We are studying the Sermon on the Mount; what might be called the Manifesto of the Kingdom of Heaven. It was given by Jesus Christ the Son of God, very likely as His first public sermon on earth, or at least, the first recorded sermon that we have an account of. Up to this point, Jesus has given us a series of Beatitudes, which are the characteristics of a citizen of the kingdom of heaven. In so doing, Jesus reminded of what we are, and then Jesus said what effect a Christian shall have in the world.
As we concluded our study last week, we saw that Jesus said that His citizens were to be salt and light in the world. As Christians, our righteousness acts as a preservative against the corruption of the world and to convict the world of sin, and the truth we share serves as a light to those in darkness and exposes the darkness. And just as importantly, our righteousness manifests Jesus Christ to the world and cause others to come to Christ so that they may glorify God.
So this is what Jesus has been saying, that we are the children of God and citizens of heaven and we are to manifest the character of God so that the world may come to know Him and glorify Him. Now, as Jesus continues His message, He tells us how this is done. How we are to live a life of righteousness. He tells us not only how we are to live righteously, but how we are to define righteousness. And He does so by turning our attention to the law.
A lot of people today make the mistake of thinking that the law is at odds with the teaching of Jesus Christ. And even as Jesus was beginning His earthly ministry there were questions about whether or not Jesus kept the law, or advocated keeping the law, or whether He was bringing in a new doctrine. And so the first principle that Jesus is establishing is that His doctrine is in complete harmony with the teaching of the Old Testament. Nothing He will say contradicts the law or the prophecies which were taught in the Old Testament. He is not teaching something new, but rather He affirms the authority of the scriptures and His obedience and adherence to it, and therefore by extension, He asserts it’s authority over the kingdom of heaven and it’s citizens.
I feel it’s necessary to make a couple of observations at this point. You should be aware of the fact, and I emphasize that it is an indisputable fact, that the Old Testament canon of scripture was already established as the word of God, and accepted by all Jewish scholars by 300 BC. So the very same Old Testament that we have in our Bibles today is the very same scriptures that Jesus and the disciples had access to. When Jesus quotes from and affirms and claims the authority of the scriptures, He is speaking of the Old Testament scriptures that we have in front of us today. And these scriptures we have today have been shown to be reliable and accurate, especially in light of the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls discovered from caves in the 1940’s. And it is widely accepted by all scholars that most of the scrolls were written before the birth of Christ. Those scrolls contain the same exact scriptures which we have before us today.
I say that because some uninformed critics of the Bible tend to try to discredit the scriptures by saying they are all of relatively recent authorship. And yet there is undeniable evidence that these writings were extant in the days of Jesus Christ and had long been accepted as the word of God. So when the Old Testament prophesied of something that didn’t happen until the days of Christ or afterwards, we should recognize that is something remarkable; that the prophecy made hundreds of years earlier came true and was verifiable.
Now that’s important to understand and believe, because Jesus says here that “not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished.” He is saying that everything that is prophesied in the Old Testament, not only the future things spoken of by the prophets, but also the types of things symbolized in the Old Testament, will be fulfilled. And a vast number of prophesies and types were given concerning Jesus.
Also it’s important to understand what Jesus means when He speaks of the law and the prophets. That phrase refers to the entire Old Testament. But let’s look at the word law first of all. The law consists of three parts; the moral, judicial and ceremonial law that was given to the children of Israel. The moral law is comprised of the 10 commandments and the moral injunctions that we laid down once for all. The judicial law was the civic and legislative laws which were given to the nation of Israel living under theocratic rule. Then the ceremonial law referred to the laws given concerning offerings and sacrifices and their worship of God. Many of those ceremonies and rituals are what we call types, which are in effect prophecy, and which typified the ministry of Christ. So all three of those constitute what is called the law.
The word prophets, as in the law and the prophets means all that we have in the prophetic books of the Old Testament. The prophets also taught the law, as well as making prophetic statements about events to come in the course of history. They foretell the coming of the Messiah and the future of Israel and the church.
