You Shall Not Kill

SERMON: 2007-03-11--sm0718--you-shall-not-kill SOURCE DURATION: 00:43:21.000 PROPOSED CUTS: 1 CONFIDENCE: 0.95 APPROVED: false REASON: The entire sequence of candidates reads like a continuous hymn or benediction (a form of pastoral application/prayer). Since there is no clear transition to an announcement or unrelated audio after candidate 15, and the material itself is devotional in nature, I select the final candidate as the last part of the sermon content. Acoustic segmentation found sustained music at the end edge and moved the boundary to the adjacent transcript segment. ACOUSTIC EVIDENCE: available ACOUSTIC MUSIC INTERVALS: 00:40:02.760-00:41:02.060, 00:41:07.760-00:41:17.340, 00:41:22.960-00:42:23.380, 00:42:27.260-00:43:20.300 ACOUSTIC SPEECH OVERLAP: yes ACOUSTIC BOUNDARIES APPLIED: end Inline CUT markers identify each proposed audio boundary after the relevant word. --- ORIGINAL TRANSCRIPT WITH PROPOSED CUTS MARKED --- Well, I left you last week with the question in view of what Jesus teaches here in Matthew chapter 5. Is breaking the law of God in thought and attitude just as bad as breaking it in word and action? In other words, is thinking about killing your neighbor just as bad as actually killing him? I'm very interested in the answers that you came up with. How many of you think the answer to that is yes? All right, how many of you think the answer to that is no? How many of you think it is yes and no? All right, just to be in the safe side, that's my choice. That way we're all right. Nobody has to feel badly about himself. I believe the biblical answer is indeed yes and no to that question. No, because fact of the matter is that the deed is worse than the thought in terms of human relationships. If I kill you or you kill me, then our lives are snuffed out, relationships are significantly torn apart, and if we are found out, we're going to be held accountable by the law. If I only think about killing you, the only one who knows about that is God, and the consequences on that level are less serious than actually doing it. So the answer is no in that sense, but it is yes in that thinking about murder violates the sixth commandment "you shall not kill before God" everything as much as the actual deed, because from God's point of view, the very act of thinking it also violates the commandment "you shall not kill". God is interested not only in our obedience to the letter of the law, he is also interested in our obedience to the spirit of the law. And then of course is what Jesus talks about here in this particular passage when he says "you have heard that it was said to the people long ago to not murder, and anybody who murders will be subject to judgment, but I tell you that anyone who is angry with his brother will be subject to judgment, and anyone who says to his brother Rekha is answerable to the Sanhedrin, but anyone who says you fool will be in danger of the fire of hell". As I pointed out last week just in passing towards the close of the message, at first glance it looks as if Jesus is contradicting the law and the prophets. He says "you have heard that it was said, but I say to you", and I pointed out that Jesus himself says that he has come not to abolish the law and the prophets, but rather to fulfill them. And so he is not contradicting what the Old Testament is teaching, rather what he is doing is he is going back to the original intent of the law that God gave. And when God says in the Ten Commandments, in commandment number six "you shall not kill", it wasn't simply his intention to stop us from engaging in the physical act of killing, he also wanted us to deal with the underlying attitude that always gives rise to the actual deed. Now the scribes and the Pharisees and the religious teachers before them had so reduced the law to its literal letter application that they had lost sight of the deeper spiritual meaning that God originally intended in the giving of the Ten Commandments. And so what Jesus does in this particular passage now is he begins to illustrate both negatively and positively not only what it means to keep the letter of the law, but more importantly the spirit of the law. And as we look at that together this morning I can guarantee you there isn't going to be a one of us here who isn't going to feel spoken to at one point or another, because while it's relatively easy perhaps to curtail our outward behavior and to walk the narrow line controlling our inner life in the face of hurt, pain, and injury tends to be much more difficult. So notice this morning as we progress with these verses that Jesus addresses both negatively and positively then the attitude that he wants us to have within our hearts towards our neighbor. So negatively he says first of all we are to avoid harboring anger. I tell you anyone who is angry with his brother will be subject to judgment. Not good enough for me not to kill you. I must not even entertain inappropriate anger towards you. Now think this through with me a little bit. Why do we get angry and why do we get angry with other people? Well I can think of two reasons. The first is because they do wrong. I heard just recently the horrific story of a six-year-old girl being having been brutally raped by one of the significant men in her family. I hear a story like that and my gut wrenches and my temper I must tell you rises. I get angry and I hope you do too because you want to because God does. Anger in and of itself is not necessarily wrong the Bible says be angry but do not sin and that kind of righteous anger that is directed towards a sinner's behavior is not the kind of anger that Jesus is talking about here that ought never to be present in your life and in my life because then he himself would have been a sinner because he got plenty angry when he was