The Heart of Murder | Matthew 5:17-26

The Sermon on the Mount is too important to rush through because it is the first great body of teaching Jesus gives to His disciples. It is practical, searching, and deeply needed. Christ is not merely giving religious information; He is teaching His people how to live, how to think, and how to be transformed from the inside out. That is why the sermon must be received slowly, repeated often, and pressed into the heart. The focus here is the heart of murder. Jesus teaches that murder does not begin with bloodshed, but in the heart. God does not look merely at outward actions or visible consequences; He sees motives, desires, bitterness, envy, hatred, and anger before they ever become physical acts. This is not a new idea invented in the New Testament. The Old Testament already shows that motive matters, and Scripture often reveals the hatred, envy, and jealousy beneath acts of murder. This strips away false confidence. People often say, “I would never do that,” but they do not know what they would do under the right temptation, pressure, opportunity, or lack of consequence. God sees what a person would do if every restraint were removed. And when people say, “God knows my heart,” they often mean, “God knows I have a good heart.” But Scripture says the opposite: the fallen heart is desperately wicked. The problem is not that man has a good heart and occasionally does bad things; the problem is that man has a bad heart and sometimes does outwardly good things. Jesus therefore goes beneath the surface. He is not content to polish behavior while leaving the inner man untouched. He aims at the root. He wants to transform thoughts, motives, desires, and loves. If the heart were truly changed, the whole community would be changed. The need for courts, police, judges, and swords exists because the heart of man is corrupt. The heart of the issue is the heart of man, and Jesus comes to deal with that heart by exposing sin at its root and calling His people to true inward righteousness. Do you want to support Church of The Word? https://cotwstl.org/give/ Check out our church here! https://cotwstl.org/ #biblestudy #faith