Sermon: Rooted in the Sermon on the Mount – But I Say To You – Mt 5.27–30 (2/15/26)
Introduction
Church planting...
Let me begin with an announcement.
I'm going to be brief...
But this is very important!
I want to make just the beginning of an announcement I've shared in a little more detail with our ministers and our deacons...
Our college and missions minister, Kaleb West and his wife Kelsey sat down with me several weeks ago...
And said they were praying about something...
And wondered if this might be something our church would partner with them in doing.
We began to talk about how FBC could extend the gospel outreach of our church by PLANTING a new church or REVITALIZING a struggling church within or close to the Nacogdoches county border.
I shared with them, that this was something I too had been praying about and something I have always believed God would use our church to do AGAIN.
In fact, FBC Nacogdoches has done this eight times before.
Fredonia Hill Baptist Church (1923)
Calvary Baptist Church (1956)
I believe it is time we do this again.
There is so much I want to share with you about this.
And we will do that soon.
But today, I wanted to make the first public announcement and set us up to begin working on next steps.
Nothing is about to happen.
I expect this will be a long process.
Kaleb and Kelsey are remaining and will remain a part of our church family.
But I wanted our church to pray together for this process and for the West family today.
Prayer...
Sexual Ethics
Let us shift gears to our sermon focus today from Jesus's Sermon on the Mount.
Turn in your Bibles to Matthew 5.
We live in a culture where…
Casual hook-ups are normal and largely unquestioned.
Sexual affairs are framed as merely private matters between consenting adults.
Pornography is defended as harmless because “no one is being hurt.”
Same-sex relationships are viewed as morally equivalent to marriage.
Consent is treated as the only moral boundary that matters.
Sexual preference is understood as central to one's chosen identity.
So, into that world comes the Lord and the Bible...
God draws clear sexual boundaries that frankly can feel...
Outdated...
Weirdly restrictive...
Even unnecessary...
God speaks with SERIOUSNESS about things our culture SHRUGS at.
And many people are left asking...
Why is God so concerned about something as BENIGN and WONDERFUL as sex?
Let me give you a simple answer, and then we will see it unfold as we walk through this passage.
First, every person is created in the image of God.
This is something very special God has put in everyone...
Stamped on everyone...
Built into everyone...
That gives them inherent dignity...
And it makes them worthy of the highest respect.
To treat someone, even in your thoughts, as less than an image-bearer is to dishonor both them and the God who made them.
Second, God has designed sex to belong exclusively within the covenant of marriage between a man and a woman.
Sex is not merely an appetite...
It is a covenant act.
So to engage in sexual activity or thoughts outside that covenant is to harm what God has reserved for exclusive, lifelong union.
It takes away from what God has intended.
It steals something away from the person you engage with.
It steals away from that person's covenant partner (current or potential).
Let's see this in God's Word...
Sermon on the Mount context...
Do not tune me out...
If you quit before the end of this message, you will miss the point.
Scripture
Matthew 5.27 | You have heard that it was said, Do not commit adultery. (CSB)
You have heard that it was said
Jesus is quoting from the seventh commandment.
Exodus 20.14 | Do not commit adultery. (CSB)
We see this repeated in multiple places in the Old Testament...
Leviticus 20.10 | If a man commits adultery with a married woman—if he commits adultery with his neighbor’s wife—both the adulterer and the adulteress must be put to death. (CSB)
Deuteronomy 22.22 | If a man is discovered having sexual relations with another man’s wife, both the man who had sex with the woman and the woman must die. You must purge the evil from Israel. (CSB)
Let's define ADULTERY.
Generally, adultery is to have sexual relations with another person's spouse (or betrothed spouse).
There was some moral imbalance in the strict definition of adultery, but Jesus levels this in the next verse.
Over time, other things God declared to be sexual sins were included under the category of the seventh commandment.
Incest
Prostitution
Homosexuality
Leviticus 18.22 | You are not to sleep with a man as with a woman; it is detestable.(CSB)
Bestiality
Sexual relations with an unmarried woman
Exodus 22.16 | “If a man seduces a virgin who is not engaged, and he sleeps with her, he must certainly pay the bridal price for her to be his wife. (CSB)
Exodus 22.17 | If her father absolutely refuses to give her to him, he must pay an amount in silver equal to the bridal price for virgins. (CSB)
Rape
Biblically, sexual expression is reserved exclusively for one man and one woman joined in covenant marriage.
