Matthew 5:31-37 Christians are called to be faithful

theological wrote: »

This morning we're continuing in Matthew. The first in the series is here, and the last is here.


We've been looking through the Sermon of the Mount together, and today's passage is below:


In today's passage we see two things. The first follows on from the previous passage on lust being the adultery of the heart. The second discusses divorce and how that can lead to the adultery of the flesh. We're seeing how the Christian life calls us to "exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees" (5:20).

Matthew 5:20 says that unless your (the audience) righteousness exceeds that of the Pharisees you won't enter the kingdom of heaven.

The primary purpose of this passage isn't Christian living (unless somehow that primacy can be extracted from Matthew, seeing as we are letting Matthew speak for itself, without outside scripture informing our interpretation).

It's about entering the kingdom of heaven. We don't know what entering the kingdom of heaven means - that must be established from Matthew. But it would appear to have more to do with salvation: yay or nay (giving the amputation passages) than anything else.

How did you make the jump to Christian living in light of entering (or never entering) the kingdom?

Divorce leads to the adultery of the flesh:
In the law we see that divorce was permitted provided that the correct legal procedure was used (verse 31) is quoting from Deuteronomy 24:1 but Jesus is quite strong in this passage. He wants His hearers to be different. Christians shouldn't accept divorce apart from in the area of sexual immorality (5:32). Marriage after divorce leads to adultery because God still sees the first marriage as being in place. This would have been quite unpopular in Jesus' day and it is extremely unpopular in our day, but God's standard to covenant faithfulness is higher than ours. Our God is faithful and therefore He calls His people to be faithful.

Although I'm not sure how divorcing your wife makes her an adulterer. If she never 'went' with a man again she would still be an adulterer

theological wrote: »

If you prefer using the term Jesus-follower to Christian I'm happy to use that. The people who he is preaching to are those who came to follow after Him in chapter 4. I don't think I've made any jumps.

The jumps made appear to be:

- he is addressing those who happen to be there. They may be followers they may not be. Some could be simply following the crowds to this latest buzz thing happening. You've made it followers / Christians. And so made it into a message for Christian/follower living

But the connection is into entering the kingdom of heaven/seeing God. If you are this and do that then you will enter/will see God. If you aren't this or that and don't do this and that then you won't enter.

Dropping this 'enter/see' connection and morphing it into a 'how Christians ought to live is fine in so far as it goes. But that is not the prime message - its something secondary. The prime message poses conditional outcomes based on your characteristics and your behaviour. Which means it is not about Christian living - unless, of course, you want to draw (as you should, if confining yourself to Matthew) a works based salvation!

You can't just drop the condition based outcome bit.

On divorcing your wife, I think Jesus says it is effectively making your wife and adulterer if she remarries. Jesus is probably making the implicit assumption that if one remarries it more than likely has a sexual element. Hence why He concludes what He does in verse 32. You can see that He clearly says that anyone who divorces except on the ground of sexual immorality "makes her commit adultery".

Fair enough. Its just that she seems to become an adulterer whether or not she remarries. Maybe in those days that was so inevitable that it was assumed to be sure to occur.

theological wrote: »

I've not "dropped" the entering the kingdom of heaven. That's part of the context around the passage. Jesus is preaching about the kingdom of heaven in chapter 4 leading up to this crowd forming around Him. That's what we learned in 4:17 when Jesus tells them "Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand", and 4:23 when Jesus is preaching about the gospel of the kingdom.

Note Matthew also tells us in 5:1 that those who were hearing are actually His disciples. It says in 5:1 "Seeing the crowds, He went up on the mountain, and when He sat down, His disciples came to Him". The people who are there with Him are being referred to as "His disciples" meaning that these are the Jesus-followers. I agree with you that it is quite early in Jesus' ministry and there's a lot to be fleshed out, but they are Jesus-followers insofar as they are referred to as His disciples. Part of what Jesus is actually doing is fleshing out what it means to be His disciples.

Okay followers granted. But we don't know if they are saved yet. Just folk following Jesus. Attracted, wowed, or like Judas perhaps, figuring he might be onto a good thing.