There is one other word in Jesus’s statement which we should explain, and that’s the word translated in the NASB “accomplished.” In the KJV it is rendered “fulfilled.” What it means is to carry out, to fulfill in the sense of giving full obedience to it, carrying out everything that has been said in the law and the prophets. Now let’s look at what Jesus said.
Vs. 17 "Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish but to fulfill. For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one jot or one tittle shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished.” The primary principle that Jesus is giving here is that God’s law is absolute. It is absolute and eternal. It doesn’t change from culture to culture, from one generation to another. Psalm 119:89 says, “Forever, O LORD, Your word is settled in heaven.” That permanence is expressed by the Lord in the phrase, “until heaven and earth pass away…” The word of the Lord, the law and the prophets, shall never pass away until all is accomplished.
When the Lord said “jot or title” that indicates the smallest letter in the Hebrew alphabet, and the smallest stroke in the smallest letter. In other words, even the smallest detail of the law will be fulfilled, all will be accomplished before heaven and earth pass away. Every prophecy, every type, every law will be fulfilled, will be completely carried out. Furthermore, rather than modifying the law, or changing the law, or abolishing the law, Jesus is saying that He has come to accomplish the law. All the law and the prophets point to Him and will be fulfilled in Him to the smallest detail.
We need to recognize that Jesus confirms the whole of the Old Testament, from Genesis to Malachi. He recognizes it’s authority. He affirms it’s accuracy. As you look at the ministry of Jesus, you will notice that He quotes from almost all of it. He especially quotes from Genesis, especially the creation story and even from the story of Jonah and the whale. The parts of the OT that the critics love to dismiss, Jesus quotes as evidence which points to Himself. To deny the truth of those passages is to deny the truthfulness of Jesus Christ, which is to deny that He was holy and righteous. I will go further and say that if you deny the legitimacy of the Old Testament, then in effect you deny the legitimacy of Jesus Christ and HIs power to save. If you claim to believe in Jesus Christ, then you must believe in the word of God, because Jesus affirmed that it was authoritative and cannot be annulled. In John 10:35 Jesus said, “the Scripture cannot be broken.” It’s God’s word that is going to be accomplished to the minutest detail.
Now how this fulfillment of the law and the prophets is accomplished is something that Jesus compels us to consider. Think of the prophecies concerning His birth. His birthplace in the tiny town of Bethlehem was prophesied hundreds of years before He was born. Everyone knew that the scriptures said He was to be born in Bethlehem. And yet they somehow missed it.
Consider the description of His ministry that was prophesied in Isaiah 53. Jesus fulfilled it perfectly, and yet they missed it because they wanted a king to overthrow their enemies, not a Savior who would redeem His people. I wish I could read all of Isaiah 53 this morning, but I don’t have the time. Let me just quote a few lines; “But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; The chastening for our well-being [fell] upon Him, And by His scourging we are healed.” Jesus fulfilled these prophesies of the Messiah being our Savior down to the smallest detail.
In Psalm 22 David wrote centuries before Christ how He would die in minute detail. Listen to this; “I am poured out like water, And all my bones are out of joint; My heart is like wax; It is melted within me. My strength is dried up like a potsherd, And my tongue cleaves to my jaws; And You lay me in the dust of death. For dogs have surrounded me; A band of evildoers has encompassed me; They pierced my hands and my feet. I can count all my bones. They look, they stare at me; They divide my garments among them, And for my clothing they cast lots.” Written hundreds of years before His death on the cross, and yet it all was accomplished exactly as David prophesied.
If time permitted, I could give you many more examples of ways in which Jesus fulfilled the prophesies of the Old Testament. We must never separate the Old and the New Testament as if they are divergent from one another. But we understand the Old from the New and the New from the Old. And the gospel of Christ is found intertwined in it’s passages from Genesis to Revelation.
Let’s consider further how Chris fulfills the law. In Galatians 4:4 Paul said, “But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the Law, so that He might redeem those who were under the Law, that we might receive the adoption as sons.” Notice, that Christ was born as a man under the law. He was made under the law, as one who had to carry it out. God showed the absoluteness of HIs law by making His Son to be under it. And Jesus kept the law down to it’s minute detail. No one could find any evidence to accuse Him of breaking the law in any respect. He obeyed it perfectly, not only in letter, but in it’s intent.
