Best. Sermon. Ever.: Will The Real Murderer Please Stand Up

Good morning, Christ the King. As James just said, my name is Reverend Christopher Cooper and I am the campus minister at North Carolina Central University in Durham, North Carolina and I am super excited about being here with my Christ the King family. I always feel welcome. I always feel love and y'all just have a good time. So I have a good time with y'all. I feel like it's a great connection in that.

But as we get into our sermon today, first and foremost, I just want to give you the rundown on what's going to happen. We're going to say the scripture together. Then after that, I'm going to pray and then we're going to dig deep in the scripture. Amen? So let us stand and let us read the word of God together found in Saint Matthew's fifth chapter starting at the twenty-first verse.

You have heard that it was said to those of old, "You shall not murder." And whoever murders will be liable to judgment. But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment. Whoever insults his brother will be liable to the council, and whoever says, "You fool," will be liable to the hell of fire.

So if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go. First, be reconciled to your brother and then come and offer your gift. Come to terms quickly with your accuser while you are going with him to court. Lest your accuser hand you over to the judge and the judge to the guard and you be put in prison. Truly, I say to you, you will never get out until you have paid the last penny. — Matthew 5:21-26

Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. — Matthew 4:4

You shall be seated. Let's pray.

Father God, Father God, I come to you as humbly as I know how, grateful, grateful for the opportunity to fellowship with the brethren and the sisters in today, worshiping your holy name, Father God, and bringing our hearts bowed down before you. Holy Spirit, Holy Spirit, do the work, man, that you are designed to do. Lead us and guide us into all truth because sometimes we get distracted by all of the information that comes our way. Be a light unto our pathway and a lamp unto our feet, Father, because walking this world can be dark and lonely, Father God, and we just need you to guide us.

Holy Spirit, soften the hearts of men so that the word of God, which is a seed, may be firmly rooted in our hearts so that we may be firmly rooted in you, producing a tree not of our glory, Father God, our fruitfulness, but of your glory and your fruitfulness. Put Chris Cooper behind the cross and let your glory show forth. We need you more and more, Jesus. In Jesus's name, I pray. Amen.

The Rising Tide of Anger in Our World

As we get started with the sermon, I just want to read something off to you that was interesting to me in regards to Jesus here talking about anger. As I was reading and doing research on 07/31/2021, a person named Jack Kelly wrote an article on something called the Global Emotion Survey. This is a national global survey where they go out and test certain people and survey them and ask them certain questions, and from there they come upon certain statistics.

Jack Kelly stated: the world is getting sadder, angrier, and worried. From this survey, they came to realize that one in four people feel angry. Twenty-four percent of the nations feel angrier. That is a rise from ten to fifteen percent from the last time that they took the survey before. I don't know about you, but as I look to the world today, I kind of can agree with the statistics that are given in this particular survey.

With all of the stressors that are happening in our lives, all of the changes that have happened within the last five years, all of the things that seem to cause us anguish and to cause us pain, to get on our nerves, to frustrate us—it seems like it's all coming into a tornado of things, a national disaster, and it's making us feel a little bit more angrier. As you look on the news, as you listen to certain media, whether it's podcasts talking about things that are happening in the world, whether it's whatever news channel you choose to view, and as we listen to the radio, there seems to be more and more people angry.

The question is: what do you do with your anger? How do you let the grace of God and the love of God deal with the times where you feel like you just want to let your anger flow? How is God sifting through your heart and dealing with you when your frustrations are building, when things are causing you to lash out because you are so angry about what's going on in the world? And if you're not allowing him to deal with that, how is sin utilizing you to actually kill people?

And what I mean by kill people is not that you're going out there physically murdering somebody, but within your anger, you are not bringing life, but you are bringing hopelessness and carelessness. You are bringing what we would like to call death.

