Be Perfect

[00:00:00] I greet you this morning in the name of our wonderful Savior, Jesus Christ. And it's a real privilege to be with you again. I was afraid maybe I was going to get referred to as a visiting minister this morning. And it seems like I've been gone a lot here the last while. As a matter of fact, I preached the first Sunday, I think, in January. And I don't think I've preached Sunday morning since then. And so it seems like there's been a lot going on and other things taking place and so on. So it really is good to be here and to be able to share together from the Word of God. [00:00:45] I'd like for us to take our Bibles and turn to Matthew chapter 5 in case you've forgotten I've been preaching on the commands of Christ and that's been going on I think now for at least two years or a little more and I've just appreciated over and over again the things that Jesus has commanded us and taught us and how important it is for us to be able to take them and obey them. [00:01:19] I look at these commands as not, he didn't give them to us as options, he didn't give them to us as suggestions, he gave them to us as do this. Now he also, in telling us to do it, he also gave us the power to do it. And he gave us his Holy Spirit to give us the strength in order to do it. But they are the commands that he gives to us. Now, Matthew 5, I want to read verses 46 to 48. [00:01:55] Matthew 5, 46 to 48. For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? Do not even the publicans the same? And if he salutes your brethren only, what do ye more than others? Do not even the publicans so? Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father, which is in heaven, is perfect. [00:02:27] Now the command here is to be perfect. And I don't know if your reaction is the same as mine when I read that. But my reaction is, when I see that command to be perfect, is, Lord, I can't do it. I know I haven't been, and it's very likely that I won't be always in the future. But He still commands it, doesn't He? He tells us to be perfect. [00:02:59] Perfect. And I don't believe that the Lord just gives us some useless commands. I don't think he tells us to do things just for the fun of telling us. And I don't think he tells us to do things that we're not capable of doing. Now, I know, we say, well, we're just incapable of being perfect. But I believe that that is a goal that every one of us should have. And if we lose sight of that goal, then I think we're in trouble, and we have some serious problems in our lives. [00:03:37] So let's just not write it off. Let's not say, well, I can't be perfect, so I'm not even going to try. But I believe with the Lord's help, we can do what He wants us to do. Now, first of all, what is the standard of being perfect? If something is going to be perfect, there has to be a standard. One of the things that's important in our society is that there are certain standards. [00:04:07] You go to Washington, D.C., and they have standards of measurement. They have something there that weighs exactly one pound or one ounce or whatever the unit of measurement is. There has to be something there that is exactly perfect. This is the standard that you go by. And the same way here when it tells us to be perfect. There's a standard that tells us to compare ourselves with. [00:04:40] And of course that standard is God himself. Be ye perfect, even as your Father, which is in heaven, is perfect. And we want to look at some verses that tell us that, but it's so important that we take the right standard. All of us have a tendency to take and look at somebody else and kind of make that our standard. Some church or some individual and say, there is a standard that we go by. [00:05:10] But we always fall short on that. Go over to Deuteronomy 32. Deuteronomy 32, verses 3 and 4. He says, Because I will publish the name of the Lord, ascribe ye greatness unto our God. He is the rock. His work is what? Perfect. His work is perfect. [00:05:47] For all His ways are judgment, a God of truth and without iniquity, just and right is He. So, we see God as being perfect. If you go over to Genesis 1.31, we won't turn to that, we're familiar with that verse, But after God gets done with the creation, it said he looks at it and it was very good. I think the idea there was it was perfect. This verse we just read said all his works are perfect. [00:06:22] And so we have that the creation was very good. It was perfect, of course, until sin came upon the scene. In Psalm 19, verse 7, it says the law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul. So God's law, God's word is perfect. It's perfection. Go over to Ecclesiastes 3. And Ecclesiastes 3, verse 14. [00:06:57] Interesting verse here. Ecclesiastes 3, verse 14 He says, I know that whatsoever God doeth, it shall be forever. Nothing can be put to it, nor anything taken from it. And God doeth it that man should fear before him. Now again, we see