Eye For An Eye

Eye for an Eye

Matthew 5

Good Morning Church

Please turn with me to the book of Matthew chapter 5.

What does Jesus have to say about the attitude of an eye for an eye?

What does He says about Vengeance and retaliation.

The attitude of getting even for every wrong that has been done to you or you perceive has been done to you.

The world defiantly has a way of dealing with it but what does Jesus say about it?

Before we do that lets have a word of prayer and ask the Lord for His words to guide us and direct us.

Prayer-

Matthew chapter 5 is the Sermon on the Mount.

100’s of 1000’s if not millions of sermons have come from His words in this chapter. He speaks about relationships, our emotions…Jesus shows us how we should act.

Before you weigh in, we need to know that these words were first found in the Old Testament in Exodus chapter 21 and in the book of Leviticus. Right after the giving of the Ten Commandments in Exodus, there are words concerning personal injury caused by someone else.

Exodus 21

Strike someone with a fatal blow- you are to be put to death, however if it was done unintentional, but God let it happen, they have to flee to a place of refuse.

Attack your Father or Mother- put to death

Kidnap someone- put to death

Get in a quarrel and hit someone with a stone or your fist and the victim does not die but is confined to a bed, you are not held liable if the person is able to get up and get around and can walk with a cane.

Hit a slave in the eye, you must compensate the slave for their eye.

(23) “But if there is serious injury, you are to take life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, bruise for bruise.”

Notce it went from life for life qll the way down to bruise to bruise.

Why in the world would that be allowed? Because there was no police force- a family member would take revenge for the wrongs of those in the family. It was the Law of Moses and later in the Babylonian empire called the Hummurabi code. Without going into great detail it was to do unto someone as they did to you and more. WITH THE EMPHASIS ON MORE

The nation of Israel still practices it today. The Prime Minister was asked why they follow that law of retaliation and he said because it keeps their enemies at bay because they know they will get more done to them than what they did to Israel.

Illustration-

A trucker goes into a truck stop for dinner and soon after sitting there minding his own business, two tough bikers come over and begin giving him a hard time. The one slaps the trucker and he get up and leaves. The other biker says to his buddy, what a bad example of a man as he just leaves and does nothing. The waitress who was watching and looking out the window says, well he isn’t much of a truck driver either because he just ran over two bikes with his truck.

We have no problem listening to those stories of people getting what they deserve-

Illustration-

During the Korean War a certain military unit had hired a local boy to cook and clean for them. Being a bunch of jokesters, these guys soon took advantage of the boy.

They’d smear Vaseline on the stove handles so that when he’d turn the stove on in the morning he’d get grease all over his fingers.

They’d put little water buckets over the door so he’d get soaked when he opened the door

They’d even nailed his shoes to the floor during the night.

Day after day the young Korean took the brunt of their practical jokes without saying anything. There was no blame, no self-pity, no temper tantrums.

Finally the men felt guilty about what they were doing, so they sat down with the boy and said, “Look, we know these pranks aren’t funny for you, and we’re sorry. We’re never going to take advantage of you again.” It seemed too good to be true to the houseboy.

“ No more sticky on stove?” he asked. Nope.

“ No more water on door.” NO

“ No more nail shoes to floor?” NO never again.

“ Okay” the boy said with a smile, “no more spit in soup.”

If we were allowed to live by that standard of life, we would live in a society of people that would be missing eyes and hands and foot. Burned, beaten and hiding in caves.