Let’s jump straight into our study today found in Matthew 5 as we continue our series on the Mount of Blessing sermon by Jesus.

Matthew 5:17-18
17 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. 18 For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.

We’ve already looked at being lights of the world and the salt of the earth. But now Jesus is dealing with the law and the prophets.

What is Jesus trying to imply when he tells us to “think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets”? What does that imply about the mindset of those that were listening?

• He is telling us to not even let it enter into our minds that Jesus has changed his law or the prophets. There must have been people there thinking that the law and the prophets have been changed. That is even happening in our day today. You will see that later.
• He didn’t come to destroy but to fulfil. Some people think that that word “fulfil” refers to Jesus coming to complete it and thus don’t need the law and the prophets anymore. They think He came to finish it.
• However, the word “but” is a contrast in that sentence “but to fulfil”. It is contrasting the fact that Jesus didn’t come to destroy. Quite the opposite, He came to fill it up, to fully preach it.
• So Jesus is stating there clearly that we shouldn’t even THINK that Jesus is destroying the law and prophets.

We see that the word law is repeated in both verse 17 and verse 18. It must be important. The central focus of our study will be revolving around the issue of the law and whether it is still relevant for us today or not.

When Jesus referred to the law and the prophets, what was He really pointing to?

• Matthew 11:12-13
  12 And from the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force. 13 For all the prophets and the law prophesied until John.
  • In verse 13 when the Bible says that all the prophets and the law prophesied until John, who is this John? It is John the Baptist as we know from the previous verse.
  • Who is John the Baptist? When did he live? It was right there during the time of Jesus. He was quite possible still alive when Jesus was speaking these words.
  • So all the prophets and the law prophesied until the appearance of Jesus.
  • That means from Genesis until John the Baptist, that is what the prophets and the law is referring to.
  • We know this as what? The Old Testament! Of course not every prophet wrote something down to contribute to the Bible. Jesus called John the Baptist the greatest of all prophets but yet he never wrote anything in scripture. We even had Gad and Nathan as prophets in the Old Testament and they don’t have a book named after them either.
• Let’s go to another text
• John 1:45
  Philip findeth Nathanael, and saith unto him, We have found him, of whom Moses in the law, and the prophets, did write, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.
  • When Philip looks for Nathanael he tells him that he has found him of whom Moses in the law and the prophets did write!
  • Moses in the law. What does that mean? Well, we know that Moses is in the Old Testament. He wrote the first 5 books of the Old Testament – Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy.
  • And the prophets is referring to the rest of the Old Testament because the New Testament was not even written yet. It would be written decades later.
  • But when Philip says “We have found him, of whom Moses in the law, and the prophets, did write, Jesus of Nazareth” what is he trying to imply?
  • We have found the Messiah!
  • But not only that. He said that the law and the prophets wrote about Him. Well, where could it have been written about the coming Messiah? In the scriptures of course! And more specifically in their time it would have been referring to the Old Testament. The New Testament had not been written yet.
• John 1:29
  Nathanael answered and saith unto him, Rabbi, thou art the Son of God; thou art the King of Israel.
  • When Nathanael met him, he declared he had found the Son of God. The Messiah!
• So from the Old Testament, without the New Testament, we can understand who the Messiah is!
• And when Jesus said don’t even think that I am come to destroy the law or the prophets, what will be the problem if we have that sort of thinking? We will never know who the Messiah is. We will not understand that Jesus is our Saviour and Messiah! But even more so, we will be rejecting the scripture, the law and the prophets.

Coming back to Matthew 5. Jesus said that He didn’t come to destroy the law or prophets but He came to fulfil it. How did He fulfil the law and the prophets?

• Matthew 1:21-23
  21 And she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name Jesus: for he shall save his people from their sins. 22 Now all this was done, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet, saying, 23 Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us.
  • Even in His birth, Jesus fulfilled the law and the prophets. He fulfilled a prophecy from the Old Testament.
  • Where do you find this prophecy in the Old Testament?
  • Isaiah 7:14
    Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.
  • All these prophecies in the Old Testament pointed to the coming of a Messiah which have all been fulfilled in the man Jesus Christ! To get rid of the Old Testament is to get rid of Jesus altogether for it makes it impossible for us to understand who the Messiah would be!
• Matthew 2:23
  And he came and dwelt in a city called Nazareth: that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophets, He shall be called a Nazarene.
  • The place that where He would be raised and come from was also prophesied in the Old Testament.
• Matthew 8:17
  That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, Himself took our infirmities, and bare our sicknesses.
  • Isaiah from the Old Testament would prophesy about the Messiah and His work.
• Matthew 13:34-35
  34 All these things spake Jesus unto the multitude in parables; and without a parable spake he not unto them: 35 That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, saying, I will open my mouth in parables; I will utter things which have been kept secret from the foundation of the world.
  • Another prophecy from Psalms 78 pointing forward to the work of the Messiah and what He would do.
• Matthew 27:35
  And they crucified him, and parted his garments, casting lots: that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, They parted my garments among them, and upon my vesture did they cast lots.
  • Even the little details about His clothing at His crucifixion was prophesied.
• Luke 24:44
  And he said unto them, These are the words which I spake unto you, while I was yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled, which were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the psalms, concerning me.
• Every single prophecy had to be fulfilled from the Old Testament about Jesus if He was to be the Messiah.
• This is why the Old Testament is so important. We cannot even understand the New Testament without the Old Testament. It is an impossibility.
• For example in the book of Revelation, it talks about characters such as Balaam, Balak, Jezebel. These characters are only found in the Old Testament. You cannot understand them if we only have the New Testament.
• The book of Jude talks about Cain, Balaam and Korah. And you cannot understand any of these characters without the Old Testament.
• You know there are some pocket Bibles that have been put together that only have the Psalms and New Testament bound together. It is not enough of the Bible to be able to understand it. To have a perfect picture of the Messiah we need both the Old Testament and New Testament.