a picture of God's perfection. [00:07:31] He says, you can't take anything from it, you can't add anything to it. His work and He Himself is perfect. And so that is the standard that we need to go by when we talk about perfection in our own life. Now I had to stop and think a little bit about that. But, aren't we glad, aren't we glad we serve a Father that is perfect? And you know, that perfection, and here again I'm not getting into a lot of this this morning, but that perfection includes the perfection of His judgment, but it also includes the perfection of His mercy in our lives. [00:08:16] And just think about in comparison to serving another father. Because Satan also can be a father. And Jesus referred to that. He even said to some, he said, you serve your father as Satan. And just think of the tremendous difference between serving our father in heaven or Satan. Now what a comparison, what a complete opposite that that is. [00:08:53] There's four people in the Bible that God calls perfect. Now, I didn't call them perfect, you didn't say that they were perfect, but God himself called these four different men perfect. Go over to Genesis chapter 6, verse 9. And here we have Noah, as we are introduced to Noah, and it says, and these are the generations of Noah. Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God. [00:09:35] Now, it gets you an idea a little bit about what kind of person that Noah was. Now, does that mean Noah never sinned? No. I'm sure he sinned. All have sinned and come short of the glory of God. And we know that later on in Noah's life, he had a problem. But God still at this point called him perfect. And I think we'll see a little bit later what some of that is. We also see in Job chapter 1. The book of Job is just before the book of Psalms. [00:10:06] And there in Job chapter 1 verse 1 it says, There was a man in the land of Uz whose name was Job. And that man was perfect and upright, and one that feared God and ensued or hated evil in his life and in the lives of others, I think, too. But he was a person that was perfect. God called him that. We have over in 1 Kings 11 verse 4, we have David as being referred to as perfect. [00:10:45] Now in this it talks about Solomon and it compares Solomon and David. But 1 Kings 11, verse 4 You have, For it came to pass when Solomon was old that his wives turned away his heart after other gods and his heart was not perfect with the Lord his God as was the heart of David his father. [00:11:16] Now, he doesn't say directly that David was perfect but he compared him with Solomon there and he says David's heart was perfect not like Solomon's that was imperfect before God. And then the last one here is one that's not as well known as Noah and Job and David but over in 1 Kings 15 and this one here was a little bit hard for me to understand. [00:11:49] 1 Kings 15 verse 14 And this is the King Asa And it says that But the high places were not removed He's talking here about King Asa and some of the things he did Nevertheless, Asa's heart was perfect with the Lord all his days Now, you read on in that It doesn't take you just a few verses down and you start seeing where Asa had some serious problems in his life. [00:12:20] But evidently he's talking to up to this time here that Asa was, God declared him perfect before him. And so we have that, those four men that I think I couldn't think of any others or find any others, but those four men God referred to as being perfect. Now, as I studied this about being perfect, I realized that, and Lord willing, we want to look at some other messages on this, but there's other things that we are commanded to be perfect in. [00:13:15] Now we get over into some other passages, and you're going to have being perfect in holiness. Children of Israel were commanded to be holy as I am holy, as God is holy. Over in Matthew it talks about that he commanded one young man, he said, Go and sell all that you have so that you could be perfect. We have over in Ephesians 4, it talks about the leaders, the church leaders, their job is to bring the people to perfection and so on. [00:13:56] So those are some other areas where it talks about being perfect and Lord willing down the road we'll look at some of those. But I want to think a little bit before we get into this area of being perfect in love. I'd like to think a little bit about what it means to be perfect or perfection in Christ. I think we need to first of all lay that foundation. Because all of us realize that when it comes to being perfect, that none of us are. [00:14:28] And we all have failures and we all have sins that overtake our lives and hinder us. But there is a sinless perfection, and I want to be careful with that term, but there is a sinless perfection that is necessary for us if we're going to enter heaven. And that's a sinless perfection that can only come through our Lord Jesus Christ. [00:15:00] I want to talk about that just