Harmony #26: Building On The Rock (Matthew 7:13-29; Luke 6:43-49)

“Enter through this narrow gate [doing unto others as you would have done unto you, thus fulfilling the Law and the Prophets], because the gate is wide and the way is spacious that leads to destruction/waste, and there are many who enter through it.[1] But the gate is narrow and the way is difficult that leads to the life[2] [of blessedness described at the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount],[3] and there are few who find it.[4]

“Watch out for false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing[5] but inwardly are voracious wolves.[6]  You will recognize them by their fruit, for each tree is known by its own fruit. Grapes are not gathered from thorns or figs from thistles, are they?[7] In the same way, every good tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears bad fruit. 

 A good tree is not able to bear bad fruit, nor a bad tree to bear good fruit. The good person out of the good treasury of his heart[8] produces good, and the evil person out of his evil treasury produces evil, for his mouth speaks from what fills his heart. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. So then, you will recognize them by their fruit. 

“Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and don’t do what I tell you (bear good fruit)? [9] Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter into the kingdom of heaven—only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven. On that day, many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, didn’t we prophesy in your name, and in your name cast out demons and do many powerful deeds?’[10]  Then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you/approved of you. Go away from me, you law breakers!’ “

“Everyone who comes to me and listens to my words and puts them into practice is  like a wise man building his house, who dug down deep, and laid the foundation on bedrock.[11] The rain fell, the winds beat against that house, a flood came and the river burst against it but could not shake it. It did not collapse because it had been founded on rock and had been well built.

But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand without a foundation. The rain fell, the flood came and the winds beat against that house. When the river burst against that house it collapsed immediately and was utterly destroyed!”[12]

Let’s summarize:

• There’s a particular and hard path of the blessed life described in the Beatitudes. (vv.13-14)

• If you are on that path, you will bear the good fruit of righteous obedience.[13] (vv.15-20)

• It is the fruit that comes from a lifestyle of obedience, not displays of power, that reveal who is walking this path. (vv.21-23).

• The person who “hears” and “does” is building the house of their life on a firm foundation, and will be able to stand strong amidst the storms of life. (vv.24-27)

I want to talk today about obedience. It shows up over and over in Jesus’ summary of the Sermon on the Mount that we read today.

• Enter the narrow gate and walk the narrow, hard path.

• Bear the good fruit that follows from living righteously.

• Do the will of the Father.

• Hear Jesus’ teaching and put them into practice.

 Let’s start with this observation: When we reject obedience, we will tend to avoid the one who rightly demands obedience from us. When we embrace obedience, we can relax in and even embrace their presence.

• As children, we eat the stolen candy in our room and hide the wrappers – or so I’ve heard.

• If I were to ever drive over the speed limit, I would want a back road so I can avoid being seen.

• If we cut corners at work, it’s not in front of our employer.

• If we don’t have a license, we are probably not going to hunt close to the DNR.

 All of these have to do with avoiding someone because there were rules or laws we broke. There were agreed upon expectations that we each knew about, and we failed to live in a way that honored them, and we knew it. The easiest thing to do was hide.

On the other hand, if we are good in those situations, no problem. We have nothing to hide, so we don’t. We are at peace in the presence of the one who has authority in our lives.

When Sheila and I got married, we entered a covenant in which we pledged our lives to each other. We now owe each other an allegiance we did not have before. There are now ‘rules of engagement.’ So, what are the “rules” of godly covenant? 

• Self-sacrificial love

• Mutual respect

• Shared responsibilities

• Repentance and forgiveness

• Purity and faithfulness

When we ‘break the rules,’ it will effect our communion with each other. We will hide or avoid in a variety of ways.

• We could be physically or emotionally distant (If I’m not there, or if I stay busy, I can avoid talking face-to-face about my lack of respect or responsibility.)

• We could lie (“I was just, uh, playing games on my computer!”)

• We could shift the blame. (“If you weren’t so….”)

• We could lash out and hide behind resentment and anger.

When we break the rules, we will tend to avoid or hide from the one to whom we owe it. When we embrace the rules, we can relax in and even embrace their presence.

Second observation: when we devalue what we rightly owe others, we will devalue them as well. But when we value what we owe others, we offer value to them as well. 

All was well with Adam and Eve and God  - they communed; they walked and talked. They were in what the Bible calls shalom: peace between God and themselves. That peace was transparent, honest, and free – what the Bible describes as “naked and unashamed,” a term that covers their physical reality as well as the relational dynamic. Then, when their obedience crumbled, their community crumbled between God and themselves.[14] They hid from God; they covered themselves up so they could hide more of themselves from God. When God asked, “Where are you?” it was another way of asking, “Do you know what have you done?”

