Well, we are continuing our study this morning in the Sermon on the Mount. I invite you to turn to Matthew chapter 5. Sometimes it's wonderful when after the service last week, somebody comes up and summarizes your sermon and just absolutely gets it right. And the summary was from the last sermon, Pastor, it's not rocket science, love your enemies and don't be a jerk. And I thought, well, that does kind of summarize it. So, it is really remarkable as we look at the Sermon on the Mount, how the Lord is pressing us to the true meaning of the law. This is not comfortable stuff. This is very uncomfortable. Very uncomfortable. It's intended to be. We're going to look at that today. Because what we've seen the Pharisees do with the law of God is, using a kind of basketball illustration box it out they boxed out the law of god so that it never got internally into the human heart and when we see the weight of the law of god and we understand what the law requires of us well then it's surprising how far it reaches and how great the righteous demand of the law is what shall we do with that this is matthew chapter 5 this morning looking at verses 43 through 48 this is i'm going to back up and actually read through 38 to the end of the chapter so we have some more context on this important section this is the word of the lord beginning at verse 38 you have heard that it was said an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth but i say to you do not resist the one who is evil but if anyone slaps you on the right cheek turn to him the other also. And if anyone would sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well. And if anyone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles. Give to the one who begs from you and do not refuse the one who would borrow from you. And now our text. You have heard that it was said, you shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you so that you may be sons of your father who is in heaven for he makes his son rise on the evil and on the good and sends rain on the just and on the unjust for if you love those who love you what reward do you have do not even the tax collectors do the same and if you agreed only your brothers what more are you doing than others do not even the gentiles do the same you therefore must be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect and there ends the reading of god's word as you go through the sermon on the mount what is so surprising about jesus's sermon is that the moments he spoke in such a way that was indeed intended to trouble everyone who heard it and we're not quite used to that at times we think everything has to be nice and everything has to be accepted and jesus intended to trouble people there was an intended instance in these in these in the sermon on the mount to do this especially in the section that we heard because of the righteous requirement of the law no one was listening to it i'm not even sure we could imagine the gasps i mean we can really in our culture today but could you imagine the gasps in the first century when we knew what the jews expected jesus to come and do when he said, I tell you, do not resist one who is evil. What? What? And then he went on to tell them if they're backhanded and slapped in the face and punched in the face, humiliated by someone, to turn the cheek. And if someone wants your possessions, give them more. and go as far as you can with them all of that troubles us because it's so naturally intuitively against everything that we think and how we naturally respond to people someone crosses me watch out everyone is nervous because what you want to do in the sermon on the mount this is the great temptation with the sermon on the mount this is what we all want to do with the sermon on the mount is all of a sudden begin to start qualifying everything away with all these scenarios well you can't mean this scenario and you you can't mean that scenario jesus and no no way it doesn't mean this and all by the time we're done we don't even know what he did mean i don't think we were intended to start doing that i think we were intended to listen carefully to it i say to you do not resist one who's evil what does he mean you see what he did was take the matter to the heart he was striking deep into the human heart with the law of god he was showing how far that law what it demanded and how far it reached, that it confronted even the very desires and the motivations of the human heart. Instead of letting people out, by then qualifying it all, he made sure he left people thinking about the internal dimension of the law. As important as the outward requirement of obedience was to the law, he was pressing hard internally on the righteous requirement of the law and what it was intended to accomplish out of the human heart. Because the summary of the law is what? Love. And when we get there and understand what the law calls us to, which is love, then we're beginning to understand. We are finally beginning to understand what Jesus means when He started the Sermon on the Mount and said, Unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and the Pharisees, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven. The way to get there is to get to the summary and intention of the law, which is love. And here it strikes the strongest. And that's where we are this morning. Our actions at this point then become and are about conforming to the principle that should drive our lives, that should affect our lives, the principle that should motivate our lives, and that principle that command is love for god and love for neighbor this morning we're looking at jesus's command to love even our enemies this is not for the faint of heart this is very uncomfortable as it's intended to be it is only for really the born again heart it is only for the one born from above who can begin to understand this and desire to implement this for who can begin to taste this unless in regeneration by the spirit they understand the new commandment he gives to love one another as we have been loved you can't even understand love apart from that but nonetheless our inability does not remove our inability to love does not remove the righteous demand of God upon our lives and that's why we are looking carefully today at what the law originally meant as it called us to love even our enemies i want to look at this passage by considering the abuse of love the call to love and the reason for love as we look at this section here of jesus addressing this this last section on the law the moral law of god in the sermon