for a little bit. Go over to James chapter 2, James chapter 2, verse 23. He says, And the scripture was fulfilled, which saith, Abraham believed God, and it was imputed unto him for righteousness, and he was called the friend of God. [00:15:34] Now, that word there is kind of a word we don't use very often, that word imputed. And it's where that, through faith, righteousness is imputed to us. Or, I think a better translation of that word is found over in the book of Genesis. And let's go back there, and really he's referring to Abraham here. [00:16:04] And I think it's a word that helps us to understand it a little bit better. Go to Genesis 15, and we're going to read the first six verses. Now Abraham is looked to as the, you might say, the father of faith. He's the one that is oftentimes in the scripture is referred to as a man of faith. And we'll see why here. [00:16:37] Genesis 15 verse 1 After these things the word of the Lord came unto Abram in a vision, saying, Turn out, Abram, I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward. And Abram said, Lord God, what wilt thou give me, seeing I go childless, and the steward of my house is this Eliezer of Damascus? And Abram said, Behold to me thou hast given no seed, no children, and lo, one born in my house is mine heir. And behold, the word of the Lord came unto him, saying, This shall not be thine heir, but he that shall come forth out of thine own bowels shall be thine heir. [00:17:19] And he brought him forth abroad and said, Look now toward heaven, and tell the stars, If thou be able to number them, and he said unto him, So shall thy seed be. And then verse 6 is a real key, and it's a real foundation, really, to our Christian life. And it says, and he believed in the Lord. Abraham believed in the Lord. He believed what God told him here. [00:17:56] He believed that when God told him, Abraham, you don't have any children right now. And he was over 90 years old, past the time that normally would be able to have any children. But he says, Abraham, you're going to have, this promise that I give to you is going to come from you. It'll come from Sarah. And he said, your seed is going to be like the sand of the seashore. Boy, now that, to believe that took some real faith, didn't it? [00:18:29] But it says, Abraham believed God. And what was the result of that? God countered it to him for righteousness. That's what you call imputed righteousness. And it was counted to him because he believed God. Not because Abraham was sinless, but because he believed God. [00:19:00] He countered it to him for righteousness. Now, let's carry that on a little bit farther. And over in John chapter 3, you have Jesus there, and talking to Nicodemus, you have him referring to something that happened in the wilderness. He said, as a serpent was lifted up in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up. Now, let's go over to Numbers chapter 21. [00:19:33] Now I realize some of this is just very basic, but I think it's good that we cover some of the basic things, especially for young people and children and so on, to realize these. Numbers 21. This is an account that happened in the children of Israel. Numbers 21, verse 6. And the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people, and much people of Israel died. [00:20:10] And therefore the people came to Moses and said, We have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord and against thee. Pray unto the Lord that he take away the serpents from us. And Moses prayed for the people. The Lord said unto Moses, Make thee a fiery serpent, and set it upon a pole, and it shall come to pass that every one that is bitten, when he looketh upon it, shall live. And so you have this illustration of something that happened many years before. [00:20:47] Jesus refers to it now in talking to Nicodemus. And those people that were bitten of those serpents, if they would just have enough faith And we find out later that it was a brazen, it was a serpent made out of brass put up on a pole And I think it was something they put up fairly high so people could see it But if people would have just enough faith that they would gaze on that serpent, they would be healed [00:21:19] Now Jesus says this is likewise with him. And he goes on then right after that and he gives that great verse in John 3.16 that we all know so well and is so basic and so important to us that For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth on him, whoever gazes upon him, Whoever puts his faith and trust and confidence in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. [00:21:55] Isn't that wonderful? That by putting our faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, he then can turn around and he can count that for righteousness for us. That's what makes us righteous before God. And that's just that whole area of being declared righteousness, righteous before Him. [00:22:28] Now, sometimes