As already noted, when we choose disobedience, we usually choose a longing for distance as well, because we hate accountability, repentance and humility. Our natural tendency will be to demonstrate why the story of Adam and Eve is the story of us all: we will cover up, we will hide, we will put up barriers between ourselves and God as well as others. But there’s more.

• If we resent what God rightly demands from us as covenantal partners, we will resent God.

• If we resent His path, we will resent the One who made the path.

• When we devalue what we rightly owe God, we will devalue God as well.

If we demand freedom from our covenant with God and the expectations on our life that accompany it, we must know what the relational fallout will be. God is faithful when we are faithless (2 Timothy 2:13), but we will respond a certain way toward God if we are living in disobedience we have chosen.

We will try to hide; we will pull away; we will not want to be too much in His presence lest the light of His holiness reveal those secret, sinful places we are keeping to ourselves (Luke 8:17). We will not go to God ‘naked and unashamed’ emotionally and spiritually when we know we are in an active state of rebellion. As time  goes on, we will increasingly resent the one from whom we are hiding.

Many of us go through times of life where we think, “I just don’t feel near to God. I don’t sense His presence.” There can be many reasons for this, and I can’t go into all of them this morning. But since our focus this morning is obedience, it’s worth noting that at times the solution is to identify where we have strayed (or sprinted) off the path, and begin with repentance.

You may have heard the verse, “Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you. “ (James 4:8)  Here’s the context in James 4: 1– 8. James says: 

• you crave what you do not have, so you murder, sue and fight…

• you continually focus on self-indulgence…

• you align with the world system and declare war against God.  

 His conclusion:

Submit yourselves to the one true God and fight against the devil and his schemes... Draw near God, and He will draw near to you. Wash your hands; you have dirtied them in sin. Cleanse your heart, because your mind is split down the middle, your love for God on one side and selfish pursuits on the other.

 God doesn’t move. “God will come close to you” isn’t meant to be read as a literal description of God’s location. It has to do with communing (to go back to Adam and Eve). When God says, “Where are you?” and we answer, “Right here,” we will realize how close he was all along.

We restore broken communion with God through repentance; we enter into and build communion through obedience, which is the highest form of worship.

“Have you noticed how much praying for revival has been going on of late - and how little revival has resulted? I believe the problem is that we have been trying to substitute praying for obeying, and it simply will not work.”  - A.W. Tozer 

“A revival is nothing else than a new beginning of obedience to God.” Charles Grandison Finney

“If worship does not propel us into greater obedience, it has not been worship.”  - Richard Foster 

“Worship has been misunderstood as something that arises from a feeling which ‘comes upon you,’ but it is vital that we understand that it is rooted in a conscious act of the will, to serve and obey the Lord Jesus Christ.”  Graham Kendrick

 Over and over, the Bible stresses that God is pleased with our obedience as an ultimate display of worship and love.

• John 15:14  “You are my friends – if you do what I command you.”

• Luke 11:28   “Blessed are those who hear the word of God and obey it.”

• Romans 12:1  “I plead with you to give your bodies… as a living and holy sacrifice—the kind he will find acceptable. This is truly the way to worship him.”

Kay Arthur puts it bluntly:  

“If you do not plan to live the Christian life totally committed to knowing your God and to walking in obedience to Him, then don't begin, for this is what Christianity is all about. It is a change of citizenship, a change of governments, a change of allegiance. If you have no intention of letting Christ rule your life, then forget Christianity; it is not for you.”

Love and obedience are inseperable. If we love Jesus, we will want to obey Him, because following the path of life increasingly forms us into His image.[15] When we obey God, we show our love to Him, demonstrating how serious we are about wanting to be like Him.[16]

“When obedience to God contradicts what I believe will bring me pleasure, let me ask myself if I love him.” Elisabeth Elliot

We must obey God – we must walk the narrow path - if we want to deeply worship and genuinely display our love for God. That in itself is sufficient reason to do it. But God has designed obedience with a natural benefit: it will open up a path to communing with God in a way that nothing else does.

Isaiah 48:17–19   “I am the LORD your God, who teaches you what is good for you and leads you along the paths you should follow. Oh, that you had listened to my commands! Then you would have had peace flowing like a gentle river and righteousness rolling over you like waves in the sea.” 

James 1:22–25   “But don't just listen to God's word. You must do what it says….But if you look carefully into the perfect law that sets you free, and if you do what it says and don't forget what you heard, then God will bless you for doing it.”

