Go the extra mile, turn the other cheek, an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. Perhaps the three most well-known sayings you would find in the Sermon on the Mount. They're used universally. Christian and non-Christian alike have used those phrases. But how have we used them? And what does the Lord mean? And have we used them wrongly? Maybe out of context. The Lord is going to help us, I hope, I trust, through His Word this morning as we read in Matthew chapter 5, beginning in verse 38. Matthew chapter 5, verse 38. You have heard that it hath been said, an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. But I say unto you, that ye resist not evil, but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if any man sue thee at law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also. And whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain, or two miles. Give to him that asketh thee, and from him that would borrow of thee, turn not thou away. My title is taken from the words of Jesus, do not resist evil, implied the evil. The word resist means don't stand against it. Don't oppose it. Don't resist the evil. Now, once again, if we take that statement as an absolute and lift it out of context, as the Russian author in the 1800s, Leo Tolstoy, did in his novel, War and Peace, he concluded from this text, a utopian society had no military, Because they resist evil. They oppose evil. And no policemen, because surely they oppose evil. Mahatma Gandhi was heavily influenced by his writings, and we know his life of pacifism. But what does Jesus mean? And how is he giving us a contrasting of ideas particularly the idea and distortion of the Mosaic law by the oral tradition of the scribes and Pharisees for which is the fifth time or section which he is prosecuting their brand of righteousness which was no righteousness and putting his place, the righteousness of the law or his own righteousness for which the kingdom citizens were to rely upon, rest in by faith. There are some Christians, even today, that would take this statement and say, therefore, no Christian should be enlisted in the military, nor should a Christian be on the police force. Now, we can conclude that's ridiculous, and so it is, but have you concluded in Scripture why it's okay to be in the military? See, it's not enough just to say, that can't be true, that sounds kind of odd, so I don't believe it. What is Jesus saying that would then give us the freedom to do so? And that's what we want to try to probe this morning in what Jesus is saying. We look, first of all, concerning the Mosaic distortion. Or, what did the law really say that the Pharisees and scribes distorted, they perverted? Then we're going to look at what does Jesus say as the right position, the spirit of the Law, and then we'll look at the illustrations in which Jesus is going to apply the Law to that culture and to us as well. First of all, the Law actually said, an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. The Mosaic Law, which three places in the Old Testament that Jesus could be alluding to, all three Give that statement related to the eye and the tooth. Exodus chapter 21, the law is prescriptive. It's prescribing directions and guidance for personal injury so that the punishment fits the crime. Certainly we would want that. We would say that is just, that's right, that's fair. And the law provided for a justice horizontally in human relationships where there was a punishment that was given that was actually right and appropriate for the crime. In Exodus chapter 21, if two men strove together and a woman with child was hurt so that her fruit departed from her, meaning she went into premature labor. If there was no mischief that followed, no harm to the child, then a fine was imposed and the man that hit the woman paid the fine. But if mischief followed, then the man that hit the woman that caused the mischief would surely pay life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, wounding for wounding, burning for burning, and stripe for stripe. Exodus 21. The law was prescriptive, and as we heard read this morning in Deuteronomy 19, where that language is used once again, it was designed to be a deterrent for evil. Those that heard of life for life would be afraid and evil would depart. Now what happens in a society where the legal standards are lowered? There is no fear. There is no deterrent. And beloved, that's the culture you're living in, is it not? So the law was prescriptive. Secondly, the law was public. not private. If you read in all three occasions where the husband could impose a fine, like in a lawsuit today suggesting that damages to be awarded is based on the plaintiff, a certain amount of dollars. The husband could say, I think we need X number of dollars or silver to be imposed. But in every case, the judges or the magistrates determine the punishment. Never was an individual who was personally harmed to ensure or to exact punishment. In other words, it was for the whole nation of Israel. It wasn't for personal disputes to be handled. If they needed to go to a court of law, they went before the judges and the judges and princes of Israel settled the matter. It's the second thing about the law that Jesus is quoting from. And in some way they had heard this. Thirdly, the law was prohibitive. And this is where we start to see the mosaic distortion by the scribes and Pharisees. It was prohibitive. The law was designed to push back on the passions, the sinful passions of men. Our natural bent is to always require more. then the punishment really is appropriate to give, right? We want two eyes for one eye and a set of