It's good to be back with you all today. We're going to continue in our study on the Sermon on the Mount. And I've pointed out in previous lessons how one lesson kind of builds upon another. So, if you think about back to your math days, you know, you have pre-Algebra and then Algebra and then Algebra 2, right? Well, you can't do Algebra 2 if you haven't gone through the steps of pre-Algebra and Algebra 1. So, in a similar way, the Sermon on the Mount is kind of sequential in that one lesson will build upon previous lessons. We can think about that with the Beatitudes, for example, as they logically followed the ones that came before it. Today, we're going to be looking at Matthew 5, 17, through 20. And this flow is still consistent such that our lesson today will build upon previous teachings on the Sermon on the Mount. We studied the Beatitudes in verses 3 through 12, which we could say depicted the character of believers. Verses 13 through 16 describe the function of believers as salt and light. And today, as we'll see in verses 17 through 20, we'll see the foundation of the inner qualities of the Beatitudes and for functioning as salt and light. And that foundation, of course, has to be the Word of God, which is our only source of truth and only standard of righteousness. So, if you have your Bibles, turn to Matthew 5. We're going to be looking at verses 17 through 20 today. And as you turn there, remember, Jesus was teaching His disciples on that mount by the Sea of Galilee, but He's teaching us today. As we look at what is contained in God's Word and what He taught those disciples from long ago, this is His Word for us as well. Matthew 5 beginning in verse 17, do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot will pass from the law until all is accomplished. Therefore, whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven. But whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven." Well, I was reading this week about someone who had written into a forum and she was asking for help. on finding a Christian denomination or a Christian church that only teaches the New Testament. She was seeking this help for a male friend of hers. In her words, he hates it when people mention or quote the Old Testament. She went on to say that her friend thinks the Old Testament laws are outdated. He feels persecuted by the Old Testament and believes in being a Christian by faith alone. Well, unfortunately, that is a prevailing view nowadays in the broad evangelical world even. They believe the Old Testament was for a people long ago and it's not relevant, it's not binding for us today. Well, what should be our response to this? Well, there was one verse that came to mind. Jesus would disagree with that for sure. One verse came to mind, of course, there's many others, but all Scripture is got breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction and for training in righteousness that the man of God may be complete equipped for every good work. 2 Timothy 3 16. It doesn't say New Testament scripture is profitable. It says all scripture is profitable. How many of you have read the word of God or you've heard the word of God preached and you felt a bit uncomfortable? All of us. But just because we get uncomfortable at times doesn't mean we need to do away with it, right? It's all God's Word and it all ultimately points to Christ. Well, I want us to look at this passage today in Matthew 5 under four headings. This is on your handout. Number one, Christ fulfilling the law, as we'll see in verse 17. Secondly, the importance of the entirety of scripture in verse 18. Third, a warning and a blessing in verse 19. And then fourthly, internal versus external righteousness. So we could say godly versus human or self-righteousness. But Jesus says back and again in Matthew 5, 17, do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have not come to abolish them, but to fulfill them. Now, as we want to understand this verse as best we can, we need to look at the words and what they actually mean. So the word abolish means to overthrow or destroy. It's the same term that's used in the destruction of the temple that we see in Matthew 24-2 and 26-61, but it's also the same term used of the death of the physical body described in 2 Corinthians 5-1. The idea is to literally tear down, to smash down, to do away with. What are the terms law and prophets refer to? Well, the phrase law and prophets is actually used some 15 times in the New Testament, and it commonly refers to the entirety of the Old Testament. What does fulfill mean? Well, according to the dictionary, it means to bring to completion or reality, to achieve or realize something desired, promised, or predicted. So we've looked at the terms, but let's not forget the context. Remember that Jesus is here on the hillside by the Sea of Galilee and he's speaking to his newly chosen disciples. There's also a crowd that's begun to form. And no doubt, as you look on the crowd, there's going to be scribes and Pharisees there in the crowd as well. And he's saying to them, look, the Old Testament that you have studied and that you have been brought up with, in fact, the Old Testament that Jesus himself had learned, is still