Today we are looking at a tough topic. Something that strikes near the heart of everyone. Something that we all, as human beings, struggle with. Let’s start by reading the passage of concern in Matthew 5 as we continue our series on the Mount of Blessing.
Matthew 5:21-22
21 Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment: 22 But I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment: and whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council: but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire.
What does Jesus place on the same level as killing someone?
- Whoever is angry at his brother without a cause. Meaning, whoever is angry at his brother for no good reason.
- Notice that Jesus says that both have the same consequence. If you kill someone you are in danger of judgment, and if you are angry at your brother without a cause you are also in danger of judgment. In the eyes of heaven, both are at the same level.
- 1 John 3:15
Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer: and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him.- John takes it a step further. If you hate your brother, you are a murderer.
- One is an act – the act of murder. But hating your brother in your heart, especially for no good reason, is the same as committing the act itself.
Why? Why does the Bible put the two on the same level?
- Even though one is an action, and the other is just holding feelings in the heart, the reason they are the same is because a hatred is where the thought for murder begins.
- The only difference is the person who holds that hatred in their heart for another person either just simply lacks the courage or the opportunity to follow through with the act itself.
- You see, Jesus is not simply just dealing with actions, He is also dealing with the root cause of where that action springs from – our heart.
- But look, it is normal to be angry at someone if they do something that is wrong or cause us to be upset at them. But the difference is whether we hold on to those angry feelings or not. The passage even emphasizes the fact that there are some that are angry at others without a cause, for no apparent reason.
- Is that even possible? To be angry at people, or to dislike people, for no good reason?
- Yes it can be. Racism is like that. You dislike a person simply because of the colour of their skin.
- Or maybe you dislike someone because of the way they dress or how they like.
- In the day and age we live in there are just many angry people out there.
- But anger that is stirred up when we see injustice, or seeing God dishonoured, when we see the innocent oppressed and persecuted, the Bible speaks of a righteous indignation which can stir a person’s heart; such anger is not a sin.
- Examples I think of in the Bible is when Moses came down and saw the Israelites worshipping a golden calf after they had just pledges allegiance to God.
- Or even when Jesus came into the temple and saw it desecrated because of all the buying and selling and He overthrew the tables.
- Ephesains 4:26
Be ye angry, and sin not: let not the sun go down upon your wrath. - There is an anger that is born of heaven that does not lead a person to hate the individual, but simply hate the sin.
Why is hatred or anger in the heart such a serious issue though?
- John 8:44
Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it. - The Bible calls the devil a murderer. It all started with him. He was a murderer from the beginning. And so hatred must have originated with him as well.
- When we hold anger in our hearts, we are exhibiting the characteristics of the devil, not Jesus. We are standing under the banner of the devil and will eventually do his works and not that of Christ.
- Though we may never come to a point of murder, I think we can all honestly say that when we are angry at someone or hate someone, our actions towards that person changes. It may not be outright animosity or physically hurting that person or murdering them, but we may avoid them, or can’t stand being in the same room as them, or even how we speak to them or treat them. It all changes based upon what we have in our heart.
- Jesus condemns all of that.
Jesus also puts something else on the same level as hatred or anger. What is it?
- Let’s read Matthew 5:22 again.
- Matthew 5:22
But I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment: and whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council: but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire. - If you say to some Raca or call someone a fool, it is also on the same level.
- What is the meaning of Raca? It means vain fellow or worthless.
- But why would that be put in the same category as murdering someone?
- You see, when we call someone useless or worthless, we underestimate the value that Christ puts on that person. And even that changes the way that we act towards them or our attitude towards them.
- We don’t put in as much effort to help them or to minister to them.
- But God has claimed every person as His purchased possession, and even though they might be degraded in sin or just different to usual society, every person must be treated with respect and kindness.
- The other word we should avoid calling people is fool. That means dull or stupid or a blockhead.
- In the Old Testament, the word fool was used to designate an apostate or someone that had abandoned themselves to wickedness and totally left God.
