Matthew 5:33-37
This passage has always struck me for its simplicity. We don’t have to swear elaborate oaths. Jesus asks us to let our “yes” be “yes” and our “no” “no”. When I first studied this passage, I wondered if the religious leaders of Jesus’ time swore elaborate oaths accompanied by much ritual but that those oaths were meaningless, done for show with no real commitment to truth. I wondered if this is what was behind Jesus words. Don’t swear elaborate oaths you have no intention to keep. Say yes or no and mean it.
Matthew Henry speaks of the third commandment “Do not swear falsely by my name and so profane the name of your God. I am the Lord.” (Leviticus 18:18) when referring to this passage. In Deuteronomy 5:11 it is written as “you shall not misuse the name of the Lord your God, for the Lord will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name.”
Matthew Henry reminds us that is was agreed that violation of oaths and vows was forbidden. This was the meaning of that commandment. Jesus was concerned we understand that a promise was a promise before God and not to be taken lightly. Better to be honest to others than to say you will do something then not do it. Not only do you sin in God’s eyes, but you hurt others and damage your own reputation as an honest person.
The New Bible Commentary speaks of elaborate oaths established by the Law that set different levels of promise and corrupted the original intention of God by allowing loopholes where people could break their word without penalty.
William Barclay speaks of the taking of “frivolous” oaths in Jesus’ time. People in their everyday speech would swear “by my head” or “by thy life” that something was true. This was taking an oath when it was not necessary, and Jesus’ considered that a sin.
The second custom approved by the Rabbis was that a “evasive swearing”. There were oaths that were not binding. If the person swore the oath and did not mention the name of God, then it was not binding. So a person could swear by heaven, or earth, or Jerusalem and that oath was free to be broken. People believed that only if God’s name was used was He part of the oath. Jesus set out to teach people that every promise had God as a partner. Everything belongs to God and He is in everything.
Barclay continues with a “great eternal truth”. We cannot compartmentalise our lives into areas where God and areas where He isn’t. God is in every part of our lives. So the church goer who puts God into the Sunday compartment and excludes Him from the Monday, Tuesday and so on compartment is not leading their life as a disciple. Every part of our lives from the most ethereal to the most mundane is occupied by and belongs to God.
So let your yes be yes and your no, no. Because God is in every promise and breaking any promise is a sin. It is not easy is it? Thank you God that we have Jesus who paid for all our sins, because in life it is impossible not to sin.

Matthew 5:31-32
God’s intention for marriage was that the couple who married would become one flesh permanently (Genesis 2:24). In fact, God was stating a fact that sexual intimacy does unite people into one flesh. In a society where sex is considered as much a part of a relationship as kissing, there is a tendency to downplay the dramatic impact sexual intimacy has on relationships. The truth is, if you have sex with someone you have become one flesh permanently. This has far reaching implications.
God knew this when He called sexual intimacy “becoming one flesh”. There is God’s intention and there is the result of sin, which even in Jesus’ time had led to divorce being readily accessible. I don’t deny that many people find themselves in terrible situations where divorce is a relief and remarriage in a new, healthy marriage a blessing. However, in my work I see the impact this has on families and especially on children. There is a readiness in today’s world for people to see relationships as “disposable” and there are many women who have children to several different fathers. I am not saying these women are sinners. Far from it, there are many people I know in that situation and I don’t condemn them for that. What I see is the difficulty this causes for the children. They are torn between so many households and so many fathers. Their fathers, if they maintain contact, often have other children that belong to other households and this is very disruptive for children. In reality, most people want the God idea. They want a relationship that lasts “forever”. Sadly, not enough people learn how to develop strong, enduring relationships before marriage. Because of hurt in people’s pasts they often make bad choices in relationships. Also there is a great willingness and pressure for people to have sex with their boyfriend/girlfriend early in the relationship. Once sex becomes part of a relationship that old “one flesh” rule comes in and people stay together even when it is obvious they are not compatible.
Broken relationships also impact on the couple within that relationship. The more relationships as person has that fail, the less that person thinks about him/herself and the less likely that person will be to trust new relationships. I have seen people accept anyone because of a need to have a relationship. Children are raised with the picture that if they are not in relationships they are failures. This puts a lot of pressure on the child to take on relationships before he/she is at an age to maintain a relationship.
I would like to finish with reference to William Barclay’s comments on this passage. He commented that in Jesus’ time divorce had become so prevalent that girls were no longer willing to marry because marriage was so insecure. I wonder if we can draw a parallel to our times when so many young people choose living together rather than marriage. They still want the permanence of marriage but fear divorce. They will buy a house with their partner and have children but will avoid the wedding even though they want it. That is sad that relationships can no longer be trusted.
Barclay also spoke of Jesus’ words as being practical attempts to reform a society in which family life was collapsing and national morals were becoming more lax. We haven’t come very far in the past two thousand years. We face high divorce and relationship breakdown rates, family life is in crisis, many children bear the scars of these breakdowns, adults bear the scars of these breakdowns, children are growing up with no fathers or a succession of father figures and this has a negative impact on them, especially boys. There are increasing numbers of hurting people in our society. I know that this pain causes Jesus great grief. He wants the best for people, not hurt. Whatever you may think of marriage and divorce, the truth is relationship breakdowns hurt the couple and their children. And that is a tragedy.

When praying about today’s blog, I was asked to write about the practical application of what I have been writing. What I am writing about today is largely covered in Matthew 5:7. However, everything I have written about so far is applicable here. Another verse that is important in this blog is Hebrews 12:15 “watch out that no bitterness grows up” NLT
A few years ago I made the difficult decision to no longer have contact with my siblings. This was due to their extremely toxic behaviour, in particular that of my sister-in-law.I struggled with this for years until God directed me to take the step to cut off contact. It has been difficult because my brother and his wife were the only other Christians in my family. I looked up to them as being the ones who would show me the way to live a Christian life. Sadly, over the course of my adulthood, I have come to realise that I have outgrown them in my spiritual walk. Far from being shining lights as God’s disciples, they have become harsh, judgemental followers of Churchianity.
Christmas time is a time when my sister-in-law especially delights to “dig the knife in” and this Christmas was no exception. I may have cut off contact with them, but they do not honour that and, although they ignore me at all other times, they insist on sending Christmas cards. These cards are not sent in love, but in hatred, and my sister-in-law uses my father, who is old and frail to visit her particular brand of hatred upon me. This Christmas the card from my father came and I opened it to find it had been completely depersonalised. There was no hint of love in it. My father’s dementia is such that he doesn’t know who he is writing to and writes in cards what he is told to write. I knew the card did not represent any feelings of my father but of my sister-in-law, so his words did not upset me. It was the nastiness of what she had done that upset me so much. I couldn’t believe someone could be so vindictive when I have done nothing to incur this wrath.
I knew I had to deal with my sister-in-law mercifully and forgive her. I spent the rest of that day in prayer and meditation, asking God for help. I choose to forgive her. I knew her behaviour was due to her own pain from her past and she is using me as a scapegoat for that pain, but that does not excuse her behaviour, or lessen the hurt. There were a few things that I realised as I prayed.
• Jesus was angry at her behaviour, just as he had been angry at my parent’s behaviour towards me as a child.
• In her desire to hurt me, she was allowing herself to be a tool of satan.
The second point horrified me. How easy it is to allow bitterness to turn us into tools satan uses to hurt others! I asked God to keep me very aware of any time I may allow myself to be used in this way because I am determined I will not serve satan as she is doing. I only want to serve Jesus. However, the thoughts about what she did kept coming back and that makes me vulnerable to being used by satan. So how do I stop them?
God reminded me of Romans 12:2a “Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” Neuroscientists have found that the brain has the ability to renew itself if each person intentionally works on teaching him or herself something new. So how does that apply to me? I choose to replace those thoughts with something else. What better to replace my negative thoughts with than the knowledge that Jesus is my Lord and Saviour, and has overcome the world (1 John 5:4).
So remember:
“…whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things.” Philippians 4:8 NASB
And you will be transformed by the renewing of your mind and will be better able to resist being used by satan to hurt another person.

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Welcome to the New Year. May God bless you richly in this year to come.

Matthew 5:27-30
In the first two verses of this section, Jesus expands the commandment to not commit adultery to include other aspects of behaviour that He considered adulterous. He was again criticising the Jewish laws that imposed drastic penalties on those who committed the act of adultery but did not deal with other behaviour, such as deliberately seeking out the desired person to gaze lustfully at. Jesus was not saying that the person who sees another person walk past and find them attractive is committing adultery. What He is saying is that it is wrong to deliberately seek out those people, or representations of them, that you know will turn you on. This is particularly true of those who view pornographic material. I recently read an article by the wife of a man who many years ago had committed sexual acts against children. Having a deep faith in God, she decided to forgive her husband and stand by him. In prison he came across a group that sought to rehabilitate paedophiles by establishing a support network that could assist the former offender to abide by the agreed rules of the group. One of those rules was that the former offender was to never put himself in a position of being tempted again. He was to refrain from seeking out children to look at or from looking at child pornography. This is a perfect example of what Jesus is saying here. Avoid the sin by avoiding putting yourself in the position of being tempted or thinking about the sin. Once the thought is there, it is hard to resist the temptation.
The second half of this section is about how these temptations in our life can be a stumbling block that leads to our ruin. Although Jesus talks of taking drastic action, there is no evidence He was advocating actually physically removing body parts. In fact He was emphasising how important it was to resist temptation. We cannot resist temptation by the force of our will. Many have tried and failed in the past. The best way to resist temptation is to avoid putting ourselves in situations that stimulate that temptation (hence removing the offending eye or hand) and handing the temptation to God and asking for His help