binding. I'm not coming and doing away with that. It's still relevant today. It's still important. In fact, I am here not to abolish it, but to fulfill it, to fulfill what's been spoken of and prophesied in the Old Testament. I am here, Jesus says, to bring it to completion. And so Jesus says he has come here to fulfill the law as outlined in the Old Testament, as well as to fulfill what has been spoken of by the prophets. Now in looking at the Old Testament, we know there's lots of prophecies, right? And there's many prophets. But if you look at the very first prophecy in the Bible, it is about the coming of Jesus. It's not spoken to Adam and Eve or Moses or any other human being. It's actually spoken to Satan. And it goes like this. I will put enmity between you and the woman and between your offspring and her offspring. He shall bruise your head and you shall bruise, excuse me. He shall bruise your heel and you shall bruise his heel. I had that wrong. He shall bruise your head and you shall bruise his heel. Genesis 3, 15. What's that spoken of? Jesus coming. First prophecy in the Old Testament, Jesus coming to fulfill what was said. Well, how did Jesus fulfill the law and the prophets? Many have given many different answers to this through the years. Some have said that he came to fulfill the law and the prophets by his teaching. Well, in this view, the law was a divine outline, if you will, but not really complete. Through Jesus' teaching in the New Testament, He gave definition to the law. He expounded upon the law, and He did give it meaning, but it's not altogether false, but it's also not completely true. To fulfill means to fill up, not to fill out. So it doesn't mean to add to, but rather to complete. Jesus in the New Testament did not add any new teaching that wasn't in the Old Testament. He came rather to clarify and expound upon the original meaning found in the Old Testament. Others will say Jesus fulfilled the law and the prophets by perfectly meeting or satisfying its demands. Did He do that? Absolutely He did that. It is true. Jesus came and lived a perfect life and He obediently obeyed every part of the law. He was not only man, but he was God himself, right? Second person of the Godhead. He was perfectly righteous, and he provided the perfect model of absolute righteousness. It's very true. He did all of that. But he wasn't just perfect in obeying what we couldn't obey. By being perfect, it led to something else, and that was namely His sacrifice, right? Took the perfect lamb to be slain for our sins, but that's what it's pointing to. So it wasn't just that He satisfied and obeyed the law perfectly and then it ended there. No, it's what it led to. that's so important here. Other commentators point out that Jesus fulfills a law by means of His Spirit in the lives of His believers. They point to Romans 8.4 which says that God sent Jesus in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. It's true. And yet, All of these interpretations are not complete because they're not talking about the finished work of Jesus Christ. He was so much more than a teacher, so much more than modeling perfect righteousness or modeling perfect obedience. John MacArthur explains, Jesus fulfilled the Old Testament by being its fulfillment. He did not simply teach it fully and exemplify it fully. He was it fully. He did not come simply to teach righteousness and to model righteousness. He came as divine righteousness. What He said and what He reflected is who He actually is. What's He saying here? Jesus is the fulfillment. All Scripture finds its fullest meaning in Him and all Scripture points to Him. As Boyce would say, it is by Him, for Him, and about Him. That's what Scripture is. In other words, Jesus didn't just come to be a great teacher, though He was, and a great expositor of the law, though He was, or just to give or to live an obedient, perfect life, though He did. He came ultimately to give His life as a ransom for you and for me. For those whom the Father had given to Him, He came, and He taught the Scriptures, and He lived an obedient, perfect, obediently life. But all that led to the ultimate sacrifice that you and I deserved, and that was death on the cross. And then He rose again. It's the story of redemption. The Bible is, in its entirety, a story of redemption. So as I begin teaching the communicants class here in two weeks, we're going to be talking about that whole story of redemption for God's people. And where does it begin? It begins back in the garden when Adam and Eve sinned. And yet God had a remedy for that sin, and He has a remedy for your sin and for my sin, and it's the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. So how do we apply this? Well, knowing that Jesus came to fulfill the law and the prophets gives evidence that the whole of scripture is true. The Bible is not just some book written by people with good ideas. The author himself is God, who spoke through the writers, as the confession would say, as they were carried along. I love that word, the phrase there, as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit, as they penned his words. And although the man penned the words centuries apart, you can see a common thread