confronted by disobedience and rebellion. The kind of anger that he is addressing however is the kind of anger that we find in our hearts when we feel that we have been offended against whether in the real world or in our imagination. It's actually very interesting that if you look at the margin of this passage you will discover there is a textual variant that is to say some manuscripts in the original language add the words angry without cause. Very hard to determine whether they belong there or not. I suspect they were added by a scribe who felt that just the word anger needed a little bit of explanation but certainly there are times in your life and in my life when we're angry because people have taken us to task. I remember one time years ago I had preached you got to know what a wonderful sermon on Kadesh Brunei. First church that I pastored it was all about visioning and how God wanted his people to move forward into the promised land and you know what happens sometimes with inspired sermons like that not everybody likes them. Now you wouldn't know about that but I can tell you a thing or two about it. So somebody got really angry and they brought in what we call the church visitors who are pastors from other churches and they proceeded to analyze that sermon take it apart and skewer it to the wall. Unfairly I thought because they misread me they misrepresented my motivation and for a long time afterwards whenever I saw particularly this one colleague I had had anger just rising up inside me because I felt so unjustly treated and so wrongly done by. I dare say that most of us here will have found ourselves in situations where anger wells up on the inside and we play out all the scenarios in our minds about how it is that we'd like to get even or am I the only one who has a very fertile imagination in the middle of the night on what God ought to do with all my enemies. Well Jesus says the commandment you shall not kill not only means that I ought not to go out there and carry out my thoughts I must not even entertain those thoughts and when you get to that point you begin to realize how much we all need Jesus because that comes as naturally to each one of us as the driven snow. The Heidelberg Catechism one of our confessions you can read about it in the back of the Psalter hymnal and responds to its treatment of the commandment you shall not kill says it this way by forbidding murder God teaches us that he hates the root of murder envy hatred anger vindictiveness in God's sight all such all such are murder. We are to avoid harboring anger says Jesus and then as if to make sure that we get the point he goes on to say we are to avoid trashing people. We not only are not to entertain feelings of anger we must resist the temptation to run off at the mouth and express words of judgment and condemnation notice again how he goes on anyone who says to his brother Rekha is answerable to the synhedrin but anyone who says you fool will be in danger of the fire of hell. Now Rekha as I pointed out last week is an Aramaic term of contempt it literally means a worthless fellow the modern equivalent is something like you good for nothing idiot and Jesus says you call somebody that you give that kind of expression then you are in danger of being dragged in this case before the synhedrin which would be the equivalent of a judicial court today but then he goes on to say you call somebody a fool and you will be in danger of the fire of hell. Now listen carefully a fool in scripture is not just a silly person who makes unwise decisions a fool in scripture is a person who lives his life in rebellion against God and in defiance of his commandments how does the psalmist put it the fool has said in his heart what there is no God why is he a fool because simply thinking there is no God doesn't make God go away and so a person who likes to live as if there is no God is a fool because in the end of days he's still going to have to stand before God and give account of himself and so Jesus says to you and to me not only must we not entertain anger within our hearts but we need to put a guard in front of our mouths we can't just go calling people idiots we can't just go calling people fools the modern equivalent would be to dim them to hell because that's really what's happening in that expression because we're gonna be judged by every idle word we ever speak now that doesn't mean you can never be angry with somebody that doesn't mean you cannot in fact speak out into somebody's life and firmly call them to task Jesus himself does that but you see the difference is that it must never flow out of our frustration our angerness our resentment and bitterness if we're going to take somebody to task we've got to speak words anointed by the Holy Spirit that are intended for their good not from our heart of vengeance or because we want to feel good about it and the reason for that is that words have an incredible power both to bless and to curse we've all heard that little saying sticks and stones may hurt my bones but words will never hurt me and we all know that it's a bunch of hogwash because more of us in the course of life are hurt by words spoken in anger and impatience and unkindness than most of us ever are by being hurt physically by sticks and stones one of the women here told me the story a while back being a young girl she was in grade 8 she was cornered in a washroom by one of the girls that didn't like her and the girl made fun of her and said you're fat and then as she remained behind in the bathroom to try to recover from that the girl and another girlfriend walked out and the other girlfriend said to her what did you say that for she's not fat and the other girl said I said it because I know that those words will be stuck in her mind forever and they were not surprisingly