Pray: that Jesus be exalted and that His word be treasured, obeyed, and taught for all it is worth that we may be called great in the kingdom of heaven

[Matthew 5:17-20] "Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished. Therefore whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven."

Recap: Last week we looked at how Jesus fulfilled the Law and the importance He placed on the Law in all that He did. In fact, we see that Jesus' fulfilled everything in the Old Testament: both the Law and the Prophets. We saw that Jesus wasn't overthrowing the Law and the Prophets in His coming by setting them aside but rather He was filling them up to the full. There were 3 aspects of the Law that He fulfilled: He fulfilled the Moral Law, the Judicial Law, and the Ceremonial Law. We also saw that the Judicial Law and the Ceremonial Law were fulfilled at the cross and the Moral Law was fulfilled in His life. One of the things we saw from last week is that the Law demands our death because of its curse and the fact that we have failed to obey it. When we looked at the 10 Commandments we had broken every single one! Therefore, we need a Savior and our Savior has done what we could not do in that He obeyed the Law perfectly and took the punishment of the Law in our place. The good news of the gospel is that in Christ, God credits to our account all that Christ has done both in His life and death and so God treats us as Christ deserved to be treated, while treating Christ as we deserved to be treated. So the Law was important and Christ is the fulfiller of the Law. I gave you a quote last week by Dave Hatcher that I want to use again because I think it is a good reminder and lead into this morning's message: "Many Christians think that all they really need is the New Testament, the Old Testament being the old way God dealt with Israel. We are tempted to think that Jesus came and set all those 'laws' aside, so that now all we need to teach is the grace of the Gospel. But the Gospel is about the Law. It is about a Man coming and obeying the Law to establish us in His righteousness. Christ teaches that His Words are in complete harmony with the Old Testament, but in complete disharmony with the teachings of the scribes and Pharisees. Jesus did not come to soften the Law, or set it aside, or to change it in any way. And we need to see how this is glorious good news."

I want to focus on the last line and the fact that Jesus did not come to soften the Law or set aside or to change it any way. This morning we're going to focus on Matthew 5:19 which reads: "Therefore whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven."

Those Who Are Great and Those Who Are Least
Immediately we see a clear contrast between the least in the kingdom of heaven and the great in the kingdom of heaven and that is what Jesus wants us to see. The difference between those who are great and those who are least is how they do and teach the commandments of God. So in the kingdom there are those who are called "great" and those who are called "least" by God. I don't know about you, but I want to be called great in the kingdom of heaven. As a believer, you should desire this as well because your central aim in life is to please your King. 2 Timothy 2:5-6 says this, "No soldier gets entangled in civilian pursuits, since his aim is to please the One who enlisted him. An athlete is not crowned unless he competes according to the rules. It is the hard-working farmer who out to have the first share of the crops." In these 3 analogies Paul is setting up an aim for how Timothy's life is to be lived and how all of our lives in the kingdom of heaven should be lived in relationship to our King.

1) We Are Single Minded Seeking to Please God: I say single-minded because the good soldier is not entangled or distracted by what those who aren't in the army are doing. The good soldier sees the folly of the civilians who are always seeking to please themselves, and makes it his aim to please the King. The good soldier also knows that for his own safety and joy he must listen to the King only because the King knows what is at stake if His soldier's don't follow Him in the prescribed manner. He wants the best for his soldiers.

2) We Are Crowned When We Compete According to the Rules: If you're running a race, you don't win by shortcuts, dirty plays, or human growth hormones, you win by competing according to the rules. Do you remember from Pilgrim's Progress those who kept coming in on the road by taking short cuts or hopping fences? Those people did not make it. They did not do what God had laid out and therefore they were not crowned. If you want to be crowned or called great in the kingdom by the King, then there are rules to follow.

3) We Have the First Share When We Work Hard: The kingdom of heaven is about those who work hard. There is no room for those who are lazy and indifferent. There is no room for procrastination and leisure. The lazy, indifferent, procrastinating, couch-sitting Christians will not be those who are called "great" in the kingdom of heaven. Those who work hard will have a first share in what is to come and great will be their reward in the fruit of their labors.

So, if you want to be great then you make it your aim to please the King of the kingdom, you live according the rules to receive the reward and you work hard to have first share in the crops. Jesus isn't lightening the commandment load here in Matthew 5:19. He's not throwing it aside remember and in this He is calling us to not even relax it in the least. Obviously, Jesus is talking about the Moral Law here, which we saw is chiefly identified with the 10 Commandments, but there are also several other commandments that make up God's Moral Law as well.

Before we go any further, let me help you out with a few things that we need to understand in this passage.

