What Jesus Said about our Behaviour Intro

If you have been keeping track this is the fourth series that we have taught this year based on “What Jesus said about. .  .”  In April we spoke about “What Jesus said About Money” and we focused on Jesus’ words concerning how we make and how we spend our money.  In May and June we focused on “What Jesus said About Emotions” and we looked at his words concerning fear, love, hate and Joy. Through the summer we parked ourselves in the book of John and looked at the various metaphors that Jesus used for himself.  I am the Way, I am the Gate, I am the Resurrection, etc.

For the next few weeks we are going to look at “What Jesus Said about Our Behaviour”.    And too often I hear Christians express scorn for rules and regulations, they talk about how it is all about a relationship and how they are under grace not under the law.  It’s almost as if they think it was Jesus who said “Love God and do as you please.”  It wasn’t Jesus who said that it was   Augustine who may have been many things but he was neither Jesus or infallible. 

And so we have people who call themselves Christ Followers who have no real sense of the Christ they claim to follow.  If they think of his commands at all they hear him say “Love each other”  “Do not judge”  and “Do unto others”.  And while those are indeed things that Jesus commanded us to do they are not the sum total of what he commanded us to do.  There was a certain level of expectations to Jesus’ teaching.  That is he expected certain things and certain behaviour from those who chose to follow him. 

Apparently 2000 years ago it was expected that following Jesus would have an impact on how you behaved and what you did and on what you didn’t do.  And Jesus took this quite seriously and warned his disciples that they should take it seriously as well, listen to his words in Matthew 7:21 “Not everyone who calls out to me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ will enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Only those who actually do the will of my Father in heaven will enter.”

Wow, that’s harsh.  “Not everyone who calls out to me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ will enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Only those who actually do the will of my Father in heaven will enter.”  Somehow that doesn’t seem to line up with the Jesus that is preached so often these days.   The Jesus who loves everybody unconditially as long as they are sincere and try their best.  It doesn’t sound like the Jesus who understands that it’s really tough behaving the way the Bible would direct so with a nod and smile he will sneak you in under the wire. 

But is that the reality?  This “But at least you tried” Jesus? The Bible doesn’t seem to indicate that is.   Instead the Jesus of the Bible teaches that there are rules that must be followed, things that need to be done and things that shouldn’t be done.  If we go back to the scripture that we started with we discover a man comes to Jesus and enquires about what he has to do to live forever.  That is a good question, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?”  But the man isn’t looking for a life change he is looking for a magic bullet, some “one thing” that he can do to assure himself a place in heaven.  Listen again to his question.  Matthew 19:16 Someone came to Jesus with this question: “Teacher, what good deed must I do to have eternal life?”   Not “How should I live?” but “What good deed, what one thing, must I do to have eternal life?.  Tell me what to do and I will do and then I can get on with life.” 

And to hear some people’s theology today that magic bullet is “Just accept Jesus as Lord, pray the prayer and then get on with life.”  But that isn’t what Jesus said, what Jesus said was Matthew 19:17 “Why ask me about what is good?” Jesus replied. “There is only One who is good. But to answer your question—if you want to receive eternal life, keep the commandments.” Keep the commandments?  That doesn’t sound like Jesus, commandments?  What about grace and not being under the law?  What are the commandments that Jesus is talking about? 

Let’s go back to Matthew 5:17 where Jesus said “Don’t misunderstand why I have come. I did not come to abolish the Law of Moses or the writings of the prophets. No, I came to accomplish their purpose.”

Well in order to understand what Jesus was saying  it would help if we knew what Jesus was saying.   So what was the “Law of Moses” that Jesus spoke of?  Well, the law could refer to a number of things  1) The Ten Commandments  2) The first five books of the Old Testament, which is often referred to as the Pentateuch or five scrolls. 3) The Law and the Prophets, or what we now call the Old Testament.  And this is what Jesus said would not pass away, the Law and the writings of the prophets.

God had been speaking to his people through the law and prophets for 4000 years, he wasn’t suddenly about to say, “oops I changed my mind, let’s start over.”   And that’s why Jesus told us in Matthew 5:19 So if you ignore the least commandment and teach others to do the same, you will be called the least in the Kingdom of Heaven. But anyone who obeys God’s laws and teaches them will be called great in the Kingdom of Heaven.

Christ wants us to know that he’s not changing the rules in the middle of the game. 

