![]() ![]() Remember, we read this previously in one of the other “You have heard that I say to you” statements where Jesus said, “You have heard it was said love your neighbor but hate your enemy. If you can give a person an opportunity to do twice the damage, twice the offense because it’s a small offense, it’s no big deal, that’s the kind of people God doesn’t want us to resist. This is how we can tell who God wants us to resist and who he doesn’t want us to resist. It becomes so clear because the three examples that he gives of what he means … Notice he never says, “So, for example, if somebody wants to rape your wife, give him your daughter also.” Nah, nah. He’s correcting the false teaching of the scribes and Pharisees. But what about Jesus saying, “An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, but I say to you don’t resist an evil person?” He’s not correcting himself. What’s changed under the New Covenant as far as how judges are supposed to be judging? Nothing has changed of course because God hasn’t changed. Sure, a lot of things that God said deserve very severe punishments under the Old Covenant law, nobody even hardly blinks at or winks at today, but nevertheless that’s how God feels about certain things. If you want to know what they deserve, you look under the Old Covenant, the Law of Moses and you can see what God consider to be the more serious crimes and what are the things he consider to be less serious crimes because there’s more severe punishments and there’s less severe punishments. Meeting out fair sentences, giving people what they deserve. He wants every judge to act with justice and righteousness. ![]() Under the New Covenant, God wants judges, Christian, non-Christian, Buddhist, Hindu, atheist, doesn’t make a difference. Our court system really has a lot of foundation within the Law of Moses because it’s righteous. He’s the one that set up the court system in Israel. We set you free and we hope you don’t do it again.” That’s what God wants? Are you out of your mind? You have to be out of your mind to think that because God is a God of justice and righteousness, and he’s the one that set up this law. Now, do you think that under the New Covenant that that changed? That God doesn’t want judges under the New Covenant to exact justice and fairness and righteousness and that if there’s a malicious witness, someone who commits perjury that judges should not resist those evil people and say, “Oh, that’s okay. In this case, a case where someone has falsely accused another person, and so you’re going to do unto him as he wanted it to be done unto the person whom he falsely accused. See, are these instructions to everyone in Israel? In a sense, they are, but you can see obviously this is from the context of a court case. “Thus you shall show no pity, life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot.” “And will never again do such an evil thing among you.” Now, listen. “The rest will hear and be afraid.” This is a deterrent to other people who might be considering falsely accusing someone. “Thus, you shall purge the evil from among you.” Verse number 20 of Deuteronomy 19. Verse number 18 of Deuteronomy 19, “The judges shall investigate everything thoroughly, and if the witness is a false witness,” so he’s committed perjury, “and he has accused his brother falsely, then you shall do to him just as he intended to do to his brother.” Ooh. Get the judges and the Lord will be there.” We’re talking about the context of someone accusing someone, actually falsely accusing someone of doing something they really didn’t do. This is from Deuteronomy chapter 19 and verse number 16, God said or we can say Jesus said, “If a malicious witness rises up against a man to accuse him of wrongdoing, then both the men, who have the dispute, shall stand before the Lord, before the priests and the judges who will be in office in those days.” You get this. I’m going to read to you a verse that absolutely proves that, that I’ve been intending to read to you but neglected to in the last two Little Lessons. It was a commandment only given to the judges in Israel. It’s the one where Jesus said, “You have heard it was said, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.” I try to point out that that was not a commandment given to the people of Israel in general. We’re looking at the fifth out of the six. We’ve been looking at Matthew chapter five, Jesus’s “You have heard but I say to you statements.” There are six of them. In one sense, nothing has changed in regard to God’s Old Testament commandment: an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.
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