PerryDox – BeJustAChristian

The Setting of the Sermon

(Immediate Context)

The Structure of Matthew’s Introduction and Conclusion

Teaches Us What Jesus Is Doing

Second, let’s look at how Matthew framed this sermon in the immediate context. Matthew did not, via the Holy Spirit, write a separate book just on the Sermon on the Mount.  The three chapters containing the words of Jesus are not isolated away from other texts. Would you be surprised to learn that the beginning and end to the Sermon on the Mount is not found in either chapter five or seven? While the words of the lesson begin and end there, the scene begins and ends with three inclusios or brackets that envelop the sermon. Each provides a special, interpretive lesson to the Sermon on the Mount. We will look at each inclusio in reverse order, starting with the one closest to the sermon and working our way outward.

First Inclusio – The Crowds

Matthew 4:25-5:2 (HCSB) (4:25) Large crowds followed Him from Galilee, Decapolis, Jerusalem, Judea, and beyond the Jordan. (5:1) When He saw the crowds, He went up on the mountain, and after He sat down, His disciples came to Him. (2) Then He began to teach them, saying:

Matthew 7:28-8:1 (HCSB) (7:28) When I had finished this sermon, the crowds were astonished at His teaching, (29) because He was teaching them like one who had authority, and not like their scribes. (8:1) When He came down from the mountain, large crowds followed Him.

Both crowds and disciples; this means this sermon is designed for everyone to hear. It is not for a specialized group of followers. It is not even for those who have already heeded the call to be a disciple. While it cannot be lived without being changed by grace, it is preached to those who need to be changed by grace. It is neither New nor Old Law, but “Transcendent Law.” It is both sinner and saint. It is for those who are hungering and thirsting for righteousness and those who are being fed and filled. It is the greatest combination of law and gospel, faith and grace, ever compiled. It is milk and meat; the beginning, middle and end of righteousness. It is the heart of God and therefore must become the heart of man.

Both crowds and disciples; this means I is not afraid to teach and preach the hard lessons to both His followers and those contemplating discipleship. From the beginning, to the end, we see I, when seeing big crowds, “thinning the herd” by what people heard, by teaching the weighty truths, by forewarning through the difficult sayings (John 6; Luke 14).

Second Inclusio – The Healing

Just as I showed an inclusio of crowds setting the scene, if we go back just a little before and after that we see another connection, I healing people.

Matthew 4:23b-24 (HCSB) 23b) … healing every disease and sickness among the people. 24) Then the news about Him spread throughout Syria. So they brought to Him all those who were afflicted, those suffering from various diseases and intense pains, the demon-possessed, the epileptics, and the paralytics. And He healed them.

Matthew 8:2-3 (HCSB) 2) Right away a man with a serious skin disease came up and knelt before Him, saying, “Lord, if You are willing, You can make me clean.”  3) Reaching out His hand He touched him, saying, “I am willing; be made clean.” Immediately his disease was healed.

The power that healed is the power that speaks. I often healed by action and by words. His sermon heals by words that call us to action. But as is true with much physical healing, the medicine the Great Physician orders is not an easy pill to swallow. In this sermon I is teaching how to be saved, but why we need saving, and how to live saved. How we are saved is God’s righteousness. Why we need saving is our righteousness fails and we are hungry, thirsting, and mourning for something greater. How we lived saved is by practicing the righteousness of the Kingdom of God. This brings healing to our spirits. The same one, who had the power to heal, speaks these powerful words to heal.

Isaiah 61:1 (HCSB) 1)  The Spirit of the Lord GOD is on Me, because the LORD has anointed Me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and freedom to the prisoners;

Notice the connection between this prophecy and Matthew’s structure:

• The Spirit of Lord – Mt. 3:16
• To bring the gospel – Mt.4:23
• Heal the broken hearted – Mt.5:3-10

Third Inclusio – Gospel and Law

Matthew 4:23a (HCSB) – 23a) I was going all over Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the good news of the kingdom,

Matthew 8:4 (HCSB) Then I told him, “See that you don’t tell anyone; but go, show yourself to the priest, and offer the gift that Moses prescribed, as a testimony to them.”

Never was salvation about not needing to obey. At the beginning and end, Matthew included scenes of the gospel of the kingdom being preached, and I commanding a man to follow the dictates of the Law of Moses. In between, and all through the sermon, I taught the necessity of obedience. Those least in the kingdom teach obedience is not necessary (5:19).

This helps us understand that I is not teaching just what the Old Law meant, or even creating the New Law. I is teaching law by teaching transcendent law. I is teaching law by teaching the morality behind the law. I is teaching law by teaching the God of the law (Mt.5:17-19; 7:12,23).

I believe both the Old Law and the New Law have characteristic differences. Yet I also believe they had characteristic similarities. Aren’t both built and defined by the Two Great Commandments (Matthew 22:34-40)? When people today focus on love, saying law is not necessary, uplift Christianity as the way of the God of love, they fail to see that all the Old Testament laws were built upon and fulfilled by love of God and neighbor.

The differences between the Old and New Laws are evidently due to purpose, audience, etc. (i.e., the Jewish nation was a theocracy while Christianity is a world religion). Likewise the similarities are also reasoned and foundational. I believe that reason to be that some truths are transcendent to either law, which means that the laws are based upon eternal principles. They exist because of God’s nature, man’s nature, and God’s transcendent call to righteousness.

Can the Sermon on the Mount apply to the Jews living under the Jewish dispensation? Absolutely – “Therefore if you are presenting your offering at the altar…” (5:24). Yet who would disagree that the principle still applies today?

Can the Sermon on the Mount apply to the believers living under the Christian dispensation? Absolutely – “Blessed are you when people insult you, and persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of Me (5:11). Who would disallow the principle to be applicable under the Law of Moses? I applied it there too and the implication is, that this is true, has been true and always will be true (5:12).

Therefore do not look at the Sermon on the Mount as a contrast between the Old and The New, but rather a contrast between God and Man; between the righteousness of the Kingdom of God and the righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees. Make it a contrast between what God always meant and what religionists made it mean. It is the lifelong expression of “obeying the gospel.”

Matthew 5:17-19 (HCSB) 17) “Don’t assume that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill. 18) For I assure you: Until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or one stroke of a letter will pass from the law until all things are accomplished. 19) Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commands and teaches people to do so will be called least in the kingdom of heaven. But whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven.

Matthew 7:12 (HCSB) Therefore, whatever you want others to do for you, do also the same for them — this is the Law and the Prophets.

Matthew 7:23 (HCSB) Then I will announce to them, ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you lawbreakers!’

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This entry was posted by PHall on Sunday, July 22nd, 2012 at 2:17 am and is filed under Matthew. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.