Riffing on Lust, Adultery, & Divorce: A Spoken-word Reflection on Jesus’ words in Matthew 5:27-32

As we have seen Jesus consistently challenging the stance of legalism as being deficient in righteousness, we have learned that the law extends to the level of our thoughts and emotions. Matthew 5:27-32 certainly is an expansion of his beatitude "Blessed are the pure in heart..." and reveal the startling truth that we are not pure in heart. So, I approached this difficult section of the Sermon on the Mount using a more emotional, soul-level, spoken-word poetic/prophetic approach. While I am not Prince Ea and there is no sick beat or music video to back it, I hope it impacts you as strongly as I have felt its message this week. 

Lust…

A stolen look, a coveting glance, did anyone see me?

Boy, I’d kill for another.

I’m telling you straight up when you are enslaved to lust

                   it doesn’t matter what day it is,

                You just want to offer twisted worship before your mirrored idol.

If your mother heard what you were thinking, she would throw up...

But then you don’t speak the truth anyway,

              starting with lying to yourself behind the façade of privacy,

   so others merely suspect what you are all about....

                                            That you are taking God’s name,

                                                    his holy character, in vain.

    And in a thought indulged

                        and appetite embraced,

                                 all the commandments lie shattered at our feet.

Exchanging truth for a lie,

              freedom for bondage,

         relationship for a transaction

             a subject for an object

Even though God knows their name

      you treat them like products to consume

                                          and then assume to presume

       upon their rejected redeemer to give you a pass…

because you can’t help yourself

                  as you help yourself time and again

                to what is not yours.

Lust gives poor return on our investment for like a casino

the odds are not in our favor outside the kingdom of heaven…

the bitter aftertaste is deadly

                            and contagious.

Adultery…

Rooted in discontent and rebellion

                                       against God

                                       and our spouse

                                            or the spouse of another…

following the maxim that stolen fruit is sweet,

 but not realizing that sin,

                           like poison from an ant trap

                                      is carried home with us to kill our family.

A tearing of affection away from God and his gifts

                                                    to pursue that which,

                                                                      though it looks good for food

will only leave us naked

                     and ashamed,

                     and afraid to enter into real relationship.

Giving away pieces of our heart, soul, even body

                     and receiving nothing that lasts in return.

Or perhaps we distance ourselves,

                taking back our affection and intimacy

                        from the one to whom it belongs by holy covenant

        so that we can break out against all reason

                                                against all trust

                            to draw another into our dinner date with the dead.

Such soul infection cannot be hidden forever,

           for either sin finds us out in conviction

                                               or in getting caught.

                   We might think we are clever covering our tracks,

                                       yet God knows

                                              and feels the pain of our betrayal

         right from the first longing that we cast away

                    to another who knows not

                                  that they are merely a temporary stand-in for our own ego.

Will we stop and look up to meet God’s patient gaze

                                in time to hear the rooster of conviction crowing?

Will we like Simon weep bitterly at our repeated denial?

Divorce…

The death and burial of the two become one that God brought together.

A public killing of one of God’s creations.

Since Adam and Eve disturbed the peace

                                               of the cosmos in self-promotion,

                                                                  their selfish actualization cost us all.

               But we fall close to the proverbial tree,

                                                   judging for ourselves

that this daily walking together in the cool of the day is pointless.

                     We want to choose our own path.

                     We want to make our own way.

                     We want to play the field,

                                        explore our options,

                    stop having to share ourselves

                                              with the wife/husband of our youth;

                                                  Breaking faith all too willingly.

            Sure there are reasons,

                                        hurts,

                                             failures- a-plenty.

                   There always are.

             Sure we can make a case for it

                  if we try hard enough even lobbying support

                                                                          from family and friends,

      but that merely exposes our own hard-stony-heart

                                                                      that has not been changed

                    by the love of Christ into living beating flesh.

If it had…

           would we not rather accept the disappointments,

                             even the small niggling defraudings

                                          that come from living in community

                                                                   with an imperfect person

                                                                                          like ourselves?

        Why draw away instead of drawing near?

                                   Oh, let not man separate

                                           what God has brought together,                                                                        

                                     but instead learn to forgive

                            and trust the One who died,

                            and now lives, to bring wholeness

                                                                     into our lives!

Divorce breaks the vessel that Jesus is shaping…on the potter’s wheel of life

              I don’t want to be that guy…you know…

       The one who breaks God’s stuff.

                     Who rebukes the Lord’s stated purpose,

           “Far be it from you, Lord! 

                 This shall never happen to you.”

Yet just because I didn’t pay a lawyer

                                   or sign the paper

                              doesn’t mean I am free and clear.

Where is my heart?

           Am I laying down my life, like Jesus did,

                                 to walk in love towards my spouse?

      Or am I continuing to deny them delivery

                                       of the love Jesus has sent them in care of me?

God hates divorce, because it kills a relationship

                                         and wreaks more havoc than any terrorist plot.

Fact is, we all have failed.

