We are continuing this morning in our study of the Sermon on the Mount. This morning, we will be examining a new section in Matthew, chapter five, verses 17 through 20. At this point, Jesus has laid forth what it means to be a citizen of the kingdom. He has laid forth what it means to be salt and light in this world. And now he wants to be clear on what his relationship is to the law. Our focus this morning will be on verses 17 and 18. We'll examine Christ's relationship to the law and then, Lord willing, next week we will look at verses 19 and 20 and look at our relationship to the law. So let's turn our attentions now to God's word. We'll begin reading in chapter five, verse one, and read through verse twenty. Let's give our attention to God's holy word. And seeing the multitudes, he went up on a mountain and when he was seated, his disciples came to him. Then he opened his mouth and taught them, saying, Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn. for they shall be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled. Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God. Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when they revile you and persecute you and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for my sake. Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven. For so they persecuted the prophets who were before you. You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its flavor, how shall it be seasoned? It is then good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by men. You are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden, nor do they light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house. Let your light so shine before men. that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven. Do not think that I came to destroy the law or the prophets. I did not come to destroy, but to fulfill. For assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled. Whoever therefore breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches men so shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven. But whoever does and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I say to you that unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven. Let's pray and ask the Lord to bless our time. Gracious Heavenly Father, we thank you for the privilege of coming together as your people. We thank you for your precious word, Lord. We thank you for these words that you spoke. That you have spoken to us, you have made yourself clear. Lord, as we examine your relationship to the law, may we have a greater appreciation for the gospel and for the work that you have done on our behalf. We pray your blessing on this time, Lord. We pray that you alone would have the glory. We pray this in the good name of Jesus. Amen. Most of you have no doubt seen a speed limit sign, and most of you at one time or another have chosen to ignore those types of signs. And we live in North Park, and the speed limit is only 25 miles per hour, which is fairly low. But there's a reason that it's only 25 miles per hour. It's a park. There are people walking and biking, kids and adults crossing the road frequently. So the purpose of the speed limit is to protect the pedestrians, to prevent people from getting injured or even killed. And one of the most frustrating things about where we live is people who frequently choose to ignore the speed limit and go as fast as they want. And in doing so, they endanger the lives of the people in that park. And you think about it, these drivers never really stop to think about the reason behind that speed limit. They don't really care about the reason and they just choose to ignore it. But sadly, this is the same attitude that many in the church today have towards God's law. They don't understand it, they don't really care to understand it, and they just disregard it. John Newton, the converted slave trader who wrote Amazing Grace, said that ignorance of the nature and design of the law is at the bottom of most of our religious mistakes. Most Christians are uncertain about the role that God's law plays in this new covenant era. And sadly, many disregard the issue as if it no longer matters. But in our text today, Jesus is clear that the law does matter. And he wants to be clear about his relationship to the law. He said that he came not to destroy the law, but to fulfill it. Today's text builds on what Jesus had already said, but it marks the beginning of a new section in the sermon. Jesus has declared who we are and what our function is to be in this world. So the question is, how are we to do this? In one word, The answer is righteousness. That word sums up the life of the Christian and is the theme of the remainder of the sermon. But before Jesus gets into the how, he lays forth his relationship to the law and the prophets. So his exhortations to righteous living rest on his relationship to the law. And we must realize that this is central to the gospel message. Understanding Christ's relationship to the law should bring us to a greater appreciation of the work of our Savior, of what he has done for us. So as we ponder Christ's relationship to the law, we should rejoice in the reality of the gospel, that Christ has kept the law on your behalf. freeing you from his curse and giving you his righteousness. As I've mentioned already, we will consider verses seventeen and eighteen this morning. Just two points for the day, and they come in the form of questions. Why did Jesus say these things and how did Jesus fulfill the law? So why did Jesus say these things and how did Jesus fulfill the law? Let's first consider why Jesus said these things. This first question or point serves a twofold purpose. First, it will help us set the context for the passage before us, and second, it will at the same time serve as a review for what we've covered so far. In the Sermon on the Mount, themes build on one another and flow into one another, so we must keep the big picture in mind as we move through it. Look with me at verse 17. Jesus said, Do not think or do not imagine that I have come to destroy the law or the prophets. Now, as we consider what came before that, the Beatitudes and Jesus teaching on salt and light, that statement almost seems out of place. It doesn't seem to fit. It seems like an abrupt transition. But what we have to keep in mind is that Jesus was responding to the accusations of his critics. He was responding to the accusations of his critics, the Old Testament was often referred to as the law, the prophets and the writings or the law, the prophets and the songs, or in this case, just the law and the prophets. It spoke of the entire Old Testament. In our text today, in order to emphasize certain aspects of the Old Testament, Jesus uses the phrase the law or the prophets. Many of Jesus listeners were wondering if he was destroying or abolishing the Old Testament. He was not a typical rabbi, he did not have the same schooling that everyone else had. He wasn't associated with any of the popular sects of the day. And not only that, he was openly contradicting the teachers of his day. The Pharisees were the separated ones, they were the conservatives, they were the experts on the law, and Jesus comes along and calls them hypocrites. So there were no doubt questions surrounding the nature of Jesus teaching and his relationship to the Old Testament. But at this point in the sermon, Jesus has proclaimed what it means to belong to the kingdom of heaven and the Beatitudes. Jesus taught that the kingdom of God is not for the proud and self-righteous, but rather it is for the poor and spirit who mourn over their sin. He says the kingdom citizens are also meek and they hunger and thirst for a righteousness that they know they don't have on their own. The result is that they are filled with Christ's righteousness. They become one with Christ through his saving power. They now share in the nature of their savior and of their heavenly father. Having obtained mercy, they are now merciful, having been purified by Christ, they are now pure in heart and having obtained peace with God through Christ, they are now his peacemaking sons. Jesus then proceeded to end the Beatitudes by emphasizing that kingdom life in a fallen world will bring conflict. The result of kingdom living will be persecution. People will revile and slander us because of our relationship with Jesus Christ. But Jesus turns this bitter reality into something sweet. He reminds us that the persecution that we endure is a sure sign that we do not belong to this world. That we belong to a heavenly kingdom, that we have a heavenly father. And he says that we should rejoice and be glad because we have a reward in heaven that far outweighs the suffering that we endure on this earth. But consider what Jesus said in those few words. Very little that he said would have sat well with the Pharisees. To them, it was like he was speaking a foreign language. They saw themselves as rich in spirit, so they saw no need to mourn over their sin. They were not meek and they had no hunger and thirst for righteousness because they thought that they had all that they needed. The Pharisees probably didn't even consider mercy to be a virtue. When they heard Jesus say, blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God, the idea of purity would have probably resonated with them. And they saw themselves as the guardians of God's law, the ones who preserved its purity. But the idea of purity of heart was foreign to them. They probably didn't know what to make of Jesus comments about peacemaking, and the idea of persecution was no doubt offensive to them. So in their mind, everything that they heard was new, it didn't line up with their teachings, their traditions or their practice. But then Jesus continues, he moves from the Beatitudes, which were a declaration of who we are to our function in this world. He says, you are the salt of the earth and you are the light of the world. You preserve this world from moral and spiritual decay by your lifestyle and your attitudes. You also purify this world from darkness by shining forth the light of the gospel, by your words and deeds. Jesus turned to the disciples and said, you are the light of the world. And it's easy to miss the impact of such a simple statement, but this probably angered the Pharisees. They saw themselves as the ones who brought light to Israel. They were expecting this to be said of them. Instead, Jesus turns to a group of uneducated nobodies and says they are the light of the world. And they're not just the light of Israel, they're the light of the world. And Jesus was affirming there the truth of Isaiah 60, which said that the light of God's glory would shine forth to the Gentiles as well. But again, the Pharisees saw this as new teaching, something that was foreign to their understanding of the law. So Jesus had just admonished his disciples to let their light shine before men. In our text today, which begins a new section, he begins to explain how he's going to show how the good works he mentioned in verse 16 are in complete harmony with God's law. And so he's answering the question that his critics were asking. The question was. What is his position to Moses and the law? Has he come to destroy the law? And by this point in his ministry, his opponents had already begun to regard him as a destructive rebel who wanted to cut ties with the past. And this attitude never subsided, it only grew worse. In John 5, John tells us that the religious leaders sought to kill him because he was healing on the Sabbath and calling God his own father. They saw Jesus as a lawbreaker and a blasphemer. But in reality, his opponents could not have been more wrong. Jesus obeyed the law, so there was no conflict between him and the Old Testament. And despite what his detractors were saying, what Jesus required of his followers far surpassed what the scribes and Pharisees required of theirs. The Pharisees were concerned about the letter of the law, about mere mechanical outward obedience. Jesus moves beyond that superficial obedience to the law to require something more. And ironically, while they accused Jesus of destroying the law, they buried the law under a load of tradition and regarded mechanical obedience as the only means to salvation. So in the end, they were the ones who were setting aside the Old Testament and the law of God. So as Jesus begins to set forth the righteousness of the kingdom, he immediately dismisses the charge that he is an iconoclast. He's going to show that his teaching was not contrary to the Old Testament, but in complete harmony with it. In fact, without him, the Old Testament would not be complete. So let's look at our second question, how did Jesus fulfill the law? How did Jesus fulfill the law? Look at verses 17 and 18 again. Jesus said, Do not think that I came to destroy the law or the prophets. I did not come to destroy, but to fulfill. For assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled. Many in the Church of Christ today believe that Jesus coming somehow does away with the Old Testament. This is a sad and an unnecessary error, because Jesus is crystal clear in this passage about his relationship to the Old Testament and to the law. Now, notice the negative and positive statements that he makes in both of these verses. He says, Do not think I came to destroy the law or the prophets. That word destroy means to abolish or utterly destroy. He is saying to his critics, stop thinking that I have come to destroy the law. The gospel grace does not abolish the law positively, he says, I have come to fulfill it. And then in verse 18, we have a negative and positive again, for assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one title will by no means pass from the law. So he's being emphatic here. He's he says, for assuredly, I say to you. Some translations say, amen, amen. This indicates that the following statement is going to be a sobering statement of truth that is of the utmost importance. So he hones his focus in on the law to disprove his detractors. He says that not one jot or one tittle will pass from the law until all is fulfilled. The tiniest letter and the tiniest mark will remain until all is fulfilled. Jesus here affirms the eternality of his word. That his word will never pass away, the heavens and the earth are more fragile than God's word is. So he turns the tables on his critics. He essentially says, don't think I am the one abolishing the law. I came to fulfill it. You are attempting to abolish it. Let's consider what this means for us. Consider that Jesus has kept the law on your behalf. He's kept the law on your behalf. Notice the emphasis in both verses is on his fulfillment. He says, I did not come to destroy, but to fulfill. And then at the end of verse 18, he assures that the law will not pass away until all is fulfilled. Both verses emphasize fulfillment of the law, and we must be careful to define that word correctly. To understand what it does and doesn't mean. It does not mean to bring to an end or do away with. Rather, that word means to carry out, to fulfill in a sense of keeping full obedience to it. Jesus fulfilled the prophets by being the substance of all of the Old Testament predictions concerning the Messiah. So he came not to destroy the law or the prophets, But to fulfill them, to carry them out and to give them a perfect obedience. He was their fulfillment in and of himself. So we set aside the Old Testament, if we ignore the Old Testament, then we will have an insufficient view of our savior and an incomplete view of the gospel. Christ was the fulfillment of the entire Old Testament. And consider just a few of the Old Testament predictions concerning Christ. He is the seed of the woman of Genesis 315. He is the Passover lamb of Exodus. He is the sacrifice of atonement of Leviticus. He is the prophet like Moses of Deuteronomy. He's the captain of the army of the Lord and Joshua. He's the Davidic King of Samuel. He's the priest forever in the order of Melchizedek of Psalm 110. He is the suffering servant of Isaiah. He's the son of man of Daniel, and he is the son of righteousness of Malachi. And that doesn't even scratch the surface. Jesus was the fulfillment of all of these. But what does it mean that Jesus fulfilled the law? What is meant by the law here? Well, Jesus is referring to the entire law. The ceremonial, the civil and the moral law, he came to fulfill all three. So first, consider that Christ fulfilled the ceremonial law on your behalf. The ceremonial law dealt with the priesthood, the temple and the sacrifices. This is all fulfilled in Christ, in his obedience and in his sacrifice for our sins. The writer of the book of Hebrews demonstrates how Christ was the fulfillment of the ceremonial law. Hebrews 10, verses 11 through 14, says. Day after day, every priest stands and performs his religious duties. Again and again, he offers the same sacrifices which can never take away sins. But when this priest, meaning Christ, but when this priest had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God. Since that time, he waits for his enemies to be made his footstool, because by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever. Those who are being made holy. Jesus has kept the ceremonial law for your sake. If you are in Christ, you stand today with your sins forgiven because he has finished his work on your behalf and sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high. If we think of it more broadly, Christ fulfilled all of the Old Testament types that were contained in the ceremonial law. So many people today seem uninterested in the Old Testament books in the Pentateuch, like Leviticus and Numbers. Those books talk about burnt offerings, sacrifices, the tabernacles, ritual cleansings. What do all those things mean? What are they for? What are their purpose? Those things were all shadows and types, prophecies of what was going to be done in a perfect and final way by the Lord Jesus Christ. Every single one of those types and shadows were fulfilled in the person of Christ. He was the reality of the shadows. This is what the writer of Hebrews, again, emphasizes and again, in chapter 10, this time in verses one through four. For the law is only a shadow of the good things that are coming, not the realities themselves. For this reason, it can never, by the same sacrifices repeated endlessly year after year, make perfect those who draw near to worship. If it could, would they not have stopped being offered? For the worshipers would have been cleansed once for all and would no longer have felt guilty for their sins. But those sacrifices are an annual reminder of sins because it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. The writer there is endeavoring to show the superiority of Christ's sacrifice for sins to show Christ's fulfillment of the ceremonial law. He mentions the good things to come. Those good things, that was Christ's fulfillment of the law on behalf of his people. And the result of these good things are eternal life, access to God that we have made available to us through Christ. And they are good things because they are final and they are perfect. The writers pointing out that the ceremonial law could never make the worshipper perfect. It could never be obeyed by a mere man. The fact that the sacrifices were offered over and over and over again pointed to the fact that sin still stood between man and God. Christ, as the fulfillment of the law, has provided you with a superior cleansing. a lasting cleansing. That is why there is no longer any need for any repetitious cleansing ritual. This one-time permanent cleansing was not available through the ceremonial law. It was made attainable through Jesus Christ and His fulfillment of the law. In verses 3 and 4 of Hebrews 10, the writer alludes to the Day of Atonement. which involved an annual remembrance of sin. Every year the people remembered their sin and trusted that God would pardon it. This was repeated year after year. The writers pointing out that the peace made available through Christ is once and for all. Because of the sacrifice of his son, God promises to no longer remember your sin. Consider that the promise is that he will no longer remember your sin. And that is because he came not to abolish the law, but to fulfill it. So Christ fulfilled the ceremonial law on your behalf, his death and his work is a fulfillment of all of the types and shadows that were contained in the ceremonial law. He is the offering. He is the sacrifice. He is the high priest. And he has presented his blood in heaven in order to fulfill the ceremonial law for you. He came to fulfill the law by his death, resurrection and presentation of himself in heaven. He has done this. But he is not just fulfilled the ceremonial law. Christ fulfilled the civil and moral law on your behalf. Now, when we use the term civil law that just pertain to the judicial law codes of the nation Israel in the Old Testament, the moral law deals with the duties of man towards God and towards other men. These are summarized in the Ten Commandments. Christ fulfilled both of these with his perfect obedience to them. He obeyed the law perfectly as the perfect man. Now, the civil law passed away theologically at Christ's death and historically when the temple was destroyed in A.D. 70. But even though the civil law has passed away, the general principles of morality behind it remain. So what about these principles of morality, what about the moral law, the law that is summarized in the Ten Commandments? Well, Jesus kept these for you, for your sake, and his righteousness has been imputed to you. This is the doctrine of justification that you stand clothed in his righteousness because he has become the sacrifice for your sin and obeyed the law on your behalf. Jesus fulfilled the law actively and passively for you. Psalm 40 beautifully expresses Christ's work on your behalf. In verses six through nine of Psalm 40, we have very much a Christological psalm here, so we can see it as though Christ is speaking these words. So