This week’s readings are tough. Jesus raises the moral bar far above external behaviour to our internal thoughts. “You’ve heard it said … well I say …”
Jesus addresses three arenas in Matthew 5 – murder, adultery and lying. While my outward actions are limited to the last one, God and I both know I fall short of the holiness to which God calls every person.
But how can Jesus’ expect us to behave even better on the inside than we do on the outside?
The core of the Good News of Jesus is that cleanliness is possible because Jesus’ makes the salvation way open through repentance, justification, sanctification and glorification. These big words describe how our relationship with God as Creator, Saviour and Sustainer is on a journey of restoration to an even better state than that described in the Garden of Eden.
John Wesley was personally challenged by the call to be holy as God is holy, to be sanctified, so he devised methods to help his fellow believers to practice what is preached without the use of soap.
One method that you might consider was to practice these three simple rules: Do no harm. Do good. Stay in love with God