As we look at the twenty-first verse, Jesus is talking to the crowd, to those sitting on the hill. He goes on to say:

You have heard that it was said to those of old, "You shall not murder," and whoever murders will be liable to judgment. — Matthew 5:21

He is referring to the Old Testament here, right in Exodus 21:12:

Whoever strikes a man so that he dies shall be put to death.

He is letting us know that yes, there may be a point of view that goes through the scope of evidence. As the lawyers give the case, we come to the conclusion that judgment must happen. They must pay for the penalty of murder. And in this case, this is what Jesus is talking about because the same process happened during that time in the Old Testament. People combed through the evidence and they made a decision with the wisdom of God to say judgment must be paid for physically murdering somebody.

The Pharisees' Corruption

The crazy thing is that during this time period, they had something called the Pharisees or the Sadducees. A lot of times they were very gifted and knowledgeable in the Bible, in the text. And at this time, he was talking to individuals on the Sermon on the Mount who were poor, who were not well off, who may not have had the same knowledge as them. Many times they listened to the Pharisees to get what they needed from the text.

And at this very moment, the Pharisees, a lot of them were corrupted. A lot of them were teaching from the Bible for personal gain. They were telling the poor, the uneducated, certain things. They were saying things like, as long as you haven't murdered somebody, it's okay to do these things. They were utilizing the Old Testament to say that, "Hey, man. Guess what? You haven't murdered nobody. You can bring this gift to me and I can give it to the Father, but what's really going on in your heart doesn't really matter. You can be angry, you can be frustrated. Right? You can have those things in your heart that are against the holy God, but as long as you haven't murdered somebody, you are fine."

Now, I don't know about you, but we live in a society today where that happens a lot. Right? We get in arguments with people. We tell them off in our anger. Right? But I didn't physically hit you. I didn't physically attack you. Yet we hurt them through our words. Yeah. We hurt them through our actions. Yeah. We hurt them through our non-emotional body language, right? Yet we hurt them, but I say, "Hey, I didn't physically hit you. I didn't murder you. So it shouldn't be that bad."

Man, I don't know about you, but that directly convicts my heart because many times in the body of Christ, we will take the same approach in our own human minds.

Jesus Goes Deeper

What I love about Jesus is he challenges the people here at the Sermon on the Mount. He goes directly against what the Pharisees said—not in a sense that, yeah, if you murder, there shall be judgment, but it goes a lot more deeper than that.

The first thing you need to realize: there is more to murder than just physically killing somebody. You have to deal with the motives behind your hearts. He says in the twenty-second verse:

But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment. Whoever insults his brother will be liable to the council, and whoever says, "You fool," will be liable to the hell of fire. — Matthew 5:22

Let's break it down. What does he mean when he says insult? He means abusive behavior towards another verbally, physically, and mentally. What does he mean when he is utilizing the word fool in this context? Strong language suggesting an attitude of angry contempt.

He is dealing with the motive behind why you are taking your actions. He is dealing with the anger within your heart that you hide and don't let nobody see. He is dealing with the inward man that eventually comes out and kills those who we're supposed to be loving.

He is challenging us to go below the surface. Stop dealing with what's on top, skimming what's on top, but deal with the dirt and the soil and the rockiness that comes below because guess what? That matters.

He is challenging them to look at themselves in the face and say, "Look, you may look down upon the murderer. You may want to be so quick to bring judgment upon the murderer for what they did, but guess what? If you are dealing in unholy anger, you deserve to be judged also."

And here's the thing: when he talks about the judgment for murder, he is talking about a human judgment. He is talking about going through the court of law, right? But when he is specifically talking about the twenty-second verse, the judgment is a little bit more harsher.

It's a little bit more different. He's talking about judgment, counsel, and he says, you will go to the hellfire. He is talking about the divine judgment of God. He is saying, if you don't deal with your anger, yeah, you may hurt your brother and sister but guess what? It is against the holiness of who I am, which is your Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. He is challenging us and letting us know that it is not acceptable. It is not acceptable to flow in an unholy anger because it is not acceptable to me. It is against my nature. It is against who I am.