teeth for one tooth. Genesis 4, 22 and 23, Lamech, the son of Enoch, who had two wives, Ada and Zillah. He said to them on one occasion, I have wounded, I have slain a man to my wounding, I have killed a young man to my hurt. Translated, I slew a young man who only hurt me. Why did he do that? Because the natural bent of the human heart is to exact more than the crime should require. The judges were demanded, the law was prohibitive, in that it pushed back on the sinful passions of men and said, life for life, and if you lost an eye, you get an eye, but it's not two for one. It's not a set of teeth for one single tooth. That natural bent comes out even at a young age, doesn't it? When perhaps the toy of a young tyke has been damaged, not only will he take the toy from the friend, he will deliver a blow to the nostrils as a personal act of retaliation. Hence, the mosaic distortion. When Jesus says, resist not evil, He's not talking to the judges. He's talking to individuals who had heard the scribes and Pharisees take that law and distort it to serve their own sinful passions to allow them to enact personal vengeance, retaliation, revenge. This is what Jesus is countering. This is what Jesus means when he says, resist not evil. This is how Jesus is unpacking both the intent and the spirit of the law. See, our personal self-interest, when it's exalted to the place of supremacy, and it rules the heart, when someone injures us, When someone maligns us, when someone defames us, that bent then, that self-interested exaltation of oneself then moves us to retaliate in some manner. The Pharisees and scribes who loved the praise of men, who loved their own self-righteousness, when Jesus infringed upon what they thought were their rights, what did they do? They became judge, jury, and executioners. And that's what the scribes and Pharisees were allowing individuals to do, for which the nation of Israel had heard them unpack in the oral tradition, is that you can be judge, jury, and executioner. And it's this distortion that Jesus is confronting in this text. Resist not the evil. Now, let's talk about what Jesus means more specifically. We see then that there's a way to resist evil. The judges surely were to resist evil and give an appropriate punishment. But there was a way in which we are not to resist evil with personal retaliation. Think about the spirit of the law for a minute in what Jesus is saying. If the law was designed to be a prohibition on personal passions, that would express itself in revenge, what's the spirit of that law? Remember, Jesus and the Old Testament is not just concerned with what the hands are doing and the feet are doing, what the mouth is saying, it's concerned with the spirit and the heart of what's happening. So if the law is prohibiting passions that produce revenge, the fulfillment of that law is when the man does not take revenge, right? Now, what has to happen in your heart to subdue the passions that are there, that lashes out in your relationships to punish others? Anybody struggle with that? What needs to happen to me? More than an external code that's saying, Michael Stewart, don't you take revenge. That's not going to help. What needs to happen in me to subdue the passions? And what are those passions? This is the heart of what Jesus is saying. This is the heart of Matthew 5 20. The righteousness that's superior to the righteousness of external code. of the scribes and Pharisees, who had no heart for righteousness, which means they always distorted the law to serve their sinful passions." So, yeah, they wouldn't say take revenge, but they could say, well, that's okay in this case. I mean, is that what the guy did to you? You can go beyond that. So that they removed the limitations, and they took it upon themselves, and took it out of the courtroom, put it in their own authority to do so. What needs to happen to my passions." And what are those passions? Passions like bitterness. That'll produce revenge, won't it? You ever been so bitter at someone? If you couldn't get even, you sure wanted something to happen. Right? Wrath. Wrath, sinful wrath is the guardian of my honor and my reputation and what people think of me. And if you belittle my honor, what happens? Well, there might be an honor killing, right? Imagine that. Imagine a man so exalting his own honor that he would kill his own daughter because of a perversion, a perverted sense of his own Reputation. What he loves. And hence you have that in the Islamic world. What distortion! But what about you? Have you ever allowed your wrath to lash out and take revenge on your spouse with words because she or he, maybe intentionally, maybe unintentionally, insulted you? your sense of honor, and so you became a punisher. Maybe it was just, I'm not going to talk to him. I'm not going to talk to her. You're a punisher. Why are you doing that? The passion, bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, evil speaking, malice, And if you know your Bible, you know that that was not haphazard in those emotions, were they? They came right out of the pen of Paul in Ephesians chapter 4. And what does he say? That all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, outcry, that this injustice against me, and maybe it is an injustice. Evil speaking, vilification, slander, blasphemy against that person. What are you doing? I'm just trying to get even, that's all. I just wanted to get what's coming to them. And then malice, a desire for ill will. I just want something to happen. Paul says, let that passion go. Be kind one to another, tender hearted. Now you already know the next word, don't you? forgiving one another, even as God, for