on the mount in verse 43 we conclude the first section of the sermon on the mount if this were a three-pointer this was a long first point a long long long first point but so important he was correcting what the scribes and the pharisees had done to the law of god remember what they did they found out a way to disregard the law of god in their lives and elevate their own wrong interpretations of the law of god to showcase themselves and create a religion that showcased themselves as true pillars of piety and religion thereby they were infecting everyone else with this false religion in israel it never their teaching on the law of god it never unleashed the law to do its convicting work in people's lives and this is this is important as they sit around and debated the scribe says this and this scribe says this and this it was just all in the head it was just all heady it never penetrated to the human heart and that's a danger to this day in preaching it can be so academic that it's never preaching and getting to penetrating to the convicting work of the spirit in the heart we've got to have that this is what the apostle was constantly talking about this was the great problem in israel they had no idea because they had boxed out the law they had no idea of what the character of a true believer in the lord looked like so again we're we're dealing with their corruption and now jesus brings it full circle to address the summary of the law at the end of chapter five remember he's been choosing selectively certain commands and working through them but it's no surprise that he would conclude with love in this first section and then the the final there's a final sort of line here that shows he's made a conclusion to this first section in verse 33 43 he says you have heard that it was said you shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy what the pharisees believed was that their neighbors were only israelites fellow israelites so they were the ones they were only to love in this life fellow bloodline israelites or those who had been brought into israel through circumcision anyone who was not of israel they had come to this conclusion was that they were not to love but they had gone further in that and they had said not only are we not to love them but we are actually to hate them we are to hate the wicked hate. Now we say hate, we have to remember that what that meant in their minds was when the Messiah would finally come, the enemies of Israel, the Gentiles would be judged and destroyed. They wanted this. They prayed for this. They prayed against everyone who was not an israelite they wanted this so bad and and you see how built in it was to the disciples when they're doing ministry and they come to that village in samaria and that village in samaria does not receive the gospel does not receive the good news of jesus christ and they the disciples immediately said lord do you want us to call fire down from heaven like elijah and consume them let's just get it going let's just burn them up see it was in them this confusion is alive today in the church just as much i guess it's somewhat understandable you've been confused by it here's what you've been confused by we went through joshua and there were commands to wipe out the nations wipe out the enemies a lot of people have pointed out that but i think what was interesting is maybe most commentators come to this and say, well, the Old Testament never said this. The Old Testament never said, listen, you know, love your neighbor but hate your enemies. So they say we don't find anything like that in the Old Testament and I'm not sure that's true. We just sang Psalm 139 the other night. That's quite a verse in Psalm 139. Oh, that you would slay the wicked, oh God. Oh, men of blood, depart from me. Do I not hate those who hate you? And do I not loathe those who rise up against you? I hate them with a perfect hatred. i count them all my enemies right on and you sing that psalm and you say that's the part when we sing the psalms by the way when we get the praise part everyone's up and then we get a verse like that and i could just hear the level of the congregation go all the way down i'm pretty sure the pharisees looked at psalm 139 and many point to the old testament and they say of course we are to sing the imprecatory psalms that god would slay the wicked in this life those who don't believe so what gives what gives here because you have two options either jesus directly contradicts this in matthew chapter 5 that's one option the lord of scripture all scripture given by inspiration by the spirit all scripture directly contradicts the old testament teaching or we haven't understood exactly what we're singing or saying it's kind of a big one isn't it today we have many christians right now of sort of the post-mill theonomic movements who are very similar to the pharisees in their readiness to slay the wicked oh god right now and they say this and so this very brash approach to christianity has come of people who are fighters and ugly. We have many Christians right now who have the theology of the Pharisees. They can't even hear Jesus on this point. They are deeply troubled by it, actually. I think it's very clear all those references to the cleansing of the land in Joshua and in the Psalms are judicial passages. What do we mean by that? It means that they are all anticipating the final judgment of God. They are all looking to that final judgment of God. That final righteous judgment. They are joining in and they are celebrating in God's justice. What a scary thing. That God judicially is going to judge everyone outside of Christ. And it's going to be awful. And believers share in that verdict. That's what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 6. In making that verdict. The error is trying to bring that final judgment into the present time. That's the error. The heir is trying to bring that judgment, final judgment, into daily life and how we treat people. And to desire to hate our enemies, wanting them gone and wiped off the face of the map. Now. When you live wanting God to exact judgment on all the wicked right now, you become one of the worst, ugliest Christians, if you can call yourself that, I've seen. Cold, hateful of all God's enemies. The question is, the question is, was that the intent of the law? That's the question. To love only God's people. And hate all unbelievers and pagans. That's the question. That's important because they have made a great discontinuity between the law of the old covenant and the summary form of the law