and a consistent thread throughout all of Scripture that points to Christ who accomplishes our salvation. Well, Jesus then moves on in verse 18 to underscore the importance of the entirety of Scripture. He says in verse 18, for truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot will pass from the law until all is accomplished. The whole counsel of God is important, both the Old and the New Testaments. It's so important that it will stand the test of time. It will be here when the heavens and earth pass away. Every part of it is important, as indicated by the Greek word, iota. Now, what was an iota? It was the smallest letter in the Greek alphabet. Remember, though, that Jesus was also talking to Jews and people that would have known Hebrew. And so that same word in the Hebrew is called Yod, which was the smallest letter of the Hebrew alphabet, which really looks something like an apostrophe or a comma. It's that small. What's the point Jesus is making here? Not only will the law not be abolished, what we saw in verse 17, but even the smallest letter that we see in verse 18, even the smallest letter will not be erased. Not even the smallest part of a letter will be erased from the law until all is accomplished. It means God's going to bring to fulfillment all that has been said and prophesied in Scripture. John MacArthur writes, Scripture is God's own Word, not only down to every single written word, but down to every letter and the smallest part of every letter. What does that mean? It means every part of it is important. Every word in Leviticus is important, just like every word in Romans. Every part of God's Word is important. We see many examples where Jesus Himself underscores the importance and the authority of Scripture by using Scripture Himself. The Old and New Testaments were so interwoven and are so interwoven and should be seen collectively as the Word of God. In fact, the Old Testament is so essential that the New Testament writings are built upon them. The New Testament has over 200 direct quotes from the Old Testament and almost a thousand references to the Old Testament. Jesus himself would refer to the Old Testament at least 64 times throughout his time on earth. How can you separate the two? It's all God's Word. It's all important. Jesus even confirms the accuracy and the authenticity of the Old Testament when he confirms, for example, the standard of marriage that God established in the Garden of Eden. He does that in Matthew 19.4. The murder of Abel, Luke 11.51. Noah and the flood, Matthew 24. Abraham and his faith, John 8.56. Sodom, Lot, and Lot's wife, Luke 17.29. The call of Moses, he references in Mark 12.26. Manna from heaven, John 6, 31 and 58, and the bronze serpent, John 3, 14. You know, even if we look at the very chapter before the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 4, Jesus is being tempted into the wilderness by Satan. How does he counter Satan's attacks? By using Scripture, using Scripture. Specifically, he quotes from Deuteronomy. So what's the application here? We can have peace that Jesus will not come back, His second coming, until all that God wants to accomplish is brought to completion. What does that mean about loved ones that may not be walking with the Lord? Keep praying. Keep praying. We see that Scripture is so important that it outlasts us. We can rest in knowing that God will accomplish the full manifestation of His kingdom and we pray for that. We have confidence that the Lord will accomplish His will and bring in whom He has chosen. Let us pray for that and let us be His instruments as we tell of God's faithfulness in our own lives and evangelizing other people. Well, the entirety of Scripture is so important as we saw in verse 18, but that leads us to our third point found in verse 19 where we see a warning and a blessing. In verse 19, we read, therefore, whoever relaxes one of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven. But whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. So the warning is given to those who relax or other translations will use the word annul these commandments and teaches others to do the same. And the consequence is they'll be called least in the kingdom of heaven. Versus those who do the law, who teach the law and teach others to do the same, they will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. And I'll spend a few minutes on this because it's an important topic. It's such an important verse. There are some pastors out there that relax the commandments. There's a pastor here in the upstate that not so long ago, a few years ago, was doing a sermon series on the 10 commandments. And what did he call them? The 10 promises. Why is that? Because people don't like the word commandment. They don't like to be commanded to do something. So he called them 10 promises, when in fact they really are 10 commandments that we as God-honoring Christians should dutifully pay attention to and listen to and seek by the grace of the Holy Spirit to live. But another pastor once said, the one thing I've learned is that when you get into the pulpit, You've got to somehow communicate without using the Bible because the Bible turns people off. I've spent a long time