3. The title of the sermon is called Raising the Bar of Righteousness. Now here's why it's called that. Because if you believe in a works-based salvation which most so-called Christians actually believe in a works-based salvation either by keeping the commandments, not committing certain sins, doing certain works of the law or works of the flesh or good deeds or whatever. Look all the different ways that people can dress up works salvation. Whether they call it repenting of all your sins or making a commitment to Christ where you're going to live for him from this day forward and where you're going to follow his commandments or whether it's obeying this law or that law. If you believe in a works-based salvation, you know what you're going to have to do? If you're going to teach, hey, in order to be going to heaven you have to live a righteous life, you know what you're going to have to do? You're going to have to lower the bar a little bit so that you can make it. That's why the religions that teach a works-based salvation usually have lowered the bar of righteousness the most. Have you ever noticed how people who teach that salvation is a free gift just by believing in Jesus, that if you just believe on the Lord Jesus Christ you're saved and that it's a free gift, it's by faith, it's not of works, it's easy to be saved. Have you noticed that those people are often the strictest? A lot of people don't understand why. A lot of people are confused and they think, well, if it's all free, if it's all by grace, if it's all by faith, if there's no works necessary, why are you guys doing so much work? Why are you living such a clean life? Why are you so strict? Here's why. Because when you raise the bar of righteousness, you know what you realize? That you don't measure up and then you put all your faith and trust in Jesus to save you. But you still, through the love of the Lord, strive to follow those commandments because you have that goal set very high to where, yeah, you're not going to hit that goal but you know what, that's the goal. And you're not going to try to say, oh, that's not a sin, that's okay, that's not a sin. You're going to admit, yeah, it's a sin. Let's get it out of our lives and you're going to work toward that. Whereas if you're one of these work salvation teachers who says, oh, well, you have to repent of all your sins to be saved, well, here's the thing, you're going to have to classify a lot less stuff as a sin because then you've got to make it a little easier like, well, as long as I don't commit the actual act of adultery, as long as I don't commit murder, as long as I don't get drunk, as long as I don't do something horrible like murder someone or rob a bank or whatever, then I'm good enough. Jesus says, no, you're not good enough. You're not as good. Oh, you've never committed adultery? Well, but you have lusted. Oh, you've never committed murder? Well, you have been angry without a cause. You have hated your brother in your heart and you've done all these other things that are sin. Okay, now look at Galatians chapter 3 verse 21. The Bible says, is the law then against the promises of God? God forbid, for if there had been a law given which could have given life, verily righteousness should have been by the law. And by the way, righteousness was never by the law because there never was a law given that could give life. Otherwise, righteousness should have been by the law. But the scripture had concluded all under sin that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe. Everybody's concluded under sin so that the promise can be offered to everybody that they can be saved if they do what? What's the last word there in verse 22, believe. But before faith came, we were kept under the law. Shut up under the faith which should afterwards be revealed. Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ that we might be justified by faith. But after that faith has come, we're no longer under a schoolmaster for ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus. You see, we need the commandments. We need the law of God to show us we're a sinner. And we're never going to come to Christ for salvation unless we realize that we're a sinner. Because otherwise, what do we even need to be saved from in the first place? In order to be saved, you got to first realize that you're a sinner. You're not going to go to the doctor until you realize that there's an illness. You're not going to take the medicine until you realize that you're sick. And so they that behold thee, not a physician, but they that are sick. So when we realize that we're a sinner, that's when the fear of God comes over us, the terrors of hell. And what does that cause us to do? To seek salvation. And then we find salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. We become the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus. But if people think that they're a pretty good person and that that's going to get them into heaven, then there's no need for the Savior. Just live a good life, go to heaven. What do you need him for? And that's why it's funny when you ask people sometimes how they know they're going to heaven. Sometimes they won't even mention Jesus. Oh, I do this. I do that. I quit this. I quit that. They have a salvation that's not even based on the death, burial and resurrection of Christ at all. It's just based on their own works, their own deeds. So in the Sermon on the Mount, we're opening up the New Testament as far as the preaching of Jesus Christ with some important truths. Number one, hey, the Old Testament's God's word. I'm not here to do away that. I'm here to build on that, fulfill that. I'm not here to destroy it. I'm here to affirm it. And then he starts out by saying, wait a minute, those of you who think you're going to heaven because you're righteous, because you're so good, because you're so holy, let me tell you something. Your holiest role model is not going to get into heaven. You have to be more righteous than him. And you know what that's going to cause people to do that hear that message? They're going to think like, well, if that guy who's that religious and separate, if he's not righteous enough, how in the world am I going to get in? Well, you know what? A person who has that realization is now ready to get saved, is now ready to get saved. I mean, when you're out soul winning and you run into somebody who you, the first thing you show them is that they're a sinner. And if they just go, oh yeah, of course. And then you show them how, you know, sinners are doomed and deserve to go to hell. I mean, the person who just readily accepts that readily admits that readily understands