The seriousness of sexual selfishness...

This week we are looking at a part of perhaps the most famous sermon that Jesus preached, which we know today as the Sermon on the Mount. Tuesday, we looked on as Jesus proclaimed in Matthew 5:27-28 "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 lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.”

Jesus statement, if communicated in the language we use in our culture today, would have sounded something like this: You have heard that is was said “you shall not engage in sexual activity with someone other than your spouse, but I say to you that everyone who takes in the sight of someone else’s wife with a strong desire to have sex with her or whoever looks at a woman who is not your wife with a strong desire to have sex with her has already had sex with her in their heart."

We discovered that Jesus is addressing the temptation that we all face, which is to look at the message and teachings of the letters in the Bible as though they simply address external behavior. Jesus here is addressing the temptation that we all face, which is to make our lists and charts for what we believe is spiritual and what we believe meets God’s standard of obedience, while missing the reality is that our lists and standard looks nothing at all like God’s standard. Jesus here is taking an external commandment and is revealing the internal realities that drove God's true intent behind this command. Jesus here is revealing what true obedience to this commandment as given by God would look like.

And it is here that we see Jesus reveal for us a timeless truth about the true nature of what it means to obey the message and teachings of Jesus and the true nature of a lifestyle that is living a right relationship with Jesus in that we are guilty of adultery when we desire sexually what we are not committed to relationally.

You see, once again, Jesus is confronting us with the timeless reality that our words and our actions are the overflow from what is going on inside of our hearts. And because of that reality, we are guilty of adultery when our heart desires something sexually that goes against God’s desires for our sexuality.

We are guilty of adultery because Jesus is not simply concerned with our external behavior. We are guilty because at the end of the day Jesus is concerned with our internal heart condition. Jesus is concerned with our internal heart condition because Jesus knows, and human history has shown, that eventually what is in the heart will spill out. Human history has shown us that when we desire something sexually in the heart, that desire will ultimately spill out into the sexual activity that occurs in a hotel room or a bedroom.

And because of that reality, as Jesus continues His sermon, we see Jesus reveal how we are to respond when what spills out of our heart reveals what is inside of our heart when it comes to desiring sexually what we are not committed to relationally. So, let’s look that response together, beginning in Matthew 5:29-30:

"If your right eye makes you stumble, tear it out and throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. ³⁰ "If your right hand makes you stumble, cut it off and throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to go into hell.

In verse 29, Jesus makes a seemingly strong and shocking statement: “If your right eye makes you stumble, tear it out and throw it from you;” Now when Jesus uses the word stumble here, this word literally means to cause on to experience a downfall. Jesus here is basically saying “if your right eye causes you to selfishly rebel sexually, then tear it out and throw it away from you”. Jesus then explains that the reason why someone would take such seemingly strong action was due to the fact that it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to be thrown into hell.

And if that was not strong and shocking enough, Jesus doubles down on His statement in verse 30: "If your right hand makes you stumble, cut it off and throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to go into hell.” As we discovered last week, when Jesus refers to hell, he was pointing the crowds to a place called Gehenna. Now Gehenna was the place where the Jewish people of Jesus day believed that God would exercise His final judgment.

In other words, Jesus is explaining that it would be better for a person to lose the part of their body that was causing them to selfishly rebel against God sexually and still be able to live in relationship with God than have all of the parts of their body, only to be in a position where they could be judged worthy of the eternal punishment that one would experience from God in Hell. Now your natural reaction to Jesus statement here is “Dave is Jesus serious here? I mean, you don’t actually believe that Jesus is literally saying that we should pluck out our eyes or chop off our hands in they cause us to rebel against God. I know that there are some legal systems that do such things, but are you saying that Jesus would want us to do such a thing?”

 So is Jesus literally saying that we should cut out our eyes or chop off our hands if they cause us to rebel against God? The answer to that question is a resounding no. And there are two reasons why the answer is no. First off, just because a person only has one eye, that doesn’t mean that a person couldn’t still commit adultery with their other eye. Just because a person only has one arm, that doesn’t mean that a person couldn’t still commit adultery with their other arm.

Second, Jesus has just explained that we are guilty of adultery when we desire something sexually that we are not committed to relationally. And that desire for something sexually for something that we are not committed to relationally has nothing to do with one’s eyes or hands; that desire has everything to do with one’s heart. You see, Jesus is not being literal here.

Instead, Jesus is using an exaggerated metaphor to reveal the seriousness of selfishness and rebellion in the area of sexuality and its ability to cause people to reject the message and teachings of Jesus and experience salvation. You see, the area of sexuality is the area where people are most likely to either compromise or totally reject the message and teachings of Jesus.

The message and teachings of Jesus on sexuality is often pointed to as a reason why people reject the message and teachings of Jesus as a whole. And the message and teachings of Jesus on sexuality is often rationalized and justified away in a way that results in compromise by those who say they are followers of Jesus.

Jesus uses this exaggerated metaphor to reveal the reality that anything that would cause someone to fail to follow Jesus and live in a right relationship with Jesus must be removed or eliminated at all costs. Jesus uses this exaggerated metaphor to reveal the reality that the danger of selfishness, rebellion and sin, especially selfish rebellion in the sexual arena, requires drastic action to avoid such selfishness, rebellion, and sin.

You see, how we handle our bodies in the sexual arena really matters to Jesus because, at the end of the day, Jesus is concerned with our internal heart condition. Jesus is concerned with our internal heart condition because Jesus knows, and human history has shown, that eventually what is in the heart will spill out. And, as Jesus points out in this part of His famous sermon, we are guilty of adultery when we desire sexually what we are not committed to relationally.

So  here is a question to consider: What do the desires of your heart reveal about how you are handing your sexuality? Are you guilty of desiring something sexually that goes against God’s desires for our sexuality?

Are you guilty of undressing with your eyes someone who walks by who you are not committed to relationally in marriage? Are you guilty of watching online porn to satisfy your sexual desires with someone on a screen who you are not committed to relationally in marriage? Are you guilty participating in sexting or snapchat images of others who we are not committed to relationally in marriage? Are you guilty of using tinder as a means to satisfy your sexual desires with someone who you are not committed to relationally in marriage?

Because, as Jesus points out, if that is the case, we are guilty of adultery.  We are guilty of adultery because Jesus is not simply concerned with our external behavior. We are guilty because at the end of the day Jesus is concerned with our internal heart condition.

Jesus is concerned with our internal heart condition because Jesus knows, and human history has shown, that eventually what is in the heart will spill out. Human history has shown us that when we desire something sexually in the heart, that desire will ultimately spill out into the sexual activity that occurs in a hotel room or a bedroom...