Matthew 5: Jesus Did Not Come to Abolish but to Fulfill

Introduction

This message is part of the series "À l'école du roi" (In the King's School), in which the Église du Tabernacle works through the Sermon on the Mount. After the portrait of the citizens of the kingdom in the Beatitudes, and then their role as ambassadors, salt of the earth and light of the world, the preacher turns to Matthew 5:17-20.

He starts with a confession. He arrived in Paris with his family in 2023 and voted in a local election for the first time. Leafing through the candidates' programs, the first thing he looked at was not the vision for the city but what each candidate planned to do about the 50 km/h limit on the Paris ring road: he had been caught by a speed camera three times, "often at 54 or 55". When a new leader arrives, we first look for what he will do away with, to our advantage.

That is probably what the crowd on the Galilean hillside was thinking as they faced Jesus. The preacher builds his answer in two parts: the King does not wipe the board clean, and the King does not lower his standards.

Message Outline

1. "Do Not Think": What the Crowd Was Thinking

• When you tell someone "don't imagine that", it is because you know what they are imagining. The preacher thinks of his son hovering around the bag of candy. Jesus knows what is going through the crowd's minds.
• For weeks, Jesus has been proclaiming that the kingdom of heaven is near, healing the sick, commanding demons and teaching with an authority no one else has.
• The prophets said "Thus says the Lord", the scribes said "It is written". Jesus says "Amen, I tell you", as if God himself were speaking. "And in fact, it is God who is speaking."
• In the crowd, some hoped he would ease laws they found burdensome. Others, like the Pharisees, feared he would do away with everything.

2. The King Does Not Wipe the Board Clean

• "The Law or the Prophets" means all the writings the Jews had in the first century, "from A to Z": what we call the Old Testament, three quarters of our Bible.
• Many wonder whether this part still concerns them: God seems harsh there, and Jesus seems nicer. Why not put the Old Testament in a museum?
• To abolish is like the history teacher who walks into the room after the math class and wipes the equations off the board with a sponge: "That's not my subject." The Greek word could even be translated "demolish".
• Jesus does not change subjects. He continues the lesson: he fulfills.
• To fulfill is first of all to obey. Israel spent forty years in the desert grumbling, criticizing its leaders and setting up idols. Jesus spends forty days in the desert, hungry and tempted, and answers every time with the Law: "It is written." Where Israel and humanity failed, Jesus stands firm.

3. Connecting the Dots: Everything Points to Jesus

• To fulfill is also to fill up, to go all the way, to bring something to completion. The preacher recalls an illustration from his childhood: the numbered dot drawings in holiday activity books. At first you see nothing, then as you connect the dots a sailboat appears.
• God placed dots in the Law and the Prophets. The prophets themselves searched for the time to which the Spirit of Christ in them was pointing (1 Peter 1:10-11). On the hillside, Jesus draws the line.
• The panorama: the offspring of the woman who crushes the serpent's head and the ram offered in Isaac's place (Genesis), the blood on the doorposts (Exodus), the high priest as mediator (Leviticus), the lifted-up serpent (Numbers), the son of David with an eternal reign (Samuel), "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" (Psalm 22:1), the one pierced for our sins and led like a lamb to the slaughter (Isaiah), the Son of Man on the clouds (Daniel), the Spirit poured out (Joel), three days in the depths (Jonah), the birth in Bethlehem (Micah), the entry into Jerusalem on a donkey's colt (Zechariah).
• "Without Jesus, the Old Testament is dots without a line." The preacher admits that he too once started the year in Genesis, ran out of breath in Leviticus and found himself back in Matthew by March.
• On the road to Emmaus, two disappointed disciples know the texts. Jesus, beginning with Moses and all the prophets, explains what concerns him. He connects the dots, and their hearts burn (Luke 24:27, 32).
• In a debate, a Jewish theologian criticized Christians for reading the Old Testament "with their Jesus glasses". "Yes, of course, because it is about him." That Isaiah, writing centuries before Jesus, speaks of him with such precision has no equivalent, and it strengthens faith.

4. Not an Iota Will Fall: A Hope

• If so many dots are already connected, why "until heaven and earth pass away"? Because some dots are not connected yet.
• The preacher points out three: Jesus will return; he will judge the world with justice; all things will be made new and God's people gathered together "without sadness, without anxiety, without fear, without tears".
• Those who have put their trust in Jesus will be declared righteous. Those who did not want him will live at the "extreme" of what they chose here below: life far from God, which we call hell.
• To those anxious about wars, uncertainty, or artificial intelligence threatening their jobs: "Not an iota will fall."
• A warning: do not read the Old Testament thinking "they failed, but I will make it". Israel had the Law, the temple, the prophets, the praise of the Levites. No one made it, "not because they are worse than us, but because they are like us". Putting ourselves back under the Law is exactly what Paul fights against in his letter to the Galatians.

5. Reading the Law as a Signpost: The Example of Food

• Leviticus 11 forbids certain animals: pork, hare, shrimp. Some religious movements, and some Christians, are returning to these rules.
• God gives the reason: he set his people apart from the other peoples, so that they would tell the difference between the clean and the unclean (Leviticus 20:24-25). "God is not a dietitian." It was a signpost, recalled at every meal.
• In Mark 7, Jesus declares all foods clean. A contradiction? No: he does not abolish anything, he shows what the signpost was pointing to. What makes a person unclean comes from the heart.
• "Jesus did not come to clean our plate, he came to clean the heart." The signpost announced the cross, where Jesus makes us clean before God.
• The right question when reading an Old Testament text is not "does this rule still apply to me?" but "what was this text pointing to?" And if these verses annoy you, "be just as annoyed by the impurities in your heart."

