This confusion sent me on a journey searching through the Bible trying to find out exactly what God wanted me to do in the relative situations.

I actually wrote about this experience for it lead me to realize a horribly sinful mentality I had towards life.
No, this sinful attitude wasn’t necessarily not giving money to swindlers, but it sprung from that.

Your post boosts my confidence in what I have learned about the true nature of the Gospel.

You ask a very good question. I will take some time to contemplate a good answer (if there is one).

Please be patient with me.

I apologize if you prefer short and sweet questions, but I am in a great degree of confusion, which can’t be summed up in one sentence:

My question concerns the issue of “embracing the ways of Christ” and requires me to tell you a story about my life:

When I was a fourteen-year-old freshman in High School, a new acquaintance came to me on lunch period and asked for a dollar.
I was young and hence naive about human nature and the ways of the world. Being brought up in a Catholic household, I did the purely Christian thing: gave the dollar without hesitancy or conditions.
Two days later, he came back for another dollar; I responded the same way.
Two days later, the same event.
Eventually it happened every day and went on for a few weeks; I kept doing what Christ commanded of us “Give to everyone who begs from you, and do not refuse anyone who wants to borrow from you.” (Matthew 5:42)
And then, I woke up; got “mugged by reality” and realized how not only was I being taken advantage of, but how my friend was making himself a slave to my generosity.
That day I told him no more dollars; he accepted this and left me alone.

This experience fed into the world view I would adopt in life: we live in a Fallen World; in a perfect world I would have been able to give him the dollar and trust it was a genuine need. But in a Fallen World, it only encouraged him to not be self-sufficient.
Considering that a central message of Christianity is that we need a savior because we can’t be 100% sinless, it seemed reasonable to me to approach life that way: sometimes we have to break the Law for a higher principle.
Any anxiety of punishment for doing so is unwarranted since Jesus atoned for out sins.
This doesn’t mean I take advantage of Christ’s Grace and live a gleefully sinful life, for I constantly strive to improve myself, not sin, and advise others to do the same.

One could call this a Conservative Point of View.
I do not wish to turn this issue into a political discussion; I use the word “Conservative” more broadly than political policy.
However, I have always believed that what today is referred to as “Conservatism” is simply the acknowledgment that we live in a Fallen World; while “Liberalism” is the attempt to pretend we can live in a perfect world, and ignoring our sinful natures.

This has been a big part of my World View, which I believed to be Biblical.

But recently, I’ve been reading The New Testament and find Jesus’ commands to seemingly be conflicting with this World View.
The fifth, sixth, and seventh chapters of Matthew in particular seem to be teaching us to ignore the sinful nature of the world with commands such as the quote I’ve already mentioned above.

It seems to me that the absolute and unconditional care for others Jesus expects of us would have required me to keep giving my friend a dollar a day, which would probably go on for the remainder of High School (or at least Freshmen year).

But I don’t understand why God would be pleased with this behavior.
Nor do I understand why Jesus says in Matthew that if we don’t keep these commandments we “will never enter the kingdom of heaven,” (Matthew 5:20) if He went on to sacrifice Himself so that we can all enter the Kingdom of Heaven by His Grace and our Faith.

My father tells me that I’m misreading this section of Matthew; that Jesus isn’t demanding works of us, but instead using extreme rhetoric to express how impossible it is to keep the Law and enter the Kingdom of Heaven on our own merit.
This makes sense to me, except for the fact that this is not stated in these passages.

I fear deceiving myself by believing somebody’s “take” on the Gospel, as opposed to what is actually written in it.

So, I have spent many hours reading the rest of the Gospels, as well as the New Testament Letters, especially by Paul.
I’ve learned a lot, especially concerning the nature of the Law and Christ’s sacrifice and Grace.
But I can’t quite resolve the original confusion in my mind without putting in my own “take” on it.

Can you help me understand what Jesus expected me to do about the friend who was exploiting my generosity?
Is there something written in the Bible that clarifies my confusion over Matthew chapters Five, Six and Seven?

PS: My pseudonym, Mark-O-Solo, is my new one.
My old one was Terran; I’ve left comments on your blog in the past.

If it is something you are born with, how can people with identical DNA wind up differently?

The proposed theory: it’s hormonal which happens after birth and can be affected by exterior or psychological circumstances.