Mike Bickle emphasizes the significance of the Sermon on the Mount as the foundation of authentic Christianity, urging believers to confront the pervasive spirit of anger, which he equates to the spirit of murder. He explains that anger, if left unchecked, can lead to toxic spiritual conditions and strongholds in our lives, ultimately hindering our relationship with God and others. Bickle encourages immediate action to address anger and resentment, advocating for reconciliation and the cultivation of the Beatitudes as a means to foster a healthy spiritual garden. He warns that minimizing the seriousness of anger can lead to spiritual imprisonment and ineffective ministry, stressing the need for integrity and urgency in dealing with these issues. The sermon serves as a call to live out the true values of the Kingdom of God as outlined by Jesus.

Father, we come to you in the name of Jesus and we bless you for the giving of your word to your people. Lord, I ask you for a spirit of revelation and a spirit of grace for application. In the name of Jesus, amen. Well, last week I began talking on the Sermon on the Mount and I'm going to give just a minute of review about that for those that are just with us here today for the first time. The Sermon on the Mount, I like to call it Christianity 101 because sometimes we read the Sermon on the Mount and it's such an intense counter-lifestyle to what is common in the church today that we tend to think of it as the super saints do the Sermon on the Mount, the people we write biographies about. But Jesus never meant the Sermon on the Mount to be elevated to a status of the unusual and the extreme commitment. It really is Christianity 101. There is no other kingdom except for the one described in the Sermon on the Mount. The kingdom that's in the mind of the American church is no kingdom at all from God's point of view. There's a lot of preoccupation with self-help religion with Jesus' name sprinkled throughout it. It's not the kingdom of God. The kingdom of God is wherever these dimensions, these values are being manifest in God's people. That's where the church is being built authentically. And so when we read the Sermon on the Mount, these three chapters, Matthew 5, 6, and 7, we take it very, very serious. We take it very personal. We don't take it as the super high standard. I've had folks ask me that over the years. You're like, well, you know, you're really going for a high standard. I go, absolutely not. This is the only entry point into authentic New Testament Christianity. The other thing, again, I want to say it again. It's a self-help religion with Jesus' name sprinkled through it. It's not real Christianity that's going on across our nation in most places. I'm not trying to be mean about it. I'm trying to alert us so that we're not lulled to sleep by what is being paraded as authentic Christianity. It is not Christianity. And it's going to be manifest as such before it's over. Matthew 5, 6, and 7 is the true standard, the true measure of ministry and discipleship. It's the only one. It's not the highest one. It's the only one. That's an important thing to understand. It's how we measure our own godliness. It's how we measure our discipling of others. It's how we measure our effectiveness in ministry. If we're not producing these values in the saints, we do not have a New Testament ministry. I want to say that again. If we are not producing these values in others, in the saints. Now, in our outreach ministry, we can just give to the poor just with no strings attached, and that's authentic before the Lord, whether the poor receive these values or not. But when it comes within the household of God, there are many teachers, many prophets, many worship leaders, many trainers and pastors. And I say this to myself because the Lord says it to us. If we're not producing this value by what we contribute in the house of the Lord, we do not have an authentic ministry. No matter what men say or no matter what our brochure says. And so I'm not saying that to be mean. I'm saying that so that we're living in reality. I want to live in reality. I'm going to stand before the Lord and I want him to say, you know, I hop was the real deal, Mike. Not like, wow, you guys really had some cool conferences too bad. I didn't show up at very many of them. We're not interested in an image of ministry. We're interested in the sort of thing when the Lord looks at us and says that was true. Well, Lord, why was it true? It was producing what I said was the kingdom in the lives of people. Now I'm not saying it has to produce it real fast. I'm not saying it has to produce it at record measures, but if, but I don't have a ministry. If I'm not motivating and imparting and producing this kind of impact on saints, I don't have a ministry to the saints is what I mean. The point is we're going to be aggressive about this. We want to be aggressive about this. We want to be intentional about understanding this. This is for intercessors, pastors, group, home group leaders, the children's, uh, ministry. It's every single, uh, arena of ministry is measured by this. We read these sometimes, and we end up with a kind of, no one actually says it, but Jesus is kind of like, uh, you know, if we take these things serious, he's like a, uh, a teacher that's so extreme and eccentric. He's kind of fringe, you know, because to really do it as a, come on, let's get real. And, uh, this is the Jesus we tend to hide away when our friends come over. We don't want to pull this Jesus out in the living room when our visitors are here. Beloved, this is the only Jesus that exists. There is no other Jesus. And when we minimize the sermon on the Mount as the normal way, the kingdom, we are imagining that we are more loving than Jesus is. And we understand people better than he does. And that our way is a little more effective. He would just be patient. He would see the wisdom of our way. Let's reduce these things to something a little more practical, a little more hands-on. And then Jesus will be surprised that our love and our methods are a little more superior than his. Now, no one actually says that, but that's exactly what we're doing when we minimize this as the front and center focus of the kingdom of God. Well, Matthew chapter five, right there, verse three to 12 are the eight beatitudes. There are several ways to outline the, uh, sermon on the Mount. These three chapters, Matthew five, six, and seven, several valid ways. And they're different, but, uh, the