that there's a really, really good chance that that person's going to get saved. The people that are going to be hard to get saved are the ones who think that they're righteous. They think that they're a good person. They think, well, I've done some sins, but I mean, I haven't done anything that bad to warrant going to hell. I mean, that's the person that's hard to get saved. They're not even close. Jesus is basically getting people to first base here of just realizing the condemnation, realizing the fact that they're doomed. Now, with that in mind, we'll flip over, before we go back to Matthew 5, go to Romans 3. Romans 3 is one of the clearest chapters on salvation by faith. I mean, it makes it crystal clear that we're not saved by our works, we're only saved by our faith, and that we're all sinners, we're unrighteous in the sight of God. We could read the whole chapter. There's a lot here. He says, of course, in the most famous portion, verse 23, for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God, being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. Verse 26, to declare, I say at this time, His righteousness. How is your righteousness going to exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees? I'll tell you how, when you have His righteousness. Because your righteousness isn't going to ever measure up, but His righteousness will. That's why Paul said, be found in Him not having my own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith. So, he says here, to declare His righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God, verse 26, to declare, I say at this time, His righteousness that He might be just and the justifier of Him which believeth in Jesus. Where's boasting then? It's excluded. By what law? Of works? No! But by the law of faith. Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law. But look at verse 31. This is the key I want to point out. Because this is exactly what Jesus was saying in Matthew 5. Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid, yea, we establish the law. You see, teaching that salvation is by grace through faith and that it's not of works actually establishes the law and makes it stronger. Because now we can preach hard on sin, we can take a strong stand on what's right and wrong because we're not constantly trying to justify ourselves like we never make a mistake. Well, that's not really a sin because that's something I do so that can't be wrong. Because I know I'm going to heaven and I'm going to heaven by being good and I do that so therefore maybe that's not so bad. You know, that's the thought process and that's why it used to blow my mind. At work as a teenager, I'd be witnessing to Catholics that I worked with. And these people that just lived a wicked lifestyle, they're fornicating, they're going to the strip club, they're getting drunk. And then I'd give them the gospel and here's what they'd say, well you can't just live however you want and go to heaven. And I'm thinking like, here I am, you know, going to church, not drinking any alcohol, you know, not committing fornication, not partying, not going to the gentleman's club and then here you are telling me that I can't live however I want and go to heaven. But it doesn't make any sense, folks. But that's the way people think when they're in a workspace, salvation, they're blinded. Go back to Matthew 5 now with that in mind. So it's no coincidence that this is the first sermon because he wants to first of all just make it clear from the get-go, we're not eliminating the law or the Old Testament. That's all God breathed. That's all inspired by God, okay. And what's interesting is that Matthew, more than any other gospel, is putting the fear of God into you and talking about hell more than any gospel. That's why it makes sense that it comes first. The gospel that's going to show us that we're sinners, that we're doomed, that we're on our way to hell without Christ. That's why Matthew hammers the law, hammers the Old Testament, hammers on the doctrines of hell. Look, if you're going to show people scriptures about hell from the four gospels, yeah, Luke 16 is a pretty popular passage, but there's a lot in Matthew about hell. Why? Okay, because he's laying down right away the condemnation of this world. Then, you know, as you work your way through the Bible, you go Matthew, Mark, Luke, John. By the time you get to John, he's not talking about hell hardly at all. What he's hammering in John is believe, believe, believe, believe 90 times in the book of John. It's believe, right? Because these books are emphasizing different things. They're all true, but they're emphasizing different things. And it makes sense to get you lost in Matthew, get you condemned, realize that you're damned before we can get you saved in the book of John where he's making that really clear. And obviously, we can find salvation in all four gospels and we can find condemnation of sinners in all four gospels. There's no question about that, but there's a different emphasis. So in Matthew chapter 5, he says in verse 20, 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. Look at the last verse. Be ye therefore perfect, verse 48. Be ye therefore perfect even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect. And the Bible also tells in James chapter 2 that whosoever shall keep the whole law and yet offend in one point, he's guilty of all. I mean, good luck with that. So now we get into six specific examples. This is the meat of the sermon here in chapter 5. Six examples. Let's look at example number 1, verse 21. You've heard that it was said by them of old time, thou shalt not kill. And whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment. Now, that's not a super hard commandment to obey, is it? I mean, I've never murdered anyone, and I don't see myself ever murdering anyone. I can't even imagine a situation where I would ever murder anyone. And so that's pretty easy. And, you know, I'm not going to ask for a raise of hands, but I think probably most of the auditorium could raise their hand and say, hey, I've never murdered anyone. Well, Jesus wants to make sure that you don't just think that you're so righteous because you didn't murder anybody, right? Because then he says, well, yeah, you know that. You've heard that. It was said by them of old time, thou shalt not kill. Verse 22. But I say unto you that whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment. And that's something that everyone has done. Everyone has done that. Everybody's gotten angry at their brother without a cause. Now, there are some times when anger is warranted. That's why it says without a cause. Of course, if you