and Jesus' ministry itself. They've created the discontinuity, not him. Now with this, Jesus comes in. And he says something shocking, but it really shouldn't be. He says, they are all telling you to love your neighbor, your fellow Jews, and hate your enemies, those Gentile dogs. But I say to you, love your enemies, pray for those who persecute you. Let me make sure we understand this is how radical that would have been to hear that in this context. He just said, your enemies, in their worst form in this life, hate God and hate me. And hate you. jesus said in the beatitudes they will revile you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely have you had that that's an awful thing to go through they hate god they are people who are the wicked in this life jesus said the worst kind of people if they hate you for your faith and hate you for who you are if they come up and backhand you and slap you on the cheek and they insult you in the worst ways possible, go ahead and turn the other one. Our natural impulse? I know my natural impulse. My natural impulse would be to lay the guy out. We're fighters. we're tough turn the cheek and give them the other give them beyond what they're asking in your possessions go the second mile with them do not resist evil why why what's the why are you telling me to do that imagine the offense of this Jesus says well because the heart of the law is the summary of the law is love love does good even to your enemies and so you love them and you have made these people the highest priority in your life of your prayers. These people are your highest priority in prayer. You're praying for them, not all your aches and pains. Them. And when you do that, Jesus says something surprising here. You're being like God. Now that we have to wrestle with because that would have stunned them. but it shouldn't have. Then you show that you are sons of your Father who is in heaven. That's a remarkable connection. Now here it is. Because He makes His Son to rise on the evil and on the good and sends His reign on the just and the unjust. What is He like to them? Jesus says. Why don't you think about that for a minute? God has even announced this. God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. All throughout the Scriptures, God has demonstrated a benevolent kind of love to this fallen world. It's remarkable. It was someone like Jonah who refused that. When God had called him to go to that wicked baby-aborting city of Nineveh to go minister the Gospel in Nineveh to go to the worst place in the earth, Nineveh and leave Israel in the comforts of Israel to go minister to Nineveh he fought God the whole way. And when he finally was put in the fish and he went to Nineveh and he went and proclaimed the gospel and they repented. The man went and sat outside the city waiting for fireballs to come down and destroy them. And the whole book ends. Jonah, you're worried about your little comforts? Worried about being a little hot in the sun? Should I not pity 120,000 people who do not know their right hand from their left and a few cattle? From the beginning of the world, God's proven this. There have been the most wicked people who have hated God, despised God. He could have taken them all out. Has He? What did He do? What did God do? He says, He sent rain on them, Jesus said. He watered their crops. And He sent sunshine on them. Here's what's overwhelmingly happened in history. Overwhelmingly in history. Here's the general course of things. God has been good to all. God has demonstrated a beneficent love to all. You know that eclipse this week that everyone was fascinated? Wasn't that just the bizarrest thing you've ever seen under the sun? Everyone's just out looking at this eclipse. And they had all this time to waste to do it. It's really remarkable. I don't know how much money was lost in society over that. I was writing sermons for you. I just want you to know that. if we think how much evil has gone up before the throne room of God, how many awful things have been done, how many things have been said against Him, how much perversity, how much death, how much destruction, how much wickedness, no one's ever thanking Him. He could have taken the lights out this week. He could have sent His Son in a flaming fire to judge all of them and instead millions of people were able to see Romans 1 the eternal power in Godhead by the things that are made that's what we're studying tonight you get the privilege to hear it preached to you tonight with the hopes that they might seek I'm quoting scripture see all this and seek the Lord and live all these God hating people he continues to feed he continues to give them heartbeats continues to provide for them just like you god's not dealing with them right now according to what they deserve that's astonishing and the apostles when they preached made this point everywhere you know they said listen all this goodness you you have look what you live there's something to be understood about the love of God that the entire history of the world has seen and can prove seed time and harvest after the fall God said we'll always be here you're always going to have food when Paul preached to gross idolaters he said you did not he did not leave himself without witness For He did good to you, pagans. That's what He's saying. By giving you rains from heaven and fruitful seasons, satisfying your hearts with food and gladness. Why? That you might repent and be saved. For He has appointed a day, Acts 17, when He will judge the world with justice by the man He's appointed. That's what all those verses in the Old Testament anticipated. Look at how long-suffering God has been to the wicked. What a statement about His long-suffering and patience. So Jesus says, so you want to be a follower of Me? Love your enemies. And here's the test of the phony, hypocritical religion of the Pharisees. This gets really tough. It's exposing. Here's what he's going after. For if you love those who love you, what reward is there in that? Do not even the tax collectors do that. If you greet your brethren only, what more are you doing than others? The Gentiles do that. everyone makes family a priority in this life let me respond with what jesus just said and this is going to strike hard pagans do that you are not being impressive you are not being impressive but to love your enemies and give them the heart of your attention and prayer and love that's true religion that's not sham religion that just puts friends and family and thinks that's what this is all about in life i want to make sure we