Sermon Tone Analysis

It is once again an honor to stand before you presenting the Word of God.

This is a great privilege and responsibility that has been entrusted to me by the Lord and this church.

Today, we are going to talk about responsibility.

I would guess that most of us are familiar with the concept.

We all have different responsibilities that we are in charge of in this life.

There may be a particular task that you are responsible for getting done at work.

You may be responsible for taking care of your yard or your home.

I recently became responsible for the life of another human through the birth of my son.

We all have responsibilities that we are called to take care of.

When you think about it, responsibilities are just aspects of, what’s one of my favorite words, stewardship.

We are going to talk about stewardship a lot tonight as we walk through that section of the Baptist Faith and Message, so I wont linger here too long.

But Stewardship, at its core, is taking care of or managing something that has been entrusted to you.

When we talk about stewardship most of the time people think about how we are stewarding our money, that is how we are spending, saving, investing, and giving.

That is a part of stewardship, but it really expands to every facet of our lives.

When we understand that we were created by God, we understand that the life He has given us is a gift.

Last week we said, “the ultimate point of anything in this life is to give God the glory.”

So if God has given us life, which He has, and the ultimate point of anything in it is to give Him glory, then we are called to steward this gift, manage our lives, with the intention of maximizing the glory given to God.

We do that by living out Colossians 3:17 which says, “In whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him.”

That is a very big statement.

“In whatever you do.”

That is because each of us are going to have different things asked of us, different responsibilities that we are going to have to manage in such a way that gives God the glory.

It would be impossible for me to stand here and give everyone listening this morning the exact way to live out your specific life, job, familial situation, and responsibilities for the glory of God.

However, this morning, as we continue to walk through the Greatest Sermon Ever Given, Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, the King of kings is going to show us two responsibilities that everyone has.

Understanding the proper stewardship of these two responsibilities will have drastic implications on everything else you do in your life.

So, with that in mind, would you please turn to Matthew chapter 7, today we are going to look at verses 12-14.

As stated earlier, this comes from Jesus’ Sermon on the mount in which He is teaching His disciples and a large crowd gathers around.

He is teaching about what true righteousness is.

Jesus is indirectly denouncing the religious elites of the day for the hypocrisy of their beliefs.

They Had the appearance of being righteous, that means it looked like they had it all together, but on the inside they had no real love for God.

They were much more worried about serving themselves than serving God.

So over the last few weeks we have seen how Jesus denounced the self-righteous, hypocritical judgment that would come from Pharisees.

He tells His followers to use discernment when discussing what is Holy so that the name of the Lord will not be profaned.

And last week, we saw how Jesus explains the good gifts God the Father gives to His children.

Then we come to where we are going to begin this morning.

Read with me verse 12.

The first responsibility that Jesus is pointing out in this sermon is to

Treat others as you would want to be treated.

We all have the responsibility to treat others in ways by which we would wish to be treated.

This is known as the golden rule and I would venture to say that most of us are familiar with this in some way.

At first glance, you may not think that this is a very revolutionary statement.

We’ve all heard the golden rule.

In fact, the golden rule, in some form, is found in many cultures, even predating Jesus’ use of it here in this sermon.

Just about every religion or philosophy has a version of the Golden Rule.

Here are a few:

The Philosopher Isocrates said, “Do not do to others that which angers you when they do it to you.”

Hindus say: “One should never do that to another which one regards as injurious to one’s own self.”

Buddhists say: “Hurt not others in ways that you yourself would find hurtful.”

Confuscists say: What you do not wish for yourself, do not do to others."

Zoroastrians say: Do not do unto others whatever is injurious to yourself.

Wiccan teach that the Mother Goddess says: “I command thee thus, O children of the Earth, that that which ye deem harmful unto thyself, the very same shall ye be forbidden from doing unto another.”

Even the Jewish religious leader Hillel, who predated Jesus, taught: “What is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow.”

