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so nice to have you back again today as
we continue our chronological study
through the new testament and today our
study brings us back to matthew chapter
five where right the beginnings of the
sermon on the mount looking today to
start in matthew chapter five
and verse number 17. so if you've got
your bible why don't you follow along
write with me
jesus has already uh told those
followers who climbed up the mountain
near the sea of galilee that they were
blessed because they were characterized
by
various things the pure and hard and
merciful and gentle and so on and so
forth it showed that they had truly
repented of their sins and that christ
had come to live in them by the holy
spirit and the transformation process
had started of course uh this is a
two-way street uh
salvation certainly god is the initiator
of salvation god is
the the granter of salvation god is the
one who does all the work in salvation
but he doesn't do it apart from our
cooperation okay and yes we give god all
the praise and honor and glory and
credit for all the wonderful things he
has done and is doing but still it's
very clear we have to cooperate and that
became very clear as we read previously
in the in the verses right before this
where jesus said you're the salt of the
earth but you better remain salty
obviously that's a commandment it
depends upon us whether or not we remain
salty that is if we stay among the
blessed because we continue to be
characterized by those very things that
jesus said makes us blessed and he said
you are the light of the world so let
your light shine we have that choice
it's a commandment it therefore reflects
the fact that
we can either let our light shine or not
let our light shine we can be salty or
we can remain salty or we can abandon
saltiness okay so that's so important
and now we come to uh what i would
consider a very pivotal
section of the sermon on the mount
matthew chapter 5 verses 17 through 20.
just four verses but these
begin to introduce
uh the bulk of the themes that are going
to surface again and again and again
through this sermon so let's not take
this lightly let's not rush our way
through this let's go slowly and take it
piece by piece to see what christ is
saying
very important verse number 17 of
matthew chapter 5 jesus said do not
think that i came to abolish the law
or the prophets i did not come to
abolish but to full fill okay now why he
said that i don't know i assume that he
had good reason to say it because
perhaps some in his audience were
tempted to think that he was in fact
coming to abolish the law which would be
you know the first
five books of the bible um
you know genesis exodus leviticus
numbers and deuteronomy and then the
prophets which of course we have the
major and the minor prophets and so
forth so basically encompasses uh just
about all of the old testament maybe you
could leave out
some of the poetic books and and so
forth the psalms are prophetic all right
so they'd be thrown in there maybe some
of the history books wouldn't be
considered but the bulk of the old
testament christ saying don't think that
i've come to
abolish all that well stop and think
about it for a second of course he's not
going to abolish that he's the inspirer
of the law the problem he's the giver of
the law
jesus is the
inspirer of the prophets
and so god's not in the business of like
changing his mind he's not a fruitcake
he's not like one day this or another
day that he's always the same when
you're perfect you never change okay and
so morality ethics it's all it's all the
same because god is consistent he's the
same so don't think i came to abolish he
said no i didn't come to abolish quite
the contrary
uh i'm not abolishing i'm fulfilling
the law and the prophets now what is
wrapped up
in the original greek word that has been
translated in the bible version that i'm
reading the new american standard what
was wrapped up the connotations in that
word fulfill that's a matter of opinion
and we'll leave that to the greek
scholars okay but we all know probably
that not just one word
is the perfect translation of whatever
that greek word was fulfill but we know
this much from the context it it means
something like the opposite of to
abolish and when you think of the
opposite of abolish what do you think
well you think doesn't abolish he
establishes
something you don't do away with it you
prop it up you build it up and and so
the the word that the new american
standard has used here to fulfill the
law and the prophets you know that that
english word comes from to root in other
english words to
fill and full it means to
fill to the full when you fulfill
something that means there's something
lacking that's been waiting to be added
right here's a here's a
little mug i have and it's half full
right now so if i say i'm going to fill
this to the full well i'm just going to
pour some more add to it and that's in
essence what christ was saying well
there's a lot of revelation there in the
uh old testament through the law and the
prophets god revealed quite a bit of his
will for us but he didn't reveal
everything he intended to reveal right
obviously who did he reveal it through
he revealed it through jesus christ he
revealed even more later on through the
holy spirit who inspired the writers of
the new testament epistles okay so jesus
saying we're not doing away with that no
no no we're gonna build on that we're
gonna even add to it
all right and that's why christians have
a bible that consists of an old and a
new testament we don't just have the new
testament because christ didn't abolish
the old now we always need to interpret
the
old covenant through
the lens of the nuke new covenant
because the new covenant is the most
recent revelation it's it's building
it's filling up what was incomplete
before so
sometimes christians make mistakes by
just looking at the old testament and
not not interpreting it not looking at
it through the lens of the new testament
that's so important the new testament of
course is the most important
right but we're not tossing out the old
testament the new testament builds
upon the old testament all right so
let's keep that in mind uh the old
testament is very very relevant but
it's not standing by its own any longer
it's been fulfilled by the lord jesus
christ all right
see you next time
you