Jesus clearly states his anger, and his anger on the gift of angriness within us. He lets us know within his attention that he is serious about cleansing us from this particular sin. He is letting us know that there is eternal consequences to anger. That within his judgment, it will not just go away. So you need to fix that thing.

Anger Has No Place in Worship

He goes on to let us know, look, as we get to the twenty-third verse, he flips it to worship. He changes the script. He says, so if you are offering your gift at the altar, right? Form of worship, when we come to Christ, when we come into his presence, when we come with our right bowed knees and our hearts low towards him. If you come for the gift at the altar there, remember that your brother has something against you. Leave your gift there before the altar and go. First, be reconciled to your brother and then come and offer your gift.

Second thing is anger has no place in worship. It has no place in worship. An unholy anger has no play in worship. You know, one of the things he says is you honor me with your lips but your heart is far from away from me, right? In the scripture.

How many times have you been angry at somebody? How many times have you had an argument with your wife? How many times have you had a disagreement with your friends that caused some brokenness and some hurt? How many times have you made a mistake or done something that been angered or you've done something that's crazy and then you come in here in the house of worship and act like nothing's wrong. And then you come in here and wave your hands and you tell God hallelujah and you clap and yet when you go back to where you just came from, all the anger that happened, it is still broken because you never went back and just asked to be reconciled or forgiven. How many times have we done that?

That's not to say you don't come into a place of God's presence so that you can receive his forgiveness or grace but it is to say that he is letting us know here that you need to deal with that right away.

Who shall ascend to the hill of the Lord? His presence, the hill of the Lord within his presence, right? And who shall stand in his holy place? He who has clean hands and a pure heart, who does not lift up his soul to what is false and does not swear deceitfully. — Psalms 24:3-4

You want to know what deceit is or swearing against it, right? When you're chilling with your friends, you say, man, I swear I didn't do it. You are actively saying, I put more onto what I already said. Most of the time when people say that, they're covering up the fact that they did something and they just don't want to admit it. So many times, we are being deceitful when we come in here with our makeup on, acting like we're not angry, acting like we didn't have this argument, and we're telling God, I love you, I worship you, I bring my gift towards you, but behind it all, you are angry. He requires clean and pure hearts. He wants to know the real you.

What I love about the scripture is the action is upon the worshiper. It is not upon the one who may have hurt you or made you angry. Like, think about it. He is challenging the one who is bringing the gift. He is challenging the one who's in the house of the Lord coming to bring the gift. He is challenging the one who is in covenant with him, who knows to bring the gift, and he is challenging you that if you have ought with any man, if you have anger with your brother, then you need to go handle that before you bring your gift of worship. He is putting the onus on those who know Jesus Christ.

My question to you is, have you dealt with it? Have you went to the person who may have hurt you, that made you angry? I know I'm not telling you to be crazy and go to people who have hurt you in a way where it's unsafe but what I'm telling you is have you told them, hey, I forgive you because I walk in Jesus no matter how much it hurt so I can be free and give him my pure worship. Have you gone if you yelled or had a friction with somebody and you're angry at them? Have you come and been reconciled to them and say, hey, man. I just want you to know, it hurts me. I'm dealing with it. I'm processing it but guess what, man?