understand the heart of this listen to what he's saying if you make the priority of your life your family and your friends if god looked at your life and that's the extent of your life under the sun as to why you are in his kingdom and that's all you're about that's all you're about you are no different than pagan non-believing wicked people did you hear that there is nothing distinctively christian about you in that about making family the priority in life only. The wicked do it all the time. Practical application, since we love that. Love the most difficult in your life. Help with their kids and grandchildren. Their kids who are going off the rails. Care about them. Imagine if none of your family was here today. What would you do after the sermon? Would you look out here at the tax collectors and sinners that God brought together? Or would you bolt to the car? Is your love sincere? Who is this really about? If your friends and families weren't in church, would you be here? who are my mother who's my mother and who are my brothers then he pointed to his followers and said here they are my true brother and sister and mother are those who do what my father in heaven wants and now you begin to understand the gospel who was given and standing right there this is why i have been saying what is described in the sermon on the mount to love your enemies could only belong to somebody who's of the new creation you see that it's absolutely impossible for us because no one can understand this but why can you understand this that's my question what did the pharisees think about the love of god That it was merited by all their good works they did. And that was the basis upon which they sought their righteousness before God. But if the assessment of God about your hearts is true, that my heart and your heart is desperately wicked, who can know it? What made God love you? Why did God love you? It's a scary thought. and an overwhelmingly good one at the same time? Did God at any point in your life look at you and think, wow, you know, that guy or that woman has really moved me to love them. I just saw so much in them that's so attractive. No, the message is, while you were a sinner, God loved you. And because, for the only reason you get in the Scripture, because of the good pleasure of His own sovereign will, He did this. And His Son. You were the wicked. I was the wicked. I was the son of wrath. You were a daughter of wrath or a son of wrath, just like me. and grace was given to you and God loved you for no reason in you at all. You show nothing of God-likeness when you're running around just loving friends and family. That doesn't do anything. At the heart of the commandment, this is some sort of reciprocal, beautiful thing. We are most loving God when we are loving our neighbor the way that we've been loved. and then we have the ability to love when we've received God's love. We are, as one pastor said, no longer controlled or governed by what people say or do to us. It really doesn't matter, does it? See, the natural tendency is to get offended. We are no longer taking personal offense because we see what they are we see where they're headed and what a hatred and persecution of us really says about them and what they need and we want the best for them we want them to be delivered as we've been delivered and you see jesus now gives the conclusion to the first part of the sermon on the mount in addressing the moral law of God. You, therefore, must be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect. We all should desire to be just like our heavenly Father and to strive for that perfection. Now, we read this as a family the other day. And when I got to that last verse, you therefore must be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect. And we all said, we're done. And that's what the law first does. This is why Machen said of the Sermon on the Mount, in reality, if the requirements for entrance into the kingdom of God are what Jesus declares them to be. We're all undone. We have not attained even to the external righteousness of the scribes and the Pharisees. How shall we attain to the righteousness of the heart which Jesus demands? The first conclusion is, beloved, we need a Savior. I need a Savior. We drop the knee. And we say, God, be merciful to us sinners. That's what he loves. And in his forgiving mercies, he picks us up. And he washes us. And he justifies us. And he cleanses us. And he begins his new work of creation in us. to certainly attain to a righteousness that's better than this phony stuff. John commented on this for Christian character. In this, the love of God was made manifest among us. That God sent His only Son into the world that we might live through Him. In this is love. Not that we have loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, he's commenting on the Sermon on the Mount, I'm convinced. If God has loved us, so loved us, we ought to love one another. No one's ever seen God. If we love one another, God abides in us and His love is perfected in us. See that? if we love one another no one's seen god there he's seen when you love your enemies when you're doing what is beyond what the pagans do the law brings an end to us and it shows how selfish we are but this is what jesus wanted to accomplish so that people broken of themselves might come to him for eternal life might be broken of themselves and conquered by the love of God to understand how much He's loved you. Then and then only will this new creation begin to take shape. Then we'll begin to love God and neighbor with a sincere heart. For the love of Christ compels us because we are convinced that one died for all and therefore all died and He died for all that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again. We need Jesus. We need his salvation. We need his deliverance. And we need a righteousness that far exceeds that of the scribes and the Pharisees. Praise God. He's committed to do that for you. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank You for Your Word to us. Thank You for challenging us and making us uncomfortable where we need to be made uncomfortable. Thank You for delivering us by the righteousness of a perfect Savior. Thank You for saving us with a love that endures forever. Thank You for upholding us by Your Spirit now. As a new creation, we may begin to pursue and strive for that perfection that will be given to us fully in glory to be like our Father in heaven and what he has demonstrated to this lost world. Bless this to our hearts and minds today. In Jesus' name, amen.