Reasons to Be Righteous | Matthew 5:1-16
Jesus begins his Sermon on the Mount with three reasons to be righteous: (1) not accomplishment, but dependence; (2) not conformity, but distinction; and (3) not concealment, but enlightenment. This sermon is part 1 of “Messiah's Righteousness,” Bryan Craddock’s verse-by-verse sermon series on Matthew 5.
When I was 6 years old, I woke up on Christmas morning to find a guitar waiting for me under the tree. I'm not talking about a toy but a carefully crafted instrument. It wasn't too expensive, but it also wasn't cheap.
You have to wonder what my parents were thinking in giving me a gift like that at that age. Six-year-old boys are certainly not known for handling things with care. That guitar could have ended up being used as a ramp for Hot Wheels cars or even a baseball bat. Obviously, that is not what it was designed for. It could have gotten scratched, warped, or even shattered. But with help, I learned how to hold it, tune it, and eventually to play it, so that I continue to enjoy it today.
Something similar can happen with God’s Law. He gave it to his people as a precious gift, designed to help them enjoy the blessing of knowing him and walking with him in righteousness. Moses makes this point in Deuteronomy 4:7-8, when he says,
For what great nation is there that has a god so near to it as the LORD our God is to us, whenever we call upon him? And what great nation is there, that has statutes and rules so righteous as all this law that I set before you today?
But God’s Law can be misused, and when that happens it is not the Law that ends up damaged. People’s understanding of righteousness can become so warped that it hinders them from having a relationship with God. So, when Jesus came, he confronted those distortions and taught people how to think about the Law. That was his purpose in the Sermon on the Mount.
The Sermon is central in Matthew’s Gospel. He presents Jesus as the promised Messiah and builds his book around five major discourses that Jesus delivered. The Sermon on the Mount is the first one, and Matthew sets the stage for it in the first four chapters. When I preached on that part of the book a few years ago, I called my series, “Messiah’s Dawn,” because it shows us that though Jesus was born and began his ministry in dark times, he would bring hope.
In fact, the Sermon on the Mount begins with a declaration of hope in a passage that we call the Beatitudes, a series of blessing statements. We worked through them in detail in a series titled, “Messiah’s Blessing.” At the time, I intended to take a short break from Matthew to focus on other portions of Scripture. But that detour has taken us almost three years. So, I thought it would be good to get back into Matthew by reviewing the Beatitudes and continuing through Matthew 5 in this series that I am calling, “Messiah’s Righteousness.”
We start with the first 16 verses, and we could sum them up as three reasons to be righteous. God’s Law is not just a set of rules. It addresses the heart. Your motivation matters. So, if you seek to obey the Lord, I challenge you to ask yourself why. See if your reasons align with Jesus’ teaching. If not, you need to make a change. If you resist obeying the Lord, it may be that your impulse is in part a reaction to people’s distorted reasoning. You need to hear the truth. So, I invite you to come with an open mind as we consider the teaching of Jesus.
Now I think that each reason that he gives stands in opposition to a false way of thinking about righteousness that was common at the time. Different groups even formed around each one. So, we will identify those groups, but we need to recognize that the same ideas are still dividing people today. The first reason is one that many seem to misunderstand.
Not Accomplishment but Dependence
Imagine this. You promise to give someone you love an extravagant gift that they could never afford. But they refuse to accept your generosity. They try to show you how much they deserve it. They might even convince themselves that they can earn it on their own without you. They’ve missed the whole point!
In the Beatitudes, Jesus describes the ultimate gift, the blessing of God. He also describes the righteous character of those who are blessed, and these characteristics show that true righteousness starts not with accomplishment but dependence. So, let’s review them. Matthew 5:1-3 speaks of Jesus and tells us,
Seeing the crowds, he went up on the mountain, and when he sat down, his disciples came to him. And he opened his mouth and taught them, saying: "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
The blessing is the kingdom of heaven, and Jesus is not the first to speak of this hope. It is the overarching storyline of the Old Testament. God made Adam and Eve in his image so that they could walk with him and exercise dominion over a perfect world (Gen 1:26). But when they disobeyed, they forfeited the blessing of dwelling in God’s presence, and they and the entire world came under God’s curse.
The Lord, however, had a plan to restore that blessing. He started with Abraham and his descendants. He began to build his kingdom with the people of Israel. He gave them the Law through Moses, and a kingly line in David. His goal was always to lead them back to that state of blessing. The people of Israel just needed to trust him, but they didn’t do it. They kept relying upon their own strength or on the false gods of other nations. So, God allowed them to be conquered by various empires.
