The Centrality of Faithfulness
Matthew 5:27-37
Psalm 89
If we thought Jesus was being a bit intense last week when he compared anger and insult to murder, today feels like Jesus takes that one step further. As Jesus compares looking with lust at another person to adultery, he says that most of us, if not all have committed adultery in our hearts. Then he tells us to maim ourselves, for it is better for us to be crippled then for the whole of us to go to hell. WOW! Jesus, you are intense. I think to some degree this is hyperbole, where Jesus is using a really extreme example to show us how serious our actions are, but I think there is something real to the comparison too.
You may not have realized it, but all of our readings today are about faithfulness and not just in marriage. The readings are about how we are faithful to God through what we desire, through our relationships, and through how we live. You see that is why adultery is so bad, because it is being unfaithful - unfaithful to God as the fulfiller of our desires and unfaithful to others as we turn them into objects for our satisfaction. Adultery in Jesus’ terms is not a term kept only to those who cheat in marriage, but it applies to anyone (in or outside of marriage). Whether in or outside of marriage, if we look at another person with lust, we are betraying a relationship, because we are imagining something beyond that relationship, at least beyond that moment.
Adultery, ultimately, is not being faithful, so we are not living like our faithful God or living up to our faith in him. Adultery does have obvious sexual realities, but adultery is more than that. It is the betrayal of a relationship, of a promise, it is unfaithfulness, it is turning away from someone, replacing someone, making someone something they are not and ultimately as our faithfulness to one is a way we show our faithfulness to God, adultery is a form of idolatry. If we can’t be faithful to the people who are right in front of us, how can we be faithful to the God we cannot see? How we live our lives with others is how we live out our faithfulness to God.
Just from this reframing of the term adultery, can you begin to understand why even thinking about another person can be adultery? To realize how serious this is, the next thing we need to realize is that our hearts and minds shape our lives. Our minds lead our thinking and our decisions and so, guide our actions. Our hearts lead our desires, and our longings and so guide our decisions and relationships. The more we let lust and betrayal enter our hearts and minds the more that will shape us and distort our attitude towards others. This is letting temptation invade our thinking, guide our actions, and form us. Even letting temptation guide us once can have more effect on us and our relationships than we may realize.
Yet, the hard part is that we have made lust so normative in our culture. I know so many people who struggle with pornography (and those are the ones who have been humble enough and repentant enough to tell me). I know far more people that objectify women or men. Still, even more, that may not obviously objectify others sexually but treat relationships as a commodity or a resource - only caring for others as they can serve their needs. These are all ways that our lustful hearts and minds lead us to betray those around us and shape us to be unfaithful. This is why God cares so much because he cares deeply about relationships and faithfulness.
A note for anyone who is struggling with pornography or lust. Like any addiction, it can be hard to change. It has become a habit, possibly even a crutch that you depend on. You have to start changing that habit. It starts by working with God to change your heart and mind; the consistent actions will follow. As Jesus says, it is from our hearts that our lives flow. So, you need to redirect and reshape your desires. Being cognitive and thoughtful about changing is an important starting place, but we also need to search ourselves and find what we really long for and put God there. For me, what I truly desire is the bounty of God and a fuller, deeper relationship with those around me. It is possible to go cold turkey, but not always. Habits can be hard to break, so the important thing is to keep repenting by turning back to God, keep trying, and rest in God (and get support from others): change will follow.
It is important to know that lust is not the same thing as passion or sexual love, though for most they are, sadly, intertwined. Lust is us manipulating a relationship out of sexual desire. Lust deteriorates relationships because it lies about a relationship. It objectifies and turns someone into something for your use and manipulation. Lust can even put sexual desire for someone as the answer to other needs: turning them into a kind of idol again. The more we turn someone into an object even just in our minds, or in private, the more it affects every other relationship too.
When Jesus tells us to pull out our eye or cut off our hand if it causes us to stumble, he is telling us to look at what is getting in the way of our relationship with him, what is getting in the way of His love pouring out for others. If there is something that is truly causing us to stumble in those fundamental relationships then we should get rid of it. It can’t really be our eye or our hand, because those are appendages led by our heart and mind. Instead, what in our hearts and minds, or practices, should we get rid of that doesn’t lead us to a full relationship with God and others? This barrier or temptation can be a person in our lives, but this is very rarely the case, because it is these relationships that God has called us to. It is more often our perspective, desires, or thinking that need to be changed, or even the way we relate to that person and relationship.
This leads us to divorce and how Jesus compares divorce to adultery. Many of you will know that my parents are divorced, as I know a few people in this church have been. God does make room for this as he knows that people are broken and so are our relationships. There are legitimate times like in unfaithfulness (as Jesus references) or in abuse, when divorce is necessary.