get these modern versions of the Bible, like the NIV, they'll take out without a cause. Even Jesus is a sinner because Jesus got angry at times, but he didn't get angry without a cause. He only got angry over a righteous reason, but we've all been angry with our brother without a cause. You know, we haven't said Rekha because we don't even know what that means, but we've said stuff like that, right? We've just blown off our mouths for no reason, and I'm talking without a cause, just calling names, saying mean things for no reason. Not saying, look, even that's a sin, and all sin dooms you to hell. Even one lie would send you to hell. So he says here, don't even get angry with your brother without a cause. Verse 23, therefore, if thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath ought against thee, leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way. First be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift. Agree with thine adversary quickly, whilst thou art in the way with him, lest at any time the adversary deliver thee to the judge, and the judge deliver thee to the officer, and thou be cast into prison. Verily I say unto thee, thou shalt by no means come out thence, till thou hast paid the uttermost farthing. So he's using an illustration of earthly justice that's going to take you to task, and he's basically using that to symbolize God's justice that's going to take you to task for your sins. Verse 27, you've heard that it was said by them of old time, thou shalt not commit adultery, but I say unto you that whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart. Now look, not committing adultery is not a super hard commandment to obey. Why? Because it takes a lot of effort to commit adultery. I mean, you're not just going, whoops, I committed adultery. I mean, if somebody's committing adultery, that's probably seriously premeditated, because think about how much time and effort it takes you to build relationships and, you know, think about when you married your wife. You know, you meet, you talk, you date, you know, to actually go out and commit adultery, I mean, you have to make a decision to go do that. That's not something that you fall into or accidentally do. You know, you make a, look at David when he committed adultery, what did he do? You know, he stands up there, he looks at Bathsheba bathing, right? But there were a lot of steps, it wasn't just like 10 minutes later, what have I done? There were a lot of steps there, because what did he do? He first asks who she is, he finds out, he asks around, he asks his buddies, who is she? Then he sends other people to go fetch her, and then they bring her, and then she shows up, and then he commits, I mean, look, he had plenty of opportunities to say, wait a minute, what am I doing? Time to stop here, right? Like when he first asked about her, he could have then said, well, sorry, I shouldn't have even asked about her. She's already married, I'm married, shouldn't even be having this conversation, right? Or else, you know, when they bring her, he could have just said, hey, listen, sorry to, you know, bring you over here, this is a big mistake, you know what I mean? Have a nice day. I mean, there were a lot of points along, do you see what I'm saying? So committing adultery, or committing murder, obviously, is something that is pretty easy not to do. I mean, don't pat yourself on the back too hard, because you've never committed adultery and you've never committed murder, you see what I'm saying? So it'd be pretty easy for people to lift themselves up with pride, like, well, I didn't commit adultery, I didn't commit murder, well, join the club, because most people aren't going to commit adultery or murder either, even a lot of people that aren't even saved are never even going to commit adultery or murder, right? Millions of Americans who don't even believe in Christ will go through their whole lives without committing murder or adultery, but wait a minute, he said, don't pat yourself on the back too hard, because whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her has committed adultery with her already in his heart. Now that's something that would be easy to slip into, that's something that would make most people feel guilty to think about, you know what, I've done that, I've had that bad thought, I've gotten angry with my brother without a cause, I've looked upon a woman to lust after her. So what he's trying to show here is that everyone is condemned, that's one thing he's trying to show. But number two, he's also trying to raise the bar of righteousness, what's he saying? You don't walk away from the sermon saying, okay, I get it, we're all sinners, so I'm going to go out and get angry with my brother without a cause, and I'm going to go out and look upon a woman to lust after her because everybody's doing it. No, no, no, that's not what we're saying here. That's the sermon called Raising the Bar of Righteousness. See once you realize that that's a sin, then you strive not to commit that sin. You get your temper under control. You get your mouth under control, and you get your eyes under control. Not because you don't want to go to hell because you're already saved, but because you want to please God, because you love Christ, because you want to live a godly life so that you can please him, and so that you can be used greatly by him because we know that sin is going to harm our lives and damage our lives, even if it is just in our mind or in our tongue. So there's a double meaning here. We need to get both meanings. Number one is to realize that we're all sinners, and number two is to realize, hey, Jesus Christ wants us to raise the bar of righteousness in our life. Let's raise the bar of righteousness. That's why he warns of hell. If thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out and cast it from thee, for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell. And if thy right hand offend thee, cut it off and cast it from thee. So to look at the strange woman or to touch the strange woman, he'd say, look, you'd be better off to just chop off your own hand or pull out your own eye than to go to hell. Now let me say this, if I believed in a repent of your sins salvation, if I believed in a works-based salvation, if I believed in a salvation through the works of the law, I would not rip out my own eyeball, but I'll tell you what I would do. I'd move out of the city and I'd take my family and I'd go move out in the middle of nowhere somewhere away from temptation, away from sin, away from wicked images, out of sight, out of mind, and I would live a lifestyle that was just really clean and separated where I