These followers are being told what kinds of things result in entry to heaven and what kind of things have you (followers) cast into Hell.

The good news of the kingdom isn't unpacked. Jesus saving might be no more than him making a way open through salvation by performance and behaviour. If no salvation existed before then a performance based salvation is good news. Good news is relative!

Thus far we have clear lines drawn. And it is performance and attribute based. Personal performance and attribute based.

I don't see how anyone reading this far could draw any other conclusion. And it wouldn't be very encouraging given Jesus setting the bar high. Exceeding the Pharisees is a high bar.

If we are Christians we too are Jesus' disciples in that we are following after Him and seeking to live for Him. I think that's perfectly justified as His secondary hearers.

Whoa! Christians?? These disciples aren't necessarily Christians.

And Christians won't be reading Matthew in isolation (just as you aren't really).

We are supposed to be taking it only in terms of what we read on the page. What conclusions do we draw from that? Well, works is clearly a clear lead taker in this message.

Given the strength and focus on behaviour and what it results in: heaven or hell, what is there to deflect from that conclusion?

"Good news of the kingdom of God"? What does that even mean at this point??

A fairer conclusion would be to be very worried. Someone who hadn't given things afterlife much thought would be seeing this good news as anything but good news. High bar. Higher than the Pharisees? And he'll awaiting all who fail to make that grade.

What Jesus says makes perfect sense in a law being a schoolteacher sense. The law is aimed at putting the fear of God into you. For no one can uphold the law. But schoolteacher is Romans. And that's not permitted with this method.

And so, works the conclusion.

theological wrote: »

I am not "denying" anything. I'm simply pointing to the conclusion that we know why Jesus has come in part from chapter 1. We know that we fall short in these areas continually. I think Jesus is setting up a tension that we'll see resolved as we work through the text further.

I agree with you at this stage, there is a lot to be fleshed out. It is the beginning of Jesus' ministry.

But your approach is to take the text in isolation - not to refer to what else we know from scripture. As if reading it for the first time. Which means we cannot take what might subsequently be revealed nor take what we know of our falling short. We simply let the text say what it has to say and conclude what there is to be concluded from it.

Thus far, the conclusion these followers (or us, if we are following the text now) is that those who do not have the attributes listed or who do the things that Jesus says will result in our going to Hell, will go to Hell.

His coming as a saviour doesn't override that conclusion - as I say, his coming as a saviour might merely involve throwing a rope and our performance is the grabbing of it. Rope throwers are seen as saviours, even if we grab at the rope.

What, I ask, are the specific reasons we should not draw this conclusion at this stage - if doing as you appear to say we must do: take the text in isolation and without reference to anything else we know from scripture?

I've explained to you why I'm referring to Jesus being a saviour. We've been told this at the start of the gospel. We're yet to see that work. I agree there's a tension between 1. We need a saviour, and 2. You ought to live this way (a way in which we continually fall short).

The good news of the kingdom of God at present is that the long awaited King has arrived. We're told that He has come to be our Saviour in chapter 1. We're yet to learn what that looks like.

As I say, saviour and performance can go hand in hand. Jesus the rope thrower, our performance the grabbing of that rope. When you compare the weight of "saving from sins" to the sheer weight of Jesus talking about performance and destination arising from it, there is no compare. You are, I suggest, taking a mere morsel (saviour) and using it to counteract an unwelcome, but obvious conclusion. This is not "tension". Tension implies some equal tugging on the rope. Savior (as yet undescribed how) vs. the weight of focus on performance and destinations arising from same is an utterly unequal contest.

I would remind you that a certain not-insignificant Christian church has managed to conclude a works based salvation from scripture. They might be wrong, we might agree. But they didn't lick their conclusions off a stone. They conclude so because it isn't hard to conclude so when you read tranches of scripture like this which has a clear "how you perform determines your afterlife destination" tone to it.

I'm taking Matthew in terms of what I've seen so far in Matthew. What Jesus is telling us is true for His hearers back then, but it is equally true to the those who are following after Him now.


