In this Sunday’s Gospel, we encounter part of the Sermon on the Mount—the Lord’s most profound teaching. Here, the Lord addresses three specific commandments regarding murder, adultery, and swearing.

To truly grasp His message, it helps to examine the structure of the sixth, seventh, ninth, and tenth commandments of God’s Law. The relationship between these commandments reveals a movement from exterior behavior to the interior of the human heart. The sixth and seventh commandments focus on conduct, explicitly forbidding the acts of adultery and theft. The ninth and tenth commandments go deeper, forbidding even the desire or intent to commit those same acts. While the first two say, "Do not do this," the latter two say, "Do not even entertain the thought."

This distinction highlights a central theme of the Sermon on the Mount: God’s Law is not merely about policing our outward actions, but about transforming our hearts and the intentions within them.

The Mosaic Law, through the final two commandments, served as a foreshadowing of the New Law the Lord would eventually promulgate. While the "righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees" mentioned by the Lord focused primarily on external compliance, Christian morality shifts the lens to the interior of the human heart. It emphasizes that our spiritual life is defined not just by what we do, but by the underlying intentions that drive our actions.

Living this way requires more than just willpower; it demands an inner motivation and a wisdom that comes only from God. To bridge the gap between knowing the Law and living it, we rely on the guidance and strength of the Holy Spirit.

Let us humbly ask the Lord to help us remain open to the actions of the Holy Spirit, enabling us to live authentically as the Lord teaches us.