Matthew 5, verse 21. We can't really ignore what came
before this, so I actually feel like I should read from verse
17 through 26, if you want to follow along with me there. In
this chapter, especially in the verses from verse 17 on through
the end of the chapter, the Lord Jesus Christ, in His sermon,
brings home to us The point, it brings it to a very sharp
point, what he's trying to say. And I think that if we miss this
point, we really completely misunderstand the sermon on the mount. And
I hope to get to that point in this sermon. But one thing I
want you to see that I think what we tend to do when we read
the Sermon on the Mount is the spotlight goes bright towards
our hearts. And we naturally have the same
response that we do whenever we find something wrong with
ourselves. We try to fix it. And so we think that we take
the Sermon on the Mount as a moral lesson. But it's not meant to
be a moral lesson. It's meant to be It's meant to
be an examination of our hearts under the spotlight of God's
law in order to show us our Savior, bring us to him and show us what
he's done. So he raises, in stark contrast to the scribes and Pharisees,
the demands that God places on us in his word. But he doesn't
leave us with those demands over us like an anvil ready to crush
us. He points us to Christ and then he teaches us that in Christ
all of our hope is found. So let's read here with those
things in the forefront of our mind. Verse 17, think not, Jesus
said, that I am come to destroy the law. I'm not trying to get
around it, not trying to bypass it. People will accuse me of
that later on in my ministry. That's not the point. Not come
to destroy the law or the prophets. I'm 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. Not the smallest commandment.
All will be fulfilled. Therefore, whosoever shall break
one of the least of these commandments and teach men, so he shall be
called least in the kingdom of heaven." That was the pattern
of the scribes and Pharisees and is the pattern of every self-righteous
natural man. That he tries to manipulate the
law to make himself look better in the eyes of men and in the
eyes of God, but it fails miserably. Because he dishonors God in doing
so, he makes God's law his servant rather than honoring God by it.
But then he says here, but whosoever shall do and teach them the least
and the greatest commandments, the same shall be called great
in the kingdom of heaven. That ascription to greatness
can only really be applied to the Lord Jesus Christ. He only
has kept all the law continually, perfectly, from his heart. And so that's really the setting
of the rest of what follows in the chapter 5 we're reading.
He says in verse 24, I say unto you that except your righteousness
shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees,
you shall in no wise enter into the kingdom of heaven. Entrance
into heaven requires righteousness, a perfect righteousness, a righteousness
that exceeds the righteousness of the best of men. A righteousness
that's inward, perfect, continuous, spotless in God's eyes. And that's
a righteousness that we don't understand. Naturally, we don't
understand it. And so he's going to remove all
the props and what follows. He's going to turn the light
on and expose us for what we are and show us our utter impossibility
of keeping God's law. He's going to show us the spirituality
of the law. And so, pay close attention as
we read these next few verses, and I want you to see that in
this chapter, and the rest of the chapter, six times, six times,
two phrases are used over and over. He says, you have heard,
that's the first part of the phrase, and the second part is,
but I say unto you. You've heard one thing, but I
say unto you." Now, as we read those things in this chapter,
understand this, that it underscores what was said of Jesus, that
He spoke with one as having authority. And so the first point I want
to make here, and I'll make the point before we read these verses,
is that Christ is speaking in this sermon authoritatively.
Authoritatively, he speaks and he explains the true meaning
of God's law. What God means by His law, the
spirit of that law, not just the letter, because that's what
we do. We look at the letter and the scribes were expert at
understanding the letter, but they didn't understand the spirit
of that law. And so when the Lord Jesus Christ
does that, He does it these six different times. We're going
to take just the first one today in these verses 21 through 26,
and I've entitled this message, Can a Murderer Be Forgiven? So
let's look at that. Verse 21, You have 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. I don't think
that any of us have actually taken the life, the physical
life of another person. And that was the law. That was
the way that men understood the law. Thou shalt not kill. The
scribes would make a point of pointing out that this means
you can't take a life, except in certain circumstances where
it's justified. You can't take a life. And if
you do so, you'll be in danger of judgment. That's what you've
heard, Jesus said. That was what they taught from
the law. That's what the men of old explained. That's how they explained the
law. That's what he means when he says, you have heard. The
teaching you've heard from God's law was, thou shalt not kill,
and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of judgment. That's
what I heard. That's what I heard as a child.
And not the people necessarily taught that, although they did,
but I heard that when I read it. That's the way I took it.
You read the letter of the law, you say, well, that's one that
I can say, that's the one I've met. You know, I haven't killed
anybody. But sadly, that's exactly what
we have done. Look what Jesus says, verse 22.
But I say unto you, I'm explaining now the spirit, the meaning of
what God said in the law when he says, thou shalt not kill.
And this is what he says, that whosoever is angry with his brother
without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment. The same words
are used, in danger of the judgment, in danger of the judgment. We
understood the law to say if you take a physical life, but
Jesus says no. It means this, if you're even
angry with your brother without a cause, without a just cause,
you shall be in danger of the judgment. It doesn't take us long to think
of an instance where we've been angry, does it, without a cause. The next thing he says here is
that anger is coming out now in words. He says, and whosoever
shall say to his brother Raka shall be in danger of the council.
