“If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell.” – Matt. 5:29
How painful it is to gouge out your own eye, don’t you think?
Before, I thought this verse was literal. What really is the very essence of this? If I’d follow this literally, I’d look like those victims from the movie Jeepers Creepers.
Some people say the eye is the window to the soul. And it is more often than not, that body part that’s easily inclined to sin, since we really can’t control the things we see. Lust is something that doesn’t only pertain to people, but also to material things. It is a deep desire to possess something that belongs to another regardless of the consequences, and oftentimes starts with just one look. But the commandments clearly say: “Thou shall not covet thy neighbor’s wife, nor his goods…” What must we do to avoid this?
Following what the apostle Matthew wrote, “gouge out your eye” - avoid entertaining temptation. Or if you already did, get it out of your body, and out of your system – even if it is as painful as losing a body part.
Matthew Henry’s Concise Commentary expounds:
“Victory over the desires of the heart, must be attended with painful exertions. But it must be done. Every thing is bestowed to save us from our sins, not in them. All our senses and powers must be kept from those things which lead to transgression.”
As the prophet Jeremiah said, we can’t trust our own heart, for it is “deceitful above all things and desperately wicked.” (Jer. 17:9) And sometimes what we thought to be love isn’t love at all, because “love does not delight in evil.” (1Cor 13:6)
Wesley’s Notes explains further:
“If a person as dear as a right eye, or as useful as a right hand, cause thee thus to offend, though but in heart… part with any thing, however dear to you, or otherwise useful, if you cannot avoid sin while you keep it.”
Yes, it is difficult to give up something so dear to us, even with the knowledge that we offend our Creator while we keep it. But it is better to “lose a body part” than to lose our salvation. And God is ever faithful; whenever He asks us to give up something for Him, it is always because He’ll give us something better – even when we think that what we had is already the best.
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If your right eye causes you to sin…
Filed under: bible, Faith, Faith and Religion, Faith and The Bible | Tags: bible commentary, lust, matthew, sacrifice |
“If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell.” – Matt. 5:29
How painful it is to gouge out your own eye, don’t you think?
Before, I thought this verse was literal. What really is the very essence of this? If I’d follow this literally, I’d look like those victims from the movie Jeepers Creepers.
Some people say the eye is the window to the soul. And it is more often than not, that body part that’s easily inclined to sin, since we really can’t control the things we see. Lust is something that doesn’t only pertain to people, but also to material things. It is a deep desire to possess something that belongs to another regardless of the consequences, and oftentimes starts with just one look. But the commandments clearly say: “Thou shall not covet thy neighbor’s wife, nor his goods…” What must we do to avoid this?
Following what the apostle Matthew wrote, “gouge out your eye” - avoid entertaining temptation. Or if you already did, get it out of your body, and out of your system – even if it is as painful as losing a body part.
Matthew Henry’s Concise Commentary expounds:
As the prophet Jeremiah said, we can’t trust our own heart, for it is “deceitful above all things and desperately wicked.” (Jer. 17:9) And sometimes what we thought to be love isn’t love at all, because “love does not delight in evil.” (1Cor 13:6)
Wesley’s Notes explains further:
Yes, it is difficult to give up something so dear to us, even with the knowledge that we offend our Creator while we keep it. But it is better to “lose a body part” than to lose our salvation. And God is ever faithful; whenever He asks us to give up something for Him, it is always because He’ll give us something better – even when we think that what we had is already the best.
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