Okay guys, lets admit it, this is a hard one. Especially in our era when woman are objectified, and objectify themselves so much. Men have had an issue with this since almost our first parents. Now I must make a distinction. You see a woman who is very beautiful, she is in an elegant dress and is all done up. You feel the desire to linger a moment looking at her....Is this what Jesus was talking about. That depends. What are you thinking about when you look at her? If you are thinking ,"That is a very beautiful woman." Then I feel that that is not lust. If you are thinking ,"Wow, I wonder what she would look like with less on." That is lust.
There is no problem with recognizing beauty, whether in art, nature, or in those other human beings on this planet. The difference is where do the thoughts go. Do you feel as if you are looking at a piece of art, or are you looking at them in a sexual nature.
Now, you need to remember something. We are wired to look for the most fit mate. As such when you see a member of the opposite sex, who you body says would be a suitable mate, you are going to feel something. It is unavoidable. The question is, do you let those thoughts and feelings stir within you. Do you notice that Christ did not say that whosoever looketh on a woman and feels lust. He said "to lust" indicating intentional looking for the purpose of arousing those feelings.
This scripture is about pornography. And as Elder Oaks of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles said,"young women, please understand that if you dress immodestly, you are magnifying this problem by becoming pornography to some of the men who see you." Thus a woman does not have to be naked for it to be pornography. Any thing you look at for the purpose of lusting, is pornography.
Pornography is void of love or respect. Thus this can even refer to your interactions with your spouse. If those interactions are void of love or respect of them, then they have also become pornography, and its not their fault at all. It is the responsibility of each person to dress appropriate for the occasion, and to think appropriately for the occasion.
Now in closing I wish to remind the woman that you are just as prone to this. Elder Oaks indicated "Pornographic or erotic stories" are just as bad. This included many of the romance novels you all love so much. Many of which are just as bad as any pornographic magazine. It might not be visual, but it in acts the same chemical reactions.
While anger is not sinful, not allowing ourselves to forgive is sinful. How long do you hold on to anger? How long do you let it eat away at you. The spirit brings feelings of peace and love, how can we expect to be lead by the spirit when we are cankered by anger and hate. My father once told me that the heart is affected by every thought we have. Imagine that a drop of everything we think makes its way into our heart. Then whatever we fill our thoughts with will eventually fill our heart. The lord has admonished us to fill our hearts with charity. How is this possible if we allow drops of anger to seep through.
Many believe that a righteous individual will never get angry. This is not true. Righteous individuals do get angry. God himself gets angry. The difference is why we get angry, and how we react. The first few words of verse 22 give us the incite. It is only a sin if we are not justified in getting angry. When it says angry without reason, I imagine it is implying that you must have a good reason. A good measure is whether you think God would be angry in the situation.
Now you notice that it says that you are in danger of the judgment. What does that mean? The judgment would indicate God judgment due to sin, however notice that it does not say that we are convicted. Just that we are in danger. Danger indicates a state where you can still come back before you get into any trouble. Thus when we are angry without cause we can still get ourselves under control and avoid sin.
However the next line indicates that if we act rashly on that anger, then we are in danger of hellfire. Once we have acted rashly we have committed the act. Thus the sin has been made, and judgment on that act has been passed. However again the lord indicates danger, or the possibility, of hellfire. There is still a way back through repentance.
Anger is not sinful. Unjust anger, or acting rashly when angry is sinful, and requires repentance. Think about a time when you where angry, can you honestly say that you where justified before god in being angry? Do you think you reacted in a just manner before God?
These verses from the sermon on the mount are quoted in almost every talk about missionary work I have ever heard. Yet they strongly contrast some of the lords other sayings. Here we are told to let our light shine that people may see our good works. Later we are told to pray hidden in our closets, and to not let the right hand know what the left hand is doing. That the fathers seeing what is done in secret will reward us openly.
In many ways these two scriptures are said to contradict each other. One says to let everyone see what you do that is good, the other says to not let anyone know. So what are we supposed to do?