In this first Beatitude, Jesus calls the Jewish people to recognize their spiritual poverty and to admit that they cannot regain God’s blessing by their own efforts. That’s where we all need to start. We are undeserving, sinful people who must depend upon the Lord.
But there were two groups at the time that had very different outlooks from what Jesus describes. There were zealots who wanted to build God’s kingdom by seizing political power. Then there were Pharisees who tried to earn God’s blessing by browbeating people into following all the traditional rules that had grown up around God’s commands.
Listen to these next few Beatitudes with those groups in mind. In verses 4-6, Jesus says,
Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.
The blessed are not powerful or morally superior. They are broken, humble, and hungry. They are waiting upon the Lord to bless them with comfort, an inheritance, and satisfaction in his kingdom. This dependent outlook shapes their relationships. Jesus continues in verses 7-9 and says,
Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.
The blessed treat others with mercy because they understand how much they need it themselves. They reject superficial spirituality. They know that God sees their hearts, and they must be prepared to meet him face to face. True peace is found in him, so that should be expressed in their relationships. But some people resent this dependent righteousness. So, in verses 10-12, Jesus says,
Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
Now you might assume that persecution like this would come from unrighteous people. It certainly can, but much of the persecution that Jesus faced came from self-righteous Pharisees. His teaching exposed the folly of their supposed spiritual accomplishments, and they lashed out at him for it. The same can happen to us as we follow him. Are you willing to trust him through that kind of opposition?
True righteousness is not some personal accomplishment of self-improvement, cleaning up your life and taking control to earn God’s approval. It’s the acceptance that you need to depend upon God for his blessing. It’s all about faith. The Apostle Paul makes this connection in Romans 4:3-5 by quoting from the book of Genesis. He says,
For what does the Scripture say? "Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness." Now to the one who works, his wages are not counted as a gift but as his due. And to the one who does not work but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness,
How can God count faith as righteousness? We’ll consider that question in more depth when we get to Matthew 5:17. The short answer is that we need someone to fulfill the Law on our behalf, and that is why Jesus came. He lived a perfectly righteous life so that we can receive the blessing of God’s kingdom. Are you depending upon him? If so, that trusting relationship leads to a second reason to be righteous.
Not Conformity but Distinction
Over the last century salt has got a bad reputation. Many doctors thought that eating too much salt caused high blood pressure. So, when I was growing up, I remember my grandfather being forced to use a salt substitute, and he hated it. It just wasn’t the same. It didn’t satisfy his cravings. He wanted the real thing.
Jesus uses salt to illustrate another reason to be righteous. It must be the real thing. You cannot replace it with some kind of substitute. It cannot be motivated by a desire to conform with the world. It must be distinct. In Matthew 5:13, he says,
You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people's feet.
Critics take issue with this verse, saying that salt cannot lose its taste. That is true of pure sodium chloride, but in ancient times salt was probably not very pure. Other minerals like gypsum could have been mixed in. So, if your sack of salt got wet, the sodium chloride could leach out, leaving you with something that appeared to be salt but would not have any taste. It would be useless.
So, in the context of the Sermon on the Mount, righteousness is what makes us salty. Jesus wants all of us who follow him to be distinct from the world around us. But why? Many people note that salt was used as a preservative in ancient times. They use this verse to argue that followers of Jesus should try to hold back moral decay in the world. But there is no indication in this verse that Jesus had that goal in mind. To me that moralistic rationale sounds more like the Pharisees than Jesus.
We will see in a moment that Jesus uses a different picture to describe the goal of being righteous. Here he is simply saying that his followers should be distinct. What makes that difficult is that we face pressure to conform to the world. Rather than simply depending upon God’s word to guide us, the world tells us to water down our values and standards to be more accommodating.
How was that happening in Jesus’s time? There are always people who make spiritual and moral compromises to fit in. That was part of Matthew’s personal story. Prior to following Jesus, he worked as a tax collector for the Roman Empire, and most tax collectors inflated taxes to pad their own pocket. They were motivated by greed. But everyone recognized that. Tax collectors did not claim to be righteous.
So, when Jesus talked about salt, I suspect that he had a different group in mind: the Sadducees who associated with the high priests. They cooperated with the Romans just like the tax collectors did. They were also just as greedy, making money off the sale of sacrificial animals at an inflated price and the exchange of currency at an unfair rate for donations at the temple. But they did it all under a pretense of righteousness as they maintained all the rituals of worship at the temple.
By mentioning salt, Jesus might have been drawing upon a curious detail from the Old Testament instructions about sacrifices that the priests would have known well. Leviticus 2:13 says,
You shall season all your grain offerings with salt. You shall not let the salt of the covenant with your God be missing from your grain offering; with all your offerings you shall offer salt.
