(Matthew 5:27-30)

I am going to use the image of a sandwich as an allegory for sin. I made myself a sandwich for my tea. It was a sausage sandwich, no lettuce, no mayonnaise and no tomatoes. I looked at the sandwich and thought this can be improved. I went into the fridge, brought out some bacon, fried them up and put them in with the sausage. I looked at the bacon and sausage sandwich and thought that can be improved. I went back into the fridge and brought out some cheese – grated the cheese over the bacon and sausage and ate it – a great sandwich. Keep on eating sandwiches like that though and I end up fat and overweight. Similarly, sin will make me spiritually flabby. This is sin (described by Tillich) as forcing a separation between myself and I, I and others and I and God. These gaps can easily be filled up in a tempting world with many things designed to excite - films, clothes, advertisements, music, images.The first thing Jesus says is “keep it simple and keep it straight – let your yes be yes and let your no be no. If you say something ‘do it’ and don’t get caught up with swearing on the Bible, or swearing on your fathers grave; be a person of your word and do it. In crude terms if we are trying to add in an extra bit on to what we say we will do then we end up trying to do God’s job for him.The reason that Jesus wants this clarity and integrity of behaviour is because of how strong sin can be. Sin is an untrendy word in a world where the assumption is that you can do what you want as long as you don’t hurt other people. However, a few pointers about sin:

1. The stronger your understanding of sin then the stronger will be your understanding of grace and mercy. Jesus came to earth to save the world and not to leave us marooned, caught by habits and thoughts and bad feelings that we can not break. The greater our appreciation of sin, the more we can anticipate the strength, love and power of God to reach us at our point of need.
2. Sin goes hand in hand with responsibility. God is not a cuddly teddy bear parent hugging us closely so that we can not move away. Sin means that we have a natural draw-away from God. This means that it is up to us to decide turn towards God in faith. In one sense, this is something we do each day.

The sin tackled in this passage is adultery. Anger and sexual lust are two of the most powerful influences on mankind; we looked last week at the idea that there is such a thing as heart adultery – you don’t have to be touching, kissing or getting in to bed to have committed adultery. Many of you know that before coming to St Stephens I was involved in a research project looking at soap operas in the UK : East Enders, Coronation Street but not Emmerdale Farm. Stories in soap operas have an inevitability about them in the same way that stories do in real life. One of the absolute inevitabilities in a soap storyline in that secret affairs always get found out. I have been in churches where members of the leadership team have had a secret affair. They have been found out and the damage had gone on for years afterwards.There is mental adultery, spiritual adultery and literal adultery. Mental adultery might be in where to manipulate a situation to your own advantage - you tell a story at someone else’s expense just to gain some popularity or you exaggerate the truth or make things up to reflect well on you. Spiritual adultery is when your put your own thoughts and feelings in a cheap and easy way above the things of God – don’t use your mind to judge the truth of God but use the truth of God to judge your mind. Jesus hinges his teaching on the issue of divorce or not. He was speaking into a situation (not unlike our own) where divorce had become common place. The teaching in Deuteronomy 24 was that if a man finds no favour in his wife because he has found some indecency in her then he can write her a bill of divorce. One school of thought (Shammi) interpreted the word ‘indecency’ lightly and took it to refer to adultery or chastity (only). Another school of thought (Hillel) defined the word ‘indecency’ in the widest way possible. A man could divorce his wife if she put too much salt on the food if she was troublesome or disrespectful or talked to men on the streets. All of these reasons are putting our own thoughts, needs and ambitions above everything else, In essence a betrayal of ourselves, a disloyalty to others and disobedience to God.

• “Shall I go and visit my parents? Can’t be bothered”

• “ Shall I do my homework? I can’t be bothered”

• “ Shall I proud because I am a good Christian and a good church goer?"

• “ Do I feel depressed because I am just not good enough”?

• “ Do you feel edgy if you can’t check your phone for texts? Does your phone take priority even if you are having a conversation face to face?"

All these are sin – creating divisions within yourself, separating yourself from others and from God. Take responsibility, turn towards God and you are forgiven the lot.