Danny Taylor: Skinny Guy Thinking it Through

After discussing person-to-person relationships, Jesus turns his attention to duties related to religious life.  The point of the chapter 5 examples was, how you treat other human beings matters .  For some, not killing another human being is enough.  Jesus’ disciples must go beyond that and actually treat their enemy with love and dignity.  His audience had been misguided and had misunderstood certain aspects of Old Testament Law and Jesus takes time to clear up those misunderstandings. Starting in chapter 6, they haven’t misunderstood anything, but Jesus checks their motives for doing things they are apparently already doing.  Jesus grants that they give, pray, and fast, and they should be doing these things.  However, when they give, pray, fast, or commit other acts of righteousness, they are not do to them like the hypocrites do.  Instead, You are to be different .   Jesus calls giving, praying, and fasting “your righteousness.”...

There are a few “son of ...” phrases which are popular in our culture.  “Son of a...” as an independent phrase was popularized by “Tommy Boy.”  Whenever he took a shot to the face, his painful outburst was simply, “OWW, Son of a!”  “Son of a gun” is a tamer version of the more common “SOB” phrase.  Both can be used as a forceful exclamation of frustration, disappointment, or throbbing thumb pain due to a stray swing of the hammer.    On the other hand, “SOB” can also be used as an insult to the highest degree: “You dirty no good SOB!”  When used, the one using it isn’t necessarily saying something about your actual mother as if she were the “b-word”, and you just happen to be her son.  Instead, it is understood that the person is saying something about you yourself.  There is something about your character that another person is calling out. In a biblical context, “Son of ...” statements were rather common.  If you were to do a...

This is probably one of the more divisive sayings of Jesus.  Strict pacifists in particular use verse 39 to suggest that Jesus himself is a strict pacifist who hates war, just or otherwise.  Therefore we should be pacifists too.  After all, we are to “turn the other cheek” when slapped, punched, kicked, mutilated or what have you.  In addition, we are not to “resist the one who is evil.”  That means we do not fight wars, join the police force, or even defend our families from an intruder, regardless of how “evil” the opponent might be.  In my opinion, many avoidable evils have taken place all because a pacifist believer—well intended, no doubt—played the “turn-the-other-cheek” card.   The pacifist / non-pacifist dialogue will inevitably continue until we all nuke ourselves into oblivion (or non-violently protest our way to a blissful utopia).  What I will say here is not likely to put an end to the discussion.  In fact, as I read through...