How We Relate to God's Word
Verse 19 begins with "therefore" and He is saying that based on what He has just said, that He has not come to abolish but to fulfill the Law and the prophets, here is how we must relate to the Law and prophets. In v.17-18 Jesus is showing us His relationship with the Law and then with the "therefore" He begins to show us our relationship with the Law, or we could expand this to say the Word of God. That might be more helpful to you, since God's moral law or will is seen throughout God's Word and it is not just contained in a few small places. So, verse 19 says, "Here's how you relate to God's Word."

Commandment Relaxers
In the first part of this verse Jesus, is as we saw, telling us who will be called least in the kingdom of heaven and they are those who relax or loose themselves from the requirements of God's Word. They are those who say, "You don't really have to take it all that serious." God doesn't mind if you don't seek to do everything in His Word. The one who relaxes will look for loopholes in God's Word or find ways around doing what it says by making excuses about school, homework, work, tiredness, busyness, etc. The first words that come out of the mouth of someone who will be called least in the kingdom of heaven are the words "O.k." This person will say, "It is o.k. to listen to this music that magnifies sex and worldliness because it's not cussing." They ignore God's Word that says, "Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world--the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride in possessions--is not from the Father but is from the world." The commandment "relaxers" will also say, "It's o.k. to watch this TV show because there is no flagrant language or nudity." When you do this, you weaken God's standards because God says, "Everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart." And "whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things."

Or a commandment relaxer might think it is all right to think rude things in his or her heart about their parents, but Scripture calls you to honor your father and mother and this is not done by just doing what they say, but by honoring them from your heart. Do you do this? Is this important to you?

The Hierarchy of Importance
You see, the people whom Jesus was speaking to were the Jewish people and the laws were divided up into 2 categories: 248 were positive commands and 365 were negative. Some would have debates about what was important and what was not and so they would put more weight on certain ones and fail to do the others. Now, we can't say they are all equal in importance but they are equal in that they are God's Word and to disobey the smallest commandment is to sin. Jesus reveals some sort of hierarchy of the laws when He was asked what was the greatest commandment and He said, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength" and then He adds a second that is like it, "Love your neighbor as yourself." So if we were doing a list of importance: there's number 1 and number 2, but Jesus is also saying here in Matthew that every command that follows is important as well. Even to the very least of them, and that is what we are called to do and teach.

The Lesson Our Lives are Giving
Now when Jesus refers to those who "teach" others to do the same, He is not just referring to pastors and teachers, but every single believer. You might not know this but you are constantly teaching others the Word of God. Your life and words are lessons for how you live and act in accordance with God's Word. You also, display the importance of God's Word in your life by how you talk about it when you do talk about it. So what lessons are you teaching? One of the things I am constantly challenging myself with is this: What kind of follower of Jesus am I creating with my life? In other words, if someone is just like me, will they love Jesus and His Word they way that they should? You should ask yourselves the same question. Are you transferring a passion for God's Word among every person you talk to?

Then Jesus in the text shows us how those who are great in the kingdom of heaven live: they do and teach God's Word. These two always go together. James 1:22 says, "But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves." They are inseparable. It is not enough to be a hearer or teacher of God's Word, you must do. Your life must line up with the words. Your heart must be united to the commandments and to the will of God. We must always delight to do His will no matter what the circumstances may be for when we do this we will be called great in the kingdom of heaven.

In the Garden of Gethsemane we see a scene of greatness in Christ in His obedience to the will and word of God. It is the most profound act of obedience in the history of the world. Jesus is the Garden and in short while He will be arrested and will suffer physical beatings, whippings and the cross, but the worst of all He will incur the wrath of God poured out and will be forsaken by His Father of which had never happened for all of eternity and would only happen once. This was a dark night and it was so bad that He was sweating drops of blood.

Matthew 26:36-42

This is what obedience looks like. In the face of the worst possible temptation obedience to God's will says, "Not as I will, but as You will." Believer's that is how we are to live our lives in the kingdom of God. We only move at our King's Voice and we do whatever He says because He is good and is for our good.

1 John 5:1-3 "Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the Father loves whoever has been born of Him. By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey His commandments. For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments. And His commandments are not burdensome."

Note: God's Moral Law reveals God's character and the way God thinks about things. When we seek to obey His law we seek to line up with God in what He says and does. The life of Jesus most clearly reveals how we are to relate to God's Word and how we are to live.

Assignment: Work through the Gospel of Matthew this week and the book of James and note all of the commands. Write them out on a piece of paper and pray for strength to do these commands. Pray that you won't be a relaxer but you will be a doer and teacher.