If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off and throw it away from you, because it is better for you to enter eternal life maimed than to have two hands and go into Gehenna, into the unquenchable fire.
Here the Lord uses strong and vivid language to show how decisive the believer must be against sin. This is not a command for literal self-mutilation, because the root of sin is not only in the members of the body, but in the heart. Yet the hand represents everything that, in practice, leads us toward sin. If any habit, relationship, occupation, or pleasure tempts us, then it must be cut off from life at the root. It is better to suffer a temporary loss than eternal destruction. The Lord does not soften the danger of sin. He shows that half measures are often insufficient when we are dealing with the salvation of the soul.