people take that whole concept to extremes. And people will sometimes say, well, since I have been declared righteous before God, And it's only because of my faith in Christ that no matter what I do from here on out, I'm saved. And I don't believe that's what Jesus intended at all in this. I see that whole area of imputed righteousness and being declared righteous through our Lord Jesus Christ, [00:23:05] I see that as our foundation. That's our foundation. But we need to build upon that foundation. And we need to continue on growing and building and doing the works and obeying the commands that Jesus has given to us. But it's always on that foundation of being declared righteous through our Lord Jesus Christ. [00:23:36] And that's why we say salvation is free. Salvation is through our Lord. And it's through faith in Him. But that's our foundation. And we need to continue to build upon that foundation. And we can only do that because of the power of the Holy Spirit in us. Now, let's go back over to that kind of foundation then. Let's go over to Matthew chapter 5 and look at what he's teaching here to us. [00:24:15] These verses that we read in the beginning, verses 46 to 48, we really need to take in context with the few verses before that. And we've preached on these verses and these commands of Christ already, but I'm just going to read those first 43 to 45. He says, [00:25:01] Now, he talks here about doing these things. He says that ye may be, or you may represent, your father. You can be the children of your father. You know, I always find it interesting, and I think we all do this, and that is if you get into some place where you haven't been for a while [00:25:33] or meet people you know their families and so on you can pretty well or often times pick out which family they belong to, can't you? You look at them and you say, oh I can tell which family my wife did that just yesterday with a lady when we were doing a viewing and she looked at the lady and said, I know which family you're from and we do that because they resemble that family And I think that's the same way when God is our Father, we are going to resemble Him. [00:26:08] We are going to be like Him. We're going to do the kind of things that God does. Because He's our Father. And those traits just come right down and we do them. So, God is setting the example here. He said, as his father, I want to tell you what God does. The way that he treats his enemies. Because he's telling us, love your enemies, do good to them, and so on. [00:26:41] But God is not going to tell us to do something that he's not willing to do himself. Just look at how God treats his enemies, he's saying. He said he makes the sun come up on all his enemies. When the sun comes up in the morning and shines, it shines over everybody, doesn't it? Do you ever think about that as being the mercy of God? You know, if God was like I am sometimes, I would say, you know, there's some neighbors over there, people over there that just don't shine over on his ground, you know. [00:27:21] And also the rain. The rain comes and we like to kind of joke sometimes that if you'd have paid the preacher more, you'd have got rain. But that's not the way it works. God sends rain on the just and the unjust. And that's his mercy. That's his love. But he uses this here as an illustration, Jesus does, is this is the way that we are to operate. [00:27:56] This is the way we are to treat our enemies. But now he goes one step further and applies it some more here in these last three verses. And he says now, he said, if you just love those that love you, he says, what different, he uses the publicans here for example, but that term publicans there, it's just, it's a term for the ungodly. [00:28:28] He said, if we just love those that love us, he says, how are we any different than the ungodly? Do the ungodly love each other? Sure. Sure they do. Do people that are out, thieves and robbers and people that set up the local bar and all that kind of thing, they love each other? Sure. They show love to each other. And Jesus is saying, if that's all we do, if that's all we do, what's so great about that? [00:29:11] Now, Jesus isn't telling us that we don't love our friends, we don't love our relatives and families and our church family and so on. He's not telling us that at all, that we don't love them. But he is telling us that our love needs to go further than that. Those are people that are easy to love. Well, usually. We can even get into some of those. Sometimes aren't always the easiest, can't we? But, you know, if we only love those that just respond in love to us, [00:29:47] we can't expect anything. We can't expect the Lord to say, hey, you're doing a good job with your love. But he wants us to become perfect in love. Now, this thing of saluting, as I understand, they had quite a custom back then, a little different than what it is today. But they had this thing there