In the reading, the written note of divorce is a reference to a commandment God gave Moses, but Jesus tells us later that this commandment was only given because he knows our hard hearts. God gave us divorce because he knows of our hard hearts, our unfaithfulness, our unwillingness to commit and open our hearts to even those closest to us. If you read over the original commandment about divorce, it is not primarily about permission as many Pharisees thought, a lot of it, was about protecting women from the fickleness of husbands and other men. Men had a lot of power and the commandment about a written note of divorce meant that women were free of their influence and control, at least to some degree. It is also important to note that divorced people in God’s commandment had no necessity pushing them back together - though of course reconciliation and restored relationships are always a goal for God.
Divorce though is a very serious matter. To understand how serious, we must first understand what marriage is. Marriage is not primarily about a feeling, it is about commitment and faithfulness. It is a sacrament, a gift given from God, that mirrors our commitment and relationship with God and so holds a special place in how we show our faithfulness to God. It is also the place where our love overflows out to others, just like our relationship with God. Marriage is a married person’s primary ministry given to us by God, that then all other ministries are empowered by. For those that are not married, Paul commends you dearly to faithfulness to God as it is better anyway for God to be your primary ministry. Divorce is a statement that we are not willing to remain committed or faithful to another person. That we have given up on it. It is abandoning a God-given relationship. It is giving up on a commitment to God.
Divorce should not happen because we don’t feel it anymore. Divorce should not happen because we have found something better. Divorce should not happen because we have realized that our spouse isn’t enough. Marriage isn’t about someone not being enough, no one is enough only God. Marriage isn’t about who is best, it is about how God can work through our spouse and us as a couple. Marriage isn’t about feelings, it is about commitment and faithfulness.
The shortest comment on promising at the end of our passage. Jesus is showing us that we shouldn’t even need to promise. We should simply live up to our word or be faithful to what we say. If we say yes, that should really be a yes, and the same for no. This means that we need to be extra thoughtful about what we say, but also what we do. It would be better if we didn’t need contracts, or leverage, or to swear because our honest faithfulness should be bigger than that, it should be a part of us. Even if our world doesn’t live into this, we are meant to live a different kind of faithfulness as best we can.
So, today has been all about faithfulness. Ultimately, we are faithful to God through our faithfulness to others. This faith plays out in every part of our interior and exterior lives. Jesus shows us that our desires must be first for him and then for good relationships with others so that our hearts might be faithful. Jesus shows us that we must stay true and committed to our relationships so that we might mirror our faithfulness to God and pour out His love. Jesus shows us that we must be thoughtful and faithful to our word and actions so that we might live out God’s goodness. This might seem difficult in our broken lives, but the central thing to realize in all of this is who is speaking. It is Jesus who is truly and continuously faithful. Our Psalm today just pours over again and again God’s amazing faithfulness. Since God is so immensely faithful to us. We can rest in his faithfulness and desire after it for ourselves so we will be changed to become images of God’s all-surpassing faithfulness. AMEN
Notes:
Why does God care what we think?
Why does he care about my sex life or marriage?
Why does he care about what I swear by?
You may not have realized it, but all of these questions are about faithfulness.
If we can’t be faithful to the people who are right in front of us, how can we be faithful to the God we cannot see? How we live our lives with others is how we live out our faithfulness to God.
Lust is adultery even if we or that person isn’t married
What is adultery? The betrayal of a relationship, a promise, unfaithfulness, turning away from someone, replacing, idolatry
Why is lust so bad? - Lust is not the same as eros (passion). Lust deteriorates relationships because it lies about a relationship. It objectifies and turns someone into something for your use and manipulation. The more we do this even just in our minds, or in private, the more it affects every other relationship.
Temptation - Letting temptation invade our thoughts, guide our thinking, form us
Divorce is a very serious thing. Marriage is not primarily about a feeling, it is about commitment and faithfulness. It is a sacrament that is most similar to our commitment and relationship with God and so holds a special place in how we show our faithfulness to God. It is also the place where our love is meant to overflow out of. It is a married person’s primary ministry given to us by God, that then all other ministries are meant to be empowered through. For those that are not married, Paul commends you dearly to faithfulness to God as it is better anyways for God to be your primary ministry.
We don’t promise by things that much and that is good, but I don’t know if contracts are any better. As it is a kind of promise by our lives, which is not ours. Even our stuff isn’t ours, it has been entrusted to us. (This is difficult on a practical level because that is how our society works - loans, mortgages, jobs, marriage, stocks, etc.).
Promise rather by a simple answer and live into it. When you say Yes, be faithful to it.
From the evil one? We are laying claim that is something of God’s to increase our own status, becoming a kind of idol.