could just avoid sin, if that's what I thought, and you know, I'd still fail to be perfect because we're all human, but I'm just telling you that's what I would do. And you know what? That's what a lot of these Catholics do. They go lock themselves up in a monastery. They go out and buy themselves somewhere. It's called a hermit. They go and live as a hermit. They go and live as a monk. They go and live in a monastery. Or whatever. And they punish themselves and meditate all day and pray and chant and never look upon a woman, whether to lust after her or not. They just say, well, I'm just not even going to look at her. And sometimes they do mutilate themselves. Why? Because they don't understand salvation through Christ. That Christ's goal, he said in John 17, was not to take us out of the world and isolate us, but to keep us from the evil. That's why I'm going to live in the city. Why? Because this is where the lost people are. This is where our job is, to win the loss to Christ. And we need to realize that the grace of God is sufficient for us. Yes, we should strive to avoid sin, but we know that if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. And he's the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world. But does that help you understand now why Catholics will often do those kind of weird things? Of isolating themselves, and other cults have done the same thing, where they say, hey, let's move the whole church out in the middle of nowhere, get away from all the sin, and we're going to have a compound, and we're going to, you know, that's what they do. It's not biblical. It isn't right. They're missing the whole point. It'd be like if somebody just heard this sermon and just said, oh, that's it, I'm ripping out my own eye. It's like, whoa, buddy, you missed the point. And people need to use common sense when they read the Bible. But let's keep reading. It says in verse 31, here's example number 3, it had been said, and notice, this isn't, it wasn't said in the Bible, necessarily, it's just, it's been said, whosoever shall put away his wife, let him give her a right of divorcement, but I say unto you that whosoever shall put away his wife, saving for the cause of fornication, causeeth her to commit adultery. And whosoever shall marry her that is divorced, commiteth adultery. Now, again, this is raising the bar of righteousness here, because, again, your average person in America, even unsaved, is not going to literally commit adultery. What does it mean to literally commit adultery? I mean, we're talking actually you're married and you go and sleep with someone else, or you're single and you sleep with one who is married. That's also adultery, by the way. That's every bit as much. You say, oh, I was single. Yeah, but the person that you were with was married, that you're an adulterer, too. You're an adulteress as well, okay? If you're a single woman with a married man, that's adultery, okay? So here's the deal. Not only is that a sin, but he's saying also if you divorce your wife and marry someone else, that's adultery, too. Now it's not literal adultery where you're going to be stoned to death, but it's a figurative adultery just like looking on a woman to lust after her is a figurative adultery. It's adultery in your heart. It's sin. And it's the same way with divorce and remarriage, that it is a type of adultery. Obviously it's not the literal sin, but it's the same thing. Number one, he's showing a lot more people have sinned and deserve to go to hell than would like to admit it. And number two, he's raising the bar of righteousness saying, hey, when you get married, you need to stay married till death do us part. Now the Pharisees were big time guilty of this. And it's so funny because people today, they have the totally wrong idea about the Pharisees. They think the Pharisees are people who are strict. So anytime you preach anything strict, they're like, oh, you're a Pharisee. I've even had people call me a Pharisee over this issue. If I said, hey, don't get divorced and remarried, it's sin. You're a Pharisee. Well, wait a minute. That's the opposite of what the Pharisees taught. The Pharisees taught that you could divorce your wife for every cause. That's what the Pharisees taught. So how am I a Pharisee for preaching against divorce? The Pharisees taught that you could divorce your wife for any reason you want. That's what the Pharisees taught. And Jesus rebuked them in Matthew 19, and he taught them the same thing that he's teaching here in Matthew 5. You'll find this twice, Matthew 5 and Matthew 19. You see, when a person divorces their wife, like let's say I were to divorce my wife, the Bible says that I'm causing her to commit adultery. That means when she goes and marries someone else, it's my fault, because I caused her to commit adultery by divorcing her. Isn't that what it says? Let's read it again. I say unto you that whosoever shall put away his wife, saving for the cause of fornication, saying for any reason other than fornication, causes her to commit adultery. Why? Because chances are if I divorce my wife, she's going to marry someone else, and I'm causing her to commit adultery, because I'm putting her in that situation now where she's going to end up getting remarried, and I'm causing her to commit that sin of adultery. That doesn't mean that she's without sin for committing the adultery, but I'm also responsible for causing it. I mean, look, it's right there, folks. It's pretty clear, isn't it? If you don't think this is clear enough, it says the same thing in Matthew 19. It says the same thing in the book of Mark. It says the same thing in Luke chapter 16. Same teaching is found in Romans 7, 1 Corinthians 7. It's in a lot of places, folks. It's a clear teaching of Christ. You don't hear it a lot, because there are so many divorcees today in America that every pastor is afraid to offend the divorcees. And look, if you're divorced here and remarried, I'm not here to offend you, but you know what? I need to lay down this truth. And there are plenty of people in here who've not been divorced and remarried, and if you are right with God, oh, thou divorced one, you ought to want them to hear the truth to not make the mistakes that you made. And if you want them to make the same mistakes that you made to make you feel better, then you're wicked in your heart. You should want them to do better. You know, I've made mistakes in my life, and I want my children to grow up and be better than me. But somehow these divorced parents, it's like they almost want their kids to get divorced sometimes, and it's sick. It's sick, but it's out there. I've observed it. It's sick. Look, you