Matthew 5:48 You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

What is our perception of perfection? What does that look like?

I will admit it is unfair to ask this question of others since I have struggled so hard with it myself. I struggled with it because of just one word, must. My Lord has said to me that I must, and since He is Lord and I am His to command, then I must.

In order to do what we must, it takes an understanding of the task at hand in order to do what we are told to do. Sometimes I think about what others were told and how they obeyed. For instance Saul was struck blind on the road to Damascus. Then he was told Acts 9:6 “But rise and enter the city, and you will be told what you are to do.”

Men who had not heard our Lord helped him into the city and led him to the house of Judas on the street called “Straight.” There in his blindness he prayed and saw in a vision one called Anninias was to come and restore his sight.

We are like that. We need help from others, even if it is the blind leading the blind, getting us to a point where we can stop and pray. We don’t know exactly what Paul prayed but we know what we want to pray about. So we pray.

Lord I am blind, show me how to do what I “must” do. Amen

Proverbs 3:5 Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding.

So then, leaning on our own understanding is a form of blindness and we must trust the Lord to lead us to that place where our eyes will be opened.

Matthew 5:48 is the last verse under the heading “Love Your Enemies”. The word therefore precedes the word “must” so we must love. It seems impossible to understand perfectly and now I am being asked to love perfectly? How can I do that Lord?

“Trust me!” says the Lord.

Psalm 91:14 “Because he holds fast to me in love, I will deliver him; I will protect him, because he knows my name.”

The Authority of Jesus

28 And when Jesus finished these sayings, the crowds were astonished at his teaching, 29 for he was teaching them as one who had authority, and not as their scribes.

I did not include all the teaching from the Sermon on the Mount but I will include the last 2 lines from Matthew 7. Jesus did not teach as the scribes taught.

International Standard Bible Encyclopaedia

Scribes:

skribz: The existence of law leads necessarily to a profession whose business is the study and knowledge of the law; at any rate, if the law is extensive and complicated. At the time of Ezra and probably for some time after, this was chiefly the business of the priests. Ezra was both priest and scholar (copher). It was chiefly in the interest of the priestly cult that the most important part of the Pentateuch was written. The priests were therefore also in the first instance the scholars and the guardians of the Law; but in the course of time this was changed. The more highly esteemed the Law became in the eyes of the people, the more its study and interpretation became a lifework by itself, and thus there developed a class of scholars who, though not priests, devoted themselves assiduously to the Law. These became known as the scribes, that is, the professional students of the Law. During the Hellenistic period, the priests, especially those of the upper class, became tainted with the Hellenism of the age and frequently turned their attention to paganistic culture, thus neglecting the Law of their fathers more or less and arousing the scribes to opposition. Thus, the scribes and not the priests were now the zealous defenders of the Law, and hence, were the true teachers of the people. At the time of Christ, this distinction was complete. The scribes formed a solid profession which held undisputed sway over the thought of the people.

When I finished yesterday’s devotional I made a comment about the length of sermons. We set aside a time for listening to those sermons. Important issues should be addressed in a manner that does not wear out the listener. We have taken the Sermon on the Mount and parsed it into bite size pieces.

Even here in my offering to others I am aware of the need to be as brief as possible and try to hold the readers attention without making them weary, causing eye fatigue. I have not held sway over anyone. I do not have a cast of thousands hanging on my every word.

Jesus did. He held the interests of the crowds for a long time and amazed them.

And then Jesus got right back to work. He healed a leper right after finishing His sermon.

That gives me pause as to how I live my life.