I think everything I've said can be justified in a Matthew context.

For the record, I'd much rather we focussed on what we can learn from the text rather than why you dislike my method of reading.

What you are doing, I think, is looking as an informed-by-scripture Christian. You will naturally draw useful conclusions from the text. Such as you do when you talk of just how serious Christ considers sin to be. It is a useful thing for a Chrisitan to remind themselves of and in my critiquing your approach I can't help but be reminded of that message.

But that is a secondary message to the message that is being issued forth here - because the conclusion is performance based salvation. There is nothing of substance to counter the weight of performance-bar-scaled being issued by Jesus. It is only your a priori Christian knowledge that allows you to suppose tension and it is only your reading forward which allows you (or might allow you, we shall see) suppose the present conclusion to be other than what it currently must be.

We either approach it without reference to scripture and without reference to our being indwelt by the Holy Spirit and without reference to all our experience of God in our lives and how that informs us in total. Or we approach it with all these other insights at our disposal and let those insights help us establish what it is Jesus' primary focus and aim is here.

We cannot have it both ways. And if letting our being Christians inform us then we might conclude Jesus laying it on thick for a reason. That reason belonging to the realm of law as schoolteacher - for that is what a newbie approaching this scripture could not but conclude "If this is true, then I'm utterly bunche

theological wrote: »

No, my method is to look at Matthew in context, not just the immediate section we're looking at.

And what you have is savior. Whatever that means: including throwing a rope we have to grasp by performance

Where OT scriptures are quoted or alluded to they can provide context to the passage.

And where do they deflect from the weight of a performance conclusion? How often we only read the OT citations through the lens of knowing something of the fuller picture, through our wider scriptural knowledge.

Rememeber: you say it's as the hearer then would read it. The hearer then hadn't a notion of salvation by faith. It was there latent in the OT - but the Pharisees didn't see it. What chance the dog in the street?

I've been really clear on that whenever I have explained this to you previously. I've also explained why I think what I've said is pretty grounded in what we've seen already in Matthew.

What in Matthew grounds other than a salvation by works conclusion by these hearers (and by a Christian who is asked to leave what he knows from elsewhere at the door). Saying "chapter 1", when all there is is a vague, non-defined reference to savior which the hearers then hadn't access to - Matthew not yet being written isn't enough. Not if you've left the rest of the Bible (bar in-Matthew OT references) at the door?

I'm looking at what has come already in Matthew to conclude that Jesus has come as saviour (1:21 is before our passage).

Savior doesn't mean anything unless the "how he saves" is revealed. A "throwing a rope we've to grasp with our performance" savior? That's all that can be concluded given savior + clear, sustained focus on our performance.


Listen, I don't want to pester. Do what you will with your thread and suppose what you want to suppose by way of stitching together conclusions that hearers then could reasonably draw. Me? I just think you're reaching waaay beyond what's there.

theological wrote: »

I agree with you, we're early in the gospel and we need to see that work out. I'm simply countering your claim that what I'm saying isn't based on what we've seen in the gospel so far. I've explained how it is.





I never said that they did. I'm simply re-stating what I've said about the method of reading I'm using because you seem to misunderstand it.





I've dealt with this in another thread that you made this point on. This is why it may be better to start a thread as to why you dislike the method and focus on discussing what we can learn from the passages.





You really really ought to read what I'm saying. I said explicitly that it is a truth that is unfolding, I said explicitly that at this point in Matthew there is a tension between these two ideas that need to be worked out as we continue reading.

There is no tension. At this point there is clear salvation by work on the balance of the text thus far.

You are reading ahead and inserting now what you know the overall scriptural conclusion will be. And you may not even find the overall scriptural conclusion in Matthew.

This is a narrow point: would the hearers at this stage suppose 'tension' or would they be supposing salvation by performance? Clearly the latter.

Your method only works when you know the answer from the get go and read that into the text - the tension is a false construct based on this a priori knowledge as to the overall: salvation by faith.

You are right that salvation is so. But just not from the balance of text thus far.