18th September 2024

18th September 2024


Pray (ACts)


Read (Matthew 5:21-26)


Message (Alan Burke)


Deserving of the hell of fire for anger and belittling our bother, insulting them might seem ridiculous but it is with a purpose and that is to drive us to look to the grace of God, not despairing and while if we are relying on our own righteousness then we have absolutely no hope whatsoever we have hope through Jesus Christ who while we were still sinners died for us (Rom 5:8). As Jesus continues to teach of the full extent of the Biblical teaching on Anger he now turns to the need for us to be reconciled with our brothers and sisters. He speaks of a worshiper taking their offering gift to the alter. 


Now we don’t have an altar because Jesus offered himself as a sacrifice for us. But before he offered himself the practice of the church in the Old Testament was to bring their offerings to the Lord and make sacrifices to him, God was pointing his people to what would be fulfilled in his Son for us (Rom 3:25). Here the offering that is likely in view is that of a sin offering that a faithful Jew would have brought as he sought atonement for sins. You wouldn’t normally bring an offering and then leave the offering in front of the altar, in fact that wouldn’t have been done or if it was it would have been in an extenuating circumstance. 


And what Jesus says if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, you’ve done or said something that has caused offence, that you are to leave the gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled to your brother; then come and offer your gift. 


We might see some of the force of what is being said here by Jesus but I suspect that we miss the true gravity of what Jesus was teaching here. If you were bringing a sacrifice to the Altar it would be an animal unless you were very poor and then it would be one tenth of an ephah, about 2.2 litres in volume. Otherwise you’d bring a young bull, a male goat, a female goat or a dove or pigeon. You would bring the animal bound so it could not move and you bring it there on the alter ready to be sacrificed. The animal is there ready to be sacrificed and you are to leave it. 


Think to what Jesus just said in v21-22, the judgement that we deserve for anger for belittling someone, how we are deserving of the fire of hell. Well it should concern us so much that we have caused someone else to endanger themselves to hell because of us that we should be those who are so concerned about it we don’t leave it for another moment, we go and we want it sorted out now. If we have wronged someone or not, if their anger is justified or not we should seek reconciliation. 


This points to what we need to do before the Lord, not to wait, not to put it off for a moment, for the one whom we have offended, who we need reconciled with more than any other is the Lord God himself. We are serving of the fire of hell and we need to be reconciled. If you do not know and love the Lord Jesus, if you have not trusted in him your works are worthless, you may think you are good and your commandment keeping is enough but it isn’t. But do not despair, turn to the Lord Jesus and trust in what he has done, how he bore the wrath of God that was due for sin. This is the Love that God has shown forth to us, not one of us deserve it but God by his grace bestows us upon us, God requires what we are unable to do but has done all that is required of us so that we may be reconciled to him through faith as we trust in what Jesus has done for us. 


Pray (acTS)


Sing


WSC
Q93. Which are the Sacraments of the New Testament?
A. The Sacraments of the New Testament are Baptism, and the Lord’s Supper. 
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