Monday of Lent 3

DAY 17: March 8, 2021 Monday of Lent 3- Matthew 5:29-30

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  

Jesus will use hyperbole to drive home a serious point. Sin has its consequences. Jesus is addressing sinful actions and behaviors. They destroy families and personal relationships. They create scars with deep and lasting wounds. “What was I thinking?” is the statement made in regret when we consider the deep consequences for our words and actions.

Whatever is causing you to sin, take drastic measures to get that thing out of your life. “It is better for you to enter life maimed or crippled than to have two hands or two feet and be thrown into eternal fire…It is better for you to enter life with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into the fire of hell” (Matthew 18:8–9). Nothing is worth missing heaven for. Nothing is worth going to hell for. Nothing.  

Realize the importance of the soul and its destiny, "It is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell." (KJV) If an eye or hand leads one to commit sin, it would be better to get rid of these body parts than to go into hell.

God takes sin seriously—seriously enough to sacrifice His only begotten Son to destroy it. We must take sin seriously as well. A lack of repentance is a crime punishable by eternal death. It is better to deny our flesh—to pluck out an eye or cut off a hand, as it were—than to risk sinning against God. We naturally tend to pamper ourselves and excuse our sin. That is why we need Jesus’ shocking, radical hyperbole to wake us from our spiritual complacency. 

Jesus does not demand that we do the impossible – to live a perfect life. In His conversation with Nicodemus Jesus gave no mention of right living. The only condition He gave for eternal life was faith in Him alone. (John 3:16) He called people to recognize their sinfulness and then look to Him to forgiveness and life.

Look upon the heart-felt desires of Your humble servants, Almighty God, and stretch forth the right hand of Your majesty to be our defense against all our enemies; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever. Amen [2]

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[1]  Luther’s Seal copyright © Ed Riojas Higher Things

[2] Collect  for Monday of Lent 3, http://www.liturgies.net/Lent/LentenCollects.htm