I'm coming to you and just saying I'm sorry and I'm forgiven because I want to bring a pure form of worship to my savior. Think about this. If we're supposed to model Jesus, right? We were in enmity with God and his wrath was against us. He had every right because as human beings, we make God mad. I know we do. By the way we act, your kids make you mad. You'd be like, don't do that. They'd be like, no, I'm doing it. And we're at the same way with God. He's like, you walk free in me, man. Just don't do that. No, Jesus, I'm doing it. He had every right, but he sent the Son who bore the anger. He sent the Son who dealt with the anger of the world on his head. Beaten to the point he was bleeding, spit on, mocked, and you're supposed to be the King of the Jews. He took all that anger upon him, and he said, I know how angry you are. I know how angry my Father is for what you keep doing, but guess what? Be reconciled. Get back in right relationship with me through the cross. We're supposed to take the same approach. Yeah, I've seen you mock me. I got some whips, some lashes on me because of this world, makes me a little frustrated, makes me a little angry. Sometimes you have every right as a human being, but the Scripture says put that gift away. Be reconciled with your brother.

The hardest thing is how can I be reconciled to somebody who doesn't accept my forgiveness or love? Well, when you think about that, think about Jesus. How has he reconciled all these people, and yet people still deny his forgiveness and love? He's saying it's on you. It's on you, the worshiper, to take that step so that we can be pure, so that we can be holy when we come into his presence. And we have an understanding that reconciliation is required as God's covenant people for us to deal with anger.

If it is possible, as much as depends on you, live peaceably with all men. — Romans 12:18

It's funny, man. I always laugh. We want to have peace with nations. We can't even have peace with our kids. We want to have peace in our jobs or at work. We want to have peace even within our church, but we can't even have peace with our fathers, mothers, grandfathers. We can't even have peace with individuals who birthed us. We can't even have peace within our own self, but yet we have this cry for peace. It lets me know that the only way we can have peace is to rest in Jesus. It is to rest in Jesus. And the only way the process can begin to happen is that we reconcile with those who we hurt or who hurt us and has made us angry.

As you look and comb through the Scripture, in the twenty-fifth verse, it says:

Come to terms quickly with your accuser while you are going with him to court. Lest your accuser hand you over to the judge and the judge to the guard and you'll be put in prison. Truly, I say to you, you will never get out until you have paid the last penny. — Matthew 5:25-26

The Real Murderer

And the third thing you realize, man, often times we look at this and we look at the murderers, but the truth is the real murderers are ourselves. And it's because of sin that dwells within us. But I'm so grateful that though it is ourselves, there is Jesus the destroyer who takes care of that sin. The Scripture goes on to let us know:

For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus, our Lord. — Romans 6:23

When you look at these verses, just letting us know that there is an eternal consequence. There is a penalty for not reconciling with your brother and with your anger and dealing with those things that when it is brought up, when it is brought forth unto eternal judgment from our Savior, guess what? You will have paid the last penny. He is letting us know if you don't deal with that sin, then the wages of it, the fruitfulness of it is death. It's not life-giving. You are actively destroying someone. And he's saying, look, if you don't deal with that thing, then guess what? When it comes forth to be brought to you, you have to pay the penalty.

But what I'm grateful for in Romans 6:23, it has a button. It says, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ, our Lord. He is saying, though you may have to pay to the last penny, I brought my Son who gave a free gift of grace that convicted your little hearts, that dealt with your anger, that you can reside with him. He brought you back unto himself. He made you his child. And through that gift of Jesus Christ, then you can destroy anger also. You don't have to be the murderer. You don't have to be the person who dwells in the anger and the eternal consequences of it.

Look, think about it. In this life, man, I deal with college students. Don't you know a lot of them have anger issues? Why? Because of the decisions of others. My father wasn't there.

I'm angry. So I'm acting out. I didn't get enough support. I'm angry. So I'm acting out. Maybe you made a decision that hurt somebody. They're angry, so they take that decision and it dwells within them for the next fifteen years and it's brought down to their generation and to the next generation.

If you want me to be honest about this thing, think about the first murder: Cain and Abel. Somebody bringing forth a gift was angry, and God even says, "Hey, man. Watch yourself. It's knocking at your door." Cain goes, forget that. I'm angry. The first murder happens. Cain goes on to live, but you want to know the penalty? He was far away from God, and it affected generation and generation after him.

