We live in a culture today that is obsessed with sex and sensuality. From tv ads, magazines at grocery store checkouts, perfume ads, images of women in their undergarments in store windows, to the songs on the radio that glamorize infidelity—how is it possible to live a life of purity in such a society? Jesus in Matthew 5:28 is making it clear that he is addressing more than just adultery but all sexual immortality because He is bringing it to the root of where all sin begins: in the ... continue reading...
EP 113: The Sin of Anger (Matthew 5:21-26 – Sermon on the Mount Series)
We have been working through the true character of a Christian in our time in the Sermon on the Mount series. When a man is truly poor in spirit, recognizing his bankruptcy before God, meek, pure, desiring righteousness and a peacemaker—he will be salt and light for Jesus to a lost world around him. Now, as we turn to this next section of the Sermon, we begin to see that the teaching of the scribes and Pharisees to avoid murder meant they were keeping the sixth commandment; but Jesus lays ... continue reading...
EP 112: Jesus, the Law and the Christian (Matthew 5:17-20 – Sermon on the Mount Series)
Jesus did not come to do away with the Law—He came to fulfill it. As we continue on in our series on the Sermon on the Mount we will see how Christ fulfills the scriptures and what place the law has in our lives as His followers. Through the law comes knowledge of sin (Romans 3:20), and the law is a plumbline that shows us how far we fall from God's righteous laws. We don't need straightening, but we need to be reconstructed, made new. The law shuts our mouths and shows us all to be ... continue reading...
EP 108: You are the Light of the World (Matthew 5:14-16 – Sermon on the Mount Series)
When Christians begin living like Christians, it affects the world around them. We are light to a dark world. Jesus is the light of the world (John 8:12), and He is a great light that has come to those dwelling in darkness (Matthew 4:16). Because of Christ's work in those of us who are in Christ, we are now light, and we're to live as children of light. We are to have nothing to do with darkness because we've been delivered from its domain (Colossians 1:12-13). Today we find ourselves in ... continue reading...
EP 106: The Salt of the Earth (Sermon on the Mount Series – Matthew 5:13)
In this next episode of the Sermon on the Mount, we start with two common pictures we're all familiar with from everyday life. No matter your location in the world—you know what salt and light are. We are to be salt, and we are to be light or better to state as the scripture states - we ARE salt, and we ARE light. We're going to take these one at a time, so today, we're just working through Matthew 5:13: "You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its ... continue reading...