The word Raka is not something you find anywhere else in the
Bible, and it's not something that we use. I never run around
calling people Raka. I probably call them worse, but
never Raka. But now you're going to go out
and want to call somebody Raka, huh? Because I told you you can't
do it. But the word Raka means to call, to think of someone
and to actually call them a name that indicates that their life
is worthless, that they're senseless, mentally senseless. And so therefore,
they're really, it would be better if they hadn't, we don't need
you around. You're an empty, vain person.
And you show it by your intellect. And we think, well, when have
I ever done that? We'll get to that in a minute.
But you'll be in danger of the council. But whosoever shall
say thou fool shall be in danger of hellfire. Now, hellfire is not something
I want to be in danger of. And so when I heard of these
things as a kid, how many times have you read these words and
wondered, what do they mean? And you thought, I've called
people fool before. Maybe I said it in a kind way.
You're being foolish. But I've probably called people
worse than that too. But fool here is a word that
goes beyond the word raka. Raka, think of this as, and I
read these definitions over and over again as I was looking at
these things and looking at how they're used in scripture. My best paraphrase of this is
that raka means to consider someone's physical life and their intellect
as worthless. The second one, ful, means to
consider someone's soul as worthless. You see the difference in extreme? That's my simplification and
helps me understand. It turns up the contrast and
I'll try to justify that from scripture here in a minute. But
now, this is raising the bar, isn't it? What does murder mean? It means to be angry without
a cause. It means to say to someone you're stupid or you're an idiot. To consider them to be senseless
and to be a mental retard. Really, that's what it means,
isn't it? Mentally, you're really not worth anything. And we did
that all the time in school. It was one of the favorite words
my kids used to call one another as we were raising our kids.
For some reason, those words just naturally cling to the lips
of children. And we use them later as adults
with much more venom, don't we? And then he says here, but to
consider your brother as only worthy of damnation and not savable
is to call him a fool. That's what it means. In your
heart, you can say it. And then when you say it with your lips,
what have you done? But revealed what's in your heart.
Now I want to look at these before we get to the rest of these verses
here, 23 through 26. And look at this thing of murder,
because this is what Jesus is talking about. You heard it explained
that murder is actually taking a life. But no, that's included. But it means more than that.
It means an attitude, a thought, a word. Recently, a man took
the life of two journalists on live TV. And he did it, he said,
in a note that followed, because white women and black men had
said things against him. He responded. As if he was justified
of actually taking a life because someone had used words against
him. You use words against me, I take your life. Now, he wasn't
justified, but it shows how that we, and you know that phrase
when you're growing up, you hear it all the time. Sticks and stones
may break your bones, or my bones, but words will never hurt me.
And it's not true. Words do hurt, don't they? They
go deep. In fact, in some ways they go
deeper than sticks and stones. because they leave a mental and
emotional scar that you hold and it festers and it creates
an attitude of hatred back towards other people. Murder is more
than physically taking a life, it's actually an attitude. Look
at 1 John chapter three. The first murder that ever occurred
in the history of the world was Cain's murder of his brother,
Abel. And it's tragic that anyone would
take a life, but it's more tragic that he would kill his own brother.
I always wondered as a kid, how could you kill your brother?
But then I realized that even in my own family, there were
more fights between the people of the household than there were
outside the home. I don't know why that is. I think
it has something to do with the revelation of what's inside of
us. Because we're put in proximity with one another. But look at
this. 1 John 3, verse 11. This is the message that you
have heard, that you heard from the beginning. That we should
love one another. Okay, now that's what God has
told us. And then He flips it. And He cites Cain. What's the
opposite of love? It's what Cain did. What's the
opposite? I mean, then what is murder?
It's what Cain did. What did Cain do? He says, not
as Cain, who was of that wicked one and slew his brother. Who is the wicked one? That's
Satan. What does Satan do? He is a murderer,
Jesus said in John 8, verse 44. A murderer from the beginning.
How does Satan murder? He speaks against people. He speaks first against God's
word. He discredits God's word in order
to deceive men. in order to tempt men to break
God's law so that God, in his justice, will kill them outright. And so he achieves his end, to
kill, by making them the objects of God's wrath through deceit,
through speaking against them. And so Cain was of that man,
of that wicked one. And he slew his brother. And
then it says, it asks this question, why did he slay him? Wherefore
slew he him? It says here in verse 12. And
he gives the answer, because his own works were evil and his
brothers righteous. What is this that Cain, why did
Cain kill his brother Abel? Because Cain saw that God received
Abel. For God to receive Abel, it meant
God said about Abel, his works are righteous. And God rejected
Cain. And Cain knew by that his own
works were evil. Why was Abel righteous? Because
Abel brought to God a sacrifice. And in bringing the sacrifice,
he looked with faith at Christ, the one the sacrifice represented,
and said, my only coming to God is in Christ. God can only receive
me, a sinner, by Him. And God received Abel and had
respect unto Abel and unto his offering, it says in Genesis.