should want the best for your kids. You should want the best for all the kids of the church and the young people and the young married. And look, the people who got married, you know, less than a month ago or less than a year ago, they need to hear it. And you know what? The singles need to hear it, because they need to understand that before you get married, you better be sure that you know what you're doing, because you're making a commitment for life. And you better count the cost before going into that relationship and be ready to be sacrificed on that altar of that relationship, and it's till death do us part. It's for better or for worse, and there's no way out except the tomb. You go into it with that attitude, you're not going to marry an idiot. Think about that. Think about it. You see these young teenage girls, and they date complete idiots, derelict losers, right? People who don't work. They're all punked out. They're the bad boy, cool dude. Well, you know what? Just realize that you're going to be with that idiot for the rest of your life. And you know what? He's going to determine what kind of lifestyle you live. He's going to determine whether you live in a dirty shack or whether you live in a home that's clean and sanitary and safe for you to live in. It's going to be based on his work. By the way, if he just wants to get so physical with you and it's all about being physical, you better hope that you're the only person he wants to be physical with for the rest of his life. Think about that. If you knew you were getting married for life, you'd go into it marrying the right kind of person. Oh, man, that girl looks so good, you young guys. She looks so beautiful in the short skirt and the tight fitting outfit and the low cut top and she's got all the tattoos and the piercings and she looks so good. But hold on a second. Is this who you want raising your children? Is this who you... You say, oh, you're offended. Then get offended. I'm preaching the truth right now. Is that who you want homeschooling the kids? Do you think that that woman is likely to be faithful to you? Do you believe that this woman wants to live a godly Christian life? If you don't want to live a godly Christian life, I don't even know why you come to church here, but if you do want to live a godly Christian life, you better marry somebody who also wants to live a godly Christian life. Maybe if you knew that marriage was for life, when your parents said to you, hey, I don't think that that young lady is right for you or I don't think that that young man is right for you, you know what? You'd at least give it a second thought and think, well, my parents have been around for a long time and maybe instead of just getting all mad and slamming the door to your room, you'd ask them and say, why? Why should I avoid this young man? Why should I avoid this young lady? And at least see what the reasons are. You know, and if they told you a reason that's just crazy or something, but you know what? A lot of times parents have some pretty good reasons. And instead of getting mad and shutting it off, why don't you just ask your parents and say why? And not like, why? But like, why? You know, with an actual desire to know why. Why is that? And then actually think about what they tell you and process it, right? And think there's a, well, you know what, they've got a point. You know, the bad boy or the sleazy girl, you know, they might be fun to hang around with now, but when you start thinking about when you're 30 and 40 and 50, don't be a fool that only thinks about the next month. You know, you need to think about life is long, okay? And look, I'm not trying to discourage people from getting married. I want people to get married. I want, you know, because some people have the opposite problem. They're afraid to ever commit to anything or make any decision. But what I'm saying is make a good decision. Make an educated decision. You know, figure out what you want out of life. Figure out what the costs are and follow God's plan for your life that's laid out in scripture. Don't be dumb and don't just marry the first girl who comes along or the first guy who comes along. You know, make sure you think that through. And listen to your parents. And I'm not saying the parents should choose the spouse. I don't believe that. But you know what? Your parents can give you godly wisdom and godly advice and godly counsel. So if you're single, think about who you marry. If you're young married, realize it's till death. Make it work. Figure it out. Get through the problems. Get through the obstacles. You've been married a long time. Same thing. You've been divorced and remarried. Well, here's the thing. It's impossible to go back to your original spouse according to scripture. So you stay with the one you're committed to now and you don't break a second vow. You stay with your current spouse and you forget those things which are behind and you reach forth unto those things which are before. I got to move on. That's just one small point of the sermon. Let's keep going. It says in the next example, again, you've heard that it has been said by them of old saying, thou shalt not forswear thyself but shall perform unto the Lord thine oaths. But I say unto you, swear not at all, neither by heaven for it's God's throne, neither by the earth for it is his footstool, neither by Jerusalem for it is the city of the great king, neither shalt thou swear by thy head because thou canst not make one hair white or black. But let your communication be yea, yea, nay, nay, for whatsoever is more than these cometh of evil. So again, he's just tightening things up and raising the bar of righteousness. He's saying don't just make vows and swear by the Lord's name or swear by Jerusalem or swear by this and that and then keep it. He's saying it's better just to not swear at all. So what is this talking about? Well, in the Old Testament you'll often see people place curses on themselves like the Lord do so to me and more also if thus and so. Or they'll say as the Lord liveth. Now here's the thing. There's nothing as sure as the fact that the Lord liveth. So don't throw that. You know, it's like when people say, man, I know this as much as I know I'm saved. Bad thing to say. Because there's nothing. Just say yea. Just say nay. You don't have to say as the Lord liveth or the Lord do so to me and more because you know what? The Lord might do so to you and more also because sometimes we think we're going to do something and we don't. So you know, be careful with that. I got to hurry up. Verse 38, you've heard that it's been said, an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. But