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If your pastor or small group leader were to say:  “For our study today let’s turn to Matthew chapter five”, we might immediately think about the beatitudes. And that certainly is the content of the first few verses. But the last verses, from thirteen to forty-eight, are equally important. These teachings of Jesus about salt and light, about the law, anger, adultery, divorce, vows, revenge, and love for enemies have an important common emphasis. Jesus raises the bar or standard compared with what the law proclaimed for us.

              This should be noted carefully because the tendency deep within our human nature is to lower standards. Grace is a wonderful attribute of our loving God. Without it there is no workable plan of salvation.  Someone has said there are two ways to be saved. One is to keep the law perfectly and the second one is by the great plan of salvation made viable through the death of Jesus on the cross. The first way to be saved is not a viable option because history has proven it to be an impossible challenge. “For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God’s glorious standard” Paul writes in Romans 3:23 (NLT).  The second way is viable only because of God’s attribute of grace. The next verses twenty-four and twenty-five confirm that. “Yet God, in his grace, freely makes us right in his sight. He did this through Christ Jesus when he freed us from the penalty for our sins. For God presented Jesus as the sacrifice for sin. People are made right with God when they believe that Jesus sacrificed his life, shedding his blood.”

But we should not think that the blessing of grace was somehow given as a way we can all live comfortably and guilt free as we allow ourselves to follow our human nature with lower standards as being the norm instead of committing ourselves to the higher standards Jesus has laid out for us. Chapter five closes with a very short but demanding sentence that calls for obedience. “But you are to be perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect.”

The Greek word translated here as ‘perfect’ has some important nuances of meaning. 1: Primary meaning- ‘brought to its end, finished.’ 2: Secondary meaning ‘wanting nothing necessary to completeness’.

Jesus’ here is telling his listeners that he has aspirations for them. Plans that call them to live in alignment with a higher bar or higher standards. And in this closing verse he challenges them to complete those plans, the plans with higher standards that he has for us and implies that we don’t want for anything necessary to accomplish that.

                                                                                                                                 Pastor Dave

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