The truth of the matter is that the two scriptures talk about the motive for doing the good works. In one the lord tells us to raise them on a candle stick to "glorify your father who is in heaven." The other tells us to do them in secret and to not seek for the praise of men. When we do good works people always see. You can't hide, there is always someone watching. The issue is when you do the good deed for the purpose of being seen. Instead of for the glory of God.
This scripture might not make as much sense to us today as it did in the time of the Bible. To us, salt is what makes us retain water, and we are constantly being told to limit our consumption of salt in our diets. Salty food are generally considered to not be very healthy, and can raise your blood pressure.However, it is essential to continual life on this planet.
Did you know that Salt is required to sustain animal life. Elephants go into caves to scrape salt from the walls and eat it. We give our cows salt licks in order to make sure that they have enough salt. Without it they would die. Without salt all animal life on our planet would die. The fish of the sea would die and we would all die too.We have been using salt to preserve food for longer than we have had a written language. It was an essential element in the time of Christ to keep food from spoiling.
Thus the salt of the earth, is what preserves us as a people. It is the group of good people who go about their every day lives doing good things. They are not shining diamonds, but are dull, gray and rough. But all the diamonds in the world couldn't take the place of the salt. They preserve the order of this world with their honesty, integrity, and hard work. Without them, we would all spoil and be worthless as a people.
These are some of the most well known one liners in the scriptures, and because of such they have become overlooked in their importance.
Joseph smith likened the process of obtaining exaltation to be like climbing a ladder. You must start on the bottom rung, and work your way up one rung at a time. What if we think of the beatitudes as the rungs of the ladder that lead us to exaltation.
First we must realize that we are lacking, that we need God in our lives. Then we mourn, and feel godly sorrow for our sins and short comings. Then we become meek and teachable. Accepting what God tells us and not reviling against it. Once we have become teachable, he will teach us, and we will hunger and thirst after righteousness. As we learn and gain the spirit we will be filled with charity, and become merciful to those around us. As we are filled with faith and charity the lord will purify our hearts and we will have no more desire to do evil. Then, like Lehi after partaking of the fruit, we will desire to share these blessings with others and bring the peace of the gospel into their lives. As we work to further Gods work, the enemies of the work will work against us, and we will be persecuted for righteousness sake.
Thus as you can see the beatitudes are not just a grouping of qualities, but he step by step process to becoming Christ like.
It appears from Matt 5:1 that this first part of the sermon on the mount was taught only to the disciples. It says that Jesus went up into the mountains and then his disciples came up to him. Generally in the gospels, when the word his/the disciples it is referring to the 12. Thus the beatitudes were not taught to the entire congregation.
Christ had already met Peter, Andrew and Philip.This was not their first interaction with him. Christ had already changed Simon's name to Peter at this point. So, contrary to what people want to think, they did not answer to the call of the complete stranger. They had already received the witness from John and had seen Christs miracles. If we look at each of the records in turn, especially that of Luke, we get the feeling that after announcing himself in Nathareth, he returned to Capernaum where Peter and most of the Apostles lived. While there they fell back into their daily routines of fishing for a living. Then according to Luke 5 he came and called them to leave their nets and dedicate themselves to the ministry.
Each of the four gospels contains the testimony of one of the Apostles regarding the life and mission of Christ. Each of them chose different events to speak of, and some might have been only known by a few. Thus it makes sense that the scriptural accounts differ from one another on the chronology of certain events. There is actually quite a bit that occurs between verses 11 and 12 of Matthiew. The first meeting between Philip, Andrew, Peter and Christ, while in the wilderness of they where learning from John. Nathanial meets the savior and together they go to the wedding in Cana, where Christ performs his first miracles.
As you can see a lot happens between these two verses. to read the account in chronological order i would advise consulting the LDS Institute manual for the New Testament The Life and Teachings of Jesus and the Apostles.
It only makes sense that at this pivotal time in our saviors ministry that the Tempter came to him. Although Christ was the son of God in the flesh he still suffered from all the pains that we do. So it is rational to assume that his body was weakened to a point that would have killed a normal human being, and as suck would have left him in a weakened state. It is in this state that the tempter come to him, offering him exactly what the body wanted. Food. To use his divinely given gifts to quench his hunger.