of when they met someone, perhaps they hadn't met them for a while or so on, they had this thing of saluting them. [00:30:25] It was kind of an elaborate ceremony that they went through, took some time and so on, of greeting this person. Remember when Jesus sent out some of those, sent them out to go to different places? He said, when you go, don't salute people as you go. In other words, don't waste a lot of time in doing that. But this thing of saluting seems to be, it showed that you counted that person a person of worth. [00:30:59] And you really paid attention to that person. We all like to be paid attention to, don't we? And so you paid attention to that person. You spoke to them, you greeted them, and made them feel good, I guess. But, he says, don't do that just to those that will do that back to you. Do that to those that can't return. [00:31:33] Go to Luke chapter 14. Jesus gives another illustration here and he uses it concerning a supper. In Luke chapter 14 verse 12 The poor, the maimed, the lame, and the blind. And thou shalt be blessed, for they cannot recompense thee, for thou shalt be recompensed at the resurrection of the just. [00:32:15] And I believe that's what Jesus is saying over here in Matthew chapter 5. That is, when we love those, and when we greet those, and when we do good to those that can't return it, then the Lord is going to do the rewarding for that. He's the one that is going to take care of those rewards. And we can trust him for that, to do that. [00:32:47] I think there's a lot of ways we can apply this, isn't there? I think there's, you know, I appreciate, and I think we all appreciate, the love that's shown and the care that's shown for one another. And that's important that we do that. But I think we also have to realize that sometimes we need to reach out to those that aren't so lovely. Those that perhaps won't return the love that we show them. [00:33:18] Have you ever had the experience of doing something for someone and it seemed like they didn't really respond very well? They didn't really say thank you or, you know. We don't like that. We'd like to have some recognition, you know, of what we did. But Jesus said, don't worry about that. Just love them that can't always repay the love that we give to them. [00:33:52] And also I think it's important to greet people. You know, we're most comfortable with the people we know. And I know even in church here, it's easy to just kind of become comfortable with certain people. We know them and we get along well with them and so on. And sometimes others that, well, we don't know them, we're a little bit hesitant to talk to them and that type of thing. And I just like to challenge us that reach out to those that we're not used to reaching out to. [00:34:30] And show love and care and concern for their lives. Because I believe that God will reward a person for that. And I believe we'll be obeying the command that Jesus gave to us. If we just love those that we're comfortable with, just love those that we know love us, we're really no different. That's not a mark that we're really any different than what the ungodly are. [00:35:06] But it's when we reach out and love those that are unlovely, or just reach out and love those that we don't know, and that we're not comfortable with, then I believe the Lord is going to reward us for that. Do we want to be perfect? If we want to just stay in our own little comfortable group and just be with people that we know, we're not going to be perfect. [00:35:38] The Lord says in order to be perfect, we need to do what he says here. And loving those that can't return the love to us. I just really take that as a real challenge. Be perfect, even as your Father, which is in heaven, is perfect. Lord bless you. Let's stand for closing prayer. By the way, everyone is invited for fellowship dinner. Dinner should be ready right after the service. [00:36:09] And everyone is welcome to stay. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we come to you today in the name of our Lord Jesus, thanking you, Lord. Lord, thanking you for your perfection. And thanking you, Lord, that you are the standard of perfection. And Lord, I confess this morning, I don't always meet that. Lord, I just pray that you would help me and every one of us that we can desire to really be like you and to have a heart that is like yours. [00:36:46] Father, work in our lives today. I just pray, Father, that you would help us to take seriously this command that you have given to us. And Lord, that this command would be one that we can really put into practice. Thank you, Lord. Dismiss us now with your blessing. And Father, we thank you for the meal that's been prepared. We ask your blessing upon it. And Lord, bless those that have prepared it. [00:37:17] and the strength that we get from it, Lord, help us to use it for your glory, for your honor. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.