So then, if this thought has been shared by so many different religions and philosophies spanning across time and region in human existence, what makes it such a big deal when Jesus gives the golden rule?

Before we get to the qualitative difference in Jesus’ command, I think it is important to note that the existence of this rule in so many cultures is actually an apologetic, that is a defense, for the existence of the One True God professed in Scripture.

Way back in Genesis, we are told that the mankind was made in the image of God, in Latin, the imago dei.

What being made in the image of God really means is that humans are moral creatures who are accountable to God.

We have the ability to understand moral implications.

It is written into the very nature of humanity and our morals are reflective of being created in the image of a Just and righteous God.

Though we are fallen and often fall so short of the glory of God, humans understand moral standards at a basic level.

The fact that so many religions, religions that deny the One True God of Scripture, come to a similar teaching in regards to the golden rule does not mean that Christ is copying this idea, but rather that being made in the image of God, fallen creatures still understand the basic principle of not harming others in ways that they would not like to harmed themselves.

But there are qualitative differences to the teaching that Jesus gives in the Sermon on the mount and the general revelation spread by other religions and philosophies.

One pastor likened it to harpsichord.

The Harpsichord was arguably the most important musical of the 16th century.

When the keys of the harpsichord are pressed a corresponding string is plucked.

In that way it’s similar to a guitar that would be mechanically plucked.

“But the tone made in that way is not pure, and the mechanism is relatively slow and limiting.

Sometime during the last quarter of the 18th century, during Beethoven’s lifetime, an unknown musician modified the harpsichord so that the keys activated hammers that struck, rather than plucked, the strings.

With that minor change, a major improvement was made that would henceforth radically enhance the entire musical world, giving grandeur and breadth never before known.”

In a similar way, that is what Jesus has done to the general revelation of the golden rule.

He has made the general, special and breathed life into this moral philosophy.

Let’s take note of what Jesus has taught here versus what I shared from those other religions.

First, remember that all of the other examples I shared are written in the negative.

That is, “do not do to others what you wouldn’t want them to do to you.”

Jesus says “whatever you wish others would do to you, do to them.”

The change from a negative command to a positive makes a world of difference to what is being said.

“Do not do to others what you wouldn’t want done to you” teaches an apathetic civility.

Sure, by following such a rule you would not be a negative force in someone else’s life, but it most definitely would not be a calling to be any force for good.

The focus is on the self!

“The motivation is basically selfish—refraining from harming others in order that they will not harm us.”

Instead, Jesus teaches selfless love.

Do unto others not how you expect them to treat you but by how you would want or wish for them to treat you.

Even if there actions have shown they wouldn’t reciprocate such a treatment, Jesus says to treat others as you would wish to be treated.

Sinful man could only make it do not harm, Jesus says do good unto others.

On that line of thought there is another qualitative difference in Jesus’ Golden Rule to that of other religions.

Is comes from that one little word in the beginning of the verse, “so.”

In most other translations you’ll see the word, “Therefore”.

If you’ve studied Scripture before you may have heard the old saying, “Whenever you see a therefore, stop and ask what’s it there for?”

This therefore ties Jesus’ thought to what He was talking about just before this, the verses we looked at last week.

In those verses you will see Jesus explaining that God the Father knows how to give His children very good gifts.

He is not deceitful to His children.

He gives the good and beneficial gifts when His children ask of Him.

So Jesus is saying here in verse 12. “SO/THEREFORE, because God gives good gifts to His children when they ask, In response to the grace and blessings you receive from Him, treat others well.

Go out of your way to treat them how you would wish to be treated, how God the Father treats you!”

I’ve heard it said many times that Christians ought to be the most generous people on the planet.

Why? 1.

Because they’ve received a bigger gift than anyone could ever comprehend.

And 2. Because they know they are storing treasures in heaven not the here and now.

When we understand that God the Father is so good to us, we are enabled to do good to others.

Before we move on to the next two verses, I want to point out one more qualitative difference to Jesus' Golden Rule.

Jesus says

“For this is the Law and the Prophets.”