I say unto you that ye resist not evil, but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if any man will sue thee at the law and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also. And whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain. Give to him that asketh thee and from him that would borrow of thee, turn not thou away. Now it's clear that all of these examples are teaching the same thing. We have an Old Testament view of righteousness as abused by the Pharisees. Because you can find not lusting in the Old Testament. You can find loving your neighbor in the Old Testament. You can find all this stuff in the Old Testament. Jesus Christ is just raising the bar because the Pharisees have been lowering it. But what's funny is that when people come to these last two examples, what they'll do is they'll try to act like Jesus is changing the Old Testament law or the Old Testament teaching. Now isn't that exactly what he said he wasn't going to do? Didn't he start out by saying, hey, I'm not here to destroy the law. I'm here to fulfill. Okay, did the first example change? He didn't say, well, commit adultery, but don't look to lust. Go ahead and commit murder, but just don't get angry. He's saying, look, God's word in the Old Testament was correct, but let me take it a step further. Example number one, God's rule was correct. Let's take it further. Don't kill, but also don't get angry with that cause. Adultery is wrong, but let's take it further. Don't even look with lust. If you do put away your wife, you were supposed to give a writing of divorcement not to just disappear and not come back and whatever, but hey, let's take a step further. Don't even get divorced, you know, except for the cause of fornication, which is something I've gone into in many sermons. I'm not going to spend a lot of time on that. It doesn't say adultery. It says fornication, which is something totally different, but anyway, I'm out of time. So the point is that what he's doing is he's not saying do the opposite of this or that. What he's doing is he's affirming what the Old Testament taught, right? He's affirming it and then he's adding another layer that you really could find in the Old Testament anyway, but Jesus just needed to make it clearer to these people because they've been listening to too many Pharisees and Sadducees that were lowering the bar of righteousness, so he's raising the bar of righteousness. This is not teaching that God was wrong when he said an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. God's never wrong. When God said an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, that is correct, but what he's doing is he's not replacing that or deleting his own word. What he's doing is he's adding another layer to that, so here's what he's saying. You already know the rule that says an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. That's criminal justice is what that is. If you study that in the Bible, you look up the term eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, that's criminal justice. The Bible teaches the death penalty, life for life, hand for hand, foot for foot, burning for burning, eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth. That's God's word. He's not throwing that out any more than he threw out thou shalt not commit adultery, but what he's doing is he's saying, but if people do stuff to you, you can take the higher road by forgiving them and letting things go. For example, if somebody wants to sue you and take away your coat, just give it to them. Give them your cloak also. Somebody wants to force you to go one mile, I'll go two miles. What's he saying? When he says resist not evil, he's not saying, hey, don't defend other people. Is that what he's saying? Don't defend other people. No, no, no, what's he saying? He's saying you don't always have to defend yourself. Sometimes you can suffer yourself to be defrauded. Let him take the coat off your back. Let them smite you on one cheek, turn them the other also. That's what he's saying. He's not saying, hey, you see some kid getting the snot beat out of him? Just turn the other cheek for him. Obviously you'd still want to step in and obviously, you know, if the police come and some kid has been beaten to the point where his eye is knocked out and broken and damaged for life, you wouldn't just say, well, you know, Jesus said that that was Old Testament. No, no, no, you'd still say he ought to be punished for knocking that person's eye out. Right? But what he's saying is, look, when people do you wrong, let it go. And the examples he gives are not like, hey, somebody beats you to the point where you lose an eye. No, no, no, he's saying like somebody sues you to take your coat, you let him have the cloak also. Just little things. I mean, if somebody asks you to walk a mile, is that really a big deal? Just go to. You know, people will sometimes persecute you and mess with you and rip you off. Here's what he's saying. You know what? Just let it go. Be peaceful. Get along. That's what he's trying to say. He's not saying don't defend other people and he's not saying get rid of the criminal justice system. That wouldn't make any sense, folks. So that's what he's actually saying. Hey, somebody smites you on the right cheek, turn on the other also. And you know what? I've had people physically assault me before. And I remember when I was out, I made a decision a long time ago that if I'm out soul winning or if I'm talking to somebody about the Gospel or the Word of God or in any other situation that if a person comes up to me and shoves me, right? If a person comes up to me and shoves me or if a person slaps me in the face, I will not enter into a fist fight with that person. That's a decision I made. And you know what? That has kept me from a lot of fist fights because I've probably over the last, since I've been an adult, you know, the last, because when I was a teenager, I didn't follow this. Somebody pushes you, you get in a fight with them. And I'm not saying that was right. It wasn't right. But I'm saying when I became a man, I put away childish things. And in my adult life, when I became an adult and I've been an adult now for about 17, 18 years, I made a decision that if somebody pushes me or slaps me in the face, I will not just unload on that person. And I probably in the last 17 years have had someone either shove me or slap me in the face probably about 20 times. Just different situations. Either you'll be out soul winning and somebody will push you or somebody will push you for other reasons. And I've just had people do that in all manner of situations. And you know what? What if every time