Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill

 "Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets.  I did not come to destroy but to fulfill.  For assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled.  Whoever therefore breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches men so, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.  For I say to you, that unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven."

- Matthew 5:17-20

 We have been reading chapter 5 of Matthew's Gospel, which begins the Sermon on the Mount.  In yesterday's reading, Jesus taught, "Blessed are you when they revile and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for My sake.  Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.  You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt loses its flavor, how shall it be seasoned?  It is then good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by men.  You are the light of the world.  A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden.  Nor do they light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house.  Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven."

"Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets.  I did not come to destroy but to fulfill."  Jesus fulfills the Law in Himself and in His words, and in His actions.  My study bible explains that this happens through His performing God's will in all its fullness (3:15); by transgressing none of the precepts of the Law (John 8:46, 14:30); in declaring the perfect fulfillment of the Law, which He is about to deliver in this Sermon; and by granting righteousness -- the goal of the Law -- to us (Romans 3:31, 8:3-4, 10:4).  Christ fulfills the Prophets by both being and carrying out what they foretold.

"For assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled."  In the original Greek, assuredly is "amen/αμην."  It means "truly," or "confirmed," or "so be it."  It is used by Jesus as a solemn affirmation, a type of an oath.  His use of this word at the beginning of certain proclamations (as opposed to at the end) is both unique and authoritative.  He declares that His words are affirmed even before they are spoken.  A jot (iota/ιωτα in the Greek) is the smallest letter in the Greek alphabet.  A tittle is the smallest stroke in certain Hebrew letters.  So Jesus is affirming the whole of the Law as the foundation of His teaching.  My study bible adds that all is fulfilled refers to the Passion and Resurrection of Christ.

"Whoever therefore breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches men so, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven."  My study bible tells us that righteousness according to the Law is a unified whole.  The observance of all the least commandments is to observe the whole Law -- and the violation of the least commandment is considered a violation of the whole Law.

"For I say to you, that unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven."  Righteousness that leads to salvation must exceed that of the Pharisees because of their emphasis on outward or works-based righteousness.  Here Jesus returns to His theme:  the kingdom of heaven and what it is like.  The righteousness of salvation, my study bible says, is the communion of the heart, soul, mind, and body in Jesus Christ.

So what is the kingdom of heaven like?  How do we enter it? What does it have to do with the Law and the Prophets?  Jesus speaks of Himself as One who has not come to build, or extend, or to reform, but rather to fulfill the Law and the Prophets.  Fulfillment is related to concepts of the "end," in the sense that the fullness of something is its absolute, its totality, its ultimate end point or full flowering.  In this case, the Law and the Prophets are entirely related to the concepts of the living kingdom of heaven that Jesus brings and preaches.  All of the blessings given in the Beatitudes, the introduction to the Sermon on the Mount, are about the fulfillment of the Law and the Prophets, the fullness of not just a way of life but also the presence of a spiritual reality, a kingdom in which we dwell and which dwells also in us.  It is the fulfillment of the promise of all that has come before in Jewish spiritual history.  What we ought to bear in mind is that Christ, as Truth, brings a kingdom with Him, spiritual in nature, one in which we "live and move and have our being," which St. Paul says in Acts 17 (verse 28).  In fact, we would do well to read the full passage of St. Paul's preaching to the Athenians (vv. 16-34).  In order to understand that while salvation is of the Jews, and Jewish spiritual history gives us preparation for the Messiah, the Christ, we may also take the message from Paul's preaching that as Truth, He is also the fulfillment of the good and true and beautiful that has come before in the Hellenistic world.  The ancients saw Christianity in this way when they chose to build churches where temples to pagan gods stood, as fulfillment.  It seems to me that we must continue to understand Christ this way, as fulfillment, as the Alpha and Omega.  What we know in our lives as true can only be further extended, developed, and fulfilled in Christ, made more fully manifest, opening our eyes to new things we had not anticipated but are nevertheless also true and good and beautiful.  The kingdom of heaven is a living reality, both within us and among us, as the Greek implies in Luke 17:20-21.  Its reality, and its flowering, are contained in those blessings that Jesus teaches in the Beatitudes, things that not only make our lives full of true substance and beauty and goodness, but also continue to build fruit in the world and in us as we live and bloom and produce fruit in His grace.  To do so is to live a life of true repentance, a change that fulfills and manifests through our growth in what He brings to us as persons who seek His righteousness.  How do you dwell in that Kingdom?  How does it live in you?  How is His fulfillment always and continually at work in your life and your world?