So God imputed righteousness, the obedience of the Lord Jesus
Christ unto death, as Abel's righteousness before God. And
he received Abel on Christ, for Christ's sake, on Christ's behalf.
And Cain knew that Abel was received by God, accepted by God, approved
by God. And something rose up within
Cain's chest. It was called envy. Envy. Because God blessed Abel. And God didn't bless him. Why did God not bless Cain? It
was because Cain was disobedient. God told them how they should
bring a sacrifice. You can only come through the
blood of the Lamb. That was spoken It must have
been spoken by Adam because God had killed animals and clothed
Adam and Eve with skins and that had to be passed down. That's
why Abel knew it. And so Abel in faith believed
what God said. But he walked in unbelief. He did not believe God. And when
he walked in unbelief and God brought upon him the disfavor
that came from him rejecting God's word. He rejected God.
He rejected God's salvation. And God rejected him. And Cain
rose up with his envy, seeing the blessing that came on Abel,
because his sacrifice was accepted. And he hated Abel because of
envy. Now at that point, he had murdered
Abel. Envy, hatred, is murder in the
heart. What is envy? Envy is seeing
the blessing that God has given someone else, And hating the
fact that they received something that you didn't. And then thinking
that you deserved what they got, or you should have been given
it. And actually accusing God of not being fair. And not giving
me what someone else was blessed with. But God is just. God is right. And so we covet
what someone else has that God has given to them, and we accuse
God of being unfair because he didn't treat me with what he
should have given me. I should have got what I deserved
it. We think of ourselves as self-deserving. We think of God as being unfair,
and we hate the fact that someone else got more than we did. That's
murder. Have you ever murdered anyone? It's a shameful thing, isn't
it, to find ourselves beneath this spotlight? But look on in
1 John 3, he says this, verse 13, marvel not, my brethren,
if the world hate you. We know that we have passed from
death unto life because we love the brethren. He that loveth
not his brother abideth in death. Cain did not love Abel. He envied
him. He coveted what he had, God's
blessing. He hated him and he hated God
for blessing him. Whosoever hates his brother is
a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life
abiding in him." Murder is the most serious of crimes, isn't
it? It says in the Proverbs that greedy men, covetous men, lie
in wait to take the life of the owners thereof. Our lives are
ours. It's not yours to take my life.
It's not your life is yours and it's not mine to take your life.
Who gives life anyway? God gives life. For us to take
a life is for us to try to put out what God has created. For us to slander someone, let's
say we find someone who is mentally not up to our standards, Just
using the word raka. And we slander them in our heart,
or with our words, or with our looks, or with our silence, or
with any of these things. What we're doing is we're saying
that the potter has made a pot that we find to be flawed. Something's wrong with it. He
created this man or this woman in the image of God, and we find
a fault with what he's done. There's a proverb I was reading
in one of John Gill's commentaries, not related to Matthew 5, but
he says, a Jewish man left his place and he was riding on his
animal, his beast, and he saw this deformed man beside the
road. And he said to him, the deformed
man said to the man who was riding by, the Jew, he said, peace be
unto you, rabbi. And the rabbi said something
to him like, You are a deformed man, and he
didn't want to return his blessing of peace. He says, you're cursed. And the deformed man said, well,
you should talk to the one who made me, because the one who
made me made me this way. And then the rabbi immediately
realized his problem and he gets down off of his beast and he
begs the man for forgiveness. And he says, the deformed man
said to him, you have to go to the workman and tell the workman
that what you made was flawed. You have to go to him for forgiveness
because he's the one who made me this way. But that's just
a little story that helps us understand, I think, the nature
of the evil of finding fault with others, thinking about their
lives and murder. Look at another example of what
murder is, thinking about this. It says in 1 John 3.15, if we
hate, we murder. If we hate our brother without
a cause, we murder them. Look at Luke chapter 16. We'll look at a couple of places.
It's throughout scripture, actually. Luke 16. in verse 13. No servant can serve two masters
If you're serving one master, he's going to keep you busy all
the time. And if you try to serve two,
it's called moonlighting if you're an employee, and it used to be
forbidden. Now people do it because they
can't get full-time jobs. But no servant can serve two
masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or
else he will hold to the one and despise the other. You cannot
serve God and mammon. So here we have a servant who's
trying to serve two masters. But Jesus says, no, you can't
do that. You're either going to hate one and love the other,
or you're going to hold to the one and despise the other. You
can't serve God and mammon. The Pharisees tried to serve
two masters, God and money. They tried to put their confidence
in money, and they tried to put their trust in God. You can't
do that. One or the other. But we're all
like that. The teaching here shows us something
about hatred. It's the opposite of love. Hatred
is simply that, the opposite of love. If we fail to love,
we hate. If we give preference to one
over another, then we're showing love to the one and we're showing
hatred to the other. How often have we done this?