This salt reminded them of God’s covenant with the people of Israel. Apart from that special relationship, their ritual sacrifices would not matter. Worship has never been about going through the motions. It has always been about honoring God from the heart.
So, what does this mean for those who follow Jesus? Paul describes Christian worship in sacrificial terms in Romans 12:1-2. He says,
I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.
This passage follows the same logic that we see in the Sermon on the Mount. It begins with the incredible blessing of God’s mercies that are received by faith. In response, we should offer up our lives to the Lord. But we cannot do that by conforming to the world. We must be transformed. Our minds must be renewed so that our determination of what is good and acceptable and perfect aligns with God’s revealed will. When our relationship with him shapes us that way, we will be salty in the sense that Jesus was talking about.
So, Messiah’s righteousness is not motivated by accomplishment but dependence, nor by conformity but distinction. That leads us to a third reason.
Not Concealment but Enlightenment
In modern times, light is cheap. We keep getting brighter bulbs that use less energy. As helpful as that is, it leads to light pollution. In some neighborhoods, it never gets dark.
People in the ancient world didn’t have that problem. They lived in a much darker world. They relied upon candles or oil lamps for light that were relatively expensive and not very bright. So, no one wanted to waste light.
Jesus draws upon that idea to show that righteousness is not for concealment but enlightenment. In Matthew 5:14-16, he says,
You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.
It seems impossible to hide an entire city, but at the time there was a group that tried to live like that. They are not mentioned in the New Testament, but ancient historians refer to a Jewish group called Essenes. They thought that the best way to be righteous was to withdraw from the world into their own private settlements in the wilderness. The famous Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered near a location called Qumran where one of those communities had been.
Now you might see some appeal in being isolated from the world that way. It would seem to remove temptations and eliminate the pressure to conform. But it doesn’t work that way. According to Mark 7:21-23, Jesus argued that those sinful, worldly inclinations are already present in our hearts. You take them with you wherever you go, and they inevitably come out in particularly distorted ways in escapist religious communities.
Jesus says that true righteousness must shine in the darkness. Rather than being concealed, it should be as visible as city lights against the black of night. It should light up a room, so that other people can see. It should have such an enlightening effect on them that they are led to worship God and give him glory.
Specifically, this righteousness shines through good works. The word for “good” that Jesus uses here could also be translated as “beautiful.” According to Matthew 26:10, Jesus uses this expression when Mary anoints him with costly perfume on the eve of the Passion week. He says that she did a good work, a beautiful thing for him.
So, these luminescent beautiful works are not arrogant displays of personal piety. Later in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus confronts the Pharisees for showing off that way. These good works meet needs. Paul makes this connection as he advises Titus about leading the church in Crete. In Titus 3:14, he says,
And let our people learn to devote themselves to good works, so as to help cases of urgent need, and not be unfruitful.
Who met urgent needs more than Jesus? He fed the hungry and healed the sick. We do not have his ability to perform miracles, but we can still care, pray, and help people. In fact, Hebrews 10:24-25 explains that our church gatherings should inspire us to do things like that. It says,
And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.
If you believe in Jesus, then you have the hope of enjoying the full blessing of his kingdom on the day that he returns. That hope should radiate out from us in a Christlike concern for people. They should see his light shining through us, not to put ourselves on display but to show them the way to him. However, that will never happen if we are hiding ourselves away.
Isolation and concealment undermine this reason for righteousness. We must aim to enlighten others to the glorious goodness of our loving God through good deeds.
__________
We don’t have Pharisees, Sadducees, or Essenes today. But their distorted views of righteousness are still around. Jesus calls us to a righteousness not for accomplishment but dependence, not for conformity but distinction, and not for concealment but enlightenment.
Do these reasons resonate with you? Perhaps you have been exposed to people who claim to be Christians but seem more like modern day Pharisees, Sadducees, or Essenes. Don’t let their misunderstanding keep you from the truth. Christianity is about following Jesus. So, if you have never done so I encourage you to start down this path. Recognize your spiritual poverty and place your faith in him. If you want to learn more about him, keep reading in Matthew 5.
Perhaps you’re a believer, but you realize that your understanding of righteousness is off track. If so, I urge you to change your view. You may need to rethink your whole outlook on the Christian life. Or perhaps you just need to focus on one of the reasons that we have considered today. May we all shine brightly for Jesus and for the glory of God!
Reflect
What are some wrong reasons for righteousness that you have heard? What impact do they have?
Which of these reasons is the most challenging for you? Why?
What are some practical steps that you could take to maintain the right motivation in that area?