What Is The Meaning Of Righteousness?
Jesus’ teaching makes it clear that sin, just like righteousness, if first of all an internal thing.
God’s evaluation of us takes place in the heart. God judges the source and origin of sin.
Proverbs 23:7 For as he thinks within himself, so is he
In Matthew 5:21-26 Jesus gives an example or illustration of heart righteousness, teaching that murder is not simply a manner of outward manifestation. In fact the sin of murder occurs in the heart even if the outward act is never accomplished.
Beginning in verse 27, Jesus gives another illustration of inward, heart righteousness. It has to do with adultery and sexual sin in general.
Matthew 5:27-32
“You have heard that it was said, ‘YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT ADULTERY’; 28but I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart. 29“If your right eye makes you stumble, tear it out and throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. 30“If your right hand makes you stumble, cut it off and throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to go into hell. 31“It was said, ‘WHOEVER SENDS HIS WIFE AWAY, LET HIM GIVE HER A CERTIFICATE OF DIVORCE’; 32but I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except for the reason of unchastity, makes her commit adultery; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.
The Bible Condemns Sexual Immorality
Adultery is having sexual relations to someone other than one’s marriage partner
Leviticus 20:10
‘If there is a man who commits adultery with another man’s wife, one who commits adultery with his friend’s wife, the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death.
Deuteronomy 22:22
If a man is found lying with a married woman, then both of them shall die, the man who lay with the woman, and the woman; thus you shall purge the evil from Israel.
1 Corinthians 6:9-13
Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, 10nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, will inherit the kingdom of God. 11Such were some of you; but you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God.
12All things are lawful for me, but not all things are profitable. All things are lawful for me, but I will not be mastered by anything. 13Food is for the stomach and the stomach is for food, but God will do away with both of them. Yet the body is not for immorality, but for the Lord, and the Lord is for the body.
Galatians 5:19
Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are: immorality, impurity, sensuality,
Vs 21 and things like these, of which I forewarn you, just as I have forewarned you, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God
Revelation 21:5-8
And He who sits on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.” And He said*, “Write, for these words are faithful and true.” 6Then He said to me, “It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give to the one who thirsts from the spring of the water of life without cost. 7“He who overcomes will inherit these things, and I will be his God and he will be My son. 8“But for the cowardly and unbelieving and abominable and murderers and immoral persons and sorcerers and idolaters and all liars, their part will be in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death.”
God’s Evaluates Sexual Purity From The Heart
Jesus teaches the true meaning of righteousness when it comes to sexual purity with an emphatic statement in verse 28
28but I say to you that everyone…
Once again we need to understand that Jesus is not making a statement in contrast to God’s Law but rather he is making an emphatic statement in contrast and refutation of what was taught by the Pharisees.
He is saying, “This is what the Law of God means. Here is God’s measure of whether you violate this commandment or not.”
Vs. 28
but I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.
The clear point here is that when God measures sexual purity – he looks internally at the thoughts and intents of the heart.
Attitude is everything.
We all know that we live in a day when there is unbridled indulgence in sexual passion. It is the unending theme of the entertainment industry. Marriage, sexual fidelity and moral purity are scorned and laughed at. We are preoccupied with sex.
There is nothing more telling about our culture’s attitude about sex than what happened in Texas February 3.
(ILL) Texas became the first state in U.S. to make it mandatory for teenage girls to be vaccinated for a virus that is known to cause cancer. The controversy stems from the fact that that particular virus is spread only through sexual intercourse. The assumption behind the bill is that young teens will be sexually active outside of marriage. In other words it is simply a biological function
Sexual hedonism is not new to modern times. It was common in New Testament times as well. For many cultures during New Testament times, sex was simply a biological act, along the same lines as eating and sleeping and was not thought of in terms of moral and immoral.
Much of the culture then as now lived in clear and unconcerned violation of the seventh commandment. “You shall not commit adultery.”
But even the Pharisees who prided themselves in external compliance were guilty of breaking the true “heart” , internal intent of the Law.
Look at what Jesus is saying, “everyone who looks on a woman to lust for her”.
“Looks” means to have on going continuous process of looking
“to lust for” means the goal or action that follows the action of looking.
Jesus is speaking of looking with the purpose of lusting
He is speaking of the man who looks at a woman so that he may satisfy his evil desire.
The idea of looking with the expectation and desire of being sexually and sinfully gratified.
John MacArthur makes this significant clarification. “It is not lustful looking that causes the sin in the heart but the sin in the heart that causes lustful looking. The lustful looking is but the expression of a heart that is already immoral and adulterous. The heart is the soil where the seeds of sin are imbedded and begin to grow.”
Although Jesus refers here to a man, its important to point out that women are just as susceptible to lustful looking. AND significantly, women can be guilty of inciting men to lust.
Arthur Pink
“If lustful looking is so grievous a sin, then those who dress and expose themselves with the desire to be looked at and lusted after…are not less but perhaps more guilty. In this matter it is not only too often the case that men sin but women tempt them to do so. How great then must be the guilt of the great majority of modern misses who deliberately seek to arouse the sexual passions of young men. And how much greater still is the guilt of most of their mothers for allowing them to become lascivious temptresses.”
Deal Directly With Sin
Stop Feeding Your Lust
On the surface this seems to contradict what Jesus has been teaching. He has been teaching that outward compliance to the law is meaningless if the heart is not compliant. This seems to be saying that the way to produce righteousness is to enforce outward compliance.
He is teaching that sin needs to be dealt with. Most certainly we should not give ourselves over to it but rather to eliminate anything that morally or spiritually traps us and causes us to fall into sin or stay in sin. Rather we should eliminate them.
Jesus said, “right eye.. and right hand”. These represent a persons best and most precious faculties.
Be willing to give up whatever is necessary, even the most cherished things we possess, if doing so will help protect us from evil.
“Nothing is so valuable as to be worth preserving at the expense of righteousness.” J MacArthur
Jesus has set forth the impossible standards of His kingdom righteousness. All people are murderers and adulterers.
Jesus makes it clear that no one could deliver themselves from the propensity of sin.
He wants men to despair of their own righteousness and seek His.
Romans 10:1-13
Brethren, my heart’s desire and my prayer to God for them is for their salvation. 2For I testify about them that they have a zeal for God, but not in accordance with knowledge. 3For not knowing about God’s righteousness and seeking to establish their own, they did not subject themselves to the righteousness of God. 4For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes. 5For Moses writes that the man who practices the righteousness which is based on law shall live by that righteousness. 6But the righteousness based on faith speaks as follows: “DO NOT SAY IN YOUR HEART, ‘WHO WILL ASCEND INTO HEAVEN?’ (that is, to bring Christ down), 7or ‘WHO WILL DESCEND INTO THE ABYSS?’ (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead).” 8But what does it say? “THE WORD IS NEAR YOU, in your mouth and in your heart”—that is, the word of faith which we are preaching, 9that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; 10for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation. 11For the Scripture says, “WHOEVER BELIEVES IN HIM WILL NOT BE DISAPPOINTED.” 12For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is Lord of all, abounding in riches for all who call on Him; 13for “WHOEVER WILL CALL ON THE NAME OF THE LORD WILL BE SAVED.”
