INTERPRETING JESUS' TEACHINGS

Context is king. Take Jesus' words from Matthew 10:

* “Beware of men, for they will deliver you over to courts and flog you in their synagogues, and you will be dragged before governors and kings for my sake, to bear witness before them and the Gentiles."

From these two verses, it would seem that we should allow ourselves to be persecuted for Christ's sake rather than to flee persecution, but this would not be the correct interpretation. A few verses later, we read:

* "When they persecute you in one town, FLEE to the next.” (Matthew 10:17-18, 23 ESV)
There verse show that in order to understand Jesus' teaching, we must understand them in context. For another example:

* And Jesus cried out and said, "Whoever believes in me, believes not in me but in him who sent me."

From this verse in John 12, it seems that we shouldn't believe in Jesus but in the Father alone. However, two verses later, Jesus makes it clear that we should believe in Him:

* "I have come into the world as light, so that whoever believes in me may not remain in darkness.” (John 12:44, 46)

How then should we interpret the first verse? It seems likely, by observing the rest of Jesus' teachings, that when we trust in Jesus, we do not trust in Jesus ALONE, but also in the Father.

VERY OFTEN, WE CANNOT TAKE HIS TEACHINGS LITERALLY.

Once again, we find that understanding Jesus requires us to understand the entire context. Sometimes, we have to take into account the entire context of ALL of His teachings:

* "And when you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites. For they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, that they may be seen by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.” (Matthew 6:5-6)
To just read the immediate context, it would seem that Jesus means to prohibit all public prayer. However, when we observe Jesus' entire ministry, we find that He often prayed publicly.
How then are we to understand His admonition to pray in secret? We need to understand the immediate context where we find that Jesus' concern is our motivation to be seen by men rather than God.

Well, how are we to serve God? In this regard, Jesus said many perplexing things:

* “But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you. (Matthew 6:3)

How can we prevent one hand from knowing what the other is doing? We can't! Instead, once again, we have to interpret this verse in light of the principle of performing our righteous deeds to please God and not to impress man.

It's primarily about our motives not our actions. Are we able to give secretly without seeking the approval of others. If we find that we are not, we need to humble ourselves by confessing our sin. In fact, we find that human pride is often Jesus' main concern.

EXAGGERATION (HYPERBOLE) TO MAKE A POINT

Likewise, Jesus commands us to cut off our hands and to pluck out our eyes rather than sin and enter hell:

“If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell. 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 your members than that your whole body go into hell.” (Matthew 5:29-30)

Can we stop sinning if we pluck out our eyes (or even pray only in private)? No! Sin arises out of the heart not out of our hands or our eyes, as Jesus taught elsewhere (Matthew 15:19). Then why pluck out our eyes? I think that Jesus was teaching that, because of the overriding worth of going to heaven, instead of hell, if plucking out our eyes would insure heaven, such a sacrifice would be well worth it.

AWARENESS OF PARALLEL VERSES

Some verses are very perplexing until we take into account how Jesus expressed the same thought elsewhere, for example:

* "If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.” (Luke 14:26)

Of course, this verse seems to contradict a lot of biblical principles like honoring our parents. However, this problem is easily resolved when we observe a parallel teaching from Matthew:

* “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.” (Matthew 10:37)

It is a matter of our priorities. Jesus must be our highest priority, even above ourselves and our family.

UNDERSTANDING JESUS FROM THE CONTEXT OF THE ENTIRE BIBLE

Some Christians believe in absolute pacifism and non-violence based upon a literal reading of His Sermon on the Mount. Often in support of this position they cite:

* "You have heard that it was said, 'An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.' But I say to you, Do not resist the one who is evil. But if anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.” (Matthew 5:38-39)

I had wrestled with these verses for a long time, especially as a substitute teacher. Should I allow my students to insult and even lay their hands on me? Was this Jesus' intention? I didn't want to violate His will but allowing these violent students to have their way seemed so unreasonable. It would also be a betrayal of those who hired me and would bring disrepute upon my faith.
However, I also became convinced that such an interpretation would also violate Jesus' intent. I first had to decide whether or not Jesus' teaching was meant to correct the Mosaic Covenant or the current understanding of this Covenant.

I found that the principle of an "eye for an eye" wasn't at all barbaric. Instead, this judicial principle required that penalties had to match the crimes:

* “Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe. "When a man strikes the eye of his slave, male or female, and destroys it, he shall let the slave go free because of his eye. If he knocks out the tooth of his slave, male or female, he shall let the slave go free because of his tooth.” (Exodus 21:24-27)

Besides, I eventually perceived that Jesus never criticized the Old Testament (Matthew 5:16-19). Instead, He always quoted it affirmatively. Consequently, it became obvious that the Sermon on the Mount was not an indictment of the Mosaic legal system but of our personal behaviors.
It seems likely that Jesus was taking aim at those who invoked an "eye for an eye" to justify taking personal revenge. If this is so, then Jesus was teaching:

* It is better to allow yourself to be defrauded and insulted rather than to take revenge.
Actually Jesus endorsed self-defense in cases where legal recourse wasn't possible (Matthew 24:43-44).