But how else did Jesus fulfil the law and the prophets?

• Romans 13:10
  Love worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.
• The foundation to fulfilling the law is love.
• Jesus lived that perfect life in perfect obedience to everything that the law and the prophets stated. He kept the 10 commandments perfectly so that He could be our perfect sacrifice and pay the penalty of sin.
• John 3:16
  For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
• And it was at the cross that the final fulfillment would be seen. The greatest expression of His love for us.
• You see, Jesus said not even a jot or a tittle will be changed till everything is fulfilled.
• What is a jot? It is the dotting of the i. In Greek it is the smallest letter of the whole Greek alphabet.
• How about a tittle? It is the crossing of the t. The stroke that goes across. It is not the letter t, but simply the crossing of it.
• So Jesus is saying that the law will not even be changed to the smallest of degree.

Jesus said in Matthew 5 that heaven and earth would pass before even a stroke of the law would be removed from the law.

• If Jesus fulfilled and satisfied the claims of the law through His life and also His death, does it mean that we can change the law today?
  • Jesus did not destroy the law at the cross when He died for us, but in fact He sealed it even more into the stone that God wrote back in Exodus with His own finger.
  • The death of Jesus was proof that the law could not be changed. Yes, not even a dot or a stroke of the law was changed.
  • And even today, if we are in doubt as to whether the law still stands or not, all we need to do is go out and look at the sky and jump on the earth. And if the heavens are still there and the earth still stands, then God’s law is still relevant.
• Christ may have fulfilled the claims on the law 2,000 years ago, but He hasn’t totally fulfilled the prophets.

When would heaven and earth pass away?

• 2 Peter 3:10
  But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up.
• We’re not sure what the heaven passing away with a great noise is. The text here does not specify what that event is. But has the elements melted with fervent heat yet? No. This is still in the future.
• When will it take place? When the day of the Lord comes as a thief in the night.

When is the day of the Lord? When will Jesus come as a thief?

• Isaiah 13:9
  Behold, the day of the Lord cometh, cruel both with wrath and fierce anger, to lay the land desolate: and he shall destroy the sinners thereof out of it.
  • Is the land desolate yet? Have the sinners been destroyed out of the land yet? No.
  • So that means the law is still relevant!
  • This event is still in the future.
• Joel 2:31
  The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and the terrible day of the Lord come.
  • The day of the Lord is connected to 2 events – the sun turning into darkness and the moon into blood. When will that happen? Let’s go to the next text.
• Revelation 6:12-14
  12 And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood; 13 And the stars of heaven fell unto the earth, even as a fig tree casteth her untimely figs, when she is shaken of a mighty wind. 14 And the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places.
  • You see here the same events as in Joel – the sun became black like sackcloth of hair, the moon became as blood.
  • When does this event take place? You see in verse 14 – the heaven departs as a scroll? Theologians all agree what event this is talking about. This is the second coming!
  • So until the second coming, the law and the prophets will not change.
  • Maybe at that point Jesus will toss the Old Testament and the New Testament into a fire because we will have Jesus standing right there before us! I don’t know. But we won’t need a book to understand the Messiah anymore because we will see Him in the flesh, face to face.
• How about Jesus as a thief?
  • Luke 12:39-40
    39 And this know, that if the goodman of the house had known what hour the thief would come, he would have watched, and not have suffered his house to be broken through. 40 Be ye therefore ready also: for the Son of man cometh at an hour when ye think not.
  • The day of the Lord is compared to Jesus coming as a thief. That event in verse 40 is the coming of Jesus for a second time.
  • Jesus is not coming secretly but is coming at a time when people are not watching and not ready.
  • This event is also the second coming.
• Today the second coming of Jesus has not arrived yet. The law and the prophets are still relevant to each of our lives.

When will heaven and earth totally pass away?

• Revelation 21:1-2
  1 And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea. 2 And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.
• Heaven and earth passes away at the third coming of Jesus to the earth. That is when He creates a new heaven and a new earth.
• So the second coming is only a partial fulfilment of the heaven’s and earth passing away.
• So the law and the prophets will exist even until this point.

So what is our role in Christ’s fulfilment of the law today?

• Galatians 5:14
  For all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this; Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.
  • What is the motivation behind wanting to keep the law? How do we fulfil the law today? It is love.
  • Love is that which drives us to do what we do as Christian’s.
• John 14:15
  If ye love me, keep my commandments.
  • If we have the love of God abiding in our hearts, we will keep the commandments. Every word of God will become precious to us. Our love to Him will be demonstrated in our obedience to Him.
• Matthew 22:37-40
  37 — Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. 38 This is the first and great commandment. 39 And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. 40 On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.
  • Love to God and love to man. It is on these two commandments that all the law and the prophets hang.
  • So yes, we must be committed to Christ to keep all His commandments, to obey Him. But the other part is to love our neighbour as ourselves.
• Romans 13:10
  Love worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.
  • It’s not only love to God, but also love to our neighbour that is important. And it’s not just keeping those last six commandments in relation to our neighbour. It goes beyond that.
• If we love our neighbour, we will want to become the light of the world to them and the salt of the earth to them. We would want them to become a partaker of the blessings that God has given to us.

How important it is to have the love of God burning in our hearts today. Through our own personal experiences, our time in the Bible, may His love become even more evident. That is why the steps in the Beatitudes are so important. They aren’t just steps to happiness, but they are steps to understanding and experiencing the love of God.

May that love fill our hearts that truly we can share His love to everyone around us by sharing His law and the prophets, His word and by shining the light of the gospel to the whole world.