Think about this. How often have you shown preference
to yourself over someone else? And here's the most painful thing,
that as I was thinking about these things over the last few
days and even weeks, I realized And it comes to the point where
it almost makes you depressed. It does, in some way. If it weren't
for the gospel, I'd be completely in despair. But the very people
who love you and do you good, and the very God who made you
and does you good, we prefer ourselves over them,
so much so that we try to We covet what they have. We want
to be right in an argument. We want to promote ourselves
at their expense because we prefer ourselves over them. And this
is called hatred. This is called loving ourselves
and hating others. And it's equivalent to murder.
Look at Luke chapter 10, back a few pages. Here's another example. We're taking to some of these
examples because this is what the law really means. In verse
25 of Luke chapter 10, Behold, a
certain lawyer stood up and tempted him, saying, Master, what shall
I do to inherit eternal life? And Jesus said to him, What is
written in the law? How do you read it? And he answering
said, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and
with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy
mind, and thy neighbor as thyself. And Jesus said to him, Thou hast
answered right. Do this, and thou shalt live.
But he, willing to justify himself, oh man, what a folly to try to
justify yourselves before the Lord Jesus Christ. He says, And
who is my neighbor? And Jesus answering said this,
A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he
fell among thieves. The thieves stripped him of his
raiment and wounded him, and they departed, leaving him half
dead. All right, this man is going
to die, isn't he? There's no question about it.
If he's left, he's going to die. And by chance, there came down
a certain priest that way, and when he saw him, he passed by
on the other side. How young was I when I first
heard this story? Here's the man lying beside the
road and the priest is coming by and he sees him and he actually
makes a deliberate movement to the other side of the road. Why
do you think he did that? I think it was because so he
could quiet his conscience and say, I didn't see how bad shape he
was in, and so I just passed by. I can't look at that. It's not my problem, not my business. He left him there. He just walked
on. He passed by the other side of the road. And likewise, a
Levite, now Jesus points out these men as priests and Levites
for a good reason here, because this man who came to him was
a lawyer of the law. So he points out that these were
men who understood God's law. Likewise, a Levite, when he was
at the place, came and looked on him. He not only passed by
and went around him, but he actually went over and looked at him.
And then, he passed by on the other side. Now, what did these
first two men do to this poor man who was laying beside the
road? They murdered him, didn't they? He was half dead and they
murdered him. What does that mean? It means
that to simply neglect to meet the needs of someone is to murder
them. That's what it's saying. And
that's what John said, if we would have read on in 1 John
3, that if you see your brother in need and you don't meet those,
how does the love of God dwell in you? And how often have I
been guilty of all of these things? Envy, and hatred, and covetousness,
promoting myself at the expense of others, and neglecting, preferring
myself. This is murder. Now, I want to
take you to another place in scripture. Look at 2 Samuel.
2 Samuel, in chapter 12. This is a very notable passage
of scripture, but let me give you the summary of it here. David
had committed adultery with another man's wife, obviously. That man
was a faithful servant to David named Uriah. Uriah, I mean, when it was known when after David committed adultery
and that there was a risk that it would be made known David
needed to cover it up so in his cover-up he actually had Uriah murdered
physically murdered at the hands of his enemies Uriah's enemies
a faithful man to David and to Israel and he put him in the
first the front of the battle and had him murdered And then
he thought, in his wicked heart, this is all taken care of. It's covered up now. And then
it says in chapter 12 of 2 Samuel, the Lord sent Nathan to David.
And he came to him. And he said to him, there were
two men in one city, the one rich and the other poor. The
rich man had exceeding many flocks and herds. He had everything.
But the poor man had nothing. save one little ewe lamb which
he had bought and nourished up and it grew up together with
him and with his children. It did eat of his own meat and
drank of his own cup and lay in his bosom and was unto him
as a daughter." And there came a traveler unto the rich man,
and spared to take of his own flock, and of his own herd, to
dress for the wayfaring man that was come to him, but took the
poor man's land, and dressed it for the man that was come
to him. So, it's a pretty straightforward scene. A rich man has all the
sheep that he could possibly need. And yet, when someone comes,
he's going to feed this man. He's coming, he's going to feed
this man under the guise of being his friend. And so, instead of
taking from his multitude of sheep, he looks over into a poor
man's yard, he sees one little ewe lamb, and he says, get that. And he brings it, and kills it,
and feeds it to his friend. And look what David says. Now
David is the king. He's the judge. He knows right
from wrong. And he has the power to execute
that judgment. Verse 5, David's anger was greatly
kindled against the man. And he said to Nathan, As the
Lord liveth, the man that hath done this thing shall surely
die. die. All he did was kill a lamb. Is he worthy of death for killing
a lamb? No, but he's worthy of death. for having no pity on
this man who loved this lamb. He didn't care for the man and
killed his lamb, and for that he must die. You see what David
is revealing here in this? By his own words, his own judgment,
his own understanding of God's law, and he was a man who knew
it. he was saying that to hate a man like this rich man hated
the poor man was worthy of death hatred is murder and it carries
with it the death penalty now David in this parable was the
rich man he had taken Uriah's wife and not only did he take
his wife but murdered Uriah murder so the question really is this
have you Have I ever murdered? Have we done this? If you're
angry without a cause, if you speak against someone as if their
life was not important, or if you speak against someone to
the point where you consider them fit only for eternal judgment,
then you're guilty of murder. Look at James chapter four. Jesus is using his understanding