- Psalms 14:1
The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God. They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none that doeth good. - So when we call someone a fool, we are condemning them as an apostate or someone who despises God and it also changes the way that we thank and act towards that person also.
- So it’s not only what we think or feel in our hearts towards someone is Jesus condemning, but we must be so careful with our words and what we talk about someone as well.
- And though this language might seem trivial in our day and age today, calling someone worthless or useless of a fool, nonetheless we need to take heed with our language for surely it is impacting our hearts and our thoughts of others to some extent.
But now we come to the second part of the teaching from Christ. Let’s go back to Matthew.
- Matthew 5:23-24
23 Therefore if thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath ought against thee; 24 Leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way; first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift. - Now according to this text who should be the one doing the reconciling?
- It is the person who realises that his brother has something against him.
- Notice, the person who is fine and doesn’t hold any grudge against his brother, but realises that his brother is not happy with him or is angry at him, he is the one that needs to stop whatever he is doing and go and seek out his brother so that he can be reconciled back to him.
- Today in our time, when someone has a problem with us, we don’t usually go and approach him. Why? Because it’s not our problem, so we normally wait for them to come to us. They have the problem, not us. We are fine. That’s what we tell ourselves.
- Or we like to say if we go and seek them out about the problem, they might say that it is nothing and deny that there is an issue in the first place. And so we give ourselves reasons why it’s not necessary to go and talk to them.
- But Christ is saying that that is not the Christian approach. We need to be proactive and go and speak to that person and try our very best to be reconciled to them.
- How important or urgent is it? We need to leave our gift at the altar. Being reconciled to our brother is more important than giving our gifts to God.
What does the Bible define as reconciliation?
- Ephesians 2:16
And that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby.- To be in one body, to be united.
- Colossians 1:20-21
20 And, having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto himself; by him, I say, whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven. 21 And you, that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled.- To make peace between two parties or not be aliens anymore.
- So the person who doesn’t have a problem, even though he/she has peace in their hearts, they have to go and seek out the person that does have a problem so that there can be peace and unity again.
- This is called spiritual maturity. It is not possible unless we ourselves are growing in Christ.
- This is what the beatitudes say:
- Matthew 5:9
Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God.
- Matthew 5:9
- This is not just about helping others have peace with another person, but also us having peace with others also. And we won’t be able to do that unless we are experiencing those first steps in the beatitudes. Spiritual growth, spiritual maturity.
- Too often people like to ignore problems, or we tell ourselves it is not our fault so why should we do anything about it.
- But Jesus never identified who was in the wrong. The fact that your brother has ought against you, it is enough for you to leave your gift at the altar, seek that brother out and make sure you are reconciled first.
The perfect example that we see of this is in Christ.
- We were the ones that sinned first and caused trouble. We are the ones that alienated ourselves from Christ.
- Isaiah 59:1-2
1 Behold, the LORD’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save; neither his ear heavy, that it cannot hear: 2 But your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid his face from you, that he will not hear. - We were the ones that disobeyed and caused sin and rebellion to come upon the earth. Christ could have looked down and opted to start over. Destroy the earth and recreate another earth.
- Yet what did He do instead?
- Romans 5:7-10
7 For scarcely for a righteous man will one die: yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die. 8 But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. 9 Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him. 10 For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life.- We are hesitant to die even for a good man or a righteous man, never mind a sinner!
- Yet Christ showed us this example of reconciliation by dying for us while we were yet sinners, while we were the enemies of Him.
- Who had the problem?
- We did. We were sinners. We hated Him. We crucified Him!
- But who did the reconciling?
- Christ did.
- Why?
- Because He loved us. It was His love for us that motivated Him to do what He did.
- And likewise, if we have the love of Christ abiding in our hearts, it will drive us to reconcile with others even though we don’t have the problem or even if we didn’t do anything wrong.
- Maybe it was misunderstanding. Doesn’t matter, go and be reconciled.
- Maybe it was their fault. Doesn’t matter! Go and be reconciled.
- The love of God. Only this can help us to heed the instruction of Christ.
