Mid Week Minute - 6.5.24
Happy Mid-week all of you truth-seeking wonderful people out there. This week in our journey through the Sermon on the Mount, we're still in Matthew chapter 5.
We're going to try to deal with one of the most difficult teachings of Jesus that kind of runs contrary to our nature, what seems intuitive when we're being mistreated by others.
In Matthew 5, Jesus is looking at these people who have been mistreated. His crowd was a bunch of rag-tags, four-horned, beat-up, sick, poor, hungry, looking-for-something group of people.
He tells them, "you've heard that it was said, an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth", but I tell you do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on one cheek, turn to him the other also, and if someone wants to take your shirt, give him your coat as well. If someone forces you to go one mile, go with them another mile. And then he says, when people want to borrow from you, don't even think twice.
So, it's this intentional vulnerability that Jesus seems to talk about. Interesting thing on what he quotes from the law is that it was really there, an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth but the law was providing for justice, a type of equal compensation for equal harm, but it did not allow the person who was harmed to get more than his pound of flesh out of the person that had harmed him. It's interesting that it protected to the oppressor and the oppressed.
And his point was, you know, in God's economy, in my Kingdom, we don't retaliate. We just don't. We don't retaliate. In fact, we take it sometimes, to display the character of God.
I challenge you to read that this week, or you can get into it some more on Sunday. Think about the kind of person you are, what you do. Are you someone who seeks to retaliate at every offense that comes your way? Or are you someone who is able to push a pause on the reaction and let God into the situation?
Let him into what your reaction, your typical reaction. That's probably what God is really after.
Something to think about. Have a great week. Be the people of God and think about what that means. And that will make a diference in every relationship, I promise.
Right on.
We're going to try to deal with one of the most difficult teachings of Jesus that kind of runs contrary to our nature, what seems intuitive when we're being mistreated by others.
In Matthew 5, Jesus is looking at these people who have been mistreated. His crowd was a bunch of rag-tags, four-horned, beat-up, sick, poor, hungry, looking-for-something group of people.
He tells them, "you've heard that it was said, an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth", but I tell you do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on one cheek, turn to him the other also, and if someone wants to take your shirt, give him your coat as well. If someone forces you to go one mile, go with them another mile. And then he says, when people want to borrow from you, don't even think twice.
So, it's this intentional vulnerability that Jesus seems to talk about. Interesting thing on what he quotes from the law is that it was really there, an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth but the law was providing for justice, a type of equal compensation for equal harm, but it did not allow the person who was harmed to get more than his pound of flesh out of the person that had harmed him. It's interesting that it protected to the oppressor and the oppressed.
And his point was, you know, in God's economy, in my Kingdom, we don't retaliate. We just don't. We don't retaliate. In fact, we take it sometimes, to display the character of God.
I challenge you to read that this week, or you can get into it some more on Sunday. Think about the kind of person you are, what you do. Are you someone who seeks to retaliate at every offense that comes your way? Or are you someone who is able to push a pause on the reaction and let God into the situation?
Let him into what your reaction, your typical reaction. That's probably what God is really after.
Something to think about. Have a great week. Be the people of God and think about what that means. And that will make a diference in every relationship, I promise.
Right on.
Get caught up on "Kingdom: The Sermon on the Mount" Series below.
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