 I think the blessing to which James refers is Isaiah’s peace and righteousness, which is peace with God though the death of Jesus, and the goodness of living in this “right standing” with God. Then, no more hiding. No more avoiding the One who has laid claim to our lives.

So, when we commit to obedience, we will commune openly and freely with the one to whom we have given it.  But there’s more. When we commit to obedience, it will point us toward the goodness of the one to whom we are obedient. Following a coach’s instruction reveals a coach’s good plan. ‘Buying in’ to the coach’s system is often the same as ‘buying in’ to the coach. Following the directions and creating a tasty dish – especially when I am skeptical about the combination of ingredients - points me toward the creative wonder of a good chef.

There is something about the process of obedience that points us to the one who gave the commands. Walking in the path of Jesus helps us to appreciate the person of Jesus. “Taste and see that the Lord is good.” (Psalm 34:8). I want to finish with what I read when we participated in Communion this morning. [17]

The bread is intended for us to live on; that is the symbolism. Thus when we gather and take the bread of the Lord's Table, break it and pass it among ourselves, we are reminding ourselves that Jesus is our life: He is the One by whom we live. As Paul says, I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ lives in me: and the life which I now live… I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.” (Galatians 2:20). 

This is what the bread symbolizes — that he is to be our power by which we obey the demands of God, the Word of God, to love one another, to forgive one another, to be tender and merciful, kind and courteous to one another, to not return evil for evil but to pray for those who persecute us and mistrust us and misuse us. His life in us enables us to be what God asks us to be. We live by means of Christ. 

The cup symbolizes his blood which he said is the blood of the New Covenant, the new arrangement for living that God has made, by which the old life is ended. This is then end of the old life in which we were dependent upon ourselves, and lived for ourselves, and wanted only to be the center of attention is over.  

The cup means we are no longer to live for ourselves. We do not have final rights to our life, and the price is the blood of Jesus. Therefore, when we take that cup and drink it, we are publicly proclaiming that we agree with that sentence of death upon our old life, and believe that the Christian life is a continual experience of life coming out of death.

__________________________________________________________________________________

[1] The words in the original are very emphatic: Enter in (to the kingdom of heaven) through THIS strait gate, i.e. of doing to every one as you would he should do unto you; for this alone seems to be the strait gate which our Lord alludes to.” (Adam Clarke)

[2] “If we choose forgiveness, we will avoid the destruction bitterness brings. If we exercise…mercy, we avoid the destruction that being judgmental brings... If we exercise the Golden Rule, we bring life  to all those we touch.”(Matthew 7:13-14 Meaning.”) https://thebiblesays.com/commentary/matt/matt-7/matthew-713-14/

[3] “A remarkable parallel to this passage occurs in the Tablet of Cebes, a contemporary with Socrates. "Seest thou not, then, a little door, and a way before the door, which is not much crowded, but very few travel it? This is the way which leadeth into true culture." (Vincent’s Word Studies)

[4] “The Jews talk of the gate of repentance, the gate of prayers, and the gate of tears.” (Adam Clarke)

[5] “A garment which reached to the feet, and was made of the wool of sheep. The garment Achan saw and stole, Rab says, was , a garment called "melotes": which is the Greek word the author of Hebrews uses for sheep skins, persecuted saints wandered about in (Hebrews 11:37)… the Talmud referred to… "a talith", or "garment of pure wool"; and Jarchi (s) says, that "it was the way of deceivers, and profane men, to cover themselves, "with their talith", or long garment, "as if they were righteous men", that persons might receive their lies.'' (Gill’s Exposition)

[6] Warnings against false prophets are necessarily based on the conviction that not all prophets are true, that truth can be violated, and that the Gospel's enemies usually conceal their hostility and try to pass themselves off as fellow believers… the flow of the Sermon on the Mount as well as its OT background suggest that they do not acknowledge or teach the narrow way to life subject to persecution (vv.13-14; cf. Jer 8:11; Eze 13). (Expositor’s Bible Commentary)

[7] From a distance the little black berries on the buckthorn could be mistaken for grapes, and the flowers on certain thistles might deceive one into thinking figs were growing.

[8] “Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” Remember that from earlier in the same Sermon on the Mount?

[9] “Jesus subordinates the gifts of the Spirit to the fruit of the Spirit (compare 1 Cor 13) and submission to Jesus' lordship (1 Cor 12:1-3). Jesus' words about fruit thus refer to repentant works (Mt 7:21; 3:8, 10).” (IVP New Testament Commentary)

[10] This is not the fruit of righteousness. Lifestyle is.