Jesus fulfilled the law by keeping it, but also in bearing the penalty of it for our sakes. The cross of Calvary is not understandable except in the context of the law. The crucifixion is often displayed in a sentimental manner. We focus on the physical suffering of the cross from a standpoint of injustice of an innocent man. But the doctrine of the cross is so much more than that. What happened on the cross was that the Holy Son of God was enduring in His body the penalty prescribed by the law for our sins. For your sins and mine, He bore our penalty as required by the law. The law required death. Romans 6:23, “for the wages of sin is death.” Jesus came to fulfill the law, and the law required punishment for sin which is death. And so Jesus suffered and died on the cross to pay that penalty for us.
Please understand that God forgives sin not because He chose to ignore it, or wink at it, but because He exacted the punishment that was due to us on His only Son. God did not disregard the law in order to save us, but He punished Jesus for our transgressions.
Furthermore, we see that Jesus fulfilled the law by fulfilling all the Old Testament types that served as prophesies concerning Him. When we read in the OT about all the sacrifices, and the altar, and the ceremonies of the temple, and so forth, we see that they all are pictures, shadows or types of the ministry of Jesus Christ. He has fulfilled and carried out all the symbols and types pictured in the ceremonies and rituals of the OT. He is the high priest, He is the offering, He is the sacrifice, and He has presented His blood in heaven so that the entire ceremonial law is fulfilled in Him.
To take this idea of fulfillment one step further, consider that Jesus has fulfilled the law in us and through us by His Holy Spirit. That’s what Paul says in Romans 8:2, “For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death. For what the Law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God [did:] sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and [as an offering] for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh, so that the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.” Notice that Paul connects the way that Christ fulfills the law Himself and fulfills the law in us.
In other words, Jesus fulfilled the righteousness of the law, and we are to do the same. As Peter said in 1Peter 2:21 “For you have been called for this purpose, since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in His steps.” Jesus accomplishes this in us by giving us the Holy Spirit to enable us to love the law and keep it. We are given the righteousness of Christ which makes us holy, that we might receive the Holy Spirit, by whom we are able to be righteous and live righteously because we have a new heart and a new nature. This new heart we have been given enables us to love the law. We are no longer at enmity with God, but we love the things of God.
As God promised through the prophet Jeremiah, (Jer. 31:33) "But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days," declares the LORD, "I will put My law within them and on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.” The law is written in our hearts and minds so that we want to fulfill it and we are empowered to do so.
Then Jesus says that "Whoever then annuls one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others [to do] the same, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever keeps and teaches [them,] he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.” So then it remains for us to keep them. The question is how are we to do this?
Well in regards to the ceremonial law, we have shown that it has already been fulfilled in Jesus Christ. All the rituals and ceremonies and types in the temple were accomplished by Jesus Christ. As proof of that, the temple was destroyed, the sacrifices abolished, and the veil of the temple was torn into opening up the holy of holies. I fulfill the ceremonial law then by believing in Him and submitting myself to Him. In regards to the ceremonial law then, we have rest in Christ because they were fulfilled in Him. As Heb. 4:9 says, “So there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God.”
Now in regards to the judicial law, we understand that this was primarily for the nation of Israel under the theocracy of God’s rule of the nation. Jesus said in Matthew 21:43 "Therefore I say to you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people, producing the fruit of it.” This new people of God is now the church. 1Peter 2:9-10 says, “But you are A CHOSEN RACE, A royal PRIESTHOOD, A HOLY NATION, A PEOPLE FOR [God's] OWN POSSESSION, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light; for you once were NOT A PEOPLE, but now you are THE PEOPLE OF GOD; you had NOT RECEIVED MERCY, but now you have RECEIVED MERCY.”
There is no longer a theocratic nation, so the judicial law has been fulfilled as well.
There remains then the moral law. The moral law is the standard for righteousness. It is delineated not only by what we must not do, but what we must do. Jesus said the greatest and foremost commandment was you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength and all your mind.” That is a continual, permanent law for all mankind.
And He says the second is like it; “you shall love your neighbor as yourself.” “On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets.” So all the moral law is comprised in these two commandments, which are not just for the theocratic nation, but for the entire world. It is the basis for our relationship to God. Peter quoted the Lord as saying, “You shall be holy even as I am holy.” We cannot comprehend holiness outside of the moral law. We cannot know righteousness outside of the moral law. And we are commanded to be holy and righteous in the New Testament just as He is holy and righteous. So the moral law still applies to us.
Finally then, we must ask, what is the relationship of the Christian to the law? The Christian is not under the law as a covenant of works. Our salvation does not depend upon keeping it. Salvation is by faith in the New Testament just as it was in the Old Testament. Christ has delivered us from the curse of the law. The curse is death. Jesus paid that penalty for those that believe in Him. So we are not under the curse of the law. But we still live under it as a standard of righteousness.
The problem today is that many confuse the relationship between law and grace. The law was never meant to save man. Abraham was declared righteous by God because of His faith. The law didn’t come until 430 years later. The law came, according to Paul, to show us our sin and the need for a Savior. Paul said the law was our schoolmaster to bring us to Christ.
In a similar fashion, people have a false view of grace. They think grace has nothing to do with the law. That’s what is called antinomianism, claiming grace so that they might live in sin and think that it has nothing to do with our sanctification. Paul wrote in Romans 6, “What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin so that grace may increase? May it never be! How shall we who died to sin still live in it?”
The whole premise of grace is to provide a way to enable us to keep the law. We are justified by grace, because Jesus paid our penalty, and then having been declared righteous we are able to receive the Holy Spirit so that we are empowered to live righteously. The Holy Spirit isn’t given to give us an “experience” so that we can experience God. We show that we are children of God because we keep His commandments, according to 1 John 2:3. “By this we know that we have come to know Him, if we keep His commandments. The one who says, "I have come to know Him," and does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him; but whoever keeps His word, in him the love of God has truly been perfected. By this we know that we are in Him: the one who says he abides in Him ought himself to walk in the same manner as He walked."
The problem with many of us is that we have the wrong view of holiness. It is a dangerous thing to misconstrue holiness and sanctification as some sort of experience to be received. Holiness means righteousness, and being righteous means keeping the law. Therefore if your so called grace does not make you keep the law, you haven’t received grace, but merely a psychological experience. Grace is the gift of God that delivers us from the curse of the law, enables us to keep the law as Christ kept the law and to be righteous as Christ was righteous. Grace is that which causes me to love God, and love His law. And because I love Him, I keep His commandments. John 14:15 "If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.”
In summary, Jesus makes the case that the law of God has never been annulled. God is the same yesterday, today and forever. HIs word endures forever. He gave Himself for us that we might become righteous and holy, a peculiar people, a holy nation, that we might do the works of God, that we might act like sons and daughters of God.
Jesus goes on to say that unless our righteousness exceeds that of the Pharisees you shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven. We will consider that more next week, but suffice it to say that God intends for us to exceed even the meticulous law keeping of the Pharisees. He wants us to keep the spirit of the law as well as the letter. The Pharisees were artful dodgers in the sense that they interpreted the law so that they might appear to keep the letter of the law, but miss the intent of the heart. Remember, God said in Jeremiah that He would write His law upon our hearts. That is what is necessary to keep the law. It requires a new heart, a heart that desires the things of God, that loves what He loves and despises what He despises.
I wonder if someone here today recognizes that they fail to meet the righteous standard of God because they have not received a new heart and a new spiritual nature as the gift of God. I want to encourage you today, if that is your situation, that you call upon the Lord to forgive your sins, believe in Jesus Christ as your Savior who paid the penalty on the cross for your sins, and if you do that you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. He will give you new life, a new heart, and a new nature, so that you might be born again into the kingdom of heaven, and enable you to be the son or daughter of God so that you may do the works of God. Don’t put it off. Call on the Lord today and be saved.
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