somebody pushed me, I just went, I mean, think about that. You'd get in a lot of fight. And you know what? There's a reason why as controversial as I am and as bold as I've been and as outspoken as I've been, I've never been in a fist fight in my adult life. There's a reason why. And the reason is because of this scripture and because of deciding, hey, just because somebody pushes me or slaps me or says something to me, I'm not just going to enter because the Bible says that a pastor can't be a brawler. He can't be a striker. And I hope I go to the grave without ever getting in a fist fight ever again. Now I've enjoyed martial arts for recreation. So yeah, I've punched and been punched many times over the last 17 years. But you know what I'm talking about. And look, this ought to be our attitude, macho men. We need to understand that we don't have a need to persuade everybody how tough we are. Where we got to go around and prove it and get in all these fights and brag about it or something. That's childish. That's what you do in junior high or something, you know, wrongfully. That's what people do when they're drunk, right? It's foolish. That's what he's saying here. That's what he's teaching. Now I do, I will say this, if anybody throws a punch at me, I will unload on that person and I will do everything in my power to win that fight and to incapacitate that person, you know, without even thinking about it. And here's why. Because if somebody actually punches you in the face, you don't really know what their intentions are. At that point it becomes self-defense. That's where I draw the line. You may draw the line somewhere else, but I'm telling you my opinion is that if somebody really wants to hurt you, they're not going to slap you in the face. Slapping in the face is to insult you. It's not to hurt you, right? If somebody wants to hurt you, they're going to ball up their fist like this and they're going to punch you in the face. And if somebody balls up their fist and punches me in the face or tries to punch me in the face, I'm going to defend myself and I'm going to try my best to beat the snot out of that person and to hurt them as badly as I can just to protect myself or my family or whoever I'm with. Because I don't know, are there other assailants? You know, I don't know where this person's going to stop if this person's there out to kill me. But when somebody slaps you or when somebody pushes you, that's only to mess with your pride. Who knows what I'm talking about? That's to mess with you. Slapping, pushing. Look, a real fight involves punches with closed fists. So don't be one of the, well, he hit me first. Well, how did he hit you? Like this. That no. Let's move on. The last point here. You've heard that it's been said, thou shalt love thy neighbor and hate thine enemy. Verse 43. Let me stop and say this. The Bible teaches that nowhere. Nor does the Bible teach you to love your neighbor and hate your enemy. So again, this is not Jesus changing the Old Testament or somehow annulling that which is from the Old Testament. Because the Old Testament teaches you to love your neighbor as yourself. And it even teaches you to love your enemy in the Old Testament. It says that if your ox or your ass of your neighbor, I'm sorry, if you see your enemy's ox or ass fall in the ditch, you pull it out and help your enemy, it says. So even Leviticus teaches you to love and help your enemy. Not only that, how about chapter after chapter after chapter of David loving his enemy. The best example, right, where he loves Saul, Saul's his enemy, Saul's doing him wrong, and he keeps blessing the one who's persecuting him. So this is not a new teaching. This isn't Jesus changing anything. Because the Bible never says love your neighbor and hate your enemy. He just said you've heard that it has been said. Just like the divorced one is worded different as well than what was actually taught. But I say unto you, love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute you, that you may be the children of your father which is in heaven, for he maketh his son to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust, for if you love them which love you, what reward have you? Do not even the publicans the same? What's he saying here? He's raising the bar of righteousness. Don't just show me how much you love your neighbor or love your friends or love your family. Show me how much you love your enemy. And he's saying that's a higher level of righteousness. Also if people wanted to believe in a workspace salvation and they wanted to twist something that, oh, as long as I love people, I'm going to go to heaven, there's a lot of people who think that. He said, okay, do you love your enemies? Do you love those who hate you, persecute you, say all manner of evil against you falsely? And you know what? The truth of the matter is that everybody has struggled in this area at some time in their life where somebody did them wrong and then they didn't love that person. Now look, we're not, and by the way, this doesn't say love everybody. No, we don't love pedophiles. We don't love reprobates, but our enemy is who? The Bible defines who our enemy is. Who is our enemy? It's someone who curses us, someone who hates us, someone who despitefully uses us or persecutes us. And here's the thing. The Bible tells us to overcome evil with good because a lot of times the people who hate us today or persecute us today will change their mind, especially if we show them the love of Christ. We can turn them around. There's a guy who goes to our church who told me, he said that when he first heard my preaching, he hated me so much that he contemplated coming here and physically harming me. Like not that he was really going to do it, but just it was a fantasy to him. Like it was just something he thought about how he would just love to just come here. And that's hate. But here's the thing. But as he listened to more preaching, as the Spirit of God spoke to his heart, as he saw scripture, you know what? Now he loves me. Now he's my friend. So what if, what if I took a person like, and I didn't know that he felt that way anyway, but I'm saying like, let's say, let's say there was somebody who felt that way that I knew felt that way and I'm just like, oh yeah, well if they hate me, then I hate them. And then I just, right? Well then here's the thing. Even I might never be able to, to overcome evil with good. I'm never going to make that person a friend. You know, we, we had a situation recently where we had some, this, this just happened in the last couple of months where we had someone who was persecuting us and you know, lying about us, making false reports