If you don't think anger affects generations, it does. You don't think it has eternal consequence? It does, man. What about Saul? Saul got mad at David. He kills 1,000, which is a great number. I wish I could kill 1,000 if I was a king. David kills 10,000. So he's just mad and angry. Even though David is working for him. So what does he do? He gets angry, spirit of jealousy, anger. He goes and tries to kill David.

Anger has a tendency to dwell within us and affect others. It affected a whole nation to go against David, which David eventually becomes the king through whom God makes the promise. Think about that. If we don't deal with it and walk in the free gift of God and allow him to deal with our anger and the consequences that it will bring, then we will continue to not have peace. We will continue to have fractures within our relationships. We will continue to not be able to sometimes even speak to each other when we're side by side. We will continue to have fractured families. We will continue to have fractured churches. We will continue to have all these fractured things because we're not walking in the life-giving power of Jesus Christ.

I am so grateful that Jesus didn't allow the anger to consume him. I am so grateful that God didn't just allow his wrath to consume us. I am so grateful because of our mistakes and our ability to just hurt him, to just overwhelm him with our mistakes, with our sinfulness, with our anger, with our inability to just follow him, to walk by his commandments, with our inability to just rest with him because we're not content with our inability to just go against him that he did what he said he would do in Colossians:

And you who were once alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him. — Colossians 1:21-23

He said, I will reconcile you back unto me. I will forgive you. You will dwell in my mercy, and you will walk in my love. No longer angry. No longer dwelling in a place where you're bringing death, murdering people through your anger. But you will walk in life, in my love, in my grace, in my mercy. Why? Because you received it yourself. Because at one time, that was you. Because at one time, that was you.

The Real Murderer

So as I finish up, I challenge you today. Who's the real murderer? The case can be made. The real murderer is the sinfulness within us. It's the ability for us to be angry so much that we don't live peaceably with men, that we don't love like Jesus loved, that we allow it to not only affect our decisions right now, but within our anger, we affect the decisions of those later on in generations. We tend to judge others for being the murderers when it really is us because we're dealing with the anger within our hearts.

God has a right to be angry with us because we always seem to mess up, but I'm grateful that in understanding that we're the real murderers, right? There is a destroyer of any sin that could come upon us and try to claim us, and his name is Jesus Christ. Because of him, he has given us the gift of life that we can walk in with him, that we can deal with anger, that we can destroy, that we can give life to his love, to his mercy, through his grace.

Because of him, we don't have to deal with every penny that is owed towards what we allowed anger to bring forth, but he has taken that away and said, hey, man. What you have is my inheritance. What you have is me. What you have is love. What you have is grace. What you have is forgiveness. What you have is mercy because you are my child. Because you are my child.

So walk in the love of Christ today, not in the anger of this world. Amen? Amen.

Prayer

Let us pray. Father God, you are worthy. You are worthy, Father God. If it wasn't for you, if it wasn't for your blood cleansing us and making us whole, Father God, if it wasn't for you dying on that cross, Father God, we would all be in a place with so much turmoil and anger, Father God. Our hearts would be soiled, Father God. Our hearts would be down, Father God. But guess what? You cleansed us.

You took away the darkness and put us in your light, Father God. Deal with us, Father God. Deal with our deceitful hearts in every moment that we let this world cause us to make unholy, angry choices and decisions that have nothing to do with you but everything to do with our own selfishness, insecurities, and problems, Father God.

Let us sift it through your grace, through your mercy, through your forgiveness, Father God. If we have problems with any man, broken relationships, Father God, things that we struggle with in just communicating and saying, "Man, I need to go get forgiveness before giving this gift or offering, Father God"—give us the strength to do it and let us walk in your power to do it, Father God.

It may not be accepted. Somebody may shoo it off and act like it doesn't mean anything, Father God, but we know it does according to your Scripture. Take the weight of our anger off of us, Father God, and let us walk in your love. In Jesus' name, amen.