to reveal to us the spirit of God's law. Here, James chapter
4. Listen to what James says here.
Verse 11. Speak not evil one of another,
brethren. To speak evil is to murder. That's what Jesus is saying,
isn't it? To speak this way. to speak evil. All evil speaking
is just murder in the heart and murder with the mouth. Speak
not evil one of another, brethren. He that speaketh evil of his
brother, and judgeth his brother, speaketh evil of the law, and
judgeth the law. But if thou judge the law, thou
art not a doer of the law, but a judge. And there is one lawgiver
who is able to save and to destroy. Who art thou that judgest another? What a rebuke! James is saying
here, if you look at someone, and by your observation, and
your comparison of them to you, or even them to the law, in your
understanding, you use your your understanding of God's word and
you judge that person and you say that person should only receive
God's judgment. They're completely outside of
the ability of God to save. They're not worth saving. He
says you put yourself in the place of God and His law, and
you become not a doer of the law, but a judge, and you're
judging God as if He's unable to save. It's His law. He's the interpreter of it. His
own law promises the Lord Jesus Christ, and His own law says
that He has not only justice, but mercy. And so this is the
nature of, this is the attitude of Satan. This is the attitude
of wickedness and evil. To speak evil and to think evil.
And Jesus is pointing this out. It's to murder in our hearts.
And so back to Matthew chapter 5. It's murder in our heart. And I can tell you, I am guilty
of this. I am so guilty and so ashamed. and not only ashamed of myself
before men, but here's the thing, what did Jesus say? That if you
say this against your brother, you're guilty of hell fire. How
many times have you hear people say to other, to use the word damn you to other
people? It happens all the time, doesn't
it? verse 23 of Matthew 5 now he says 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 verse 25 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 you,
thou shalt not, thou shalt by no means come out thence, till
thou hast paid the uttermost farthing. Here the Lord Jesus is saying,
that we are murderers in our heart no man can deny from what
he said in verses 21 and 22 that he's not in his heart and with
his mouth has not murdered and not only not murdered but as
I said before murdered those who are who love and who care
for him this is the most shameful thing isn't it remember what
jesus said in verse 20 accept your righteousness exceed the
righteousness of the scribes and pharisees you shall in no
case enter the kingdom of heaven and now he says in verse 23 therefore
if you if you said these things if this is if this is what's
happening then Then when you come to the altar, he says, leave
your gift before the altar and go thy way and first be reconciled
to thy brother and then come and offer thy gift. Grace does
not permit hatred in the heart. Grace will not tolerate an attitude
of hatred, an attitude of not loving one another. Grace drives
down, drills down into our conscience and reveals to us first what
we are and shows us how we can be right with God through Christ
alone and won't leave us to rest until we do something as is described
here. And he says, to leave our gift,
go be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your
gift. And he states the same thing in a different way. He
says, 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. who is the brother, who is the
adversary in these verses, who is the judge, who's the officer,
what is the prison, and so on. Well, first of all, when we first
read this, we start to think, well, the brother must be the
one I've offended. And that's true. And we think
of it as my wife, or my children, or my brother, or my, you know,
those that we call brother in the Lord, and all these people,
my people I work with, and we think, ah, I've offended everybody,
I gotta go make it right. I'm never gonna make it back
to the altar, am I? And so we think this is the problem. I've committed murder and I'll
never be able to plug up the gap here. And besides that, when
I try to make it right with these people, what's going to happen?
Some of them are never going to be reconciled because I've
so offended them that they won't even want me to come to their
house and see them. But I think that there's something
being taught here that's much deeper than that. and much more
important than that. Remember, what Jesus said in
verse 17, Do not think that I am come to destroy the law or the
prophets. I am not come to destroy, but
to fulfill. Now, who is able to accuse us to God? on solid ground. Who is equipped,
who is lawfully able to understand what's in our hearts, to know
that we've hated in our hearts, and then to accuse us as an adversary
before God. Who can do that? Who can send
Nathan the prophet to us? and tell us what we've done in
a parable like God did to David about the rich man and the poor
man. Or who can reveal the heart that we have like Cain had toward
his brother Abel. Or as the priest and the Levite
did in the story of the man going from Jerusalem to Jericho and
was beaten and left naked and half dead and ready to die. Who
can do that? only the one who searches our
hearts and tries our reigns it says in Jeremiah 17 9 and 10
I the Lord search the heart and try the reigns to give every
man according to his works that's what the Lord does the Lord alone
can do that in other words the Lord Jesus Christ is the one
who not only knows God's law as it's meant to be, as it really
is intended, he knows the heart of God, but he's able then to
take, to understand what we think and what we do, our motives.