way that I, uh, uh, in, I mean, the outline I enjoy most is that the eight beatitudes is the central message of what Jesus is saying. And the rest of the sermon is telling ways to cultivate and nurture these eight flowers in the garden of our heart. We need to have these eight realities so clear in our spirit. We need to be in an intentional hot pursuit of these eight values, liking, liking them to a, uh, flowers. They, these are the virtues that make our life beautiful and fragrant to God and to others. These are the eight values that exemplify Christ likeness in the kingdom of God. And so we want to stare at them. We want to wrestle with them. We want an agonize over a holy agonizing over applying them in our lives. How do we do it? The Lord says, good. I'll take away to the mystery. I'll tell you the real practicalities of making this garden grow in your heart. So what he does is in verse 21 to 48, he, uh, he, he, uh, outlines very strategically. We're going to talk on one of them today. He outlined six areas in which toxin and poison gets into our garden. And these six areas must be resisted. These are six areas that are common to all of us. Each of us, you know, specialize in two or three more than the other ones. But, uh, uh, these are the six areas. Jesus says, if you shut the door to these six, these six, uh, influences, you will begin to, uh, keep poison out of your garden. If you open the door to these six things and just go with them, your garden will be toxic. It will be poisoned and the flowers will not grow. So he's approaching them. Not like you better get with it or else he's talking as a loving shepherd. He says, I, I am giving you grace for the flower of God to grow in your heart, for you to be beautiful and fragrant and to operate in these eight beatitudes. But let me tell you, let me, let me just go right at the end of the game here. Instead of having you figure it out on your own, I'll tell you the six most common open doors of toxin into your garden. If you aim on those six, you're going to be good. And then Matthew chapter six, he gives five windows of grace that will release nutrient to your garden. Chapter six, verse one to 19. If we, if we do those positives, which is basically prayer, fasting, serving and giving and blessing our enemies. If we do those five things, we release, uh, uh, the rain and the sun. We re we release nutrients to our garden. So chapter five, 21 to 48 is the things we have to shut the door to chapter six is the, uh, is the things we have to open the door to in order to receive the enhancing, the strengthening of these eight virtues, these eight virtues, these eight realities are, will cause our hearts. Again, I talked about, we'll be beautiful and fragrant. Our hearts will be fiery and tender and fascinated. These are the eight issues that cause the heart to be liberated and fully alive. And any approach to wholeness that is not founded on these eight issues in the pursuit of them by saying no to the negatives. And yes, to the five positives is not a holistic approach to wholeness. There's a lot of wholeness ministry going on in the body of Christ today. A lot of it is secular with a little bit of Christian language. And some of it's really real and profound, but the, the main counseling book on the earth is Matthew five, six, and seven. It's just, you know, counseling one Oh one, you know, they got those books counseling for dummies, you know, meaning not that you're dumb, but it gets it right to the point where, Oh, I can understand that it's, it's counseling. So direct and clear. You can't miss it. It's absolutely reduced to its most elementary principles. There's eight things we're trying to grow in our garden. There's six common enemies. Matthew five, 21, 48. There's five nutrients, Matthew six, verse one to 19 or 20, depending on how you take that the verse about pursuing treasure. Lord says, you do that. You'll be blessed. You'll, you'll have a free spirit. You'll stand the, in the storms. And then the end of the sermon on the Mount chapter seven, verse 24 to 27 talks about the storm, the storms of our personal life. We have all of us have a couple storms, big ones in the course of our life on the earth. It's not talking about, you know, uh, a couple, uh, hassles. It's talking about real life storms. Everybody has a few of them, but there's an eschatological storm coming as well before the coming of the Lord. It's going to test the truth of all ministry. And then there's the great storm of standing before the fiery throne of God with this thunder and lightning. That will be the ultimate storm that will test the quality of our life. And Jesus said, this is fail-proof. You do these. If you get these eight flowers in your garden, you will stand. You will stand alive in your spirit with a free and happy spirit in every single storm. You will stand. Does it mean you'll be carefree? It means your spirit will be, you'll have a happy spirit. Doesn't mean you won't have grief and sorrow along with it, but your spirit will be alive in a free spirit. That's the eight things Jesus is saying. This is fail-proof. It will stand through any storm in this age, at the end of the age and in the age to come, it will stand every storm. It is foolproof. If you develop those eight flowers. Well, let's look at chapter five, verse 21 to 48 more specifically. Again, Jesus is identifying six main battle fronts that are attacking our soul. First Peter to 11, first Peter to 11, Peter called these fleshly loss that wage war against the soul. There is a war against our souls. And the point of this war is to take what is our fundamental weaknesses. We're born with fundamental sinful weaknesses and upgrade those weaknesses to wickedness so that our struggle and our dullness is upgraded from Satan's point of view to strongholds of bondage in our life. These are six areas that if not dealt with, they grow. They go from sinful weakness to demonic wickedness and strongholds. They all grow. If they're, if they're yielded to the church, you know, it's a thing I've been saying to a lot of the young people. I said, when I was 20 years old, I just assumed that when I was old, when I was 30, I would be like wave just automatically fiery and God, because I was fiery with the Lord when I was 20. I thought, man, when I'm 30, 10 more years, it's going to be awesome. Cause I met the Lord when I was 15. I thought I've been walking with the Lord five years when I've been walking the Lord 15 years, when I'm 30 years old. Wow. I, and