The temptations that are presented to the savior fit into one of three categories.
Giving into the desires of the flesh
Giving into our fears
Giving into our pride
Each is a man category that Satan uses against us.
Also of note is the use of the word "if". It was Satan's desire to bring doubt into the mind of the savior as to his own ability, or that of the father, to fulfill the great and everlasting plan of happiness. ]
He uses the same temptation on each of us. How often have we wondered "if" we were good enough. How many have questioned "if" God cared at all, "if" he would answer their prayers. "If" we really received a witness of the spirit or "if" it was just our own minds. It is the great "if" of doubt that the advisory chose to use against he greatest of us all, and which he uses on us each day.
Ancient Hebrew used lots of numbers as metaphors. Forty is a metaphorical number. Which should makes sense since the number pops up too many times to be coincidental. Forty is a number that represents a transition period, a time of change and metamorphosis. Thus it most likely does not mean that Christ fasted for forty days. He he could have fasted for less, or more time. All it means is that things occurred during that time, that transitioned Christ from his pre-ministry period, and prepared him, to begin his earthy ministry.
Jesus did not go into the wilderness to be tempted. According to the Joseph Smith Translation Jesus went out to be with his father. To commune with God, and while he was there being spiritually fed, then the devil came to him to tempt him. This is an important destination. We should not seek out temptations, we should avoid them. But you will also find that as you serve the lord, temptations will come all by themselves. You don't need to go looking for them.
Quote on the matter
“Jesus did not go into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil; righteous men do not seek out temptation.
He went ‘to be with God.’ Probably he was visited by the Father; without question he received transcendent
spiritual manifestations. The temptations came after he ‘had communed with God,’ ‘after forty days.’ The
same was true in the case of Moses. He communed with God, saw the visions of eternity, and was then
left unto himself to be tempted of the devil. After resisting temptation he again communed with Deity,
gaining further light and revelation.” (McConkie, DNTC, 1:128; see also Mosiah 3:7.)
Contrary to what many people think, baptism was not a new principle to the Jews of Christ's time. The Jewish baptism is called the Mikvah and involves a similar procedure to Christian baptisms. The unique thing about John is not that he was baptizing, but who he was baptizing. Like in Christian religion, Jewish baptisms where preformed in order to induct the individual into the house of Israel. John was baptizing those who were already Jews. According to their laws they needed no baptism. This is where John's discussion with the Pharisees and Saducees arises. They felt no need to be baptized, because in their mind baptism was part of the process to become a Jew, and they were already Jews; but John's baptism was not meant for that purpose. It instead was meant to cleanse the individual from sin so that they might be ready to accept the Christ when he came.
This is not the only time in history that those already under the covenant where baptized again for repentance. Those baptized in the early days of the church, before its official organization in 1830, where rebaptized after the organization ceremony. Before the organization the church had not existed. As such they had not been baptized into the church. But only for the remission of sins. They were then re baptized as members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Much the same way that John would baptize them and then the Apostles would baptist them again after Christ organized his church.
According to Talmage the raiment of camel's hair was not made of camel skin, but instead made of woven camel's hair. This is supported by the writings of Josephus. As for his diet of Locust and wild honey, John grew up in the desert. According to Christian tradition dating back to the historian Origen in the 3rd century CE King Heron had tried to kill John as an infant, which makes sense because of the miracles surrounding his birth, but Zechariah knowing of Herod's intentions had sent his wife and son into the desert where Herod could not find them. It is logical to assume that in the wilderness they would have met up with one of the many different Bedouin groups that lived in the Judean wilderness. There he would have been raised on the food available in the wilderness. Locusts are a normal staple of life for the poorer people in the Arab nations to this day. That John ate Locusts would have set him apart as a poorer individual in Jewish society. According to James Tamage in Jesus the Christ there are more wild honeybees in Israel then there are those kept in hives. This it makes sense for John to eat these things.