Christ's sake, hath forgiven you. Beloved, the spirit of vengeance and revenge is overcome with the power of the gospel. When you love and treasure and delight in the forgiveness you have in Christ freely, Those passions will melt away. No, I don't say they'll be gone forever. You'll have to deal with them tomorrow and the next day. But they'll melt your passions. Jesus is not giving a description of how to take the law and make it a job description for doing the right thing. He's drawing you to Himself. If the fulfillment of the law is Don't take revenge, or the law's prohibiting it, then that fulfillment is you're not going to do it because the passions now have an alternative for revenge, and it is Christ has taken God's vengeance on you and satisfied it fully. And that's the power of the Sermon on the Mount. That's the spirit of the law. And that's what we need to keep calling attention to. How can I stop punishing people? How can the parent stop punishing the child with some consequence just because he or she ruined his day? That's revenge. Beloved, the spirit of unforgiveness is the spirit of revenge. You're just hanging on. Well, if I can't get him any other way, I just won't forgive him. That is vengeful. And God calls on you to abandon it. right here, right now, with faith and repentance. And what is the alternative? The Christ, the Son of the living God, and His righteousness, and His presence invades your life, and you apply the gospel of His crucifixion to everyday events like insults and injustices, and personal injury, whether it's physical or verbal and everything in between. The Spirit Jesus is calling on here, the Spirit of the fulfillment of the law of righteousness, who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit, is the Spirit of forgiveness and reconciliation in place of bitterness and anger and wrath. Our world is living by that code, aren't they? Can you not see the bitterness that is being lashed out in personal retaliation? all over the place. It's reached an all-time high. So Jesus gives us the alternative, first by telling us, that the fulfillment of this law is found in Him, His perfect righteousness, and then walking in the Spirit in such a way we're having the power to overcome the passion that produces retaliation. It won't help me just to say stop doing it. Now that's a starting place. I need to stop. But there's something going on inside that I need help with. If that doesn't happen, I'm just a legalistic scribe and Pharisee. I'm doing everything I'm doing on the outside because the heart is far from God. But when the heart comes close to God again and again, the gospel and the power of God's righteousness fulfilled in Christ becomes the power of letting the bitterness go. The power of reconciliation. The power that Jesus is talking about through the entire sermon. The second thing Jesus points out here, in the illustrations that follow, is that the right application of the law means we need to be ready to surrender our rights. Now think about it, when are you most retaliatory? When are those passions really coming to the surface as a personal vendetta when someone infringes on your rights? Jesus today is going to call you to be ready to surrender your rights for the supremacy of His Lordship. That's a hard one, isn't it? That's what the four illustrations that follow are about. They regard legal issues, right? And as we look at it, we want to see what Jesus is saying and what He's not saying. It's very, very important. He says to resist evil the way He says to resist it, and the way He says doesn't. He says not to resist it, don't retaliate, but we can resist it, and that's very important. So let's start working our way through some of these illustrations. And we'll begin in verse 39 again. But I say unto you that ye resist not evil, but Whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him that offer the other also." Now, in a right-handed society, to smite the right cheek would require a blow with the back of the hand, right? This was a legal issue in the ancient world. To slap someone with the backhand across the face was a massive insult. The Mishnah, which is the first compilation of the oral tradition in the 3rd century, required a fine. if someone slapped another person on the cheek with the back of the hand. So Jesus is not saying, here carefully, that if someone is delivering crushing blows to the right side of the cheek, make sure you give him the left side, so that when you get to the emergency room, the doctor has to give you facial surgery on both cheeks. Not what he's saying. This was highly insulting. Highly insulting. And it was a legal issue. Matthew 26. The high priest stands up, rinses his garment, says, what need if we have further witnesses? He's committed blasphemy. So they have falsely accused Christ of blasphemy. Then they spit in his face, they buffeted him, and then they slapped him with the palm of their hands. Rapidso, it's the same Greek word that we find in our text. Now the one was designed for pain only, that's a buffet. When you buffet someone, you just strike them with a blow in the face, strictly pain. The other one was intended as a massive insult and a shaming mechanism against Christ to slap him with the hand on the right cheek. But Jesus didn't retaliate. That is, he did not personally retaliate with revenge, but he did retaliate in a way, or maybe I shouldn't use the word retaliate, he resisted in a way that we are to resist. John 18.23, they smote him in the false trial. And Jesus said, If you're bearing witness of the evil, I'm paraphrasing, then what's the evil that I have done? But if I've done well, why are