So the first thing we need to understand is that the law is necessary and the second thing is that the Christ Follower is not exempt simply because he follows Christ.  Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 6:12 You say, “I am allowed to do anything”—but not everything is good for you. And even though “I am allowed to do anything,” I must not become a slave to anything.

We are able to do anything because Christ can forgive anything, but let’s not get into the mind-set.  The word of God says in Romans 6:1-2 Well then, should we keep on sinning so that God can show us more and more of his wonderful grace? Of course not! Since we have died to sin, how can we continue to live in it?

Now keeping the law means keeping the laws of the land as well as the laws of God, and in the same way if you don’t agree with them you have every right to break those laws.  And society has every right to punish you for breaking them.  In the early days of the Wesleyan Church the founders of our denomination disagreed with slavery and the laws surrounding slavery.  Part of those laws said that it was illegal to help slaves escape, that would be on the same level today as someone who helped your car to escape.  That’s called stealing now and it was called stealing then.  But that didn’t prevent many Wesleyans from helping slaves escape to the Northern States and Canada.   And while they may have been able to justify what they were doing they were breaking the law and were willing to accept the consequences of their actions if they got caught.  And a hundred and twenty years later Martin Luther King Jr. said “One who breaks an unjust law that conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for law.”

In a word the Christian preserves the world order against decay by keeping the laws of the land.  If the laws are unjust he may break them, but that doesn’t mean he is freed from paying the price for breaking them.

And sometimes people will say “I don’t agree with what the bible says, or with the rules that the Bible imposes.  And in the same way they have every right to break those commandments and not obey those rules, but they have to realize that there is a price to be paid there as well.

But the question remains: why?  Why are there rules?  Cause, that’s why.  Why are there rules today?  Same reason, to protect you and to protect others.  That is why you aren’t supposed to drive when you’ve been drinking, why you aren’t supposed to eat raw hamburger and why you aren’t supposed to sleep with everyone you meet.

Too often people look at the rules that God has put in place and decide that He does it because He’s a spoil sport, He doesn’t want us to have any fun, He just sits up there in Heaven snickering because of the rules He’s put in place.  That couldn’t be any further from the truth.  God put those laws in place for our benefit and for our protection. 

It’s a Matter of God’s Love for Us

Within God’s law there are laws that are laid down for people’s Physical Benefit:  For example Leviticus 11:7-8 The pig has evenly split hooves but does not chew the cud, so it is unclean. You may not eat the meat of these animals or even touch their carcasses.

So when the law was given you couldn’t eat bacon, or pork chops or ham.  They were also told they couldn’t eat other animals or reptiles or fish, because most of those critters were yucky, the technical term was unclean but it means the same thing.  3000 years ago it was difficult to cook pork the right way to kill the parasites that live in it, we know today that there are certain time of the year that you can eat shell fish and certain times that you can’t.  We can read about it in the paper or hear on the radio but then, it was just safer to say “Don’t eat this stuff.” 

Other rules are set down for our Social Benefit: Leviticus 20:10 “If a man commits adultery with his neighbor’s wife, both the man and the woman who have committed adultery must be put to death.

Don’t know if that was a deterrent but it certainly cut down on repeat offenders.  Leviticus 19:11 “Do not steal. “Do not deceive or cheat one another.”

It is rules that keep society from disintegrating.  They keep family together they protect us from each other. It was Edmund Burke who said “When ancient opinions and rules of life are taken away, the loss cannot possibly be estimated. From that moment, we have no compass to govern us, nor can we know distinctly to what port to steer.” 

Other rules are for our Emotional Benefit: Exodus 20:17 “You must not covet your neighbor’s house. You must not covet your neighbor’s wife, male or female servant, ox or donkey, or anything else that belongs to your neighbor.”

There are issues like covetness, hatred and lack of forgiveness that will destroy us inside if we allow them to.  And so there are rules that deal with these issues.

There are also rules and regulations that are there for our Spiritual Benefit:  There are rules against worshipping idols Leviticus 26:1 “Do not make idols or set up carved images, or sacred pillars, or sculptured stones in your land so you may worship them. I am the LORD your God.

There are rules against worshipping other gods Exodus 34:14 You must worship no other gods, for the LORD, whose very name is Jealous, is a God who is jealous about his relationship with you.

This particular section even deals with how much we are supposed to return to God Leviticus 27:30 “One tenth of the produce of the land, whether grain from the fields or fruit from the trees, belongs to the LORD and must be set apart to him as holy.