about us and, and just doing everything that they could to cause us problems. And you know, obviously the gut reaction is to want to fight back. And you know, my, I said to my wife, I said, well, I said, you know, are we just going to keep going back and forth? Because I said, if we keep going back and forth, it's just going to keep escalating. And I said that, you know, this person's not even saved. This person does not know the Lord. And the thing that, you know, the thing that kind of woke us up is that we saw this person literally fall over drunk, just fell over drunk. And you know what? We felt bad because we felt like, you know what? That's sad. That's sad. I mean, that's, you know, how can you be mad at someone when you see them living a sad life? And so I, you know, I said to my wife, I said, you know, you don't want to just keep escalating here. Why don't we try to just be nice, right? And I said, you know, why don't we make some food or give some kind of a gift, you know, and, and try to do something nice. And you know what? We did that. She did that and it ended up working. And then this person was, has been nothing but nice to us now and everything is fine. See what I mean? So that, that, that's a good way to hit, but you know, our, our first instinct just as human beings is like, you know, we got to fight back. We got to fire back. But you know what? If we fired back, it probably still be going on. And then we would endure more harm. They would endure more harm. You understand what I'm saying? So it's better to make a peace offering and look, we're not talking about making a deal with the devil folks. I'm not talking about, Oh, let's reach out to these fags and let's reach out to these pedophiles and let's reach out to heretics or people who are thrown out of our church for preaching false doctrine and heresy. No, these are wicked enemies of the Lord, not our personal enemies. We have nothing against them personally. It's nothing personal about it. Why we're against heretics, false teachers, false prophets, pedophiles, anybody who is an enemy of the gospel, enemy of the Lord. You know what we're talking about? We're talking about your enemies. We're talking about the people who lie about you at work. The people who every time you make a mistake at work, they go tell the boss, make sure he knows that you did something wrong, right? Even if you fixed it, they'll go report that. We're talking about the people who will treat you bad for no reason, lie about you, persecute you, maybe even assault you, maybe even do serious harm to you. We're talking about people that you could reach out to and give a peace offering or pray for them and love them in your heart. You know what you can say? Father, forgive them for they know not what they do. The guy that I mentioned earlier in our church, he didn't hate me because he's just a wicked rotten person. It was just because he didn't know better, he's confused. And he learned the truth. Other people, maybe the reason why they're treating you so bad at work and lying about you, maybe it's because they're insecure about themselves. Maybe they just don't know Christ as savior. Maybe they just are having a bad day or maybe their spouse is divorcing them or maybe they're trying to have kids and they can't have kids or maybe they just lost a bunch of money or maybe they just found out that they have cancer or that someone else that they love has cancer. You know what? Pray for them, love them, bless them and a lot of times you can overcome evil with good. You know, even when I was beaten by the border patrol like however long ago that was, a long time ago, seems like another lifetime, eight years ago or whatever, you know what? I literally in the back of the police car with my knees all jammed up, just holding the bathroom for hours and hours because they wouldn't take me to the bathroom. I literally prayed for every one of those agents that I knew the name of that they would be saved and I said, God, forgive these guys because they don't know what they're doing. They've been brainwashed. But Lord, if they're not saved, Lord, send a soul winner in Yuma, Arizona to their house to go give them the gospel. That's why I prayed in the back of the police car. Hey, send the soul winner. I don't want them to go to hell. We're to love our enemies but obviously the enemies of God or the enemies of the gospel or the enemies of our church or the, you know, we need to realize, hey, we don't want to reach out to these people and we don't want to reach out to perverts and things like that because we need to understand that those people are toxic individuals. But at the same time, we need to follow this scripture and say, hey, people that do us wrong, we don't always have to retaliate. And this goes hand in hand with the previous point. Somebody smites you on the cheek. Isn't that pretty similar to somebody who's persecuting you or despitefully using you or whatever? And again, we're not talking about self-defense. We're talking about people who are just messing with you, attacking you, hurting you. You don't always have to retaliate. Why? God said, vengeance belongeth unto me, saith the Lord. I will repay. I will recompense. Avenge not yourselves but give place under wrath. Let God take vengeance. So the sermon in a nutshell is this. Let's raise the bar of righteousness. First of all, if you're here today, if there's actually somebody here in this room and I don't think this is the case, but if there's somebody here today who thinks that you're going to go to heaven because of your righteousness or because you follow the laws of God or his commandments, you're not saved. And I pray that you'll get saved today. I pray that this sermon would show you that you're a sinner and show you the error of that so that you'll realize that your righteousness is not going to get you into heaven. And for those of us who are saved, which is either everybody or the vast majority of us is to realize, hey, let's raise the bar of righteousness. Let's not make excuses for ourselves. Let's get more righteous. Let's clean up our lives. Let's clean up our act. And let's not just take these six examples, but let's take the whole rest of the Bible too and raise the bar in our lives a little bit and make sure that we're not making excuses for things that are wrong. Well, at least I didn't commit adultery. Yeah, but did you look at that? Did you flirt with that and toy around with that and get close to that? We need to understand that Christ has a high standard for us to live in our lives and we should walk worthy of the vocation wherewith we're called. Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer.