“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart. If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell.
“It was also said, ‘Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.’ But I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of sexual immorality, makes her commit adultery, and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.
“Again you have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not swear falsely, but shall perform to the Lord what you have sworn.’ But I say to you, Do not take an oath at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God, or by the earth, for it is his footstool, or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King. And do not take an oath by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black.
(Matthew 5:27-36 ESV)
I think of the song If You wanted Me by Todd Agnew when I read this text. One of the verses/chorus of the song is:
And I’ll admit I’m glad I’m not King David
Ruling over everything I see
‘Cause I think I’ve fallen for more than Bathsheba
Your creation’s a temptation for me
If you wanted me to love you only
Why’d you make the moonlight sparkle in her eyes?
I mean really if we were suppose to love only God, why did He make everything so beautiful and great to look upon? Really Jesus, it is not enough to not actually commit adultery but now I can’t even look on a woman and think anything lustfully… Well I think every person is in trouble on that one… I know of no person who has not had a lustful thought for someone. If you have to think about whether this includes you or not, remember that God knows all of your thoughts and everything you have ever done… We are all guilty of committing adultery with this new expansion on the commandment…
And do not swear an oath… Pinky swears count in this? Or cross my heart and hope to die stick a needle in my eye… How many of us did something like this as a child and while it was simple playground banter, it is something that Jesus said we shouldn’t do… So here again we are all in trouble.
And included in this sandwich of making all f us adulterers and putting us on the spot for swearing oaths… is Matthews version of the divorce text. So what does all of this mean?
It is all about us thinking about the other, and not ourselves. If we are thinking lustful thoughts of another we are putting our selves in a higher position than them, making them subservient to us. In the eyes of God we are all equal. No one is higher than anyone else. We can not think that way, for how we think becomes how we act, and we need to hold others in a high place in our minds, so we treat them that way.
And to swear on something we can not control, puts others in a bad position. We merely need to make our yes be yes and our no be no. And this means we are honest with ourselves and everyone else. Do not say you can do something you know you can not do. And be helpful by doing that which you can, even when it is inconvenient.
And divorce causes issues in relationships through out the community. It is not about us being happy or always getting our way. It is about living in the relationships that we are in and building up the community. It is how we think about the other.
And here is the video of the Todd Agnew song. Hopefully it will make you think…
aSacredRebel 