developing the ability to communicate to people without ever using the Bible. I started out in my ministry saying this verse says this and this verse says that, and I finally realized that wouldn't get me anywhere. Now I will say it in my own way and people will accept it. That is dangerous ground. I will say it in my own way and people will accept it. No, say it in God's way and the people will believe it and accept it and grow in and through it. We as Christians should demand that our pastors preach God's Word, not their own Word. We get man's Word from everybody else. we should receive God's holy, inspired, inerrant Word when we sit under the preaching in our worship services. And praise God in this church, at Second Presbyterian Church in Greenville, South Carolina, we have that. We have men that are capable and able to proclaim the Word of God and care far more about what God thinks about what they're saying than what man does. And that's what we need. Another well-known pastor in Georgia, I will leave the name omitted, recently announced that Christians need to unhitch the Old Testament from their understanding of the faith. By this, he means to instruct people to ignore the Old Testament and focus solely on the resurrection of Jesus Christ, especially in evangelism. He goes on to say, Jesus's new covenant, his covenant with the nations, his covenant with you, his covenant with us can stand on its own two nail-scarred resurrection feet. It does not need propping up by the Jewish scriptures. The Bible did not create Christianity. The resurrection of Jesus created and launched Christianity. Your whole house of Old Testament cards can come tumbling down. The question is, did Jesus rise from the dead? And the eyewitnesses said he did. He continues, unhitching the Old Testament from the new is liberating for men and women who were drawn to the simple message that God loves you so much he sent his son to pave the way to a relationship with you. It's liberating for people who need and understand grace, who need and understand forgiveness, and it's liberating for people who find it virtually impossible to embrace the dynamic worldview and the value system depicted in the story of ancient Israel. How scary it is. And how can you take half of God's Word? It's not even half. Realize most of God's spoken Word is in the Old Testament. So, if we want to know who Jesus is, let's look back at what the Old Testament prophesied He would be. It's all connected. And people will say, yeah, but, you know, God was different in the Old Testament than He is in the New Testament. Somebody I was talking to the other day is actually teaching through the Sermon on the Mount, just like I am. And he made that very statement. I'm thinking, no. And how do we know that God is not different in the old and the new? Because God doesn't change. You know, we did a study years ago in this class on the attributes of God. And one of the attributes of God is His immutability. What does that mean? It means there's no shadow of turning with Thee. It means who He said He was then is who He said He is now and who He will be in the future. God doesn't change. It's His Word. It's all His Word. And so, as Christians, we're to be theologians, meaning we're to study God's Word. We're to study all of God's Word. Why do I bring up this particular example? Well, it's an example of one who's relaxing the commandments and teaching others to do the same. In order to understand, again, God's grace, you've got to understand the Old Testament. In order to understand Jesus's sacrificial death on the cross of Calvary, you've got to understand what the sacrifices were in the Old Testament and what they did. Namely, they ultimately pointed to Jesus's sacrificial death. Listen to this quote by John MacArthur, so important. It's impossible to accept Christ's authority without accepting Scripture's authority and vice versa. They stand together. To accept Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord is to accept what He taught about Scripture as binding. Listen to this, if the Old Testament contains any errors, we must conclude one of two things about Christ. One possibility is that He was ignorant of those errors, in which case He was not omniscient and was therefore not God. The other possibility is that He knew of the errors but denied them, in which case He would have been a liar and a hypocrite. and therefore not holy God." How true it is. Because Jesus came to fulfill the Old Testament, you cannot throw it out. They both relate to one another. Jesus is found in the Old Testament just as He is in the New. What about you and me? How do we relax the law of God? Well, maybe we don't pay proper attention to rest and worship on the Lord's Day. Maybe we excuse our anger, which we'll look at more next week, which Jesus calls murder. Maybe we lust, but we don't repent, thinking it's not a big deal as if it's not adultery. Maybe we are careless with how we use God's name. Do we delight in reading God's Word? Do we delight in coming together with the people of God? Do we delight in hearing God's Word, both old and new? Are we committed to living godly lives that follows the commandments? It's not legalism. It's our grateful