6. The King Does Not Lower His Standards

• An objection has already come up: "If Jesus fulfilled everything in my place, the commandments are no longer my problem." But Jesus goes on: whoever breaks the least of the commandments and teaches others to do the same will be least in the kingdom.
• We often keep two lists: the important commandments ("I don't kill, I don't steal, I don't cheat on my wife") and the aisle of negotiable ones. How we talk about an absent coworker, what we watch in the evening when no one can see, the tone we take with our children or spouse when we are tired, the tax return, the way we drive on the highway, the repayment of our debts.
• It is like a leak under the sink: three drops a day, so you put a bowl underneath, until the day the plumber tells you the cabinet is rotten. "It is often not the big commandment that falls first, it is the small one."
• Not everything weighs the same: Jesus rebukes the Pharisees for counting out a tenth of their mint and cumin while neglecting justice, mercy and faithfulness. But he adds that the others should not be left undone (Matthew 23:23).
• Worse than disobeying: teaching others to do the same. Among Christians, a pat on the shoulder, "God understands, don't feel guilty", and one more commandment comes down off the wall.

7. A Different Obedience, Coming from the Heart

• A righteousness greater than that of the Pharisees is required, and they had counted 613 commandments (248 to do, 365 not to do) and strove to keep them all. On the hillside, the shockwave: "I'm done for."
• Do we have to be bankrupt, as the Beatitudes said, or be a champion? The key: Jesus does not ask for more obedience, he asks for a different obedience. Not a righteousness you add up, but one that comes from within, because God knows our hearts (Luke 16:15).
• The bar has not been lowered for the twenty-first century, neither on sex before marriage nor on marriage itself. God is not nicer in one Testament than in the other: he is holy. Who can stand, even in their thoughts? No one. "Here we are exactly where Jesus began: bankrupt, empty-handed." It is the same door.
• We need someone who fulfills God's requirements: that is Jesus. Obedience meant to earn something is not sincere. The preacher gives this example from the baptism course: one child obeys to get his pocket money, the other because he has already received everything and loves his parents. Which relationship do you want?
• In 1998, at thirteen, a PSG fan without a cent to his name, he walked into the Parc des Princes for the first time because his brother-in-law paid for his ticket. He watched, learned what is expected of a supporter, and did not act like a fool. His ticket was already paid: his behavior was "the logical follow-up" to that gift.
• You had nothing to pay the entrance fee to the kingdom. Jesus met God's requirements and bore your condemnation. Obedience becomes the desire to honor the one who paid for everything.
• Like Peter when many were leaving Jesus: "Lord, to whom would we go?" (John 6:68). The preacher urges those who have not yet made this decision not to wait any longer: "Change your life now."

Key Takeaways

• Jesus does not wipe the board clean: the Old Testament is not a museum, everything in it points to him.
• Without Jesus, the Old Testament looks like dots without a line. With every text, ask yourself what it was pointing to.
• The dots still to be connected (Jesus' return, the judgment, the renewal of all things) will be fulfilled too: not an iota will fall.
• The King does not lower his standards: the small commandments matter, and teaching others to neglect them is even more serious.
• Jesus asks for an obedience that comes from the heart. It does not save us: it is the response to the one who paid our entrance into the kingdom.

Personal Application

• When you read the Old Testament, are you looking for rules to apply, or do you ask yourself which dot Jesus is connecting?
• Which commandments have you filed in your "negotiable aisle": what you say about a coworker, your screens, your tone at home, your taxes, your driving, your debts?
• Do you ever reassure a brother or sister with a "God understands" instead of speaking the truth in love?
• Do you obey to get something from God, or because you have already received everything from him?
• If you have not yet placed your trust in Jesus, what is making you wait?

Verses Cited

• Matthew 5:17-20
• Matthew 4:1-11
• 1 Peter 1:10-11
• Genesis 3:15
• Genesis 22:13
• Exodus 12:13
• Leviticus 16
• Numbers 21:8-9
• 2 Samuel 7:12-16
• Psalm 22:1
• Isaiah 53:5-7
• Daniel 7:13
• Joel 2:28
• Jonah 1:17
• Micah 5:2
• Zechariah 9:9
• Luke 24:13-32
• Leviticus 11
• Leviticus 20:24-25
• Mark 7:18-21
• Matthew 23:23
• Luke 16:15
• John 6:66-68

Frequently Asked Questions

What does Jesus mean when he says he did not come to abolish but to fulfill?

To abolish is to wipe the board clean, like a teacher changing subjects. Jesus does not do that: he continues the lesson. He obeys the Law perfectly where Israel failed, and above all he is the fulfillment of the Law and the Prophets. The Old Testament is like a numbered dot drawing: Jesus draws the line, and we finally see that it was about him all along.

Do Christians still have to keep the food laws of Leviticus 11?

The chapter remains in the Bible, but those rules were a signpost reminding Israel that it was a people set apart. In Mark 7, Jesus declares all foods clean and shows that impurity comes from the heart. The signpost pointed to what Jesus would do at the cross: make us clean before God. Reading these chapters means asking what they were pointing to.

If Jesus fulfilled everything, does obeying the commandments still matter?

Yes. Jesus does not lower his standards, and the small commandments matter as much as the great ones. But he asks for a different obedience, one that comes from the heart. No one can reach it alone, which is why we need Jesus to enter the kingdom. Obedience then becomes a loving response to the one who paid for everything, not a way to earn salvation.