Hebrews 4.12, it says, the word of God is living and powerful,
sharper than any two-edged sword. It pierces 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. The
Word of God does that. And who is the Word of God? It's
the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the one who acts in our
conscience to bring us as an adversary to show us that we're
guilty before God. It says in Romans 3.19, we know
that whatever the law says, it says to them who are under the
law that every mouth may be stopped and all the world may become
guilty before God. But Jesus says here in this sermon,
he says, therefore, if you are a murderer, if you've murdered
someone in your heart or with your mouth, Either by envy, or
covetousness, or evil speaking, or hatred, or just neglect. Or preferring yourself above
them, promoting yourself at their expense. Desiring better than
they have, and not serving them and their needs. All those things.
If you murder, if you simply don't love your brother as yourself.
He said, therefore, leave your gift at the altar, remember your
brother, remember that thy brother hath ought against thee, and
leave your gift, go your way, first be reconciled to your brother,
and then come and offer your gift. Agree with your adversary
quickly. Now, here's the thing. when David
sinned against God in killing Uriah and committing adultery
with Bathsheba in his confession when he understood his sin what
did he say against thee thee only have I sinned and done that
which is evil in thy sight sin murder is against God because
it's God's law And this is where society has completely lost sight
of what's right and wrong. We think that if the Supreme
Court passes as legal something, a law this way or that way, that
makes it right. It does not make it right. Any
amount of opinions by men doesn't change God's law. Jesus said
it's not going to change, it's not going to pass away. What
was intended by God remains. That's what God meant, that's
the way it'll be. And sin is against God. Our sin is hatred against God. And that sin, look at Romans
chapter 1. We not only hate our brother,
we hate God. And this is painful for us to
even think about. Romans 1. I don't want to belabor
this too much, but we have to see. Look at Romans 1. He says,
in verse 18, the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against
all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. Why? Because they hold
the truth. They simply suppress the truth
about God in unrighteousness. And then look at verse 21. Because
that when they knew God, they glorified Him not as God, neither
were thankful, but became vain in their imaginations, futile,
empty, vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. And then look at verse 25, who
changed the truth of God into a lie and worshiped and served
the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed forever. So God
gave them up, he says, unto vile affections. And look at verse
28. Even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge,
God gave them over to what? A reprobate mind. That's the
word for fool. To call someone a fool is to
say he's reprobate. He's worthy of damnation. He
has no destiny of God's goodness. because of what we observe. And
here he says, God gave them over to a reprobate mind to do those
things which are not convenient. And then he gives a long list
here. Look at verse 29, being filled with all unrighteousness,
fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness, full of envy,
murder, debate, deceit, malignity, whisperers. When you whisper
about someone, it doesn't mean you talk in a soft voice, it
means you say something against someone else when they're not
present. So they can't defend themselves, and you can actually
make other people think less of them, and therefore more of
yourself. It's called gossip. This is equivalent
to murder. All these things are like this.
And look at the next one, verse 30. Back biters. Haters of God. Despiteful, proud, boasters,
and all these things. We're haters of God. Jesus said,
they hated me without a cause. How do we hate God? We hate his
law. We hate his rule. We hate his
sovereign mercy. We hate his truth. We hate the
fact that God holds over us all our life. We hate everything
about God, naturally. And Jesus is saying, you go and
be reconciled to your brother, agree with your adversary while
you're in the way. Now look at Psalm 32. Not only
did David say, my sin is against thee and thee only, but remember
what the prodigal said to his father when he returned. He said,
father, I've sinned against heaven and before you. And remember
what Paul? Paul the Apostle, when he was
persecuting the church, Jesus said, Paul, Saul, Saul, why are
you persecuting me? So the brother offended is the
adversary. the one against whom we've sinned.
It's the Lord Jesus Christ. It's our hatred for God's law,
His authority, hating His truth, sinning in light of His goodness
towards us, turning that truth of God into a lie. Our unbelief
is calling God a liar. It's bringing His truth into
question and bringing God into question and denying the truth
of what He said. But look at Psalm 32. David was
guilty of murder, and he pens this psalm, he says, blessed,
in verse 1, blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose
sin is covered. Blessed is the man to whom the
Lord imputeth not iniquity and in whose spirit there is no guile.
Look at verse 3, When I kept silence, my bones waxed old through
my roaring all the day long. For day and night thy hand was
heavy upon me. My moisture is turned into the
drought of summer. What is this? This is the adversary,
the Lord Jesus Christ, in his convincing, convicting mercy
on David's conscience. Showing him that he was guilty
of murder and adultery guilty Against God his sin was against
God. This was the grace of God coming
to him in convincing and Convincing him of this and turning the moisture
all of his all of Everything about him was just dried up.
It seemed like his own life was lost. I And so he says, when he speaks
the words of the first two verses, we see the blessedness of them,
don't we? Verse one, blessed is he whose transgression is
forgiven. Can a murderer be forgiven? David
was a murderer. David was a murderer. Paul, the
apostle, was a murderer. Paul said, this is a faithful
saying and worthy of all acceptation that Christ Jesus came into the
world to save sinners of whom I'm chief. And David says it
this way, blessed. Oh, the blessednesses. him whose
transgression is forgiven whose sin is covered and Paul in Romans
4 explains this this is nothing less than God imputing the righteousness
of the Lord Jesus Christ to David giving him not only wiping away
his transgression but giving him a positive righteousness His sin is covered. What would
you give if you were a convicted murderer? And you face the adversary, the
judge of all the earth, who knows your hearts and your motives
and everything about you. There's no excuses here. You
did it in full knowledge. And he opens, this is what the
law really means. This is who you are. You're guilty.