duty. Jesus has died for us. How can we not live for Him? Well, this brings me to my final heading where we'll compare internal versus external righteousness. Verse 20, for I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. William Hendrickson writes, note the emphatic introduction, for I tell you, Jesus is about to make a very important statement regarding the reprehensible righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees and contrasted that with another righteousness, one in which God delights. Now, this statement would have been very important but also very difficult for the crowd to hear for there were a lot of scribes and Pharisees in the crowd. And they're thinking, well, he just said, don't be like me. Take on a righteousness that's greater than what I have. It's exactly what he's saying. The scribes studied the scriptures intensely, but they still missed the mark in many ways, focusing more on the outward than the inward. The Pharisees also studied the scriptures, but tended to follow more the traditions of man. even at times over the Bible. So, it begs the question, what is human or external righteousness? Well, it's trying to achieve righteousness in your own strength. It involves focusing again on the outward rather than the inward. It becomes self-glorifying rather than God-glorifying. One example of this is the Pharisee that's depicted in Luke 18, 11 through 12. The Pharisee standing by himself prayed thus, God, I thank you that I'm not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week. I give tithes of all that I get. Does that depict human righteousness? Absolutely. And what's the root of it? The root of it is pride, wanting to glorify self, thinking that me and my own strength can achieve the righteousness that's needed. James Montgomery Boyce writes, you can pile human goodness upon human goodness upon human goodness upon human goodness. You can refine it, perfect it, polish it, but no matter how hard you try, you fall short of God's standard because human righteousness is qualitatively different from the righteousness of God. So we can't be good enough in our own strength to earn favor with God. Romans 3, 10 and 11, no one, no one, understands, no one seeks for God. So, the righteousness that God requires is perfect righteousness. MacArthur writes, the one who demands perfect righteousness gives perfect righteousness. And what does he mean by that? He means that Jesus came and on the cross of Calvary, He took on our sins and He imputed to us His righteousness. So that by the grace of God and for the glory of God and because of His very Son, we can now be placed in right standing by having faith in the Lord Jesus Christ because of what He did. A great example of contrasting in one passage and with one person, human righteousness versus an internal godly righteousness is with Paul. Philippians 3, 4 through 6, if anyone else thinks he has reason for confidence in the flesh, I have more. Circumcised on the eighth day of the people of Israel, the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews, as to the law, a Pharisee, as to zeal, a persecutor of the church, as to righteousness under the law, blameless. There's seven achievements here, four of which were inherited, three that were earned. And yet he realizes on the road to Damascus when he is struck and he becomes a Christian, he realizes, oh, all those things don't even matter anymore. It's not where I came from, it's not my last name, it's not how I was trained, it's not my worldly achievements, though those things be great, it's am I in Christ? And so, the very next verse he says in Philippians 3, 7, but whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For His sake, I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish in order that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own. nor that that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith." We could say more about this. Ephesians 2, 8 and 9, for by grace you have been saved through faith. That's not of your own doing. So as we look at this passage today and as we conclude, let's remember how the entirety of Scripture fits together. Let's remember how all of Scripture points to Christ. Let's remember how even as much perhaps before we were Christians tried, tried, tried to earn God's favor, we could never be good enough. It's by resting and receiving alone in Christ alone and what He has done for us on the cross that now we have His very righteousness. Can you imagine that? And so now God sees us through the very lens of the blood of Christ as righteous people that then can live unto Him. as our grateful duty of sacrifice as we seek to live for Him in this world. Well, let's pray. God in heaven, we come to you as a humble people, not understanding how you could have such love and grace and mercy toward us as such sinners, and yet you have. You sent Jesus to die that death on a cross that we deserved. Lord, help us to live for Him. Help us to delight in reading Your Word, both Old and New Testament. Help us to delight, Lord, in living it out in a way that would bear testimony to Your faithfulness in our lives and would glorify You, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen.