Exodus 20:14; Matthew 5:27-30; August 17, 2025; Tenth Sunday after Pentecost
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Last week: murder. This week: lust.
Yeah, I think next week is probably a good one for me to leave on vacation.
And… for you all to have a break from the Decalogue. As good and important as these Commandments are and have been for us to revisit.
As stated, and as you heard in the scripture reading from Matthew today, this Commandment has to do with adultery. And with lust. And what to do when your right eye and right hand aren’t helping matters along.
And we’ll get to those soon, the hand and eye, and maybe another day adultery, but for now, let’s talk about the definition of lust, everyone’s favorite topic in church, and no doubt what you all discuss during coffee hour. No wonder it’s always so lively in there…
Lust, here in our text, is translated from the Greek word: ἐπιθυμία (noun) or ἐπιθυμέω (verb), which quite literally means strong desire. It appears around 40 times in the New Testament, give or take, and it can infer either a strong desire to do God’s will, or a strong desire to rebel from it.
So, either negative or positive.
For instance, Galatians 5:17 states: “For the flesh has desires/ἐπιθυμία that are opposed to the Spirit; and the Spirit has desires/ἐπιθυμία that are opposed to the flesh, for these are in opposition to each other, so that you cannot do what you want.”
While on the other hand, in Luke 22:15, Jesus himself says to his friends, the disciples, “With desire/ἐπιθυμία, I have desired/ ἐπιθυμέω to eat this Passover meal with you before I suffer.”
Context then determines whether our strong desires/ἐπιθυμία are commendable or condemnable.
In the Germanic languages, this word… or wanderlust, as it were… connotes the original Greek understanding of its meaning: simply, a strong desire. Nothing sexual. Nothing inherently bad or sinful. In fact, something to be celebrated if not sought after.
For, desires can be good too, right? Important, in fact. A vital impulse in life so to move us from points A to B, chapter to chapter, lover to lover, or simply off the couch and out of the basement, away from the chips and Netflix.
But, desires of course, can also be bad. And lead us towards destructive or possessive outlooks. Especially when coupled with nefarious impulses towards control and domination (see, politics today), or in our case in scripture, sexual advances both unwarranted and uninvited.
There is healthy attraction, yes, but then there is also this unhealthy attraction. Just as there are healthy ideas of dating, there are also these unhealthy ideas of dating.
Sexting, for instance, is not what I would qualify as a healthy version of ἐπιθυμέω — especially if that’s all you ever know of what constitutes desire, attraction, or someone else being interested in you.
In my previous job, some of my kids told me that the way they were first asked out was through a text request asking to first see nudes. Debased, right? And a rebellion against God’s will. And simply, not right, at all.
Neither, either, is catcalling, body-judging, or sexualizing someone based on their appearance or apparel. I mean, women so often can’t just run down the road in workout clothes, without being treated like a piece of meat, or fearful of the same consequence.
See, when we choose to look at someone with those hungry eyes…and you know what I mean… it gets to what Jesus was warning us about here in our lesson from Matthew. Where he says it would be better to cut out your right eye or chop off your right hand, rather than to give in to either.
Now, I’m sure some disturbed mind out there is thinking something crude about this comment on the right hand… but I sincerely doubt that’s what scripture had in mind in here. Actually, I once spoke with a Rabbi about it who had this fascinating insight (and no, this is not the beginning of a good joke).
He said in ancient Jewish literature, which no doubt Jesus would have been aware of, each person was thought to have been endowed with two tendencies. One positive; one negative. One good; one bad.
But more, that these tendencies were associated with our body parts. Eyes, hands, feet. And that our right body parts were believed to be on the good side, whereas our left-sided body parts belonged to the bad. Or, the evil side, as it were.
So then, if a right appendage of your body started sinning, then that was like really bad… because that meant that its left counterpart had infiltrated it. Overtaken it. So it would be better to tear it out immediately, before other parts also belonging to the right might fall victim too.
Interesting, right?
He went on to say that the eyes, particularly the right eye, were associated with wellbeing. How your eye looked to a physician, Rabbi, or friend, would illuminate what was going on within your soul.
Which is likely why a chapter later in Matthew (6:3), Jesus also says, “don’t let your left eye know what your right eye is doing,” so that it couldn’t have a chance to tempt it. To scam it. To corrupt it, and your inner soul.
Keep your good ἐπιθυμία away from your bad ἐπιθυμία. In fact, get rid of all bad ἐπιθυμία and ἐπιθυμέω altogether, so that your desires can be put to good work by righteous hands, righteous eyes, and righteous feet, within a righteous heart, righteous mind, and righteous soul… you get the point…right?
The note in one of my Biblical commentaries suggests that in our text today Jesus was “interpreting the Decalogue’s prohibition of adultery (Exodus 20:14) by reimagining it to condemn the predatory behaviors and structures of a patriarchal society, so to curb male power, and to establish a different male-female interaction.”
Personally, I find this explanation incredibly helpful. Especially when applied to today. Not because it falsely implies that only men possess unhealthy desires (no, we are not alone), but because it shows us how Jesus wants to shock all of his followers into embracing a paradigm shift, where expressions of intimacy must first, and always, require a mutual and healthy invitation by equal partners.
A reminder, I dare say, which is really needed right now, in this world full of predators and harassers, both online and in our workplaces and schools, and even in our highest of offices.
I once told my previous congregation about this article I read called: “Sex Before Kissing; How 15-Year Old Girls are Dealing with Porn-Addicted Boys.” It details how pornography is absolutely killing any notion of a healthy and mutual intimacy, and how it is tainting the fabric of what a relationship between two equal persons should look like.
It also goes into grim depth about what young girls are facing continuously: sexual bullying, harassing, and shaming. But I would also say tat it’s not just a youthful issue. But really, an all-age, all-person, all gender issue.
But rather than going any further into what the article has to say, let me just use this pulpit today to plainly say this: girls, boys, brothers and sisters of all ages, letters, and genders, you all deserve better. You are not a piece of meat. You deserve respect and expressions of healthy ἐπιθυμία.
For no matter what incels, advertisers, or online swiping-platforms try to sell you, you are more than just the sum of your body parts. For you were lovingly made by God. And in your heart and in your soul, you know, the right parts that matter, there is divine beauty.
A beauty that is to be complimented through nurturing. And loving. And liberating, especially freeing it from all those grubby hands and hungry eyes that attempt to groom it, and control it, and who break the seventh Commandment by sinfully desiring it, for themselves.
Amen.