What is a covenant marriage?
A contract is an agreement built on mutual benefit.
A covenant is a solemn, binding promise made before God.
Malachi 2.14 | And you ask, “Why?” Because even though the Lord has been a witness between you and the wife of your youth, you have acted treacherously against her. She was your marriage partner and your wife by covenant. (CSB)
Every other sexual act or desire outside that covenant is sin.
So, what is Jesus going to do with this ancient command?
Jesus is not about to lower the bar.
He is not about to raise the bar.
He is about to reveal where the bar actually was all along.
Matthew 5.28 | But I tell you, everyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. (CSB)
This would have been a shocking thing for honest people to have heard.
This really draws a circle around every person.
That will be important at the end of this message.
Looks... lustfully...
Jesus is not speaking of...
Simply noticing beauty...
Inadvertently seeing someone in a state that might lead to temptation...
Jesus is speaking of looking with the intent to imagine more...
Already committed adultery...
We will come back to this, but notice he does not say that looking lustfully is the beginning of adultery...
He is not saying adultery begins with the look...
When the look of lust happens, real adultery has ALREADY begun.
Not adultery in the physical sense...
There is a difference.
Not adultery in the sense that civil penalties apply...
There is a difference.
But true adultery as Jesus defines it.
Matthew 5.29 | If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of the parts of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. (CSB)
That is radical!
Why do you think Jesus is so serious about this?
We will see.
If your right eye causes you to sin...
It is not that your eye is evil...
But our eyes can set a trap for us that can lead us to sin.
Jesus is talking about the potential that your eye sets a trap for you that leads to sin...
Jesus is saying that when something becomes a doorway to sin...
When it becomes a snare to your soul...
You must deal with it decisively!
Right eye...
The right eye was considered the better (dominant) eye for most people...
Gouge it out and throw it away...
Clearly, Jesus is using hyperbole to make a point.
Jesus is not prescribing self-harm.
He is using shocking imagery to demand RUTHLESS ACTION against sin.
Even if you were to gouge out your eye, you could still lust.
Sin is not located in anatomy.
It is located in the heart.
Do not gouge out your eye!
Matthew 5.30 | And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of the parts of your body than for your whole body to go into hell. (CSB)
Again, Jesus is not commanding mutilation.
Though some early Christians did mutilate their bodies in an attempt to live with greater purity.
Origen (AD 185–254) castrated himself.
He reported that it did not have the intended effect.
Clearly, Jesus believes sexual sin even if it is just in the heart and mind is a dangerous thing... a deadly thing...
Jesus connects sexual sin with HELL!
Whether you agree with him right now or not, I would say this is worth us looking into further.
But I Say To You...
When Jesus said in verse 28, "But I say to you..."
He was saying...
What you (the culture at the time) believe about sexual sin is WRONG...
Jesus was not correcting what God has given through Moses.
Jesus was correcting the way people were interpreting what Moses wrote.
I am about to say something different than what you are currently thinking...
You need correction on your thinking about sexual sin...
That was true then...
And it is true today!
Let's learn four important truths from this passage that teach us the basics of sexual sin...
I. God alone defines sin.
But I tell you...
Jesus is holding himself up as the authority!
Jesus is saying that the truth about sexual sin is what I say...
I define the proper boundaries for sexual sin.
Why does God define the boundaries for sexual sin?
A. Because he is the lawgiver.
Morality is not discovered by consensus.
It is declared by God.
Scripture
Isaiah 33.22 | For the Lord is our Judge, the Lord is our Lawgiver, the Lord is our King. He will save us. (CSB)
Psalm 119.160 | The entirety of your word is truth, each of your righteous judgments endures forever. (CSB)
He is God!
He can and does establish any law that comports with his holiness and his will.
B. Because he has designed sex for his intended purposes.
God designed marriage before sin ever entered the world.
Marriage is not a cultural invention...
It is a creation ordinance.
