Matthew 5-8: The Law and Motives

Jesus, in the "Beatitudes," (I'm speaking particularly of 6:1-18) plays flawlessly a game that many of us fumble. There seem to be two general ditches into which people glibly drive their works following salvation.

The first is the ditch in which everything is done to the letter of the law. You* will never miss a Sunday. You will never miss a Wednesday night. You serve in every outreach activity, and you minister in every ministry. You are a spiritual Energizer bunny. However, underneath all the doing-doing-doing, your heart may be very different. Jesus talks about the heart in startling ways in these passages: you're angry = you've murdered, you lust = you've committed adultery. Or perhaps you merely follow the age-old, talked-to-death, still incredibly relevant motive of doing your works for men, rather than God: "Be careful not to do your 'acts of righteousness' before men, to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven." (6:1) Regardless, acts which should have been spiritual disciplines, such as the fasting, praying, and giving mentioned in chapter 6, become your pill you pop when you want approbation from men.

The other ditch is never stated blatantly (at least not in my cursory run-through of these chapters), and that is this: fear or worry that you are going to start doing these works for men, or that in doing these works you will get angry and consequently sin, are never options to STOP doing what the Law requires. I've heard many times (and partly because I move largely with college students, and we're remarkably good at excuses), "Well, I'm just not going to work on my prayer life, because then I'd be doing it for other people and not for God." What!?! No where in these chapters does Jesus say, "If you pray before people and you can only do it for your glory, then stop praying. Stop giving. Stop fasting."

Today I was struck by the way in which Jesus upheld the Old Testament Law: "Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. Anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven."

While he at the same time took that law and expanded it with his phrase, "But I tell you" as he addressed ideas on murder, giving, adultery, revenge, etc. throughout this entire passage. He truly is the phenomenally wise God.

*You in these posts is not referring to you specifically, dear reader. I just find it a more friendly pronoun than the academically accepted universal pronoun of "one." I could all the more easily say, "I" for these are the truths that are convicting me.