- God does not expect us all to die for others. Maybe there are some out there that He will call to do this. But in regards to reconciliation and making things right, how can we die for the other person? What sacrifice do we have to make?
- It is the sacrifice of our pride. Often it is pride that stops us from reconciling because we think in our hearts that we didn’t do anything wrong. Why do I have to go and make it right? It is not my problem. I don’t have an issue with that person.
- But it requires humility of heart to make things right when you aren’t holding the anger or aren’t in the fault. It requires meekness to come to someone and try and sort it out with them, for the sake of their hearts and minds.
- It requires going beyond the righteousness of the Pharisees. Doing more than just the bare minimum in thinking about myself, but in thinking about the heart and peace of others and their salvation, for they are the ones holding hatred in their hearts which will ultimately keep them out of heaven.
- But if there is in fact anything that we have done wrong, we need to quickly, in humility, confess our sins and seek for forgiveness from the other person. That is our duty to make things right.
However, Jesus is not done here. Let’s look at the last part of this section on reconciliation.
- Matthew 5:25-26
25 Agree with thine adversary quickly, whiles thou art in the way with him; lest at any time the adversary deliver thee to the judge, and the judge deliver thee to the officer, and thou be cast into prison. 26 Verily I say unto thee, Thou shalt by no means come out thence, till thou hast paid the uttermost farthing. - What is Jesus trying to counsel here? Let’s read the NIV version which renders it a bit more clearer.
- Matthew 5:25
Settle matters quickly with your adversary who is taking you to court. Do it while you are still together on the way, or your adversary may hand you over to the judge, and the judge may hand you over to the officer, and you may be thrown into prison.
- Matthew 5:25
- Christ’s counsel to us is to settle things outside of court as much as possible. Seems like we are in the wrong this time.
- But it also seems to indicate there is problem between brother/sister in the church. Why would I say that? Look, the worldly way is to bring a person to court. How else could they settle differences right? But between those in the church we need to keep things outside of court as much as possible. Why should we allow an ungodly person to dictate to us how to settle our differences?
- Sometimes we strive too much for justice that we forget to be righteous. We must learn to reconcile, even at the expense of losing some money or property. Let us not drag our differences between Christian brothers and sisters before the world. They need to see that we can stand united and that we can learn to settle differences in the spirit of meekness and humility.
- Not forgetting what Christ has just said – if our brother has ought against us, let us quickly go and settle that matter first. That is more important than coming to church in pretence to worship God. I am sure that if God could speak directly to us at church, He would go and tell us to settle those differences.
Leviticus 19:17-18
17 Thou shalt not hate thy brother in thine heart: thou shalt in any wise rebuke thy neighbour, and not suffer sin upon him. 18 Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the LORD.
This is the spirit of the law. And it’s not anything new that Jesus is teaching! This is the Old Testament. It’s not just about not lying, not stealing, not killing, not committing adultery. Christ is trying to remind us that to love our neighbour as ourselves is much more than that. It’s to not hold a grudge.
Yes, the foundation is love. But then we need to learn to reconcile our differences. And often times, in order to do that, we must be willing to seek out our brother or sister and to communicate to make it right.
Today, if you are holding a grudge against someone in church, if you have felt offended in any way by what a brother or sister in church has done or said to you, quickly in the spirit of meekness and humility go and seek for that person to resolve it, to reconcile. Don’t let the hurt feelings simmer below the surface and cause you to change how you treat that person.
Or if you have realised that you have offended someone, also quickly go and seek them out, seek for forgiveness, apologise, make restitution, whatever is needed so that there can be peace and unity between each other again. For surely the devil is doing all that he can to divide, to separate.
Jude 1:19-21
19 These be they who separate themselves, sensual, having not the Spirit. 20 But ye, beloved, building up yourselves on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Ghost, 21 Keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.
Separation happens when there are unresolved differences. But let’s keeping building our faith. Let’s keep ourselves in God’s love and His mercy. And as we realise the mercy that we have received, it will then be easier to show mercy to others. Let’s do all that we can today to be reconciled with one another!