God created this fundamental unit for PROTECTION and PROCREATION.
And that unit (relationship) is the family.
One man and one woman.
Genesis 2.24 | This is why a man leaves his father and mother and bonds with his wife, and they become one flesh. (CSB)
Sex is meant to beautify, strengthen, and enjoin that relationship.
C. Because he loves us.
God knows what is good for us.
When God gives us boundaries for sexual expression, he is protecting us from and for the right things.
Fire within boundaries can heat our homes and cook our food...
Fire outside proper boundaries, can burn our lives down!
God's instructions are not FENCES to imprison us, they are GUARDRAILS to protect us.
Before we talk about lust…
Before we talk about radical action…
We must settle who gets to define right and wrong.
II. Sexual sin begins in the heart.
Matthew 5.28 | But I tell you, everyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. (CSB)
Why does Jesus condemn lustful thoughts?
A. Because God is honored or dishonored first in the hidden life of the heart.
1 Samuel 16.7 | But the Lord said to Samuel, “Do not look at his appearance or his stature because I have rejected him. Humans do not see what the Lord sees, for humans see what is visible, but the Lord sees the heart.” (CSB)
You can fool people with behavior.
You cannot fool God with imagination.
B. Because sin begins with the imagination.
James 1.14 | But each person is tempted when he is drawn away and enticed by his own evil desire. (CSB)
James 1.15 | Then after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin, and when sin is fully grown, it gives birth to death. (CSB)
Sin is not spontaneous combustion.
It is cultivated desire.
C. Because today's thoughts become tomorrow's character.
Old proverb...
Sow a thought and reap an act.
Sow an act and reap a habit.
Sow a habit and reap a character.
Sow a character and reap a destiny.
The heart you feed today becomes the person you are tomorrow.
What you rehearse in private shapes who you become in public.
D. Because the heart is deceitful.
Jeremiah 17.9 | The heart is more deceitful than anything else, and incurable—who can understand it? (CSB)
The heart does not simply desire wrongly.
It explains away its wrong desires.
Sin always...
Takes you further than you wanted to go...
Costs you more than you wanted to pay...
Keeps you longer than you wanted to stay...
Let's get very specific...
Men, when you look at a porn image...
You have chosen to delight in what God forbids.
God says to hate sin, but you have chosen to love and cherish sin.
You have treated a woman made in the image of God as an object for personal gratification.
You have violated the dignity of the woman in that image.
You have sinned in three ways...
You have violated the dignity of God's daughter...
You have violated the dignity of that woman...
To whatever extent she may or may not have cooperated in that does not change what you have done to her.
You have violated the dignity of another man's covenant partner.
You have unleashed a POISON in your heart and mind.
You have trained your heart to desire what is not yours.
You have trained your heart to crave novelty instead of covenant.
You have fed a fire that does not stay contained.
You have rehearsed adultery in your imagination.
People say that pornography is the victimless sin...
We could talk about the real victims of pornography in terms of sex trafficking, violence, abuse, on and on...
Those are real things.
In those terms, pornography is FAR from a victimless sin.
But let's just bring it close to home...
When you look at porn...
You have harmed the glory of God in your life.
You have abused that woman's dignity whether she knows it or not.
You have opened doors in your heart that do not close easily.
You have volunteered yourself for consequences you and I may not have the capacity to fully imagine.
Are you struggling with your heart?
Hang in there.
Jesus is not seeking to crush you.
He wants to help you.
Are you a Christian who struggles with pornography?
I'm going to get very specific in Pastor's Show this week.
Every man should listen to this even if he does not struggle with porn...
And women...
And parents...
Mark 7.21 | For from within, out of people’s hearts, come evil thoughts, sexual immoralities, thefts, murders,(CSB)
III. It is deadly.
What did Jesus say...
Gouge it out...
Cut it off...
Better that you lose one of the parts of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell...
Jesus is weighing temporary loss against eternal loss.
What is the lesson we should learn?
A. Few things hurt us and those around us more deeply, more quickly, and with as little warning as sexual sin.
Proverbs 6.27 | Can a man embrace fire and his clothes not be burned? (CSB)
Proverbs 6.28 | Can a man walk on burning coals without scorching his feet? (CSB)
Proverbs 6.29 | So it is with the one who sleeps with another man’s wife; no one who touches her will go unpunished. (CSB)
You can manage anger for a while...
