December 8, 2012
Title: Week 11 — Cross my heart and hope to die
Series: The King’s Speech
The passage we are exploring this week is Matthew is 5:33-37. It is Jesus’ teaching on oaths. This is Jesus’ fourth case study on what a “greater righteousness” might look like in our everyday lives. Jesus seems to think that when our speech is supplemented with oaths it reveals the evil condition of the world. Oaths unveil the reality that we live in a world of lies. Especially in Jesus’ context, oaths almost seem to sanction the common lie, or that simple truth was not assumed in normal conversations and interactions. So Jesus challenges us to make our speech simpler, less exaggerated, more down-to-earth, and even less outwardly spiritual (or less filled with spiritual formulas). Liberated from manipulating and posturing speech, the disciple of Jesus encounters the simplicity of “yes” and “no.” Jesus seeks to protect speech from controlling and wounding others, just as he has already protected others from our hostility, lust, and unfaithfulness. In a certain sense, all of Jesus’ case studies are united by a desire for love towards others: by avoiding that which hurts them (anger), toys with them (lust), sits loose to them (marital infidelity), or fails to speak honestly to them (through disingenuous words).