you smiting me? What did Jesus do? He resisted evil. He pushed back on evil and rebuked them for their sin. But he didn't personally retaliate with his own personal vengeance. This is what Jesus is calling you to. How easy is it for us to return insult for insult, wound for wound, mockery for mockery, and then even in our passions to go beyond that and inflict greater pain. You see, justice is impartial. It's rational. It settles the issue. Vengeance is emotional. It's partial. It's cyclical. It's the Hatfield and the McCoys. It's just tit for tat. Have you experienced enough tit for tat in your marriage? Well, you did this and I'm going to do this. Well, she did this and I'm going to do this. Are you willing to bear the insults and even surrender your rights? Now this was a right in the ancient world for the sake of the Lordship of Christ. This is the high calling and the cost of discipleship that Jesus would turn to the crowds and say, if you're not ready for this, you cannot be my disciples. These are his demands and he supplies the grace to meet the demand. So he is telling them to be ready not to retaliate such an insult. 1 Peter chapter 2, servants be subject to your own masters with all fear, not only to the good and gentle, but also to the froward, the crooked. So we get our word scoliosis, the crooked. Why, Peter? For this is thankworthy, if a man for conscience toward God endure grief, suffering wrongfully. If a man with a consciousness of God, he's conscience of something about God, not that he's just out there, not that he exists, but he has an awareness of God, so he endures grief, suffering wrongfully. What is he aware of? He's first aware of the sovereign will of God, right? Peter says it's better if the will of God be so that you suffer for well-doing and not for being an evildoer. If you suffer for being a well-doer, the sovereign will of God has determined who will and who won't. To endure grief, suffering wrongfully, whether it's insults or something greater. Because Jesus says in Matthew 5, we'll be persecuted for righteousness sake. And such an insulting slap might have been that very issue, right? Because they're Christian. So to endure grief, suffering wrongfully, and doing well for it, I'm conscious that God is sovereign. That's the first starting place. Are you aware of that more than just a theological perspective that you get from the Bible when you read it? Or is it hitting the road in your life? When you're driving, does the sovereignty of God come to bear in your life? That's what Peter's talking about. These servants that had masters. He said, for what glory is it if you be buffeted for your faults and you take it patiently? But if when you do well and you suffer for it, doing well, that's the antecedent, when you do well and you suffer for that, and you take it patiently, this is acceptable with God. The second thing the servant's conscious of, the pleasure of God. God derives pleasure when you suffer wrongfully, doing well. His pleasure is not the suffering. It's not. Don't ever think, God's just getting pleasure out of my pain. No, it's the doing well in suffering that gives Him pleasure. Because that doing well is owing to your trust in Him. It shows His trustworthiness and His faithfulness, and that gives Him pleasure. That's the second thing the servant is conscious of. And the third thing, for even to hear are you called. He's conscience of his calling. And what does he call to do? What do you call to do? You've been called out of the darkness into marvelous light for this purpose. Not to show how good you are getting people back. Not to show how witty you are to return insult for insult. Friend, that's easy. That takes no grace. That just takes your sinful nature. We do it all the time. You've been called to show forth the excellencies of Him that called you out of that darkness into His marvelous light. When a servant was conscious of his calling, he could resist the temptation for retaliation against his master. Maybe he would do a bad job The man's gonna treat me like that. I'm gonna work as little as I can. I'm gonna get even. I'm gonna destroy his property. When I go in the fields, I'm gonna break some of the corn. I'm gonna do whatever I can to get him back. You're not conscious of your calling if you do that. You have no God awareness in the workplace, eight to five. You have absolutely no God awareness to what he's called you to. And it's not the job that he's called you to. You've been called to display. His virtue and His glories to a world that doesn't know anything about it, as you once didn't know. And then Jesus is put forth as the example. When He was reviled, what did He do? He reviled not again. He didn't retaliate. Now, what if He had? Would that have been wrong? In one sense, it would have been against the will of His Father. to trust him, but he's righteous. If he had retaliated for being slapped for doing nothing wrong, he's God. He would have been right. But he didn't. Here's your example. When he was threatened, he didn't threaten back. He didn't return the blows. He didn't return the words. He resisted evil. In a God-glorifying way, He rebuked the evil, but He didn't return the insult. When they shamed Him, and they scoffed rude at Him. For your benefit. What did He do? He committed it to Him that judges righteously. See, here's where trust comes in. God is not saying it's good to be insulted. God was not saying it's good to be slapped with the back of the hand across the right cheek. God is saying that's not right, and it wasn't right. He's saying, you've surrendered your rights to the Lordship of Christ. You have no rights except the right to obey the Master, Jesus Christ. And He gave you an example to follow. Committed to God, He judges righteously, and He will judge. all sinful slaps and insults against you that were not satisfied by Christ, they will be dealt with. Vengeance is mine, I will repay, saith the Lord. Let God repay, the perfect, holy God, who's right in all that He does, will surely right every insult against you. Do you think I'm exaggerating? the smallest infraction against you will be put down. And justice, divine justice, not just horizontal. You never really can get horizontal justice even when it's really true justice. Because you haven't brought the divine to bear on it. See? True justice is eternal. No court system can do that. No court system can ever give you true justice. But God will. And it'll last forever. It'll be perfect and right. And Jesus committed to God, and we follow that example, we're conscious of these things, we commit our case to God. Now again, I want to emphasize, He's not saying, be assaulted, be harmed, and bear it. You can defend yourself to the honor of God, without personal revenge. You can defend the innocent, that honors God for the good and love of others. That's not about you or personal revenge. The horrors that we see today in our society of a man walking down the street and punches a woman in the face. No, friends, if you're a man and you're there, you do something. No, not personal revenge. You call the police. If she's being harmed, you subdue the man. You resist the evil. See, Jesus is not saying, that's not love, to watch a woman being pummeled. You're not loving the person. So that's not what Jesus is saying. How are we to resist evil? We're to resist evil by the government, aren't we? Romans chapter 13. For the rulers are not a terror to good works, but to evil. That's not true anymore, is it? The whole aim of government, according to God in Romans 13, is to be a deterrent of evil. They should be very afraid. They should dread what the government might do to them if they perpetrate evil. Nobody's afraid. Nobody's scared anymore. The government was not designed to reform criminals. It's just not, Romans 13. He doesn't bear the sword in vain. The sword is not an instrument of reformation. It's an instrument of execution. Now, even the Old Testament, be careful, allowed for punishment based on the intent. That was an accidental murder. Well, you don't take the man's life. This is what you do. As our legal system is based on that. But the purpose of the government is a minister of God to execute wrath. And when the people no longer fear the wrath of God's minister, what happens? You got men beating women up in public, just walking away. Well, they're not afraid. You got people going and destroying public property, protesting. You got a sheriff that I just read who walks into a dangerous situation because he's supposed to, and they pummel the man. They put him down. He has to leave. Why? They're not afraid. God says, be very afraid. We are to resist evil in the government. Now, parents, you're to resist evil in your home, right? There's capital punishment by the government, but there's corporal punishment in the home. Your little tyke is totally depraved. I'm sorry to tell you that. When I look at your children, I have to go back to the Bible to tell myself that, because I don't think they are sometimes. I mean, I love all the children here. My own daughter's concerned I might not be the right grandfather because how much I love these children. I am, honey. I'm going to be a good granddad, I hope. But there's evil there. And the Bible tells you that no matter how the smile, how beautiful, and they are, they're wonderful. I know I'm not with them at your home, but they're wonderful to me. But total depravity is evil. And God's given you the instrument to push back on evil. And it's called the rod of correction. Oh, parents, use it the right way. Don't try to think the psychology and psychobabble of the world is wiser than God. Why would we do that? But the world's convinced us. I mean, you read the books of people, what they want to do to a person that spanks their child. Now, don't do it in public, by all means. Don't go out there and flaunt it, but you're a servant of Christ. Foolishness is bound in the heart of the child, but the rod of correction shall drive it far from him. Foolishness, there's no way to discern or make good judgment. They're just basing their life on the impulse. Whatever they think, whatever comes out of the heart, that's what they do. Now, how does that work for retaliation? Oh, you better believe that little boy is going to get retaliation. He's going to get even with sister. And she's going to get even with him. Now, what happens if you don't use the rod? Now the child grows up and gets into a marriage where that's all he does is retaliate. Now it's a little different than he did when he was two years old, but he still does it because you didn't push back. No, you're not saving the child. There's just no discernment. It's just impulse, impulse, impulse. Your job is to push back with the rod of correction. And God says it'll drive it out of him. So we resist evil. And why do we see so many young people that are not afraid in our society, that get revenge on a regular basis with their employers, in their marriages, in their friendships, in all relationships? It's personal vendetta. Why? Perhaps parents stopped resisting evil in the home, right? What about in the church? Now, this little caveat is I'm trying to be clear that there's a place to resist evil and what Jesus says about how we're not to resist it. We resist it in the church. Galatians chapter 2. When Peter was come to Antioch, I withstood him to the face. That's the same Greek word. I resisted Peter because he was to be blamed. We're to resist one another in that way. Peter was playing the hypocrite. When certain Jews came around with James, he ate with them and not with the Gentiles. How did Paul resist him? With the gospel and the truth of the gospel. See? Paul wasn't personally retaliating with Peter. He didn't let his wrath say, what are you doing? He brought the gospel back to Peter and he resisted Peter. We're to resist the devil, Ephesians 6, James 4, 1 Peter 5. Whom resist steadfast in the faith. How do you resist the devil? In the faith, with the whole armor of God, by drawing near to God, and the devil will flee from you. We resist the devil. We resist with church discipline, don't we? 1 Corinthians chapter 5. There is fornication in the church that is not so much as commonly reported among the pagans or the Gentiles. Paul says, you're puffed up. You have not mourned so that this person might be taken away from among you. Now, there's a plug for church membership, isn't it? How do you take away a person that's not part of the community, right? They were to remove him from church membership. And in so doing, they were resisting what Paul says is the wicked person. Resisting. We are to resist in the way the Bible tells us to resist. But Jesus makes clear there are ways we are not to resist, namely, the way that the scribes and Pharisees were in personal retaliation. Let me read this quote from Arthur Pink that just really speaks to this issue. This is back in 1974, his commentary on the same subject, he says this, "...magistrates and judges were never ordained by God for the purpose of reforming reprobates or pampering degenerates, but to be His instruments for preserving law and order by being a terror to evil. As Romans 13 says, they are to be a revenger to execute wrath on him that doeth evil. Conscience has become comatose. The requirements of justice are stifled. Maudlin concepts now prevail. As eternal punishment was repudiated, either tacitly or in many cases openly, ecclesiastical punishments are shelved. Churches refuse to enforce sanctions and wink at flagrant offenses. The inevitable outcome has been the breakdown of discipline in the home and the creation of public opinion, which is mawkish and spineless. School teachers are intimidated by foolish parents and children, so the rising generation are more and more allowed to have their own way without fear of consequences. And if some judge has the courage of his convictions and sentences a brute for maiming an old woman, there is an outcry against the judge. I wonder what Pink would say today. Notice how he connects church discipline, parental discipline, and the role of government. When they decline together, evil rises. And that's what you see in our culture, beloved. So yes, resist the evil. Government, parents, church. But don't retaliate. And that's what Jesus is saying in these principles. So give him the other cheek. Secondly, give him your cloak also. Now you see this in the next verse, in verse 40. And if a man will sue thee at the law and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also. Now, to sue a man over a suit of clothing would be a very trivial thing. In one way, Jesus might be saying, avoid a small claims court. What are you doing there? Are you trying to get your five dollars back? When we have the spirit of vengeance, it'll express itself in our rights. Now, the coat was a right in the Old Testament law, in the book of Exodus. If a creditor loaned to his brother, He wasn't to go in the house to get the pledge of the collateral. The man had to bring the collateral out to him. For the poor, it was their coat, the outer garment. It was so important as a right to the Old Testament poor that at sundown, the creditor had to bring back the coat because it was not only his clothing, it was his bedding. That's all he had. Presumably the next day he would bring it back out to the creditor until he met the demands of the loan. What's Jesus saying? You know that coat you have a right to? Give him your inner garment also. Now once again, Jesus is not talking about being sued for an estate or a business. Sometimes as Christians, we are compelled to go into the courtroom. And Jesus is not forbidding that. James said in James 2.6, do not the rich men oppress you and draw you before the judgment seat. The poor were being drawn in and compelled and they had to go. because of the corrupt rich people. Sometimes the Christian has to go, and if it's for a lawsuit over your entire state, or business, or something along those lines, Jesus is not forbidding it. What is He talking about? A coat, a right. Are you willing to surrender a right for the supremacy of Jesus Christ? See, really at issue here is our rights. We put a man on a pedestal as heroic when he stands for his rights. Boy, you told him. You gave it to him. Good for you. I don't think Jesus is cheering. Do you? Now, remember, He's not condemning a courtroom. He established them in the Old Testament. He's condemning a spirit of self-righteousness that would take a man to court over something trivial because he's trying to get back at him. We, on the other hand, Jesus says, we are to be ready to surrender our rights. You could say the right of property. That's a good right. 