SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 9/14/2020 10:32 AM
My Worship Time Focus: Intro to
Matt. 5:38-42
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Matt.
5:38-42
Message of the verses: “38 "You have
heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ 39 “But I
tell you not to resist an evil person. But whoever slaps you on your right
cheek, turn the other to him also. 40 “If anyone wants to sue you and take away
your tunic, let him have your cloak also. 41 “And whoever compels you to
go one mile, go with him two. 42 “Give to him who asks you, and from him who
wants to borrow from you do not turn away.”
John
MacArthur entitles this chapter from his commentary “An Eye for an Eye,” and so
we begin to look at this very famous section of Scripture from the Sermon on
the Mount.
Growing
up in the USA I have learned from going to school, when school actually taught
the things about the history of our country that all citizens needed to know,
that in the Declaration of Independence that we have certain inalienable
rights. Life, liberty, and the pursuit
of happiness are included. In recent
years we have seen movements to add to these rights that were not in the
Declaration of Independence, things such as civil rights, women’s rights,
children’s rights, workers’ rights, prisoners’ rights and so on.
The
bottom line here from the pen of John MacArthur is that “sinful man wants what
he thinks is his own, and in the process of protecting what is his own, he is
also inclined to wreak considerable trouble on anyone who takes what is
his. Retaliation, usually with interest,
is a natural extension of selfishness.” Again remember he wrote this from sermons he
preached back in the late 1970’s. He
then adds “Inordinate concern for one’s rights comes from inordinate
selfishness and leads to inordinate lawlessness. When our supreme concern is getting and
keeping what we think is rightfully ours, then whoever or whatever gets in our
way—including the law—becomes expendable.
Since it is not possible for everyone to have everything he wants, to
insist on our own way invariably tramples on the rights and welfare of
others. Respect for law and for the
welfare of others is always among the first and major casualties of
self-assertion. When self is in the
foreground everything else and everyone else is pushed to the background.
“When
self-interest dominates, justice is replaced by vengeance. Impartial concern for justice becomes partial
concern for personal revenge. Concern
for protecting society becomes concern for protection self-interest. As James points out, that perversion is the
source of wars and every other human conflict.
‘What is the source of quarrels and conflicts among you? Is not the source your pleasures that wage
war in your members? You lust and do not
have; so you commit murder. And you are
envious and cannot obtain; so you fight and quarrel’ (James 4:1-2). When rights are first, righteousness suffers.”
Now
when we think of those from the Word of God who have had their legitimate
rights trampled on more than most we have to think of Paul, and yet to the
selfish people of Corinth he writes the following in 1 Cor. 9:1, 4-6, and 12:
1
Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord? Are you not
my work in the Lord? 4 Do we not have a
right to eat and drink? 5 Do we not have a right to take along a believing
wife, even as the rest of the apostles and the brothers of the Lord and Cephas?
6 Or do only Barnabas and I not have a right to refrain from working? 12 If others share the right over you, do we
not more? Nevertheless, we did not use this right, but we endure all things so
that we will cause no hindrance to the gospel of Christ.” Bottom line as MacArthur writes “Paul
willingly set aside his rights for the sake of the gospel and the welfare of
others.”
“Probably
no part of the Sermon on the Mount has been so misinterpreted and misapplied as
5:38-42. It has been interpreted to mean
that Christians are to be sanctimonious doormats. It has been used to promote pacifism,
conscientious objection to military service, lawlessness, anarchy, and a host
of other positions that it does not support.
The Russian writer Tolstoy based one of his best-known novels on this
passage. The thesis of War and Peace is that the elimination of
police, the military, and other forms of authority would bring a utopian
society.
“But
Jesus already had made plain that He did not come to eliminate even the
smallest part of God’s law (5:17-19), which includes respect for and obedience
to human law and authority.
“Among
the many unrighteous things that the religion of the scribes and Pharisees (see
Matt. 5:20) include was their insistence of personal rights and vengeance. In His fifth illustration contrasting their
righteousness with God’s Jesus again shows how rabbinic tradition had twisted
God’s holy law to serve the selfish purposes of unholy men.”
This
is perhaps one of the sections on the Sermon on the Mount that we may learn the
most from, as far as what we thought it meant as opposed to what Jesus really
meant.
Spiritual meaning for my life today: Digging deep into the debts of Scripture to
better understand what it really means.
My Steps of Faith for Today: Trust that the Holy Spirit will continue to
teach me as I read and study the Word of God each day.
9/14/2020 11:12 AM
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