You can manage greed in subtle ways...
But sexual sin is like holding FIRE in your lap.
The Bug Zapper Illustration...
B. Sexual sin is different from other sins...
In one sense, every sin is the same...
All sin separates us from God.
But not all sin affects us in the same way.
In a real sense, sexual sin is different.
1 Corinthians 6.18 | ... Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the person who is sexually immoral sins against his own body. (CSB)
How is sexual sin different?
1. IT IS PARTICULARLY ENSLAVING...
1 Corinthians 6.18 | Flee sexual immorality! Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the person who is sexually immoral sins against his own body.(CSB)
Sexual sin grips the imagination.
It rewires desire.
It does not stay small.
2. IT IS EFFECTS RELATIONSHIPS IN DIFFICULT TO UNDERSTAND WAYS...
1 Corinthians 6.16 | Don’t you know that anyone joined to a prostitute is one body with her? For Scripture says, The two will become one flesh. (CSB)
We do not have the time right now to delve deeply into this verse, but understand it is saying that when you engage in illicit sex or illicit thoughts, you make some kind of real connection to that person that you should not have made!
3. IT INVOLVES SOMETHING YOU HAVE SPECIFICALLY GIVEN TO THE LORD...
You are not your own!
Sexual sin is not just breaking a rule.
It is misusing a body purchased by Christ.
1 Corinthians 6.19 | Don’t you know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, (CSB)
C. Sexual sin Sends people to hell.
Look back at what Jesus said in 29 and 30...
Matthew 5.29 | If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of the parts of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. (CSB)
Matthew 5.30 | And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of the parts of your body than for your whole body to go into hell. (CSB)
Listen to how the Lord says this through the Apostle Paul...
1 Corinthians 6.9 | Don’t you know that the unrighteous will not inherit God’s kingdom? Do not be deceived: No sexually immoral people, idolaters, adulterers, or males who have sex with males, (CSB)
1 Corinthians 6.10 | no thieves, greedy people, drunkards, verbally abusive people, or swindlers will inherit God’s kingdom. (CSB)
Now, all sins send people to hell.
And we are going to get to that in a minute.
But listen my friends...
If you can settle into sexual immorality without conviction, without grief, without repentance...
Then Scripture says you should examine whether you belong to Christ.
Some good news before we move on...
We looked at 1 Corinthians 6.9–10.
We should also notice verse 11...
1 Corinthians 6.11 | And some of you used to be like this. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.(CSB)
IV. It demands radical action.
Jesus said...
Matthew 5.29 | If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away...
Matthew 5.30 | And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away...
Listen, the question is not whether you have ever fallen...
The question is whether you are willing to fight.
Radical Action
A. Embrace radical honesty.
Quit saying you have it under control.
Quit saying yours is a victimless sin.
Quit excusing your sins by pointing to what you believe to be worse sexual sins.
B. Reject moderation.
1 Corinthians 6.18 | Flee sexual immorality! Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the person who is sexually immoral sins against his own body. (CSB)
C. Make a covenant with your eyes.
Job 31.1 | I have made a covenant with my eyes. How then could I look at a young woman? (CSB)
Pre-decide!
D. Remove opportunity.
Romans 13.14 | But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh to gratify its desires. (CSB)
Practical steps...
Remove apps...
Put computer in family space...
Don't be alone with people of the opposite sex...
No private messaging with opposite sex...
E. Pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace WITH...
2 Timothy 2.22 | Flee from youthful passions, and pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace, along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart. (CSB)
Walk in fellowship with others!
Conclusion
I've been a poor gospel preacher if I just preach, "DO BETTER!"
Here is the gospel truth in the Sermon on the Mount...
We've all failed and come up short...
Matthew 5.48 | Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect. (CSB)
Jesus has lived for us and died for us...
God forgives...
God restores...
Look around...
1 Corinthians 6.11 | And some of you used to be like this. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. (CSB)
And one more...
Our church is here to love you where you are and help you take steps...