God’s Constitution, Pt 14: Adultery
Matthew 5:27-30 27“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ 28But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. 29If your right eye causes you to stumble, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. 30And if your right hand causes you to stumble, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to go into hell.
Proverbs 2:1-8 1My son, if you accept my words and store up my commands within you, 2turning your ear to wisdom and applying your heart to understanding— 3indeed, if you call out for insight and cry aloud for understanding, 4and if you look for it as for silver and search for it as for hidden treasure, 5then you will understand the fear of the LORD and find the knowledge of God. 6For the LORD gives wisdom; from his mouth come knowledge and understanding. 7He holds success in store for the upright, he is a shield to those whose walk is blameless, 8for he guards the course of the just and protects the way of his faithful ones.
Jeremiah 29:13 13You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.
There is an old Christian cliché that says, “their walk doesn’t match their talk.” That is the thought behind the Matthew verses. Statements are called clichés because they are true but that does not make them easy to abide by. And I think it also true that most of us believers live our lives trying to hold to a higher standard and failing frequently simply because we are human beings.
So when we read a verse that directly says we have committed adultery just by thinking lustfully it seems completely unfair. After all, we tell ourselves, “I didn’t act upon it, did I?” But here’s the thing: The Sermon on the Mount is occasionally called God’s Constitution because it instructs believers on how to live righteously. Remember, God created people in the first place because he wants to fellowship with us. He can’t though because he is holy and we are sinful so when Jesus came it was first to free us from the eternal consequences of sin through our salvation and second to teach us how to live in a holy way.
So it is not just murder, adultery, divorce, oaths, revenge, and love that is being spoken of in this section of verses, but also a pattern of thinking. Jesus is saying that attention on the externals is not enough, but that our approach to life and to sin ought properly to be one of attitude. Do you have a personal habitual sin? And have you ever made the attempt to change that habit pattern? You managed to avoid that sin for a week and so you say, “Let’s try for two weeks,” and so on until you eventually crash and burn. You’re embarrassed then, feel as small as an ant, get depressed maybe, and think you’ll never amount to anything. But none of that is true; it is just Satan lying to you about your worth before God. So what is one to do?
We are told that the greatest commandment is to “love the LORD your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength” (Matthew 22:36-40). “Heart, soul, mind, and strength” is poetic language that means to love God with everything you’ve got. It doesn’t mean just we think about him like turning a switch on or off, nor does it mean loving him at Church service and then doing other things for the rest of the week. No, it means loving God all 168 hours per week. “That’s not possible!”, you say, but I counter “Of course it is.” Here’s what I mean: Are you on top ‘of your game’ 100% of the time? Of course not. You have sleep time, your have times of weariness, and you have times of relaxation. One might think a person needs all categories of time to successfully negotiate life. My response is that such different needs can be blended so that all become God time. For instance as I write this I am on vacation in a state different than my own and a friend is in the kitchen doing dishes. A rather mundane task you might say not suitable for God, but this person has turned it into a praise time by playing worship music on blast and singing, and dancing, and praising the LORD. “What about sleep,” you say, and my response is that God often used dreams to talk to us. When we devote our time to him, that happens more and more so that even our sleep-time becomes God-time. What about work? Yes this is a hard place to worship your King. But worship can also mean living a certain lifestyle. Maybe you can’t evangelize at work, but you can reject vulgar language around you, or affirm that fellow-worker who is also trying to live a righteous life.
My point is we do find time to do the things we value. We also do the things for which we schedule time. Jesus is saying everything we do in our lives is of lesser value than God. And God so values us believers that he will orchestrate things to bring us to repentance. People, when we habitually engage in a sin pattern God will bring it to light eventually. Truth always, always, comes to the surface. It costs less to deal with the root sin early on than to be embarrassed by the consequences of fully developed sin later on.
14…each person is tempted when they are dragged away by their own evil desire and enticed. 15Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death. (James 1:14-15)
Here’s my point: Are you involved in an affair? Probably not. Have you had lustful thoughts about someone else? Probably yes. Maybe the first time, or even the tenth time is not an issue. But eventually you might begin to think about putting that thought into action. That potential affair could end in divorce, loss of assets, maybe loss of job, maybe dissolution of family, maybe jail time. Get the point?
But the main intersection of worship and flesh is devotion time. We sinful human beings need to have our focus in God in the face of a demonically influenced world that constantly intrudes. It is important to value our time with God and important to schedule time with him. Usually if one schedules, one does. And that time of reboot, reset, and refresh is important to the health our soul.