To be truthful we don’t know why God required some things, maybe for the same reason that we sometime require things as parents and so we have the Just Because Rules: Leviticus 19:19 “You must obey all my decrees. “Do not mate two different kinds of animals. Do not plant your field with two different kinds of seed. Do not wear clothing woven from two different kinds of thread.

How come?  Just because.  There is a lesson there that is lost on us but it wasn’t lost on the Israelites.  Parents are fond of quoting Leviticus 19:28 . . . do not mark your skin with tattoos. I am the LORD.

But then they forget Leviticus 19:27 “Do not trim off the hair on your temples or trim your beards.

Some rules cross over into several areas, Leviticus 18 deals almost exclusively with sexual issues, things which we would say are governed for social good.  Without regulations concerning marriage etc the family unit begins to fail and we are starting to discover the results of that in Canada today. 

However they also fall in the emotional good category as can be attested by the devastation that is felt when you discover your spouse has been cheating on you, or even the damage done to yourself when you break your wedding vows. You understand that you will pay, Proverbs 6:27 Can a man scoop a flame into his lap and not have his clothes catch on fire?

By the way that verse deals specifically with the consequences of adultery, check it out for yourself. 

But the rules governing sexual conduct are also there for our physical good, the physical consequences of promiscuity cannot be ignored, whether it unwanted pregnancies or sexual transmitted disease there are a many things that could be eliminated by following the rules.  I know and you know that AIDS is not simply a homosexuals disease but we also know that it was spread primarily because people would not listen to the rules, rules that said homosexuality is wrong, rules that said sex outside of marriage is wrong.

And you and I know that if people had of followed the rules that we wouldn’t have a problem with HIV and AIDS.

When Christ came and offered himself up as a sin offering for each of us he made many of the laws in Leviticus concerning offerings and the priesthood irrelevant.  But there are rules that govern our personal behaviour that still stand and I don’t think I need to tell you which are which, I think you can figure that out on your own.

However simply being legal isn’t enough.  The motive under which the scribes and Pharisees, that is the religious elite of Jesus’ day, lived was to satisfy the law.  Everything was aimed at doing what was specified in the law.  Theoretically a person could say “I have done all that is required by the law.”

It’s a Matter of Our Love for God

The difference in the life of the Christ Follower is that the motive is not the law, it is love. We seek to satisfy God not so that we have fulfilled the law, but because we love God.  For the religious leaders 2000 years ago, and for some people today, the aim is simply to satisfy the law of God, make sure that you have dotted all the i and crossed all the ts.  But for the Christian, the Christ Follower the goal is to show our gratitude for God’s love and salvation.

When you truly love God you don’t do what you want, you do what he wants.  When we see the love that God sets before us the we seek to answer that love with reciprocal love.  And that’s why Jesus said John 14:15 “If you love me, obey my commandments.

He didn’t say if you respect me as a teacher, obey my commandments.  Or if you acknowledge me as God, obey by commandments.  Instead he said “You’ll obey me if you love me.”  Respect and fear will only take you so far, it will be love that will take you the rest of the trip.

I hope that we can see beyond the law to see people and I hope that we can see beyond our own righteousness to our reason for being righteous and that is our love for Christ.  And so Christ gives us examples of what he means.  The law says you shall not murder, you shall not commit adultery, whoever divorces his wife let him give her a certificate of divorce, you shall not lie and you shall love your neighbour. 

Each of these five statements in one way or another symbolizes the Jewish society in which Christ was raised.  Each of these five statements was part of the Mosaic Law laid down to guide the people of Israel.  There was behind each statement a purpose and that purpose was to hold together a civilization, to keep it from deterioration, to prevent it from dissolving into chaos, and to allow it to govern itself.

What these basic five laws as laid down here did was to act as salt for society.  The Ten Commandments and Mosaic Law was not intended for a redeemed society it was to prevent an unredeemed society from tearing itself apart.  Often we think of the “Ten Commandments” as being Christian principles, but the same guidelines can be found in most civilizations around the world and throughout history.  Without these principles society and everyone in it would destroy themselves.  And Christ is saying that when we have been touched by his love and his grace that even more is expected of us then what is expected of everyone else.  That when we fulfill the law that we become salt and light to the world. 

Over the next couple of weeks we will be looking at what Jesus expects of his followers. 

Earlier I mentioned a quote that is often attributed to Augustine: “Love God and do whatever you please.”  But that isn’t the quote, listen to what Augustine actually said, “Love God and do whatever you please: for the soul trained in love to God will do nothing to offend the One who is Beloved.”