then when I'm 40 and then when I'm 50, oh my goodness, it's going to be so awesome. And what I found out over the years is that most believers that get older, get more bondages. They don't get more tender. They get more angry because these six areas and the spirit that is represented by these six areas, it has a fiery negative power. That's that's seeking to conquer us and destroy us. And the idea that passing time makes us better because we named the name of Jesus is not true. Passing time in the pursuit of the sermon on the Mount lifestyle will cause our spirits to be deeper and more fiery and more steadfast, but passing time, it just being a pastor of a church, having a large ministry, being a prophet, that is no guarantee that you will not, uh, go from weakness to wickedness in one of these areas. And these things have a life of their own. I mean, they're powerful. They're mighty. The Satan, uh, these six areas, Jesus is giving us insight into Satan strategy to destroy our lives in these six areas. If we shut the door to these six and we open the door to the five in Matthew, Matthew chapter six, those five areas, beloved, these flowers are going to grow over time. And in the years passing will, they will result. And that idealism I had when I was 20, that everybody was going to be older in God. It's I'm at the place. Now the experience that I've had through the years, when I see somebody, uh, 80 years old, we had a testimony from Jan last night, 82 years old. When I see someone 80 fiery, I don't go, well, of course I've been with the Lord 50, 60 years. Now I go, this is a miracle because you know, the assumption is it would be automatic. No, they have so many storms that have hit them so much toxic and poison that has come their way. They've had to resist. So I see someone fiery at 20. I go good. When I see them fiery with her 50, I go, this is a miracle when they're still fiery at 80, they have weathered so many disappointments and mistreatments. And to weather those with godliness is, is absolutely fantastic. And it's rare. Most just lock their heart, go into silent retirement. They go into retirement with God, not just retirement in their occupation. And they just hang in there watching TV and eating and gossiping until they die and meet the Lord. It's a horrible, a horrible way to live. Let's look at, uh, let's look specifically at this first one in Matthew chapter five, verse 21 to 26. It's talking about anger. That's the term, but he's really talking about the spirit of murder. He's talking about every one of these six have a certain language he's using, but it all points to another spirit that has many applications to it. What the Pharisees were confused by is they thought the spirit of murder was only operating when somebody actually took a a life, physically killed them. And Jesus says, oh no, the top of the mountain isn't the whole mountain. It's just the top of it. When, when somebody's murdered physically, that's the ultimate in the spirit of murder. No, the spirit of murder is operating many, many steps. It's like somebody's standing at a distance saying Mount Everest and only counting the top of it as the mountain. No, the whole process is part of the mountain. The spirit of murder begins at a very, very young age in the human heart. And Jesus, he's not rebuking them. He's talking as a shepherd saying, if you, if you operate in the spirit of murder, you will be damaged by this in your spirit, you will pay the penalty. And he gives it in verse 26. He says, you'll be in prison. You'll be in the prison of a toxic defiled spirit all your days. Even as a believer, he says, you don't want to take the spirit of murder lightly. And you don't want to reduce the spirit of murder to only its ultimate expression of, of shooting somebody or murdering someone. The spirit of murder is operating, is operating in all of our lives. This is Satan. He's the father of lies. He is a murderer from the beginning. This is the, this first one, anger, the spirit of murder is the most pervasive of the six immorality is the second one. Immorality is the one that comes next. Anger is more pervasive than immorality. A little two-year-old can have a lot of anger and they don't have any immorality going on. People are, they are operating in anger from the very, very beginning. It's a spirit. It's a, uh, we're born with this sinful weakness and Satan is there to add fuel to the fire. Again, he wants weakness to turn into wickedness. He wants a struggle to turn into a stronghold. He wants poison in our spirit to, to, uh, grow into, into prison that we're in prison in our spirit. Even as believers, we can't get out of prison. Jesus said, until you shut the door to the spirit of murder, verse 26, you will not get out of the prison of its impact on your spirit. Maybe you'll get away with it in the court of man. Maybe your friends will just kind of look the other way, but your inner man will be defiled and it will weigh heavy all the days of your life. And then you'll stand before the Lord with so much opportunity in your life on the earth, wasted and missed because this spirit, if it grows and turns into a stronghold, which is all over the church, it will keep us so ineffective. And then we can't, this is fundamental point one of the sermon on the Mount. We can't bring others into the sermon on the Mount when we live in this spirit. Now this, we can express it. We express it. We all do. But if we war against that, we express it. We repent of it. We have integrity. We cry out for help. We cry out in prayer and fasting and, and we do all the issues that are involved. And as we're expressing, it is becoming more, it's becoming minimized over the years. So I'm not saying that we won't have an effective ministry till we're totally free from this. That's not what I'm saying, because I don't know anybody that's totally free from this, but I know this when it's allowed to just run freely as it is all through the ministry ranks of leadership in the ministry, there's no way that such vessels can call others into Liberty from the spirit of murder when they live in it so freely and so casually, we need to shut the door of it in our home. So it's not the sort of thing that as long as we're nice in the church context, and then at home, we vent in anger to our children or our spouse or our parents, beloved that you can't fake out the spirit of murder, it will come wherever the door is opened, it will invade. So we can't go to church settings, you know, with sincerity