listen to what he says here in verses six through nine. Sacrifice and offering you did not desire. My ears you have opened, burnt offering and sin offering you do not require. Then I said, behold, I have come in the scroll of the book. It is written of me. I delight to do your will, O God, and your law is written in my heart. I have proclaimed the good news of the righteousness and the great assembly. Would you briefly consider four statements that are made there? First, Christ says that my ears you have opened. A better translation of that would be you have pierced my ears. This is an allusion to Exodus 21, which records the law concerning Hebrew servants. Every seventh year, the servants were to be set free. But if a servant decided he wanted to stay with his master, if a servant clearly said, I love my master and I want to serve him out of love, not out of duty, They would go and they would pierce the servant's ears with an awl, and that became a symbol of the type of servitude it was serving, not out of duty, but out of love. And what a beautiful picture that is the nature of Christ's servitude. That Christ came to fulfill the law. And he did not so begrudgingly, he did not so just out of duty, but he did so out of a heart of love. He loved his master. He loved his father. In the Gospel of John, we frequently hear Jesus talking about the work that his father gave him to do. He did that out of a heart of love. And not only that, he did that out of love for you, his people. Also, he said, I delight to do your will. Oh, my God. I delight to do your will again, we hear the echoes of the Gospel of John, that Jesus talks about the will of the father, that that was what he came to do. Was another way of expressing that Jesus came to fulfill the law. Jesus carried out the will of God perfectly. And Hebrews 1010 tells us that it is by this will. That we have been made holy through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once and for all. It is by Christ's perfect obedience that we have been made holy once and for all. As the second Adam, Christ obeyed the law perfectly. And this fits perfectly with what Jesus is getting at in the Sermon on the Mount. And remember, just one chapter back in Matthew's gospel, back in chapter four, we have the record of Jesus temptation, which shows us that where Adam failed, Christ succeeded. And then notice, he also says, and your law is written within my heart. Consider that Christ was made under the law for your sake. Galatians 4.4 tells us that God sent forth his son made under the law. Think about that. The eternal son of God was made under the law. Even though he was eternally above the law, He made himself under it to carry it out for your sake. Friends, this should move us to worship and adoration of our Savior. He carried out the law perfectly for us, and it was his delight to do so. And then the fourth statement he makes there is, I have proclaimed the good news of righteousness in the Great Assembly. Christ proclaimed the righteousness of the kingdom. That is the theme of the Sermon on the Mount. And who did he proclaim it to? To the great assembly. The church. You, his people. The word used here for assembly is the same word that's used in the New Testament for the church. The good news. that has been declared to you, his people, is that his righteousness has been imputed to you. And you stand before the heavenly father clothed in Christ's righteousness because he came to do the father's will. But Jesus obeyed the law. And in the preceding verses, he makes it clear That the moral law does not pass away, but remains as a rule of life for the citizens of his kingdom. Jesus upheld the law by fulfilling it. He didn't abolish it. And when people claim today that the moral law is no longer binding, we have to point no further than this verse. We have to point no further than the cross. where Christ bore the Father's wrath for sin, and sin is the transgression of the law. Its requirements were not relaxed or abolished. So there is no conflict between law and gospel for God's people. Martin Lloyd-Jones said that if we are not clear in our understanding of the law, Then we shall never be clear in our understanding of the gospel. So as God's people, we should not ignore the law. Because we can't understand the gospel without it. Part of Jesus fulfillment of the law. Was bearing the penalty for the transgression of the law. This was Christ's passive obedience on your behalf. The penalty for breaking the law is death. And that is why he died. So the penalty had to be fulfilled as well. And you stand forgiven if you are in Christ, you stand forgiven because God has punished your sin on the cross. His son bore the penalty for your sin and he fulfilled the law. And we must rejoice in this truth, my friends. We must not see a false dichotomy between law and gospel. You are no longer under the law as a covenant of works, you know, under under the law and that you have to earn your salvation through obedience to it. You have been delivered from the curse of the law. If you are a Christian, you are now under the covenant of grace. The law shows us that we can never justify ourselves before God. It leads us to Christ, the fulfillment of the law. So there is no tension between the law and the gospel for the believer. So, friends, rejoice in the reality of the gospel. The Christ has kept the law on your behalf. freeing you from its curse and giving you his righteousness. That is the reality of your justification, and that is the gospel. Let's pray.