 But do we really know it,

                               feel it,

                       cringe at it?

       Do we sense our utter lostness,

                            our disembodied desperation,

                                                               apart from Christ?

Or has the soul-numbing influence of our sin habit

                                   self-medicated us to the point of insensibility?

Our destiny hangs in the balance…so what will we do next?

Jesus calls to us,

                 “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. “

                     Run to the One who loves you too much

                                                  to leave you unchanged…

                          and He will run to meet you! 

Murder, Madness & Muttering

In the Sermon on the Mount (Matt. 5-7), Jesus made it clear that he had not come to destroy the law of God but to make sure that it is fulfilled in any and every way that it needs to be fulfilled (5:17-20). He concluded this section affirming the permanence of the Old Testament (lit. “the Law & the Prophets”) with the charge to his disciples that “unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees” that they would never, no not ever, enter the kingdom of heaven. Those were shocking words then and still are today! The thought that their righteousness would have to exceed that of the most legalistically righteous people in their world must have driven home their spiritual bankruptcy to them to their benefit (“blessed are the poor in spirit” v.3).

However, the righteousness of the Pharisees was legalistic and legalistic righteousness is flawed in that it goes to great lengths to precisely define the dos and don’ts in order to actually relax the real demands of God’s law on their lives. As R. Kent Hughes once wonderfully preached,

“The Pharisees’ righteousness was not so great. It was merely external. It focused on the ceremonial. Its man-made rules actually were unconscious attempts to reduce the demands of the Law and make it manageable. Those rules insulated them from the Law’s piercing heart demands. These men were self-satisfied….[but Jesus] was explaining in the most dramatic terms the impossibility of salvation apart from grace.”[1]

It was this Pharisaic tendency to attempt to make the Law “manageable” that prompted Jesus to address six examples (Matthew 5:21-48) or antitheses where there had come a relaxing or corruption of the original heart of God communicated in the law. He uses the formula, “You have heard that it was said…But I say to you…” to delineate each of the six examples.

This week, we will look briefly at the first law Jesus addressed the 6^th Commandment, the prohibition against murder. The Pharisaical view, legalistic righteousness, concludes that if we haven’t actually criminally killed someone then we have kept the 6^th commandment. Jesus takes a very different view.

“You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not murder; and whoever murders will be liable to judgment.’ But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment; whoever insults his brother will be liable to the council; and whoever says, ‘You fool!’ will be liable to the hell of fire. (v. 21-22)

Jesus was saying that murder starts in the heart when we act out our anger towards others because they get in the way of our having what we want when we want it. Such outbursts fail to recognize the image of God present in each and every person we meet. Our bullying words assault, abuse, and assassinate character long before blood is shed. Jesus says that waiting for blood to be shed is too easy and not worthy of the kingdom of heaven.

In addition to acting out our anger towards another, Jesus drove the 6^th Commandment even deeper into hearts and souls with the warning against speaking or thinking contempt for another person’s intellect or position (‘raca’ v.22). Likewise, there is no place for speaking or muttering contempt for the character of others even if we disagree with what they stand for. We are not to label others as clueless, worthless, or hopeless for that is not what God says about them. Such murderous labels kill our ability to see what God is doing in the life of another. Such pride deceives us into thinking that we are righteous in our own strength, ideas, and worth…killing our ability to enter the kingdom by grace through faith.

The only way we can enter and exist in the kingdom of heaven it to repent of our selfish pride, and its offspring—angry outbursts, verbal abuse, and inward contempt. Remember that this repentance is relational; it is not just a change of behavior but a returning to the Lord Himself! Jesus gives two examples of how we should apply this commandment and they both center on the urgent need for reconciliation—with our brothers and sisters that we have offended, and with our God to whom we owe more than we could ever pay. Jesus desires relationships to be healed not severed. In fact, 1 John 4:19-21 makes it clear that we cannot love God if we hate people.

I am reminded that Psalm 133:1-2 says,

Behold, how good and pleasant it is
    when brothers dwell in unity!
It is like the precious oil on the head,
    running down on the beard,
on the beard of Aaron,
    running down on the collar of his robes!

The “precious oil” was the oil used only for anointing the High Priest, the Ark of the Covenant, and the furniture and utensils of the holy place—the sanctuary of the Lord. This olive oil contained large quantities of myrrh, cinnamon, cassia, and other fragrant ingredients (Ex. 30). Why do I mention this here? Because the word picture powerfully communicated to the ancient worshipper (on his way to offer his gifts at the altar of the Temple) the same message Jesus returns to in his examples. Simply put, when brothers dwell in reconciled unity it smells like heaven! O Lord Jesus, please bring the scent of heaven to our relationships today! Let heaven’s work be done in this community!

Jesus spoke with authority, not to abolish the Law and the Prophets, but to fulfill them. Will we let him do that in our hearts, minds, words, and actions this week?

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[1] R. Kent Hughes, The Sermon on the Mount: The Message of the Kingdom, 96-97.