at good, and then go invent it, and expect the spirit of murder to, you know, say, well, you know, I'll let you have today off. No, no, the spirit of murder, it's a demonic, there's a demonic involvement in that spirit of murder is an attitude in its most basic way that we all have. And then it's actually a demonic spirit at a more at a more heightened level, we all don't have the spirit of murder in the demonic sense. But we all have it in the sense of the spirit of murder using the word spirit as the attitude in the flow in the in the mindset of murder. And that's what Jesus is pointing out here. He says, and he's not being heavy, and he's not giving them something new. I mean, he's not giving a new standard, you know, it's like the Old Testament was one standard, the New Testament's a new one. No, he's saying no, God always met in the sixth commandment, when he said, Do not murder, he always meant don't let the spirit of murder have any access in your life. He always meant that. And these Pharisees are going, Oh, let's read it. Verse 21, because you've heard it said, you have heard that it was said to those of old, you shall not murder. That's the sixth commandment. And whoever murders will be in danger of judgment. He goes, you heard that? He goes, what I say to you, he goes, when my father gave that command to Moses on Mount Sinai, what he meant was the whole of the subject of murder, not just the physical ultimate act of taking a life. He goes, I say to you, whoever's angry with his brother, Jesus, again, he is not increasing the standard, he is explaining what always was in God's heart when he gave that that original commandment. He goes, who's ever angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment. And whoever says to his brother, Raqqa shall be in danger of the council. And that's the governmental council that, that, uh, uh, renders them guilty and sends them to prison. It's, it's the court councils, what he's talking about, whoever it is talking about the councils of heaven, by the way, that heaven will, if a person gives their way to that spirit, his lifestyle doesn't mean to a person who says it once, but a person who camps in this spirit will be guilty. They will be in danger before the divine council. That's why there's forgiveness. That's why there's grace. That's why there's power to get free. That's why Jesus is offering this. So we don't end up in danger at the divine council. Whoever says you fool will be in danger of hell of the lake of fire. Now he's not saying the idea isn't if somebody accidentally says fool, ah, it's over. No, he's talking about somebody who camps out in that lifestyle. He says, you, it has a domino effect. You will end up in the lake of fire. So he's saying the same thing, three ways. The point is moving in the spirit, operating and moving in the spirit of murder. He says, whether it's anger, whether you say Raqqa, or you say you fool in meaning is you say it as persistently as a lifestyle. If it's okay with you, if that's something you've come to grips with, that you can live that way, he goes, you're flirting. You're flirting with the judgments of God. He says, you don't want to do that. You don't have to. He goes, because my blood is making a way of forgiveness for you. And my words of wisdom are exposing this spirit to you right now. The sermon on the Mount, this portion of it is exposing with divine insight, the spirit of murder. So we don't have to be, we don't have to be taken unaware by it. We are very aware of what we're operating in. Now, most of the church, I'm sad to say, doesn't see speaking this way as opening the door to the spirit of murder in their life. But Jesus made it really clear. This is not to be a mystery. It's supposed to be very clear to all Christians. And we're supposed to take it very, very serious. Okay. So what they have done in verse 21 is the Pharisees, they reduced the meaning of the, of murder to its ultimate, most extreme manifestation of actually taking a life. Jesus says, don't do that. Don't do that. He goes, I'm trying to be helpful. You are blind guides. He could tell the Pharisees, he goes, I am a faithful shepherd showing you the truth. Don't let that spirit in your heart. Don't, don't come to peace with it and let it have a place in you, the way you carry your heart. And don't, don't just, uh, uh, you know, act one way with all, all the saints, which is good to act that way. It's called, uh, uh, I mean, the kindness of that. It's not all hypocrisy, but he says, don't, he says, you got to do it at home because at home and in the secret place, you got to do with your best friend. When you're whispering about somebody, he says, because the spirit of murder, it has no, it has no, uh, uh, uh, uh, friends. It will, wherever the door is open, it will enter in and increase the problem. It will give toxin and poison on your spirit. And those flowers, those eight beatitudes will begin to diminish. And then you don't have that free living spirit in your heart that that is the destiny of every single believer. So verse 22 is the core message. Verse 22 is the major point in one sentence. There it is. If you are angry, if you, uh, uh, uh, settle on a lifestyle of calling your brother Rocca or calling your, uh, somebody fool, you're in the pathway of judgment. You're in danger of it. It didn't say that it's guaranteed. He's not measuring every individual. He says a situation. He says, you're in the pathway. You're in the pathway of coming under divine judgment because God hates murder. He hates murder. Absolutely hates it. So the spirit of the law, as I've already said, the spirit of the law, the heart, you know, when it says the spirit of the law, it means the heart of the matter, the heart of it, the true meaning of it, not the secret meeting, just the true heart. Meaning of this thing is do not operate in the spirit of murder in any of its manifestations, because it will hurt you because it will hurt you. Well, hurt your brother too. But he's talking right now in verse 25 and 26, he's talking about how it puts you and me in prison. And again, the spirit of murder, it has no friends. It has no allies. It doesn't make peace with us in the sense of saying, you know, I'll be nice to you. I'll let you off the hook this one time. Anytime we open the door, that influence, whether it's an attitude or far more pronounced and heightened, an actual demonic activity, which is more than the attitude. And I'm using the word spirit of murder as an attitude. And as