7
📚“Do not judge, 📖 so that you will not be judged.2 📚“For with the judgment you judge, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you.
3 📚“And why do you look at the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not consider the plank that is in your own eye? 4 Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye’, and, look, a plank is in your own eye? 5 📚You hypocrite! First take the plank out of your own eye, and then you can see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye.
7:3-5 As long as we have a harsh critical spirit we are incapable of helping others. Our very attitude is one “plank” we may have in our eye. Our high estimate of ourselves makes us like a blind oculist trying to prescribe glasses for others. Jesus calls such people “hypocrites” because those who judge others are guilty themselves (Rom 2:1), and have not faced themselves or judged themselves as they ought. God has not sent His children into the world as judges but as witnesses (Acts 1:8). Each disciple of Christ should think that others are better than himself – Phil 2:3. If we do that we will not condemn them.⚜
6 📚“Do not give what is holy to the dogs, and do not throw your pearls before pigs, so that they do not trample them under their feet, and then turn and tear you to pieces.
7:6 Jesus means there are some people in the world who in their behavior are like pigs and dogs – they want to roll in the mire of sin and indulge in moral filth (by “dogs” He meant the street scavengers of villages that we see in many parts of the world, not household pets). They are not interested in repentance or God's kingdom. Compare Ps 22:16; Isa 56:11; Phil 3:2; 2 Pet 2:22; Jude 10; Rev 22:15. Such people are thoughtless and greedy, and oppose truth and righteousness.
His people are to discern such, and refrain from giving them holy truth or wisdom's pearls – until they repent, if such a time ever comes. Does this mean God's people should not preach to the unconverted? Of course not (Matt 28:19-20; Mark 16:15; Luke 24:46-47). But they must be discriminating and careful – wise as serpents and harmless as doves, knowing when to speak and when to be silent, and what to say and what not to say to various kinds of people (Matt 10:14, 16. Compare Luke 23:8-9; Acts 13:46; 18:6).⚜
He gives further instruction on prayer
7 📚“Ask, and it will be given to you. Seek, and you will find. Knock, and it will be opened to you. 8 📚For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened.
7:7-8 Jesus gives these great promises to God's children. They are in the context of this Sermon on the Mount where we are already told what good things for which we should ask and seek (Matt 6:9-15, 33). So our praying should be in accordance with all that. The Bible does not give us sweeping promises that God will give us anything for which we ask even if He knows it is bad for us. We should ask God for those things which will enable us to live according to His teachings. And for this we need a continual supply of God's grace to us, the power of the Holy Spirit, a pure, undivided heart, etc.
The words “seek” and “knock” indicate persistence in prayer. We should keep on seeking until we find, keep on knocking until God opens the door. Of course these verses do not teach us to ask men for what we need. Quite the opposite. We are to ask God. See also Ps 34:10; 69:32; Jer 29:13; Hos 10:12; Luke 11:5-11; 18:1-8; 1 Thess 5:17.⚜
9 📚“Or which one of you, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone? 10 Or if he asks for fish, will he give him a serpent? 11 📚If you then, being evil, 📖 know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him?
The King gives “the golden rule”
12 📚Therefore, in everything, whatever you want people to do to you, do the same to them. For this is the Law and the Prophets.
7:12 The Lord Jesus revealed how gracious God is. He is a loving Father always giving good things and seeking our highest good. Now Jesus tells us to do likewise. This is not a mere rule to follow; it is a spirit of love to have. We must be what we should be before we can do what we should do. “Law and Prophets” means the whole Old Testament (Matt 5:17). The essence of the OT is seen in Matt 22:35-40; Rom 13:8-10.⚜
The King speaks of broad and narrow ways
13 📚“Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in through it. 14 📚Because narrow is the gate, and strait 📖 is the way that leads to life, and few there are who find it.
7:13-14 Both the gate and way are narrow and restricted. Those who enter cannot take with them all the “baggage” of the world. Sin and selfishness and egoism, other gods and other ways must be left behind. Compare Matt 5:29-30.
Entering the narrow way requires repentance (Matt 3:2; 4:17), denial of self (Matt 16:24-26), humbling of self to go God's way (Matt 5:3-5), and a willingness to accept the rule of the one true God in one's life (v 21; Matt 6:9-10, 33).
The narrow gate is the only way into God's kingdom, and the Lord Jesus Himself is both the “gate” and the “way” – John 10:7-10; 14:6. So faith in Him is absolutely the essential thing – John 3:36; 8:24; Acts 4:12; 16:31; Rom 3:21-25; Gal 2:16; Eph 2:8-9. True faith in Christ will be joined with repentance, self-denial, and a willingness to submit to God. If these things are absent can faith be genuine? (See the note at Acts 22:10).
God's “narrow” way leads to life – spiritual life, eternal life with God – John 1:12-13; 3:16; 5:24; 6:47. But compared with the multitudes of earth “few” ever find this narrow way. This is because few will desire it or search for it, few are willing to repent, humble themselves and trust the Lord Jesus alone. The few who find God's way are those who want it above everything else, who cannot rest until they find it. And this is a result of God's work in their hearts.
Most people are in the “broad” way. This is the way of the world, the way of sinners, the way of the worship of many gods, or none, the way of living according to one's sinful nature, the way of doing what pleases self without concern for what pleases God, the way of ignorance of the truth, the way of rejecting the Lord Jesus who is the true way (Deut 11:28; Jud 2:17; Ps 1:6; Prov 14:12; 21:2, 8; Eph 4:17-19; Col 3:5-7). The end of that way is destruction. That means spiritual death, separation from God, and the lake of fire (Matt 3:10; 5:30; 25:46; Luke 16:22-24; 2 Thess 1:8-9; Rev 20:15; 21:8).
