Before we can hear what Jesus says about oaths in Matthew 5, we have to feel what God has always said about them. The Old Testament does not treat oaths as a small matter. Leviticus 19:12 sits in the middle of a long string of holiness commands, and the warning is...
Step back and take in the whole week. Jesus has not been making the law harder; he has been making it honest. He has restored the seventh commandment to its full scope: not only the act, but the heart. He has named the lingering gaze for what it is. He has called us...
Before we get to Jesus on divorce, we have to understand what Jesus is walking into. In his day, the school of Hillel had taught that a man could divorce his wife for almost any reason. The certificate of divorce Moses had permitted in Deuteronomy 24, originally given...
Earlier in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus makes a claim that should have emptied the synagogue: unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. The scribes and Pharisees were the religious overachievers...
Jesus tells us to tear out eyes and cut off hands. Nobody in his audience took him literally; nobody should today. Blomberg rightly calls this hyperbole, a deliberate overstatement meant to drive home a point that understatement would blunt. But hyperbole is not...