it's upgraded to a new level of demonic energy, but that demonic energy can get on us without us being demon possessed. That demonic energy visits us. And Ephesians six is called a flaming missile where the enemy shoots a flaming missile, where there's this heightened energy of anger that hits us. That's that it doesn't mean we're possessed of a spirit, but a demon spirit is breathing on our spirit. That's not actually how it happens, but that's the word picture of a dragon breathing on your spirit, inspiring you and energizing you in anger. That is a demonic spirit energizing us. Paul says, resist that thing. That thing shut the door to that thing. Are you kidding? He says that thing gets its goal. It's an enemy on the outside is to become a resident on the inside. You don't want to play around with that spirit because that spirit, once it gets in, it's really difficult to get out at you. We can through, through the sermon on the Mount lifestyle and the means of the grace of God. But that spirit is a very, very damaging spirit. And it's still, it kills our free spirit inside. We want to have a free spirit, a heart buoyant in love and life and fascination with Jesus flowing with tenderizing and the Holy spirit being tenderized. Now, John, the apostle, he really picked up on this. John, the apostle uh, in first John three, verse 15, John says, if you hate your brother, you are a murderer long before you would ever touch them physically. You are a murderer already. It's like, well, no, no, this isn't well, this is like, we do not want this influence on our spirit. It is not figurative. It is not symbolic. There is a spirit of murder operating when hate grows in our heart, but beloved, we're born all of us with a propensity to this. We we're all born with a strong, uh, orientation to this attitude, this spirit. We don't want it to again, to increase from an attitude and a mindset into a demonic stronghold. We do not. And John was being very serious when he said he that hates is a murderer. It's operating in them. It's grown. It's got out of hand and people don't really use the word hate. Christians don't because it's such an ugly word. We call it, uh, I'm really, really, uh, been wounded and I've really got a check in my spirit against that evil brother. We never say we hate and we never say we have the spirit of murder. We always say we've been wounded. We've been mistreated. God is grieved and I am concerned. That's how we call the spirit of hate. That's how we, that's how we talk about the spirit of hate in our heart. Uh, we just, I, again, no one says I have murder in my heart unless they're joking, but it is a absolute pervasive sober reality. That's destroying the garden of God, the flowers of God in our heart, the spirit of murder. It's, it can be contempt. Jesus says it's in the, it can be, uh, expressed through these words, through slander and insult. And I don't mean you, you slander once you insult somebody once you go, ah, it's over. I got now murders taken over. No, no, you don't do that. He's not talking about being carnal and being loose. And then when you do it, you own up to it and you call it what it is you repent of it. The spirit of murder is not going to, uh, establish a stronghold in your life with that kind of integrity, even in the midst of weakness. But we call it, we say, this is not funny. This is real cancer getting into my body. This is really going to spread to my other organs. And the man, not of the man or woman of integrity, the man or woman of wisdom says, I am not taking an injection of this spirit into my being. I'm not letting this spirit in. It is cancerous. It will spread to the other organs. It will destroy other areas of my life. It will, it will shut down your life in the word. It will shut down your relationships. It will shut down, uh, your family, your marriage, your children, your all kinds of dynamics will be shut down by this spirit because that cancer will grow to other organs. It will destroy other dimensions of our life internally and externally. And it's unbiased. It again has no favorites. It has no allies. There's nobody that it's more kind to. It is unbiased in its operation. It is murder. Man, I'm just getting so convicted right now. I mean, you guys are just listening to it and you can daydream for a while. I got to read on this thing. It's like ringing in my spirit going, I got to get out of this sermon. You know, I got to call the altar, call and get out of here. I'm dragging my little weak heart over these burning coals right now. And I got to do it again tonight. You know, wow. Jesus's point is don't ever allow anger to remain uncontested in your spirit. That's what he's saying. Don't allow anger to remain uncontested. Don't look at it and say, so what look at it, you know, uh, express it in our weakness. We, we do it. He says, okay, okay, you've done it. There you have it. Now it's what you do now that matters. Go to your brother, confess it, make it right. Go operate in the opposite spirit and its influence will be diminished in your life. Attack this in the opposite spirit. And that's what he's going to say in verse 23 and 24. He said, he's going to say, go to your brother and operate in the opposite spirit and undo the damage in your spirit. That venting the spirit of murder, undo that damage, go to your brother. That's what he says in verse 23 and 24, go to your brother, go to your friend. Then in verse 25 and 26, he goes, go to your adversary. He says, whether it's your brother or your adversary, get that spirit off of you and do it. Now he says both times quickly, quickly, there's urgency. Get the spirit of murder minimized in your being by operating in the opposite spirit today. Don't wait three months. That thing is growing and you cut the thing off. And beloved, the good news is we can express, we can vent it, but with integrity and with wisdom, we can, we can, uh, we can neutralize the, uh, opening the door to, we can go the other way by operating in opposite spirit, but it won't just go away by quietly in our heart going, Oh God, forgive me, forgive me. That's good. That's better than nothing to acknowledge it and ask for forgiveness is one thing, but to operate in the opposite spirit is taking, uh, the, the antibodies that are destroying it. It says, minimize it, attack it in the opposite spirit. Verse 23 and 24, go to your brother. Now verse 25 and 26, go to your adversary. Now break the defilement of that spirit that you've vented through your words. Jesus is talking