Interpretation is complex but vital work. I cannot hope to do justice to this subject in a brief essay. Consequently, we are instructed to meditate on His Word day and night. There is no substitute for this. Nor is there any greater blessing (Psalm 1; Joshua 1:8).

How Can “Eternal Hell” Be Consistent with God’s Character?

Renowned atheist, Robert Ingersoll (1833-99), was no friend to the biblical faith. He had attacked it in perhaps its most vulnerable place – the doctrine of eternal damnation:

• Eternal punishment must be eternal cruelty…and I do not see how any man, unless he has the brain of an idiot, or the heart of a wild beast, can believe in eternal punishment.

Ingersoll had charged that hell was “eternal cruelty,” not eternal justice as we Christians believe. However, it is difficult to launch a defense. Although the doctrine of eternal damnation is scripturally well-established, much about the nature of hell is left uncertain, and perhaps purposely so. Scripture warns us that we are not going to understand everything:

• The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but those things which are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law. (Deut. 29:29)

To illustrate our uncertainty about the nature of hell, let’s take a look at one common revelation about it. According to Jesus, it will be a place of “wailing and gnashing of teeth”:

• “And will cast them into the furnace of fire. There will be wailing and gnashing of teeth.” (Matthew 13:42)

• “Then the king said to the servants, 'Bind him hand and foot, take him away, and cast him into outer darkness; there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.'” (Matthew 22:13)

• "There will be weeping there, and gnashing of teeth, when you see Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, but you yourselves thrown out.” (Luke 13:28)

These verses reveal one consistent problem in our attempt to understand the nature of hell. Much of the language seems to be figurative (poetic). The first verse associates the “wailing” with a “furnace of fire,” while the second with “outer darkness.” Both descriptions – fire and darkness - cannot be literal. Meanwhile, the last verse associates the “weeping” with the regret of missing out eternally on the benefits of the kingdom. While they wanted the benefits, they continued to reject the Benefactor as they had in their first life.

Reject? The consistent absence of any attempt to confess sins and repent makes their rejection of God rather obvious. It was absent from Judas’ thinking. Instead of confession and repentance, he elected to pay for his betrayal of Jesus himself by his suicide. It was absent from Jesus’ parable about Lazarus and the rich man, who, upon death, found himself in a place of torment. Instead of confessing his sins asking pleading for forgiveness, he merely requested that his torment be slightly eased (Luke 16).

This leads us to another question about hell – one that opens the window to a possible understanding of divine justice in this matter. What if hell is self-chosen? Jesus gives us a hint of what this might look like:

• For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God's one and only Son. This is the verdict [“condemnation,” NKJV]: Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. (John 3:17-19)

According to Jesus, He need not condemn us. We are self-“condemned already,” because we have rejected the Son, the only way of finding forgiveness. And it seems that the condemnation in the next life will be little different. Because we have chosen the darkness of sin instead of the light of Christ, it is we who have made the choice for our eternal destiny! If we loved darkness here, we will continue to love darkness there and will flee from the now blinding and terrifying Light of the Presence of the Savior.

This is not to deny that there will be a great judgment in the end. However, it does suggest that God might simply approve the very judgment we have chosen for ourselves. Heaven and hell, therefore, might simply be a matter of God giving us what we have chosen for ourselves.

Another illustration of this principle is found in the Garden account. After Adam and Eve had sinned, their orientation towards the Light was radically transformed. While prior to their sin, they enjoyed unbroken fellowship with God in the Garden. They were so comfortable with this arrangement that their nakedness caused no discomfort whatsoever. However, once they sinned, they hid in the darkness from the Light, which had now become distasteful to them, and determined to deal with their guilt and shame in their own way, much as Judas had done. While the first couple attempted to cover their sin with fig leaves, Judas resorted to a hangman’s noose.

Even after God had given them room to confess their sin, they lied and refused to take responsibility for their betrayal. Indeed, God cast them out of the Garden and out of His Presence. However, they never once pleaded for His mercy. Even after they were informed that they would be sent to a place of pain, death and hard work, they never once expressed any objection to this terrible judgment. Instead, it seems that they were more than willing to endure the pain in order to avoid the Light.

Perhaps this is a dim picture of the supreme and terrifying justice of hell? I don’t know. However, I am confident that our God is just and merciful despite our perplexities. He promises as much:

·         “The servant who knows the master’s will and does not get ready or does not do what the master wants will be beaten with many blows. But the one who does not know and does things deserving punishment will be beaten with few blows. From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked.” (Luke 12:47-48)