Jesus' Words Only

The Modern Gospel Teaching That The Sermon Is Irrelevant

 

Those who today believe in the Modern Gospel of Cheap Grace find it necessary to denigrate the value of Jesus’ teaching in the Sermon on the Mount.

 

One argument is that Jesus’ words in the Sermon on the Mount are meant for a different dispensation. For example, Pastor Mike Paulson of Touchet Baptist Church in Touchet, Washington, in a sermon entitled What Would Jesus Do or What Would Paul Do? boldly dismisses the Sermon on the Mount. He claims its teaching belongs to a different dispensation. Pastor Paulson says it is heretical to teach the Sermon on the Mount literally as applicable today.

Unfortunately, most ‘modern’ Christians follow those teachings today—I call them Beatitudinal Christians and a simple reading of the Sermon on the Mount should [show] them that they can NOT live that sermon completely today—no way, not at all—not even close! The stuff in the Sermon on the Mount actually contradicts Paul’s teachings in everything from salvation to doctrinal belief! You would think folks would see this—but like Jesus said of them, ye err not knowing the Scriptures...[Link to PDF]

Pastor Paulson is not an aberration, but a normative teaching today. Walvoord published under the Moody Press is likewise typical:

 

The Sermon on the Mount, as a whole, is not church truth precisely…It is not intended to delineate justification by faith or the gospel of salvation. (John Walvoord, Matthew: Thy Kingdom Come (Moody Press: 1984) at 44, 45.)

 

But if claiming atonement is part of the gospel of salvation as Paul insists in 1 Cor. 15:1-4, the Sermon's mentioning you cannot use the DONOR -- meaning atonement gift (see link) -- until you put it down at the altar, and go back to do what is necessary in repentance to allay the anger of the one you offended, would thereby be a key salvation message. See Matt 5:23-24. Jesus' work on the cross became our DONOR. See also this link.

As a result, this passage in the Sermon on the Mount becomes the most important message on salvation in the entire New Testament. No wonder translations never tell you donor is a Hebrew term for atonement appearing in Matthew, and was borrowed into Greek with the same meaning.

 

This approach to ignore the Sermon on the Mount found its clearest exposition in the teachings of the founder of dispensationalism — Clarence Larkin. He began the movement by saying there is nothing for a modern Christian to worry about obeying from the Sermon on the Mount. His text, still cited today among dispensationalists, is Dispensational Truth (Philadelphia: Larkin, 1920 -Fortieth Printing). Based on dispensational logic, Larkin explains Jesus’ teachings in the Sermon on the Mount “have no application to the Christian, but only to those who are under the Law, and therefore must apply to another Dispensation than this.” (Id., at 87 -view of PDF of pg 87.) This notion thus divorces the church from Christ.