that girl went on as the years went by to have a significant eating disorder sticks and stones may hurt my bones but words can do damage to the core of our being and Jesus says watch your mouth and watch the attitude that speaks judgmentally about others even in the privacy of your own home because you know I think there's a verse in proverb that talks about if you're talking about the king a little bird will hear it and he'll go carry it to somebody else likewise if you hear somebody say something bad about somebody else don't be the carrier of bad news unless your motivation is to help restoration not just to stir the fire and to feel powerful because you're keeping people off balance again the catechism in response to the question what is God's will and the sixth commandment puts it this way I am not to be little insult hate or kill my neighbor not by my thoughts my words my look or gesture and certainly not by actual deeds and I am not to be party to this in others rather I am to put away all the desire for revenge we are to avoid harboring anger we are to avoid trashing people negative attitudes that we must learn to avoid and then Jesus says positively we must first of all seek restoration for notice again how he goes on if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you leave your gift there in front of the altar first go and be reconciled to your brother and then offer your gift couple of things in that verse or those two verses that are worth noting and the first thing is that it is possible for relationships to be broken the context of the whole passage is constantly that of dealing with your brother or dealing with your sister and a brother and a sister in your life in this context is not just anybody it is a fellow disciple of Jesus God delights in unity among his people but we live in a real world and there's plenty of sin left in all of us and every so often it will happen in your life and in my life that our covenant with a brother or a sister gets broken now it may be because the other person fails to keep his or her side of the deal the fault may lie with me often it lies with both of us it may be real it may be imaginary the break or the misunderstanding fact of the matter is you can go through life without periodically getting hurt wounded and offended particularly by people who are close to you it is unavoidable and anybody who professes that it never happens to them is either such a saint that they don't belong here or they're such a big liar and they don't belong here relationships can be broken and when relationships are broken the onus is on each one of us to try to make it right and it's very easy to say well you know it's the other person's job and they have wronged me and they need to come to me in the context of the passage whoever it is that is the most mature will probably have the greatest obligation to try to work through the difference as quickly and as efficiently as you can and that doesn't mean that every relationship can always be restored but it means that we must make every effort to try to understand each other and engage each other you see because what happens to a lot of us we get offended by something somebody says or does and we say to ourselves well I'll just sit it out and and wait till it wears off and sometimes it does but the enemy of our souls has a vested interest in stirring up misunderstanding in stirring a broken relationships and stuff as we'll see in a few moments can get out of hand real quick and sometimes it isn't enough just to talk to God about it sometimes we just need to sit down with each other and say I have a problem and this is the issue a very scary thing to do doesn't always immediately lead to understanding but it's in that engaging process that community is built and relationship is restored and Dave and Valerie have shared with this congregation previously how there was a season in their lives where they weren't understanding each other and they would try to engage and instead of getting better it got worse but they stuck to it and in sticking to it ultimately they got to the core of what their issues were and they were reconciled I'd much rather you come to me if you're offended by anything that you hear or anything that you see or anything that I have or haven't done then for you to sit back and stoop on it talk to 100 friends about it and leave me out of the loop because it makes me powerless to deal with it and it does you to Jesus says leave your gift at the altar go find your brother or your sister and try to straighten it out while you can and the reason this is so important says Jesus is that unresolved relationships impact our walk with God and most of us will have experienced that get really angry at somebody stew on it day after day you try to put it away you can't you don't want to confess it deal with it or resolve it and pretty soon spiritually you begin to suffer because every time you try to draw close to God it's like God is standing there and saying excuse me we have a little unresolved issue here that you need to deal with do you notice how it's in the context of going to worship that you discover your brother has something against you you know why that is because every time you open up your heart to God and start trying to connect with God God alerts your heart about the places where your relationships are broken I remember one of the very earliest dunamis is that we had here one of the most interesting effects of that first dunamis conference wasn't so much the teaching that we received about the Holy Spirit great and good as that was it was the conviction that was taking in people's hearts or taking place in people's hearts about broken relationships that needed to be restored and Jesus says when that's what your discovery is leave your gift at the altar