Sermon Series: The Good Law and The Good Life
Sermon Text: Exodus 20:13; Matthew 5:21-26
Sermon Title: “Killing Murder with Love”
Sermon Slides:
SLIDE 1 – Sermon Title Slide
SLIDE 2 – Today’s Big Idea: First-Degree Murder Begins in the Heart … with Sinful Anger.So, We Must Kill Murder … with Godly Love.
SLIDE 3 – Point 1: First-Degree Murder Begins in the Heart … with Sinful Anger (Ex. 20:13; Matt. 5:21-22)
SLIDE 4 – Romans 7:14 – “We know that the law is spiritual.”
SLIDE 5 – Insert Copy of Point #1 of Sermon
SLIDE 6 – James 4:1-2 – “What causes quarrels and … fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you? You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel.”
SLIDE 7 – Insert Copy of Point #1 of Sermon
SLIDE 8 – James 1:13-15 – “Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am being tempted by God,” for God cannot be tempted with evil … But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death.”
SLIDE 9 – John 8:39-44 – “They answered him, ‘Abraham is our father.’ Jesus said to them, ‘If you were Abraham's children, you would be doing the works Abraham did, but now you seek to kill me … You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father's desires. He was a murderer from the beginning … when he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies.’”
SLIDE 10 – Insert Copy of Point #1 of Sermon
SLIDE 11 – 1 John 3:15 – “Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him.”
SLIDE 12 – John Owen (1616-83) – “Be killing sin … before it kills you.”
SLIDE 13 – Point 2: We Must Kill Murder … with Godly Love (Matt. 5:23-26)
SLIDE 14 – Romans 5:3-5 – “Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.”
SLIDE 15 – Ephesians 4:32 – “Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.”
SLIDE 16 – Seven Uses of This Sermon for Our Church and Lives
SLIDE 17 – If We Reduce the Law to External Actions … We Will Become Pharisees.
SLIDE 18 – Both Anger & Murder Deserve Punishment … But Have Different Consequences.
SLIDE 19 – Righteous Anger is Proper … but Must be Handled Properly.
SLIDE 20 – In the Process of Reconciling Love, Don’t Skip Necessary Steps.
SLIDE 21 – Do You Need to Reconcile with Someone?
SLIDE 22 – Craig Blomberg (1955-Present) – “It is particularly bad for Christians to get angry at one another who have themselves been spared God’s wrath.”
SLIDE 23 – Sometimes Reconciliation Isn’t Achievable … But Forgiveness is Commanded.
SLIDE 24 – But What if I’m Angry … with God?