kindly to his people. He's not talking, uh, to them, like saying, you better get with it. You old, you know, centers. He's saying, Oh no, you don't know the nature of how this thing operates. And, and there's such propensity in all of us. And again, this is the first of the six, and this is the most pervasive. And this one starts, doesn't start at age two. It like starts at age zero or maybe minus zero. I don't know. Some of those little guys are kicking so hard. You don't know what's going on. Really? I don't know when it starts. I know it starts a lot earlier than all the others do. That's all that really matters. I'm not a child psychologist. I just know that, uh, it starts real early. Jesus says, don't let that thing remain uncontested in your spirit. Beloved. It's not about integrity. It is integrity to go to your brother and to, uh, and to, and to, uh, go to your adversary. It is integrity, but I'm not talking about integrity. I'm talking about wisdom, sanctified selfishness. I'm talking about the wisdom that takes whatever you take to get cancer out of your body. It's the wisdom that takes whatever you take that neutralizes the poison that you accidentally swallowed. I'm talking about sanctified selfishness right now. It happens to be an expression of integrity and relationship, but if you only appeal, uh, the fact have integrity and do what you ought to do, then you're only getting half of what Jesus saying. Jesus is actually appealing to their sanctified selfishness. You're not appealing to integrity here. He says, you will go to prison. And I mean, you will pay double. If you get in that prison, it will be so much harder to get those demons out. Once you let them in, because you get a stronghold, you get into a, a prison of poison in your spirit, the heaviness, the injury that will happen to your marriage, to your children, to your relationship, to your ministry, because you will pay double triple. If that thing sets up inside of you, he's appealing to their own sense of wellbeing and selfishness in the right sense of the word. And, and often, uh, when we talk about anger, we, we, we, we talk about it in the ought tos of, you know, wouldn't our ministry be better if we had integrity to deal with it. And, and Jesus, he's far more fundamental than that. He goes, let's leave the integrity thing aside for a minute. I'm talking about you being in trouble on the inside. And I'm talking about the reason your heart is shut down and all the five or six areas of relationships, because you invented this spirit. You've never been called on it, or maybe a couple of times, you just figured out a way where you were not guilty, but it's still, again, it has no bias. They've got ahold of you. And he says, get out of prison. Go now, what thou doest doest thou quickly. You know, it's interesting that here, uh, in verse 23 and 24, he talks about what you do with your brother, verse 25, 26. He talks about what you do with the adversary and both of them. He says, quick, quick, the urgency is time. Now do it today. Don't let that spirit get set up in you and don't even let it grow from a one to a two, you know, even if it's far from being a 10 on a, you know, in negative, even don't let it go from a one to a two because by the logic that it goes from a one to a two in terms of pervasiveness in our being, it goes from a two to a three sooner than later. Then a few years pass and it goes to a four and it always gets harder to deal with. He says, go now, don't let that thing in. Don't let that thing in, you know, in, in the, in the next, uh, of the six negatives is immorality. He he's real extreme with this on the anger. He says, do it quick on the immorality. He says, cut your arm off or poke your eye out. He's being, being radical, make extreme adjustments in your lifestyle. And he's not talking about a physical damage because the right eye and the right arm were the most valuable assets. It was an idiom for that, which was most valuable to you. He goes, if it's most valuable to you, get rid of it. He's not talking about physical damage because some people have misunderstood this and they've injured themselves different ones through church history. You honor their sincerity, but you wonder where their brains are. The Puritans would call that heat without light. I said, the brother has heat, but no light. He has a lot of zeal, but no wisdom. So there's this radical with anger to it. Now there's radical with immorality, cut off the arm, poke out the eye, change the setting and the relationship that lets this thing happen. No matter how dear it is change it. It's this radical Jesus. And he's not talking just about the subject of integrity. He's talking about the subject of self-preservation in the inner man. He's talking about being alive on the inside. He's talking as a dear shepherd, not as an angry judge. He's talking as a very dear shepherd. He goes, this thing will bite you. Both of these will bite you and they will destroy you on the inside. Do not play games with this. Okay. Let's, let's, uh, look at another point or two of this in verse 22. And I'm not going to cover all of it today because it's the sort of thing we got to do over and over and over. So there's no hurry to get it all done now. I mean, these same verses will be here in a week and a month and a year, and they'll be here a million years from now. This is, this is the way the whole kingdom will be run when the Lord returns. This is how the kingdom will be run forever is on these principles. Now we don't have the same dimension of negative in eternity, but these are the values that are represented in the Sermon on the Mount. He tells them, he says, you'll be in danger. He says it three times in verse 22, three times in danger of judgment, in danger of the council and in danger of hell fire. And it all means the same thing because the council means the divine council, the court of heaven, the bar of justice of God's throne. Now being in danger doesn't mean again, that if you express it, you're finished. It means if the idea of being in danger means there's a domino effect, it's growing and growing, but he says, you're not normally aware of it and you're not watching it grow. It's it's it's, uh, the frog in the kettle, it's acclimating. You're acclimating more and more to its presence in your life. And it's getting bigger and bigger. He goes, the danger is building. It's not that you do it. Once you go to hell, that's not what he's saying. He goes, you're in the pathway to where you're