Series: The Sermon on the Mount
August 15, 2021 - Mark Buckley
Well, good morning, Living Streams. It’s a blessing and a privilege for me to be with you today. David and the guys are at the men's retreat. And if you sent somebody to the men's retreat, make sure you ask them, “What did the Lord do in your life?” Because some significant things are happening up there with the guys.
Speaking of significant, Friday night I was trying to go to sleep and there was like rumbles and rumbles and rumbles. And I went out and opened our front door and there was lightning flashes one after another after the other. And I'm like, “I've never seen this before.” I mean, it went on for over an hour. That's not like Phoenix, Arizona. And it reminded me that the Lord can still surprise us. He can still do things that we never experienced before. I actually had a couple of those things this week. If I get to one of the other ones as well.
But this message is going to be about judgment, passing judgment. And a significant number of reasons. Because if we get our relationships right, if we know how to love one another, if we know how to relate in a healthy way, then we have the potential to have a rich and full life, a flourishing church, and to demonstrate to people that Jesus is alive. If we don't get them right, then all kinds of dysfunction happens in our church, in our family, in our personal life.
So this message is not out of context. It is in the context of the whole Sermon on the Mount, which is one of my favorite passages. We named our first son Matthew because I loved the Sermon on the Mount. It shows me that Matthew the Apostle was really close to Jesus, and there's something precious about it. The context of the Sermon on the Mount is about, it starts with “Blessed are the pure in heart, blessed are the meek.They will inherit the earth, the pure in heart will see God. It goes on to talking about responding to persecution and being blessed by God, being salt and light in the world, not being angry at your brother and incurring judgment on yourself, being able to give, being able to forgive, being able to pray in secret and fast In secret, and seek first the kingdom of God.
And then when we get to Matthew 7:1, he says, “Do not judge or you too will be judged.” And in the context, it’s "Don't try and categorize everybody else and how they're doing with the Lord,” okay? “Do not go there because you're going to get it wrong. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged. And with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.”
Let's pray:
Father, God help me to get this right and to speak in a way that your Holy Spirit can illuminate to the church what you want us to know. Let the truth set us free. In Jesus’ name.
So, you know, we're in a time in our American history that has been very divided. We got Democrats and Republicans judging each other, sometimes people within their own parties judging each other. We've got people judging the CDC and the medical community and vaccers and anti-vaccers. And everybody knows what they believe. And you know that you're right in the middle. There's the extremes on all sides. But you're right in the middle, right? You know the truth. If only they would listen to people like you and me, we could solve everything.
I was preparing this message a few weeks ago, after David asked me to give it, and I was doing a video presentation for another church. I spotted a guy on it and I said, “Hey, can we take your picture?” And some of you are going to recognize this picture. I asked him a question. And first of all, the man in the picture, you can see certain things about this guy just from this picture. If you could see his dreds, you'd know they'd go below his waist.
And when guys are like that, you know they've got a history, right? And I said, “Well, how many times have you smoked weed? How many times have you used psychedelic drugs? What have you done with with taking care of your brain or whatever? How many times?”
And he gave me an answer. And it might surprise you. There's a zero there. Because, usually guys that are dressed like Bob Marley have got a certain lifestyle, a certain approach to drugs, to women.
And I knew this guy had traveled around the country, traveled around the world, been in many different nations. And I said, “Well, if it isn't drugs, maybe it's women. How many different women have you been intimately involved with throughout the course of your entire life?”
And he gave me a number. And the number is one — his wife, Colleen, who's on our worship team. Because this guy is a man of God. He doesn't dress like a typical man of God. He doesn't act like a typical pastor. But in some ways, he's more brilliant than most pastors you’re ever going to meet ,or more people you're ever going to meet. Because he's lived a dedicated life to Jesus Christ almost his entire life. And the pure in heart see God and to know God and communicate his grace in very special ways.
But he told me a story that I wanted to relate to you. Alec Seekins did. He was on a youth group trip and he was an overseer and they were in Guatemala about to fly back to the United States. And so he had gathered the youth as best he could. And then he spotted somebody across the terminal that looked sort of nefarious, looked sort of dangerous, and he wanted to to really guard the kids.