1 Corinthians chapter 6, there is utterly a fault among you. Because believers taking believer into a courtroom. Not in any valid way. How terrible for believers to be in the courtroom together, suing each other before unbelieving judges. Paul said, why would you not rather be defrauded? Why not take the loss? Take it! Apparently it was trivial. Take the lump! The answer to that question is in 1 Corinthians chapter 3. Are you not yet carnal? Whereas there is envy, strife, divisions among you. You are carnal and walk as men. Envy, that spirit that produces retaliation. Strife. That was the problem. And so they were taking each other to law and retaliating in the church. What a terrible witness! Jesus says, be ready to surrender not only the right of your coat, but your inner cloak also. Now, He's not saying, should we walk around almost naked? No. There's a spirit that Jesus is touching on here. It's surrendering to His Lordship. Because Paul would say, you're bought with a price, therefore glorify God in your body and your spirit, which belongs to God. Rights can be a good thing. But when rights are exalted to the place of ruling the heart, That self-interest produces revenge and retaliation, which is what you see in our society. That's why it's growing. There's nothing pushing it back. But for the Christian, the gospel is not a pushback, it's a delight. When it is applied again and again, it helps us overcome that spirit of retaliation. James chapter 5, the rich men are condemned. The cries of those that you're hiring and reaping down the fields, your fields, are coming to the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth. What are they doing? They're keeping back by fraud. You're not paying them a full wage. You're condemning and killing the just, and the just doth not resist you. We know that James takes a lot of the teaching of the Lord Jesus Christ in the Sermon on the Mount, and he begins to apply it. So he takes that text. The justified, the ones that have the righteousness of Christ, are not resisting you rich men. James did not say if there's a formal way to lodge a grievance, don't ever do it. That's not what he's saying. What's he saying? They weren't retaliating. They weren't destroying the fields when they went out to reap them because their wages were Fraudulent. It's corrupt. So Jesus is not saying if there's a way and a means to take care of this corruption because that's not good for society and that doesn't honor God by all means. He's saying don't retaliate. Don't steal because he's got what's coming to him. Oh, the rich have enough money. I'm going to steal it because the man's not giving me my due. Don't do that. What do you do, James? Be patient, brethren, for the coming of the Lord. The husbandman waited for the precious fruit. He waits long until he receives the early and the latter rain. Be patient like that. Establish your hearts. Be grounded, settled, rooted. For the Lord is coming near. And what's He going to do to the rich men? What's He going to do to every rich man that doesn't know Christ and has held back your wages? Vengeance is mine. I will repay. See, let that guide you. Let that settle your passions. Jesus, my Lord, said He would take care of it, and He will. And He wants us to so apply that that it keeps us from retaliation and puts us back into the fields, working with integrity and virtue. Unless you can get another field to work in with a different master, then go for it. Jesus condemning retaliation. Not the use of the court system. He established that in the Old Testament. The powers that be ordained of God. Next we see. Whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain. Now here we have government overreach. Commandeering. This was not a popular thing. To commandeer means you could enlist a person. To do a task against His will. Personal freedom lost. What do you do? Jesus says, I've got a suggestion. Give him another mile. A Roman soldier can commandeer a Jew. Boy, that wasn't a good mix. To be a porter or a guide in certain regions for a certain distance. A Roman mile. That means, whatever he tells you to carry, guess what? You're going to carry it. His gear. That's not freedom! That's overreach! Imagine the spirit of that Jew carrying that. It doesn't matter what you're doing. You may be late for work. You may be on your lunch break. If you're commandeered, you stop and you go the mile. The word compel means press into it. Simon the Cyrenian was commandeered to carry Jesus' cross, the same word compel. He was compelled by a Roman soldier. I don't know if he wanted to do it or not, but likely. What Jew wanted to carry the cross of Jesus Christ after they'd just been complicit in his crucifixion? He did it. Jesus says, now at the end of the first mile, be ready to go a second. Beloved, that's not our nature, is it? That is not our nature. Beware of exalting our cherished freedoms. I'm not using irony here. I really mean cherished. I absolutely mean cherished liberty. Be careful of exalting it above the supremacy of your Lord Jesus Christ, who says, go another mile. I want to ask you, what has to happen at the end of the first mile to make you willing to do the second mile when you weren't willing to do the first mile? Think about that. Boy, you're angry, you're bitter, you're thinking about how you can retaliate to that soldier. When you get to the end of the mile, you just drop it. Maybe you say a few words. All of a sudden, now you're going to get willing for the second mile? There's no switch, is there? See, Jesus doesn't want you to be retaliatory for the first mile, nor the second. Which means something has to happen at the level of the heart when we're compelled, and we would rather not do it. And this is overreach, and you just took away my freedom. I'm not free to leave? I mean, they could not do it right, but with the Romans, I don't know what would have happened to them. But they could refuse, and I'm sure some did. They hated