getting more acclimated to it as it's getting bigger and bigger. And you're unaware of what's taking place inside of you. And then again, weakness goes to wickedness. The poison becomes a stronghold, and then you begin to do other things. And he says the domino effect, it takes a while, but you end up in hell when it's over. Not because you said you fool, but because the spirit that was motivated, you grew and dominated more of your life and character. And that's what brings you to hell, not the statement of you fool. So what is the judgment? I think of three judgments that we are, we participate in when we operate in anger. Number one, the judgment of which I've said over and over already, verse 26, of being in prison with a toxic spirit. That is a judgment. That is a judgment on us. And as much as this is operating in me, and it is operating in me to the measure, it is operating in me. It is a judgment. I don't mean God's angry at me saying, no, it's, it's, it's a reaping. And so it's just the administration of his universe, the law of reaping and sowing, but it is a form of judgment. Secondly, the domino effect, the spirit grows and dominates other areas that we end up in the lake of fire. People end up in hell with this spirit because of the spirit. And the third, the judgment is our contribution, our contribution in injuring other people. God's plan and God's treasure and God's desire for their lives has been injured by our input into their life. That is a judgment on us. The fact that I have injured people is something I don't like. The fact that I have created stumbling blocks and caused people to stumble over the years, I get forgiveness for that, but I don't like the fact that it's happened in my life. And so that is part of the judgment as well. Now the judgment he's talking about here is the ultimate judgment, but that judgment has three dimensions to it. It's a judgment of our inner life, a judgment ultimately on the last day, but the judgment because we all have the dream of our interactions with people make them better. But in truth, brothers and with brothers, their interaction make them, it makes their life more difficult because of our interaction with them. And the Lord says, don't do that. That's one of my vessels. Yes, one of my messed up ones, but don't help them be more messed up. Help them get unmessed up. Don't contribute to their problem. Contribute to giving them hope to have a way of grace. I would that, that, that, that you would be a trophy of grace signifying the way of freedom by the way you bless your enemies, not by you bad mouthing them behind their back. And then it gets back to them and injures them again. It says, and they're responsible for getting injured in it. But the Lord says, we've, we've contributed to it because I want you to be a, a trophy of a free spirit that even that person, and that will impact that person in time. Not all people will be impacted by it, but some will. Now, the reason we get angry, the fundamental reason, James, the Lord's brother said it in James four, one, he says, we get angry because we want stuff and can't get it. Bottom line. We get angry because people block our goals, our little goals. I want to, I want tranquility now for the next, you know, for the next hour. And they bugged me. So they're blocking my goal of tranquility for an hour. They're blocking my goal. They take our money. They block our goals. They make decisions that make our life harder. They block our goals is basically the reason we have anger in terms of circumstances. That's what it is. Jesus says, I mean, James said, you want things, you want tranquility, peace, money, honor. You want life to be easy. You got a lot of goals, which was common to all of us. It goes when somebody gets in the way of them, even just, you know, just an easy one hour afternoon, you know, it says when they get in your way, you get angry and that's, I do, you do, we do, they do. The problem isn't that we get angry. It's the problem. The issue is what we do with it. We all do it. Now Jesus qualifies the statement. He says he's ever angry with his brother without cause. There's been more of a, of a defiled man that has got himself off the hook by using that qualifier. There is an anger that is not unrighteous. There is holy anger. It's very rare. And I just wouldn't go there. You know, if you get angry, I wouldn't like, ah, there it is. I'm the, without, I had cause they bugged me. There is a way to be angry and not sin. Paul says it in Ephesians four 26, he goes, be angry, but don't send. But here's the issue. See, Jesus called the Pharisees fool, but he says here, don't call your brother fool. Jesus, what he was doing was giving a judgment on the leadership of Israel that was harming the nation. He was operating in the state and as a zealous prophet, giving God's evaluation to the leaders, judging and hurting, injuring Israel. When those same people hit him personally, he said, I forgive you. He didn't say you fool because they invaded him personally, his personal domain. And that says, well, it's hard to talk about Jesus because he's God and all that. But, uh, so his domain is, is so much more than, than, than, than ours. But here's the point. We can get angry when it does not affect our personal life and honor and convenience. It's, you know, you know, someone is, which is very true. There's people in our midst. This is glorious. They're angry about abortion. They're not angry because somebody bugged them today or took or took some of their honor or money that they deserve. They're angry about abortion. That is anger with cause. But here's the tip off when it affects your life and your anger, any of it can be traced back to your money and honor and convenience. It is not righteous anger. It is unrighteous anger. No brother. It's the Lord's money. They took, Oh brother, don't go there. It's a lot of deception. The Lord's got all the cattle, a thousand hills. No, no. It's the Lord's honor in me that they're violating. The Lord says, no, I got big shoulders. I can handle it. I want you to bless that guy. So it's whenever there's personal interest involved, he says, now he says, when you say to them, Rocca, now, uh, I've studied this a bit. And, uh, most, uh, commentators are agreed upon the fact that, that the terms Rocca and you fool are hard to really distinguish exactly what it's, uh, what it's saying. And so I acknowledge that, but most of them, uh, the general idea of Rocca means empty headed or stupid. In other words, you're