And I find a problem with that. And you know what? Not only is
Christ the one who gave the law and understands it, but He's
the last stop in the judicial chain. When you reach the judgment
bar of Christ, the judgment seat of Christ, there's no further
appeal. You can't go on and say, well,
I didn't get the answer I wanted. I need to appeal one level higher.
There are no levels higher. He's the judge. And if the adversary,
if you don't agree with the adversary, That's it. You're going to go
to court and you're not going to win. You're going to lose.
So Jesus says, agree with your adversary while you're in the
way, while you still have life. While it's called today, while
you hear the gospel, agree with him. Agree with what? He says
you're nothing but sin. He's opened up your heart and
your mind and your motives and the intents of your heart with
his word and he's shown you. You are guilty. You're the murderer. You're the one that David said
is worthy of death. You're him. You're words. You
are so foul that you take those that you claim to love and who
actually do you good and you turn their good into a way of
serving yourself. You argue and debate and deceit
and whisper, you gossip, you do all these things, you envy
and you're full of covetousness, you're a murderer. And what are
you going to do when you stand before this Lord? who sees your
heart and holds your eternity in his hands. Jesus says, agree
with him, agree. Lord, I'm guilty. You said I'm
nothing but sin. You're right, I agree. I take
my place. I stand in the line of the accused. And the Lord, and you know, like
David says, that thou mightest be justified in thy sayings and
mightest overcome when thou art judge in Psalm 51. Look to 1
Corinthians 1 with me. So we take our place as the accused
before the Lord. Yes, I am guilty of all that
you say, Lord. 1 Corinthians 1. Actually, look
at 1 Corinthians 1. He says this. Verse 18. The preaching
of the cross is to them that perish foolishness. But unto us which are saved,
it is the power of God. What is the preaching of the
cross? That's the gospel, isn't it?
What did Jesus come to do and to preach? The gospel. If the
gospel is foolishness, then the messenger of the gospel is a
fool, isn't he? And the God who sent him is foolishness. The whole thing is foolishness.
But isn't that the way we're all, by nature, raised? Didn't we grow up thinking, I
don't need that really. I mean, you know, I can neglect
it. I don't really have that much importance to the gospel.
What's the gospel anyway? I'm living my life. I'm fine.
I'm as good as anyone else. Have you ever noticed that men
really fall into two categories? And when I say men, I mean everybody.
Children and women and men alike. There's the totally profligate,
seem like they're completely out of control, hell-bent on
doing everything evil, that kind of person. And then there's the
person who seems really good and nice and sweet and that everyone
likes. Those are the two kind of people
that you find in the world. But it seems like I found that
the worst of men, by our judgment, are actually self-righteous. Have you seen that? And I'll
show you from scripture. But then you'd also find that
the best of men, the best of men in their heart, are really
just like the worst of men. So those two things, outwardly
they're really good. Outwardly, oh these are really
vile. But inwardly, they're both wicked. And what are we? I was thinking about my own life.
What am I? I'm like the person in this verse
who thought as growing up that the gospel was foolishness. I'd
hear the Bible read, I'd hear the Bible taught, and even though
it was incorrectly interpreted, I had the Word of God. And when
it accused me, I would deflect it. Or I'd hear someone say,
I'm no worse than the worst. I mean, I'm just as good as anyone
else. And I'd say, yeah, that's me.
I'm just as good as anyone else. All these things. Or I'd think,
somehow I can do what's necessary in order to make God approve
me. Accept me and approve of me. I would think those things.
The gospel to me was foolishness. I didn't need it. I could neglect
it without any problem. Or I could interpret it how I
wanted to. And the worst of men are self-righteous.
Remember what Lot said to the people of Sodom? He said, Men,
I beseech you, do not do this wickedness! When they were going
to break down the door to get to the angels that they thought
were men? And Lot says, Men, don't do this!
And the people of Sodom said, Who are you to judge us? So self-righteous,
they were about to be destroyed by God for their wickedness.
And they're standing up and saying, who are you to judge us? This
is the way we are. We are self-righteous whether
we're profligate or we're, and we're evil in our heart, whether
we're outwardly righteous or not. But we all think naturally,
I don't need the gospel. I don't really need it, it's
just foolishness. And to call the gospel foolishness is to
call Christ a fool. And that's what we do in our
heart. Look at 1 Corinthians chapter 3 verse 18. Let no man deceive himself. If
any among you seems to be wise in this world, let him become
a fool that he may be wise. You know what God is saying here?
Agree with your adversary. Agree with him. while you're
in the way. When you hear the gospel, when
the law of God is applied to you in the preaching of the gospel,
and it opens your heart and finds you guilty, what do you say in
your heart? Lord, I am guilty. What must I do to be saved? Is
there hope for a murderer? That's exactly what happened
in Acts chapter 2. The gospel was preached to those
who crucified the Lord Jesus Christ. And he says, you took
him and with wicked hands you crucified him. But this is who
he was. He was God's Christ. God sent
him into the world. He did his father's will. God
raised him from the dead. He set him on his own right hand.