The Lord Jesus tells men to enter the narrow gate – not to admire it, or speculate about it. His disciples had already entered. Here He speaks to those who had not entered and calls them to make a decision, a decision based on all He had been teaching. Compare Ezek 18:30-32. See Luke 13:24.⚜
15 📚“Beware of false prophets. They come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves. 16 📚You will know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes from thorn bushes, or figs from thistles? 17 📚In the same way, every good tree produces good fruit, but a rotten tree produces bad fruit. 18 📚A good tree cannot produce bad fruit, nor can a rotten tree produce good fruit. 19 📚Every tree that does not produce good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. 20 📚Therefore, you will know them by their fruits.
7:15-20 The Lord tells us to watch out for false prophets because they may not be obvious. They may have the appearance of genuine servants of God (sheep's clothing), but they are servants of Satan. See 2 Cor 11:13-14. Their teaching and ways are destructive (they are like wolves, the natural enemies of sheep – John 10:12; Acts 20:29-30). Their fruit (their teaching and their activities which are a result of their teaching) will reveal what they are, and the disciples of Christ who have discernment will know what they are. Their nature will be manifest in what they say and do not say, in what they do and do not do. If they continually bear bad fruit they cannot be good trees.
The warning to watch out for false prophets comes just after Jesus's exhortation to enter the narrow way. False prophets will teach things contrary to the teachings of the Lord Jesus. They will present other ways and will try to keep people from entering the narrow way (Matt 23:13). Their end will be in accordance with their works (v 19; Matt 3:10; 2 Cor 11:15). On false prophets see Jer 14:14-15; 23:25-26; Ezek 13:1-9; Matt 24:11, 24; Rom 16:17-18; 1 Tim 4:1-2; 2 Tim 4:3-4; 2 Pet 2:1; 1 John 4:1; Jude 4.⚜
21 📚“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord 📖’, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. 22 📚Many will say to me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name drive out demons, and in your name perform many miracles?’ 23 📚And then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Depart from me, you evildoers.’
24 📚“Therefore, I will compare everyone who hears these words of mine, and does them, to a wise man who built his house on a rock. 25 📚And the rain came down, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, for it had its foundation on a rock. 26 📚And everyone who hears these sayings of mine, and does not do them, will be compared to a foolish man who built his house on sand. 27 📚And the rain came down, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house. And it fell, and great was its fall”.
7:24-27 In verses 15-23 we see Christ's condemnation of false prophets. In these verses we have a warning against false hearers – those who hear the truth but do not obey it. Here a distinction is made between the wise and the foolish (see also notes on Prov 9:1-18). In this illustration both types of people have some of the same desires and aims – both types build a “house”. Perhaps the word “house” signifies a person's whole life, especially his or her life as it relates to Christianity. The foolish man may be very wise when it comes to matters of the world or finance or politics or such things. But in matters of religion he is a fool.
The big difference between the houses the two men built is in the foundation. The foundation is a part of a house which may not be seen outwardly. Often it is hidden in the ground, and from there it supports the whole house. In the deep places of the heart of the wise man is the desire to obey the Lord Jesus. The Holy Spirit has enabled him to recognize his spiritual poverty and has humbled him. He has given him a thirst for righteousness. He prays sincerely that God's will be fulfilled in his life. The wise man has trusted in the Lord Jesus Christ and shows by his obedience that he has trusted Him.
But in the hidden places of the heart of the foolish man there is not this desire to obey Christ. So naturally he does not put into practice what Christ teaches. He has no inward drive to do so. His religion is entirely a surface thing without depth. The foundation of such a person's life is shifting sand. The only foundation for a genuine Christian life is Christ (1 Cor 3:11). The foolish man does not even consider building his “house” on this one foundation. The foundation he chooses is his own thoughts, or impressions, or feelings, or his own religious ideas or doctrines.
Jesus indicated here that every person's “house” is going to be tested. “Rain”, “floods” and “winds” will test every part of it, and when it is tested the foundation on which it is built will be revealed. Oh, what a storm struck Job (Job chapters 1 and 2). How Jeremiah was battered (Lam 3:1-24). See what a wave struck Peter (Luke 22:54-62). What rough weather Paul faced (2 Cor 6:4-10; 11:23-29). See too the storms of Ps 66:10-12 and Heb 11:36-38. But if a man has built solidly on Christ his house will stand, nothing can destroy it. If it is not built on Christ nothing can save it.
Rain, wind, and flood may also speak of future judgment when every house will be tested and every foundation exposed. Many religious houses in which people take pride will fall in that day with a great crash. The reason is they were not built on Christ's teachings here in the Sermon on the Mount (v 26). Christ did not give His teaching in this Sermon or any other teaching, that we might merely admire it or listen to it, or speak or write about it, but that we might act according to it. If we do not do so, disaster is the only possible result. Let us make sure “our house” is built solidly on Him, that we trust Him only, love Him truly, and obey Him heartily.⚜
28 📚And when Jesus had finished speaking these words, it happened that the people were astonished at his teaching, 29 📚for he taught them as one who had authority, and not as the scribes.
7:28-29 The reason for the amazement of the crowd was not simply in what Jesus said, but the way He said it. He did not quote this or that teacher as the authority for His teaching. He spoke with the authority God the Father gave Him. See in Matt 5:22, 28, 32, 34, 39, 44, the phrase “I tell you”. Compare John 7:16-17; 12:49-50. In God's kingdom He presents Himself as Christ the Messiah of Israel (Matt 5:17), as Lord, Son of God, and Judge (Matt 7:21-23). Now in all matters concerning God's kingdom, in the whole field of religion, in all that relates to the destiny of men, in heaven and on earth, He is the absolute authority (Matt 28:18; John 17:2; Phil 2:9-11).⚜