This is a homily by Fr. Gene Tucker, given at Trinity Church, Mt. Vernon, Illinois on Sunday, February 20, 2011.
“YOUR INSIDES MUST MATCH YOUR OUTSIDES”
(Homily text: Matthew 5: 36 – 48)
We find ourselves in the midst of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. In past weeks, we’ve heard a succession of Jesus’ sayings, delivered as part of that sermon, many of which begin with the formula:
- “You have heard it said…”
- “But I say to you…”
And oftentimes in the Lord’s sermon, when he says “You have heard it said…”, which is followed by “But I say to you…”, often, the Lord then offers a short discourse which explains and applies the reasons for Jesus’ statement.
In each case, Jesus is driving toward a deeper reality. That reality can be summed up in the title phrase of this homily: “Your insides must match your outsides”.
In each case, Jesus goes from the proscriptions contained in an aspect of the Law of Moses (examples: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself”, “You shall not commit adultery”, “You shall not murder”, etc.) and then turns our attention from the outward, observable physical act to the matter of our intentions.
Put another way, Jesus asks us to consider not only the proscriptions cited (which remain in force…recall that our Lord said that He “had not come to abolish the Law, but to fulfill it.” ), but the internal, often unnoticed matter of the condition of our hearts and minds. Essentially, the Lord asks us to consider our motivations and intentions. “Look at your insides,” we might imagine He is saying to us.
For example, let’s take one of Jesus’ sayings, heard in our Gospel reading from last week: “You have heard it said, ‘You shall not commit adultery. But I say to you, anyone who looks on a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.’”
This part of last week’s Gospel text caused a large amount of discussion during coffee hour. Some said, “How can we avoid that? After all, attractions between a man and a woman are a matter of nature.” Others questioned what Jesus’ saying might mean.
Now, lest you think I deliberately dodged the difficult matter of this particular proscription by focusing my homily last week on our Epistle reading from I Corinthians, and away from the difficult issue of adultery and lust, I will attempt to address it here.
Notice that Jesus tells us we are to examine our hearts. Notice that He says that, if we look at a woman with “lust”, we have already committed adultery with her in our hearts. (OK, I think we need to admit that the issue of lustful attraction can work both ways: men to women, and women to men.)
It’s important here to see that Jesus begins with the normal beginning point for such a progression, which, in outline form looks like this: look – lust – adultery. In other words, Jesus seems to differentiate between looking and looking with lustful intent.
Well, just what is “lustful intent”? I’ll hazard a guess, which isn’t at all original. It comes from a biblical scholar, who says that an intent to look with lust is to make the person who is the object of the glance or glare just that, an object to be used for sexual satisfaction and pleasure.
So, put another way, our intentions toward every other human being must be those that honor that person as having been made in the image and likeness of God. This being so, then the other person is of infinite value to God, and is not to be treated as an object.
(I hope this helps your understanding!)
Now, let’s move into one aspect of another of Jesus’ proscriptions, which we pick up at mid-stream today.
Last week, we heard Jesus say, “Again, you have heard that is was said to those of ancient times, ‘You shall not swear falsely, but carry out the vows you have made to the Lord.’ But I say to you, Do not swear at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God, or by the earth, for it is his footstool, or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King.” Now, this week, He continues, “And do not swear by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black. Let what you say be simply ‘Yes’ or ‘No’; anything more than this comes from evil.”
What is Jesus getting at here?
Perhaps we could sum it up this way: “Be so truthful in what you say and do, that there will never be a question about your honesty and the plain-ness of your speech and your actions.”
If we have that sort of reputation, then there will be no need for swearing by anything at all, not even the proverbial “stack of Bibles”.
Our insides must match our outsides, always, in every circumstance, and in every time and place.
The matter of external behavior vs. internal intentions was a serious matter in Jesus’ day. 2,000 years ago, the Scribes, Pharisees and priestly caste were quite interested in the outward, physical, observable actions of God’s Chosen People, making sure that everything they did fit perfectly into the requirements of the Law of Moses. But Jesus said that, though they did these things quite rigorously, their hearts were far from God.
The matter of external behavior and internal intentions remains a serious matter for us, as Christian believers, today.
(To be continued next week…..)
