November 5: Matthew 5 21-26

Key Verse: Matthew 5 24
leave your gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled to them; then come and offer your gift.

Devotion:
Our next commandment we look at is simple in words but causes so much discussion when we try to apply it to our lives. The words given to Moses were quite simple: “Don’t kill!” But when we look back on the life of the Israelites, we find many places where they are told to kill their enemies – I’m not going to enter into a big discussion about when or if it is ok to kill, but to look at how Jesus expanded on this simple commandment.

Jesus did not change the meaning of the commandment but rather explained it further and how we should actually apply it into our lives. Far too often we take things literally and get into trouble for doing so. What Jesus is doing here is explaining the depth of the commandment. It is not a simple commandment to stop people killing each other but to stop people from getting to the stage where they even think about killing each other.

It is when we allow our feeling to get out of hand that we think about harming others; in our lives with God we are taught to love one another and to live in peace, yet when our feeling get out of hand we start to bend the rules or to make our own rules so we can get our own back on others! What Jesus is telling us here is to take time out to recognise these feeling and to stop them in their tracks; not to just supress them but to get rid of whatever is the root cause for those feelings.

If we put our minds to it we can always find a way of diffusing any situation if we choose to do so! Jesus is also saying that we need to do this as a matter of urgency – diffusing the situation before we come to God and ask for forgiveness. If we continue to hold on to our feelings when we approach God, we are not really laying it all down before Him because we are trying to have our own way instead.

Points to Ponder:
Do you continue to hold personal judgements whilst trying to ask God for forgiveness?

Are you willing to lay it all down and try sort out disagreements?