One passage in the New Testament book of Matthew that confused me for a long time was the passage in which Jesus says that he did not come to abolish the law, but to fulfill it (5:17). How, I wondered, does that mesh with Paul's teaching about it being faith, and not keeping the law, that results in salvation (Rom. 3:27-28, Rom. 4:13-15, Gal. 5:4, etc.)?
I thought maybe "fulfill" was a round-about way of saying "abolish," but Jesus goes on to say that "until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen" will disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished." Heaven and earth haven't disappeared, and while it is not entirely clear to me what the "everything" is that Jesus is referring to, it seems pretty clear that it involves wrapping up heaven and earth, and they haven't been wrapped up. Plus, Jesus warns that the person who breaks the commandments and teaches others to break them will be the "least in the kingdom of heaven." And finally, in verse 5:20 he adds that "unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven."
I think my discouraged reaction is probably the same reaction as those who heard Jesus say this the first time: "I can't do that! Those Pharisees are fanatics. They spend every living moment following this huge laundry list of rules." But then, as these people listened to Jesus, I think a lot of them said, "Ahhh! I see what you mean."
Okay, so what does Jesus mean?
I believe he means that the Pharisees were on the wrong track; that obeying the law is not a matter of obeying a complex tangle of rules, but it is a matter of the heart; it is a matter of looking through the outward rules to the real intent of the law, which is love and faith. I think it is this tangle of outward legalisms that Paul objected to when he rejected the law; he certainly did not reject faith and love (1 Cor. 13).
So let me try to defend this view.
I found three places in Matthew where Jesus sums up the law:
1. In his conclusion to the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says, "In everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets" (7:12).
2. In 22:23 Jesus says the most important parts of the law are to exercise justice, mercy and faithfulness.
3. And his grand summation, "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments" (22:37-40).
So, the first two of these examples strongly imply love, and the third example makes it explicit. The law is to love and love is from the heart. So, to outdo the Pharisees in obeying the law, love God and love people from deep in your heart.
When I understood that, it made a lot of Jesus' teaching in Matthew a lot clearer.
Some examples:
- Jesus looks below the surface of the law against murder, to the heart, and condemns anger and hatred (5:21).
- It isn't just the physical act of adultery; looking at a woman lustfully is a violation of the law against adultery. Again, Jesus looks at the heart.
- Give to the poor secretly (6:1-4) and pray to God secretly (6:6) and fast secretly (6:17-18). Jesus is saying not to make a show of doing these things because what is important is the attitude of your heart.
- Jesus profusely praises the centurion for his faith (8:10) and later that of the Canaanite woman (15:21-28). Again, Jesus focuses on what is in the centurion's and Canaanite woman's hearts.
- When Jesus "worked" on the Sabbath by healing a man with a shriveled hand (12:9-13) he was obeying the true meaning of the Sabbath, which was instituted in love by God as a day of rest and recovery. Jesus brought recovery to the man with the shriveled hand.
- In the parable of the workers in the vineyard (20:1-16) Jesus seems to be saying that the amount of work the workers did is not the key thing; the key thing was a matter of the heart, that the workers were willing to work for the landowner.
- Jesus condemns the chief priests and elders (21:23, 23:32) because they did not believe; again, a matter of the heart.
- When Jesus tells the rich young man (19:21) to give away all he has, this instruction is not in the Old Testament and Jesus isn't making a general rule that the rich can't enter heaven (in fact he says the rich entering heaven is possible with God - 19:25-26), but he tells the rich man this in order to take him down to his heart; to show him that he values his riches more than God.
- In the parable of the different kinds of soils (13:3-23), the seed in the rocky soil does not sink its roots down to the nourishing soil, the heart. The man represented by the rocky soil had some sort of a joyful experience, but it was a superficial experience, not the same as faith rooted in the heart.
- Similarly, in the parable of the ten virgins (25:1-13), I think the five virgins who did not have enough oil for their lamps represent those whose faith is inadequate because it does not reach down to a reservoir of faith in their hearts; it is just a fluffy surface experience. If the oil does indeed represent faith, that would explain why the wise virgins could not lend them oil - because you can only have enough faith to save yourself; other people can't borrow your faith to save themselves - they need their own.
I could cite other examples, but to sum up, let me quote Jesus' defense of his disciples, who ate with unwashed hands. Jesus said that it isn't what goes into your mouth that makes you unclean; it's the things that come out of the mouth, because ..."the things that come out of the mouth come from the heart, and these make a man 'unclean.' For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. These are what make a man 'unclean'." (15:18-20)
For Jesus, it is what is in your heart that counts.
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