when the Holy Spirit convicts you go find whoever you need to find and straighten it out while you can because God doesn't want your worship as long as it is coming out of a heart that is filled with bitterness and that's filled with anger now that doesn't mean you just pretend all is well when all is not well doesn't mean you deny legitimate emotions it doesn't mean that you just paste on a plastic smile and say all is well with my soul aren't we wonderfully great Christians now in real life in real relationships we're gonna get under each other's skin but Jesus says when that happens we need to walk across the bridge and we need to take whatever steps we can and know how to take in order for those relationships to be restored and usually that will mean each of us has to do a lot of forgiving because you see if we're debt collectors and we demand somebody else to pay the last penny then we're going to be in situations where nobody can pay the price and if that was true in God's dealings with us we'd all be out on our ears that having been said we need to do what we can to see that justice is dealt with in the context of forgiveness we must you with me here aren't you glad you came to church today applies to me as much as it does to you so join the club we must seek restoration says Jesus and then he goes on to say that there is a remarkable urgency to this for notice how he finishes this this pericope this passage he says subtle matters quickly with your adversary who has taken you to court do it while you are still with him on the way or he may hand you over to the judge and the judge may hand you over to the officer and you may be thrown into prison I tell you the truth you will not get out until you have paid the last penny the picture here is a man who has fallen afoul of somebody else who has legitimate claim against him he's gonna drag him into court and Jesus says before you ever get there try to settle with him on the way there is an urgency about making up when we are in disagreement with anybody else and the reason for that I believe biblically speaking is twofold first of all things have a way of getting out of hand I'm mad at you you're mad at me you tell 10 friends I tell 10 friends now we have 10 friends on the go and the makings of good gang warfare they all tell 10 other friends now we've got a hundred people involved the story by now will have multiplied from a molehill into a mountain and it's like the proverbial toothpaste out of the tube try to put it back in it's a lot harder to get it out there than it is to get it back in so do it quickly besides that all of us are sinful enough outside of Christ that we take a perverted pleasure in feeling angry and unrighteous haven't you ever noticed that if you don't deal with it real quick and deal with it right away and deal with it radically there is something that settles in your soul that finds a oh it is a devilish satisfaction in being able to hold this over the other person because it justifies my anger and how many times in all of our relationships don't we dig in our heels and we play those mind games to see who can hold on the longest before they cave in and has to try to make it right I've told you earlier one of the advantages of my profession is that I can never afford to stay mad at my wife for longer than a week because I get to get up and talk to you and when she's sitting there with her beatific smile on the back putting me under conviction then I got to deal with it now and so do you because you're coming to church things get out of hand and they not only get out of hand but we all face the prospect of judgment now here's something that I have never previously noted until this week in the reading of this passage the motivation all through this passage for dealing not only with your actions with regard to your neighbor but also the underlying attitudes is constantly in the context of judgment listen to how Jesus puts it you've heard that it was said long ago do not murder anyone who murders will be what subject to judgment I tell you anyone who is angry with his brother will be what subject to judgment anybody who says you fool will be in danger of hellfire settle matters quickly with your adversary or you'll get thrown into prison and you won't get out until the very last penny has been paid now what's Jesus trying to tell you there well he says in a civil society when you transgress the commandment to love your neighbor if you actually go out there and you speak words of condemnation or you actually harm them you're going to be found out you're going to be called to account and you're going to be charged that's why there's so much talk these days about cyber bullying at school that's why we have hate or anti-hate legislation on the record your words will come back and haunt you and here's the argument Jesus uses now he says if that's what happens in a civil society because of spoken words and actions that you have performed he says you got to remember that we all stand before the judgment seat of God one day and we're going to give account not only for our actions not only for our words but also for the attitude of our hearts unless your righteousness exceeds that he says of the scribes and the Pharisees you will by no means enter into the kingdom of heaven it's not enough not a kill it's not enough not to hate or to speak words of hatred we must also in a positive way embrace our neighbor love him with all of our heart and seek to do what we can to protect him from evil again here is how the catechism puts it by condemning envy hatred and anger God tells us to love our neighbor as ourselves to be patient peace loving gentle merciful and friendly to him and to protect him from harm as much as we can and to do good even even to our enemies I want to close this morning