He's the Lord of Glory. And these men who heard it, who
had killed the Lord Jesus Christ, physically killed him. They said,
what must we do? And he said, repent. Change your mind. Agree with
your adversary. Stand on his side against yourself
and say, I was wrong. And Christ is the righteous one. He's the one God loves. And they
envied him because God loved him and blessed him just like
God blessed Abel. And they envied him and they
hated him and they put him to death. They weren't satisfied
with his suffering. They had to have him dead. And God says,
agree with your adversary, take your place as a fool, as one
worthy of hell at his hand. Cast into hell, God would be
just if he cast me into hell. Take your place there and say,
Lord, you would be just and justified for throwing me into eternal
fire. Because I am a murderer. I have
murdered in my heart God who made me. He made me for himself. And I took my life and lived
it for myself. That's what a murderer does.
What a murderer of God does. He takes what God has given him
and he makes it his own. He takes it and strips it from
his hand. He'd just as soon have God dead. And the Lord says,
agree with your adversary, agree with him. Not only agree with
him about yourself, but agree with him about reconciliation. Remember what he says in Psalm
32? Blessed is the man whose iniquities are forgiven, whose
sin is covered. Blessed is the man to whom the
Lord will not impute sin. How can we be reconciled to God?
God says, entirely by grace if you're reconciled to God it comes
to you out of the grace of God and not out of something you
do you are guilty and you can do nothing about it and God has
to give you this salvation he has to work it out for you what
does it say in Romans 5 10 if when we were enemies We were
reconciled to God by the death of his son. In Acts chapter 2,
they said, what must we do? Because Christ had died. The
one who they killed is the one God crucified in order to reconcile
his people. I crucified, I put to death the
one God put to death and delivered up to reconcile me. That's how
evil I am. That's how worthy I am of God's
judgment. And yet that's how good God is. Christ fulfilled God's law. He did it all in order that he
might bring us to God. Look back now at Matthew chapter
five. Matthew five, he says, Agree
with your adversary quickly while you're in the way with him, lest
at any time the adversary deliver thee to the judge, the judge
deliver thee to the officer, and you are cast into prison. Verily I say to you, you shall
by no means come out thence till you've paid the uttermost farthing."
If you do not agree with God concerning yourself, concerning
Christ, how God saves, that He saves the guilty, not the righteous,
that he forgives for his own son's sake, that grace comes
to us by the death of Christ, the obedience of Christ, and
by his mediation. Until we're agreeing with God
on these things, then we're still the enemies
of God and he says you will be hailed to the judge the judge
will find you guilty he'll turn you over to the officer you will
be cast into hell and you will not come out until you've paid
the utter most farthing in other words you'll never get out because
hell is a debtor's prison You're in debt, you can't pay, but you
have to stay there and keep working until you earn your way out through
your own punishment. But your own punishment can never
pay because you don't earn anything in hell. You just get more debt. You're there forever paying the
uttermost farthing. But here's the good news. that
our adversary, if we agree with God outside of the courtroom,
if we come to God through the Lord Jesus Christ and we're reconciled
to Him because of what Christ has done for us, we're reconciled
to God in the way He saves sinners as guilty on the merits of His
Son, then we learn that the Lord Jesus Christ is the one who Himself
was stood before the judge remember what it says in Isaiah 53 he
says we despised when we saw him we despised and we rejected
him a man of sorrows but God put him to grief God wounded
him he was bruised for our iniquities he himself paid the utter most
farthing that's what the ransom is it was his precious blood
that was the ransom price that redeemed us out of the prison,
out of the prison where we should have spent paying the uttermost
farthing, that was the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. And
when we agree with our adversary, we see that in the gospel, God
has reconciled us in Christ, and that's amazing that He would
forgive a murderer. Blessed is he whose sins are
forgiven, whose iniquities are pardoned, to whom the Lord will
not impute sin. And that's a blessed thing, isn't
it? That God would do this for us.
We who had offended Him, who have made God our adversary.
He himself reconciled us through the death of his own son. It's
incomprehensible. And if it weren't, if it isn't
for the grace of God, we will become overly despondent because
of our wickedness. God has to give us faith to look
to Christ and not wallow in the filth of our own iniquity and
to cause us to trust and rejoice in Christ. Let's pray. Dear Lord,
thank you that a salvation has been provided and given and accomplished
in the Lord Jesus Christ. You've reconciled your enemies
to yourself. Help us as we hear this, Lord,
that we would know ourselves to be sinners and nothing but
sin. And that salvation is all of
grace and nothing but grace. And this grace is given to us
on the merits of the death and righteousness of our Lord Jesus
Christ. And because of his mediation made ours. And we're kept and
presented to God by what he's done. Lord, help us to agree
with our adversary quickly and settle out of court and come
to God on the basis of a redemption accomplished. In Jesus' name
we pray, Amen.