So the question yesterday that a guy at Sunday School asked was about Matthew 5.27-30, where Jesus talks about ripping out eyes and chopping off hands if they lead you to sin. He asked if we should take that seriously or not. I love the way he asked that question, because you can only answer YES if the question is “Should we take what Jesus said seriously?”
Ok, so that leads to some discussion, and then I realized this: I think of every other command or teaching in the sermon on the mount as literal and right and what people should do, except for these 3 verses.
what?! How can that be? How can we have pick-and-choose discipleship?
I hear people say, “Jesus is obviously exaggerating because poking out your eye wouldn’t change your heart. It wouldn’t stop you from lusting on the inside.”
It wouldn’t? Isn’t is through hardship that we learn to be closer to God? If I sat down and gouged out my eyeball, it seems like that would be an event that would stick with me for a while. And if I associated it with lust, then next time wouldn’t I absolutely cower in fear? If I chopped my hand off, would I not consider the consequences of sin whenever I reached to commit the sin, and there was nothing there?! I know I sound a little absurd, but I want to get out of this mode of applying 21st century ‘reason’ to the words of Jesus.
We don’t say that Jesus is exaggerating to make a point about other extreme things He taught. I just wonder if maybe we want to keep our eyes and our hands a little too much. We’d rather literally pay off a debt or forgive an enemy, but don’t *really* ask us to chop off our hands. hmmmm
I believe it is the difference between understanding real grace and what D Bonhoffer called “cheap grace. But, these are not the only verses most of us ignore. What about, One thing you lack, Sell everything and give it to the poor?” Shane’s book points out that Jesus told one guy to be born again, and it is our common language for salvation. But, he tells this other guy to forfeit all earthly possessions (consistent with other passages)and we treat it as applying to only that man. And, I still maintain that at the last supper He literally meant for us to offer our bodies, and our blood, our very lives to one another, not just koolaid and tic tac bread “emblems.”
The church down the street has on its sign, “If 10% is good enough for God, it should be good enough for the IRS.” I do not believe Jesus ever said either. Jesus free grace given in love, demands EVERYTHING we are and have, our bodies, our minds, our possessions (all of them), and our soul in return. The twist is, He will perfect them for us, because they are all from Him, through Him, and for Him to start with! peace