So as soon as he got the kids settled down, he walks through the terminal, gets to the far side and spots the guy. And actually, he was looking in a full length mirror. He had seen his own image across the terminal and he knew the guy was dangerous.
I thought that was such a great story.
When I was pastoring in California, we had a young church. Most of the people were getting saved in the church. We had young families, not a lot of money, but the people were having a lot of babies. We decided to start a Christian school. And in those days, most of our people, their lives revolved around the church. They went to Sunday morning, many of them Sunday night. We had Bible studies. During the week, we had prayer meetings. We had evangelistic outreaches.
This guy made an appointment to see me. And he wasn't the kind of guy that would show up at all the meetings. He came on Sunday. He had a wife and kids. He managed a bike store, and I didn't know what he wanted to talk about. So I said, “Jeff, what's up, man? What do you want to talk about?”
And he goes, “I want to talk about the Christian school that we're going to start.” And he said, “I know you're having trouble funding it.”
I said, “Well, that's going to be a challenge.”
And he said, “Well, I've got an idea. How about if we have everybody double their tithe?”
I looked at him and I was sort of shocked, because I didn't think he was that committed, because I was judging our people on the basis of how many meetings are you showing up at. And this guy, who was taking care of his family, managing the bike store, barely making it financially, already giving 10 percent of his income to the church, was proposing that his family and everybody else start giving 20 percent.
And for just a moment, I was tempted. Then I said, “Nope, we're not doing that, Jeff, but I really appreciate your commitment. I really appreciate your heart.”
It was one of many illustrations that I've had over the years that I cannot judge people's, you know, their spirituality, their commitment, their love for Jesus on the basis of what meetings they attend, on the basis of what their haircut looks like, on the basis of whether or not they've got whatever hanging from their body or etched into themselves. And neither can you, most likely. So Jesus said don't do it. Don't go there.
Verse 3,
“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.”
Now, one of the things I love about Jesus is that he rewards us by giving us insight, by giving us wisdom, by giving us understanding so that we can help people, so that we can make a difference. And sometimes our temptation is to be hunting for the problems in people's lives to our own detriment. It's easy to spot a problem sometimes. It's really hard to find the solution for that problem.
One of the premises I want to live by is to look for the treasure and not for the flaw. I wrote a little newsletter this week that some of you received, Reflections. And I told a story:
It was our forty-eighth wedding anniversary, so this is a story about my dear wife. We were up in the mountains and I had grabbed my fishing pole before we left on the trip, or I actually grabbed Kristina's fishing rod, fly fishing rod, because I was in a hurry. And we we went up for a couple of days. I caught some beautiful trout on her fly rod.
We’re driving home and I'm just sort of reminiscing. I said, “This has been the greatest trip. I've really enjoyed this time. I hadn't caught any fish like that in a couple of years. And I'm really thankful for the the rod that Jim got for both me and you.”
And she goes, “Well that rod came from Steve.
And I said, “No, no, that was from Jim. About 20 years ago, he gave us both fly rods. And I know it was from Jim because it even has “To Kristina, God bless you,” stenciled in it.
And she goes, “Yeah, that was from Steve when I used to work with him at Blue Mule Outfitters.”
And I I'm getting a little frustrated, you know what I mean? That she doesn't believe me. So I know I'll fix it. I'll call Jim. I get Jim, call him up on the phone, put it on speakerphone. She's driving and and she can listen to the conversation.
I said, “Jim, I've been thinking about you this weekend. I just got some beautiful trout on the fly rod that you gave us and wanted to thank you.” And we're chatting back and forth and talk about life a little bit. And then I hang up, smiled at my wife.
She looks at me. “That was from Steve.”
Now I'm sort of losing my joy on this trip, you know what I mean? I had been feeling really good. So I know I got an idea how to get it back. I said, “I'll bet you. I'll bet you a hundred dollars that that Rod came from Jim.”
And she said, “Okay,”
So now I'm at peace because I got something to look forward to when I get home. I start reading the newspaper. We get home. I'm unpacking all our stuff. She disappears while I'm in the kitchen putting stuff in the refrigerator.
She shows back up with two fly rods. From Jim. The one from Steve — that I'd been fishing with — was on the table. And I realize she's right. I'm wrong.
So I go into the the office, I get an envelope, I write out a note. “Dear Kristina, You were right, I was wrong. Please forgive me. I'm sorry. I love you.”
And then I know where she stashes her money, so I went and got two fifty dollar bills out of her stash spot, put it in the envelope and give it to her. And a little while later, she comes up to me and she has a big smile and she says, “You can keep the money. I love you. It's all about winning to me.”
And it just reminded me why I have this philosophy: Focus on the treasure, not on the flaw.
Because sometimes if people focus on my flaws, I'm sunk. You know what I mean? Because I've got them. And sometimes I'm absolutely 100 percent convinced I'm right. I will bet in the old days and actually I'm done. I'm done. Don't ever do that. It's evil if you do that.
Now, in verse six, Jesus says this:
“Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs. If you do, they may trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you to pieces.”
Jesus had just been talking about not judging and now he's calling some people dogs and others pigs. What's up with that? Spiritually speaking, dogs are narcissistic, immoral, spiritual beings. He’s not a cat lover, but it's a description. Other people are like pigs. Their behavior is totally self-centered. Their behavior does not take into consideration anybody else's feelings.
We're not to be going around judging people casually and making decisions about their whole life on the basis of one event. But on the basis of multiple experiences with people, on the basis of obvious behavior, there are times when this verse applies.
So Jesus is not telling us in this whole Sermon on the Mount that we're to be ignorant, naive people that get trampled on by everybody. He's telling us to protect ourselves in a way and ina little bit we'll get in a few verses on false prophets. False prophets are people who distort the image of God, distort what relationships are supposed to be all about, distort love. God is love, but love is not just making people feel good right, now all the time, no matter what.
Now, how do we figure these things out? In verse seven Jesus says:
“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.”
Spiritually speaking, we want discernment. In First Corinthians 12, discernment is one of the gifts that the Lord releases through the Holy Spirit when we want to help people. Sometimes we're not sure if their problem is a natural problem, or a consequence of physiological imbalance in their life, or if it's a spiritually rooted problem that is a consequence of dark and demonic forces that are operating in their life, or if it's some kind of a chemical imbalance. We need the gift of discernment.
So Jesus says, “Ask, seek, knock,” because sometimes, just like God buries gold in the earth and you've got to dig for it, he buries wisdom and understanding in ways that when you dig, when you ask, when you seek a new knock, it opens up.
Some friends and I fasted one time for three days. We were pastors, we were working in northern California where a lot of the people had come out of drug backgrounds, some of them had been involved in occult backgrounds, they came from dysfunctional families. And when they came to us for ministry, we wanted to get it right.
One of the the guys that I remember having to make a decision about was in jail. And I had gone to northern California for a visit, and there's this guy, his friends came up to me and said, “We think he's innocent. He's in jail for child molesting and we think he's innocent. And we want you to go talk to him and pray for him and help him get out.” And I’m, like — that’s really not what I would consider a fun thing to do, if you know what I mean. That's not something that I'm looking forward to do, but because I love the people that were asking me, I went ahead and accepted the offer.
So I go there to the Marin County jail in San Rafael. And I'm talking with the guy, and he is not convincing me that he's innocent, but I'm not sure. I don't know what really happened. And then he decides to do something. He says, “I don't have any money to pay you to help me, but I'm going to help you out. I'm going to give you a map to the Lost Dutchman's gold mine.”
And I'm in my heart saying, Thank you very much for showing me that I can't trust you for an inch, man. Because that is the typical fraud thing to give somebody is a map to the Lost Dutchman gold mine. There's been thousands of them sold and secretively handed off. And nobody's ever found that gold yet. It's probably out there, but it's not going to be from a map that somebody in jail gives you as a payoff for getting them out.
When Jesus talks about these same verses in Luke 11, here's what he says. Well, first, Matthew 7:11:
“If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!”
Jesus explained that the good gift is the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit gives us the grace to discern between right and wrong, between truth and error. The Holy Spirit can give us the key to unlock the needs in people's hearts. That's what he wants to equip us with.
So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.
How do we navigate these challenging relationships in life? We navigate them by treating the people in front of us just like we want to be treated. Exactly.
I had one of the pastors come up to me after our first service this morning, and he said, “Do you want some help with your message?”
And I said, (gulp), “Yes.”
He gave me an idea or two about leaving out a story that confused some people. And I said, “Thank you very much,” because I want people to tell me the truth. I want real feedback from my life. I know that I don't always see it like I should.
And so that's how I treat people. And it takes courage to tell somebody what you really think. It takes love to love some of them enough so that you will overcome the fear of being rejected. But a wise person will thank you. A scoffer will hate you if you bring him correction. A wise person appreciates it. And we want to reap what we sew. We want to reap wisdom and encouragement and understanding.
Also because I need forgiveness for my sins, I also try and give forgiveness no matter how painful it is. I was talking to a friend recently who left the church and we didn't want to get into a lot of depth about the reasons why he left the church. I just wanted to make sure that he knew that I loved him. And he said to me, “Sometimes relationships are too painful.”
And I responded to him and said this, “Jesus hasn’t asked me and you to go to Africa to live. He hasn't asked us to give our testimonies in Iran or Saudi Arabia or Afghanistan, even though there are believers in those places that are suffering, especially right now in Afghanistan. It's a very dangerous place for them to be. He hasn't asked us to suffer that way. But he might ask us to pick up our cross and suffer in our relationships right here, right in this fellowship, even, because every church, just like every family, has some painful and difficult relationships to navigate and to get it right. To learn how to love one another, to process through the pain of life and come out the other side brings a great reward.”
Here's how Jesus describes it.
“Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.”
He's not talking here about going to heaven when you die. He's talking about navigating the relationships of life in such a way that they will lead to life — a narrow road, a small gate that gets us to a place where it opens up into the kingdom of God.
Sometimes people focus on the road. They focus on the gate. I had a friend. His name is Ben Burt, and he invited me to Skywalker Ranch. That's where his magnificent ranch that George Lucas, spent hundreds of millions of dollars building for his animation and for his production studios in San Rafael, California. To get the Skywalker Ranch, you go down Lucas Valley Road — which was not named after him — it's one lane in each direction from Highway 101 heading west towards the coast. And you wind around for 10 or 12 miles and go up past Big Rock and down the other side. And about, I think a mile and a half or so past Big Rock, there's a little road and you take that second right under that road and it leads to a guard gate. And that's how you get there. You can't get there any other way. You can come east or you can come west. But it's a two lane road and it's a narrow guard gate for everybody.
And when you get to the guard gate, you’ve got to know somebody and they've got to be expecting you in order to get through. But once you get through, then it opens up into vineyards and a lake and Olympic swimming pool and horseback riding and organic gardens and gymnasiums and and châteaux built to look like a Tuscan winery, and it's the most phenomenal place.
Inside they have artifacts like Luke Skywalker’s original light saber and Darth Vader's mask and all of the original stuff. It's really a geek's paradise. And even as a non-geek, I appreciated being there and seeing it.
But the real magnificence is not the road and it's not the gate. The road and the gate are essential. But it's what opens up in this vast valley that, even though I had spent the first thirty-four years of my life hiking those hills and living nearby, I'd never been in that valley before.
And the kingdom of God is a vast kingdom, it's a mighty spectacular, magnificent place. Don't get too hung up on the road. You’ve got to get there on the road. You’ve got to go through the gate. And Jesus is the gatekeeper. But don't get too hung up on the road and the gate, because that's just the beginning of what it means to experience the kingdom of God.
“Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves.out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves.”
They're there to take advantage of you. And again, if we were to never judge anybody or anything, we could never call anybody a false prophet. But a false prophet is somebody who distorts the image of God, distorts what love is all about for their own gain and to their own demise.
By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? Likewise, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit.
Now I have a ministry to pastors and leaders. I was talking to a pastor the other day and he said to me, “I feel like a failure.”