insulting their intelligence. You're insulting their way of thinking. You're insulting their mind. So Rocca means it's most simple translation. Okay. I'm not a, a Greek scholar, but just from the reading, they all say the same thing means you stupid, stupid. I don't, the way you think is dumb and, and, and you're calling them. I call them stupid in its various derivative forms. We don't have to say Rocco. I didn't call him Rocco. I called him stupid. Well, it's the spirit of it. That guy is a numbskull. There you had it. Well, that numbskull is technically not a cuss word. Is it Jesus saying that's not the point you've, uh, you've, uh, expressed anger and contempt for the way they think. And because it, because it bothers your tranquility, not because again, if it's, it's the, uh, a false religion, it's not, it's not a touching your life in terms of your personal money and honor. And you say, Oh, I'm angry that these ideas are being spread of the young people. Our nation are getting it. That is not as righteous anger. It is foolish. It is stupid. It is wrong. That is not the spirit of murder. That is righteous zeal. But beloved that's normal. It's never what angers abound in our lives. It's mostly because the guy invades our space personally. Then the word fool, the word fool, the term fool would seem like that means stupid, but it doesn't because, uh, in the, uh, uh, Hebrew mindset, like Psalm 14, the fool says in his heart, there is no God. The fool was the man who was perverse. He was an agnostic. He was an apostate. He, he denied his faith. So the word fool though, to our thinking would mean the guy's, uh, stupid like the word rocker. But again, in their, uh, uh, mindset, they would use the word fool to express an insult on the person's character, not their mind, not their thinking abilities, but their heart. So rocker attacks the way they think, Oh man, you're simple minded. You're just, you drive me crazy because you keep doing the dumb thing over and over. That's rocker. I'm good at that, aren't I? You can tell I just flowed. I'm not proud of that. Fool is fool is that guy is perverse. Now again, to call a person perverse, like Jesus did the Pharisees because they were injuring the nation of Israel, not him personally, because when they touched him personally, he did not talk to him that way. He said, I forgive you. You know, not what you do. So to insult someone's character when they touch our inconvenience, our money and honor, Jesus said, you're operating in the spirit of murder. When you do that, he says, you just, you don't want to go there. Such talk is forbidden by the sixth commandment. You shall not murder. That's what Jesus is saying. Uh, uh, insulting somebody's mindset and insulting somebody's character is a violation of the sixth commandment. This was shocking to everybody. They went, are you sure? She just said, trust me. I'm sure. Matter of fact, I'm the one that gave it to Moses. My is my father's law. I gave it to him. I was there at Mount Sinai. When the audible voice of God thundered, it was me who said it. I know what that verse means. I know what that law meant. So verse 23, verse 23 to 24, he says with your brother, take immediate action, undo it. There's 25 and 26, take immediate action, undo it, get that spirit off of you. Now let's look at that just ever so briefly, because I want to be done with this. He says, uh, it's the urgency that we care about, but look, verse 23 and 24, it's not your brother. And again, he's talking about all acting in the opposite spirit. That's what he's talking about. That's how we minimize the damage of the spirit of murder, uh, being expressed in our life. We undo the toxin. We, we, we take the antibodies that, that, that, that, uh, bring us the other direction. It minimizes the negative, all the acidic dimensions of that in our spirit. And it gets us, uh, out of the, out of, uh, the negative effects of it, of that last action. Because every time we act this out, when we say it, when we act it out, it grows in us. That's the point, I guess I didn't make clear. And we have to operate in the opposite spirit to undo that little heightened open door, that heightened activity of that spirit in us. We got to act it out though. We act it out to release the negative. We have to act out the opposite spirit to minimize that negative we just released. He says, go to your brother. Now here's what's interesting. Verse 23 and 24 is that the question of who is at fault is irrelevant. Jesus doesn't even, he doesn't point at all to the guilty one. Now it would seem I'm doing good. You say something mean to me. Notice I'm, I'm the good one in the store here. And you did something mean to me. It seems like you should come to me. Jesus says, nah, nah, nah. We're not talking about legal arbitration. We're talking about operating in a spirit that is injuring you, that you're venting. He says, you don't want to do that because you, because you want to put up a guard. So that spirit doesn't get ahold of you. He goes, you go to him. Now Jesus doesn't care which one goes first. His idea is the person that has ears to hear goes first because the point isn't a legal process. The point is operating in an opposite spirit to get the defilement off of us. So it doesn't grow in this. That's the point. Does it matter how someone gets cancer? Go get the cancer taken care of. If you can go, it doesn't matter how you drank the poison. Well, it was accidentally, I reached the wrong. It doesn't matter. Go take what is ever necessary to neutralize the poison. That's the urgency. He says, forget all that who did it first thing, because that spirit is growing in you right now. There's urgency. There's no indication that you were even, had any fault at all. And there's no indication that they were justified in the way that they slandered you. No indication. They're right. Jesus said, that's not the point you're missing. I'm talking about the operation of a spirit here. I'm not talking about a legal proceeding and that's where people trip over this. They don't see his pastoral heart. They don't see his passion for their welfare. They, they see this as, wait a second here. They are just inundated with the spirit of murder, trying to figure out a legal way as to this isn't fair. And Jesus says, it's all over you. Can't you see it? The very fact that this troubles you is the proof that you're blinded by the spirit of murder. Well, let's just end with that and we'll take up more later. We're not done with this passage.