the Romans. It is not Jesus saying, in part, your only freedom is to do what your Lord commands you. Right? God is a gracious master. And so, imagine the Roman soldier that when he expects to bend down and pick up his gear, you say, could I take it another mile for you, sir? Well, you're not required. Your freedom is restored. No, no, no. You don't understand, I was free for the first mile. Right? Were you free for the first mile? Or were you in bondage to the corruption of your own nature? with revenge, and passion, and bitterness, and hatred. You're not going to tell me what to do. Or were you free? That's really what's at stake. And he says, oh, okay. You can take it. Matthew 5, 16. The good work of an extra mile was shining brightly to the glory of your Father. See, good deeds. Let your light so shine that others may see your good works. What is that? It's taking the gear another mile. And now, you had two miles to talk about Jesus instead of one. But wait a minute, if you're not free, you never talked about in the first mile. All you could talk about is your hatred, your complaining, and your loss of freedom and government overreach. Let me be on record. Bad! In every avenue, legally and rightfully, that we can preserve freedom, friends, do it. But that's not what Jesus is talking about. He's talking about your heart. When freedom is a ruling desire and rules you, What comes out of that heart is not a willingness to be commandeered, not a willingness for the sake of Jesus, for the sake of the gospel. It's preserving my rights at all costs. Do we not see that in our culture? Of course, our society makes any impulse a right now. Just because I feel it and want it, it's my right. And what happens when you don't give them their right, Christian? See, that reveals a heart that has no freedom but is in the bondage of corruption and in the darkness and chains of darkness of total depravity. But a free man, a free person, who's struggling against those passions, can be willing the first mile and the second mile because the Lord Jesus Christ is over both miles. Both miles. Isn't that wonderful? Your Lord calls you. You say, but Brother Mike, don't you understand how ignorant foolish men are sometimes? Peter does. And so Peter says, in well-doing put to silence the ignorance of foolish men. As free men, not using your freedom as a cloak of maliciousness, but servants of the Christ, submit to what they say. Well, that jars me. You know, they say you get hit by a ton of bricks, like... That's not what I wanted to do. Right? Give Him another mile. Give it to Him. Be a witness for Christ. Show Him your freedom. Show Him the reason you were carrying the gear in the first place is because of the supremacy of Christ, and you're free! And the world tells them how they're not free, by the power that comes out of their heart. And then lastly, and briefly, verse 42, "...give to him that asketh thee, and from him that would borrow of thee, turn thou not away." Now again, if we look at this antithetical, Jesus is contrasting ideas. The counterpart to the spirit of retaliation is being a giver. So this is not a blanket take-out-of-context when anybody makes a ridiculous request, or a drug addict or an alcoholic keeps coming back to you for money. That's not love! You haven't loved the man if you further his career on the pathway of destruction. That's not love. Love is your guide. A good man showeth favor, and he lendeth. He guides his affairs with discretion, judgment. But there are two extremes here. The first extreme we've unpacked. Just, you know, give them whatever they ask for. The second stream is a congressional hearing. So where'd you come up with that? Because I've done that before. I hate to say it. You know, after the 100th question. Here's the 50 cents. Give it to him! There's a balance here. Gotta pull it to the center. There's discretion, but Jesus is not after a tight-fisted person. And this is not even instruction to the local community, is it? It's to you as an individual outside of the church. Give to him that asketh of thee, and he that would borrow, and he has a genuine need, give it to him, provided you have the means and you're in the condition to provide it. Don't go take a loan out to help someone. Either they've asked for too much or you've gotten yourself in a situation that you can't help anybody because you've gone into debt that you can't handle. One of the two issues, right? The spirit of the law. You don't even have right to your own money. You get that right. Your money is not yours. Now, on one level it is. You have the right to use it. You have the right to keep it. You have earned it. It's yours man to man. But this way, you don't have a right to one cent you own. It's God's. And if you're a Christian, it belongs to God. What are you doing with it? Are you a hoarder? Are you self-interested? Are you using it for self? What happens when someone takes your right away or challenges your earnings? Rather than deal with it in a sober way, you're going to be retaliatory. You're going to get them back. And so what do we learn today from Jesus? We learn The law did prescribe punishment that met the crime. It was prohibitive. It was public, not private. But they were using it as an occasion for revenge. So Jesus is countering that and says, do not resist the evil. There's a place to resist it in government, church, and home, in one another. But the way we don't is with personal retaliation. And then we have these illustrations of ways we should be willing, willing to surrender. whatever right, and know that the Lord will make everything right when He returns. Let's pray. Father, thank you for your