I listened to his heart and it made me sad. Then I said this to him, I said, "It's too late for you to be a failure. I've known you for over 30 years. You've been a blessing to me all those years. You've been faithful to your wife. You've raised beautiful kids. You've been faithful in your congregations. Yeah, I get it that your ministry hasn't been as big as you wanted it to be. I get it. Neither of us are famous and we're not going to be famous. I get all of that. But you are not a failure if you abide in Christ.”
As a matter of fact. If you abide in Christ, you can't fail, because “Every branch,” Jesus said, “that abides in me will bear much fruit.” It may be down line. It may be your kids or your grandkids, naturally or spiritually. It may be people you don't even know who you've made an impact on. But if you abide in Christ and you keep his word like he tells you to, it's going to open up the kingdom of God to you and to those who follow in your footsteps.
Now, in closing, I want to talk a little bit about judgment from 1 Corinthians 2:14-15.
The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit.
In Matthew 7, Jesus says there's a good gift the father wants to give you. That good gift is the Spirit. Without the spirit none of this really makes sense.
The person with the Spirit makes judgments about all things, but such a person is not subject to merely human judgments,
We judge all things. We judge is there value or is there harm? It doesn't matter if we're watching a Netflix, or we're choosing to read a book, or we're reading an article about a certain theory or a form of government, or whatever. We make value judgments because we've got the Spirit of God and we have the mind of Christ and the Spirit of God. The mind of Christ, which comes to us through the word of God, gives us the ability to discern the value or lack thereof in all kinds of things.
1 Corinthians 5 says this:
But now I am writing to you that you must not associate with anyone who claims to be a brother or sister but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or slanderer, a drunkard or swindler. Do not even eat with such people. What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? God will judge those outside. “Expel the wicked person from among you.”
Now, over the years at Living Streams, we've had to remove a couple of swindlers because they were financially taking advantage of people through lies and deception. We've had to remove a couple of immoral people, not because they made a slip or made a mistake or did something they were sorry for, but because they were preying on somebody or somebodies in our congregation in an ongoing way that is contrary to the word of God.
And at such times, the Church, not as an individual pastor, leader or any, but the Church collectively in the leadership will make a judgment that, if somebody is practicing ongoing immorality, swindling or whatever these things Jesus is mentioning through 1 Corinthians 5, then we make a judgment that that person needs to be removed until such time as they're willing to follow Jesus the way we're all supposed to follow Jesus, which is in honesty and truth and humility.
Our final scripture, 2 Corinthians 5:10, says this:
For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each of us may receive what is due us for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad.
In just a moment, we're going to take communion, so if you're at home and watching this, you can grab some bread and and some a cup of wine or juice or whatever you want.
We must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ. It specifically says in 1 Corinthians 11 that when we receive communion, that we're to judge ourselves. And when I judge myself, I know I fall short. So I'm always asking for forgiveness. I specifically ask forgiveness when I am beginning to evaluate myself in terms of other people and exalting myself and putting them down, because everybody in Christ has a treasure. Everybody in Christ has a value. He has children. And his children are all really, really important to him, every single one of us. So we're going to be held accountable someday for how we've lived our life, what we've done.
And I want to ask you if you want your reward in this world or in the world to come.
In this world, we may have suffering. In this world, we may have pain. In this world we have challenges, each and every one of us.
In the world to come, by his grace, there will be no more tears, no more sorrow, no more suffering.
In this world we can overcome those things by the grace that he gives us, by the power of his Holy Spirit. We can navigate our relationships, because he gives us wisdom, because he delights in us. He said, “I've overcome the world and so will you.”
And this bread and this cup helps us in that regard. Jesus said, “this is my body. Which is broken for you.”
Lord, thank you that you were willing to let your body be broken so that we could be made whole, so we could be part of your family, so we could have a place in your kingdom. Thank you, Jesus.
He said, “Take and eat. This is my body which is broken for you. As often as you do so do so in remembrance of me.”
Jesus said, "This cop is the new covenant in my blood which is shed for you.”
Jesus, we need your blood. We need your forgiveness. We ask you to heal our hearts. We ask you to heal our church. We ask you to heal our nation. You've got the power to do it. Help us, Lord, receive this forgiveness and renew this covenant with you.
Take and drink. This is the new covenant in his blood. Thank you, Lord. Thank you, Jesus.
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