with a true story comes out of the nation of Korea Korea throughout history has often been invaded and around the turn of the last century it was invaded by Japan and the Japanese if you know history treated the Koreans with extreme cruelty particularly their cruelty was addressed to the Christian community what are the first things they did was outlaw Christian assembly and in the course of time the pastor of one of those churches went to the to the head of the Japanese garrison in the community and begged him if please very please can we gather together for worship eventually the garrison officer agreed to it Christians were elated from far and wide they crammed into that little church building and they sang their songs of praise and prayed their prayers with enthusiasm and excitement but it was a trap because as they were singing nearer my God to thee the police barricaded the doors doused the little wooden building with kerosene and said fire to you you could imagine the horror people try to jump out of the windows they get shot to pieces and as the flames were going up the pastor could only lead his congregation in songs of worship and the very lowest song they sang was the song at the cross at the cross where I first saw the light and the burden of my heart rolled away it was there by faith I received my sight soon the cries of the children and the songs of the adults were stilled as the roof caved in and every single soul died horrifically well they erected a memorial on that site the Koreans did and they picked up their lives and they went on with it as best as they could but you could imagine the bitterness that settled in their souls against the Japanese and that went on from decade to decade from generation to generation unabated growing in ferociousness the memories kept alive by the stories that were told until 1972 and in 1972 a delegation of Japanese pastors visited Korea came to this memorial shrine where this horrific incident had taken place were informed about what had happened and were deeply convicted by the horror and the guilt of the Japanese nation they went back to Japan they collected a huge offering they they built a new church building on that location and on the day of the dedication they together with the descendants of those who had been martyred in that church gathered together the speeches were made the details of the tragedy were recalled the names of the dead were honored as the service was drawing to a close they chose the two songs that had been the last two songs that had been sung decades earlier by that congregation nearer my God to thee and at the cross the normally stoic Japanese could no longer contain themselves the tears that began to fill their eyes during the song suddenly gushed from deep inside they turned to their Korean spiritual relatives and beg them for forgiveness the guarded calloused hearts of the Korean the Koreans were not quick to surrender but the love of the Japanese believers unintimidated by decades of hatred tore at the Koreans emotion at the cross at the cross where I first saw the light and the burden of my heart rolled away one Korean turned toward a Japanese brother then another and then suddenly the floodgates holding back a wave of emotion let go the Koreans met their new Japanese friends in the middle they clung to each other and they wept the Japanese tears of repentance and the Korean tears of forgiveness intermingled to bathe the site of an old nightmare heaven had sent the gift of reconciliation to a little white church in Korea Jesus said you've heard it said you shall not murder but I say to you anyone who is angry with his brother will be subject to judgment aren't you glad for Jesus how else can injuries so deep in pain so great ever be overcome and my counsel and suggestion for each one of us here this morning regardless of where we find ourselves whenever the Lord tugs at your heart and says your attitude towards him or her is not right then lay hold of God's grace in Christ however you do it in whatever way you must but don't give up until he transforms you to the core of your being remember that colleague I talked about earlier the one who wounded me so badly so unjustifiably in my opinion and how I struggled and struggled Lord God how can I ever forgive him how can he ever love him well I can testify to the saving grace of Jesus in that regard because you know there came a time I met that man totally unexpectedly and none of those stirrings were there and I knew that God had worked a miracle of grace in my heart and what he can do for me in that regard he can also do for each one of us because Jesus is alive at the right hand of God he intercedes and he has poured out the Holy Spirit so that we can keep not only the letter of the law but more and more by grace through [PROPOSED CUT 1 START at 00:40:02.760; remove through 00:43:21.000] faith in him this spirit of [CUT] the law Lord I come to you let my heart be changed renewed flowing from your grace that I found in you Lord I've come to know the weaknesses I see and me we'll be stripped away by the power of your love love me close let your love surround me bring me near and draw me to your side and as I wait I rise up by thee and I will stand with you your spirit leads me on by the power of your love Lord unveil my eyes let me see you face to face the knowledge of your love as you live in me Lord renew my mind as your will unfolds in my mind in living every day by the power of your love love me close let your love surround me bring me near and draw me to your side and as I wait I rise up by thee and I will stand with you your spirit leads me on by the power of your love and I will soar with you your spirit leads me on by the power of your love [CUT] [PROPOSED CUT 1 END 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