[11] “The sand ringing the seashore on the Sea of Galilee was hard on the surface during the hot summer months. But a wise builder would dig down sometimes ten feet below the surface sand to the bedrock below, and there establish the foundation for his house. When the winter rains came, overflowing the banks of the Jordan River flowing into the sea, houses built on bedrock would be able to withstand the floods. (Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Of The New Testament)

[12] Elisha, the son of Abuja, said, "The man who studies much in the law, and maintains good works, is like to a man who built a house, laying stones at the foundation, and building brick upon them; and, though many waters come against it, they cannot move it from its place. But the man who studies much in the law, and does not maintain good words, is like to a man who, in building his house, put brick at the foundation, and laid stones upon them, so that even gentle waters shall overthrow that house."  (quoted by Adam Clarke)

[13] “The one who does the will of my Father…”

[14] “If you do not obey him, you will not know him… let me die insisting upon it, for my Lord insists upon it.”  - George McDonald

[15] Romans 8:29-30; 2 Corinthians 3:13-18

[16] “Without the gospel, we may obey the law, but we will learn to hate it. We will use it, but we will not truly love it. Only if we obey the law because we are saved, rather than to be saved, will we do so ‘for God’ (Galatians 2:19). Once we understand salvation-by-promise, we do not obey God any longer for our sake, by using the law-salvation-system to get things from God. Rather, we now obey God for His sake, using the law’s content to please and delight our Father.”  - Tim Keller

[17] Ray Stedman, https://www.raystedman.org/daily-devotions/1-corinthians/the-lords-supper

Harmony #25: Righteous and Unrighteous Judgment (Matthew 7:1-6; Luke 6:37-42)

“Do not judge [as if you knew who is wheat and who is chaff] and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned; forgive, and you will be forgiven. For by the standard you judge you will be judged. Give [forgiveness and hospitality from your heart], and it will be given to you: A good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be poured into your lap.

What happens if a blind man leads a blind man? Won’t both of them fall into a pit? [You know the saying]: you can’t turn out better than your teacher; when you’re fully taught, you will resemble your teacher.[1] [Don’t be a blind teacher.]Why do you see the speck in your brother’s eye, but fail to see the beam of wood in your own? How can you say to your brother, ‘Brother, let me remove the speck from your eye,’ while you yourself don’t see the beam in your own?

You hypocrite! First remove the beam from your own eye, and then you can see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.” [2] [But…not everybody is ready for that kind of corrective teaching.] Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs. If you do, they may trample [your attempts to help] under their feet, and turn and tear you to pieces.

Jesus clearly said in this passage (and others), "Do not judge." But He also said, "Stop judging by appearance, but instead judge correctly." (John 7:24)  In 1 Corinthians 5, Paul tells the believers in Corinth that it’s actually their job to judge other believers (as opposed to judging those outside the church). In the section we just read, right after Jesus tells us not to judge, we are told to discern who those are who are might tear and trample us.

So there must be two kinds of judging: one that is wrong to do, and one that is right. I think the difference is this (these are my definitions; I’m sure there’s room for improvement):

·      Unrighteous Judgment: Arrogant and hypocritical attack that functions as an authoritative judgment on one’s identity, character and potential, done for the purpose of condemnation rather than restoration.

·      Righteous judgment (discernment): Humble intervention motivated by a loving desire to see the other person stop sinful and destructive behavior, grow in maturity and holiness, and be restored in reputation and community fellowship.

UNRIGHTEOUS JUDGMENT

Is self-prejudiced.  Note the advice in Romans 14:1-5:

“Accept the one whose faith is weak, without quarreling over disputable matters. One person’s faith allows them to eat anything, but another, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables.  The one who eats everything must not treat with contempt the one who does not, and the one who does not eat everything must not judge the one who does, for God has accepted them. Who are you to judge someone else’s servant? To their own master, servants stand or fall. And they will stand, for the Lord is able to make them stand.”

We must not judge people’s progress. We cannot read the heart; we cannot truly know why people act as they do.  We also shouldn’t compare them to ourselves. We can easily be inclined to think, “I’ve got this figured out. If they could just be like me. Wait – in fact, they should be like me if they want to be truly spiritual!”

Is unmerciful. 

"God has told you what is good, and what the Lord requires of you: to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God" (Micah 6:8).

"Be kind to one another, tender hearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ has forgiven you"(Ephesians 4:32).

Unrighteous judgment is not exercised for the good of the other. It’s done for condemnation rather than restoration. Having someone walk away humiliated, ashamed and broken is a feature, not a bug. This kind of judgment finds satisfaction in making sure someone knows their place, which is going to be lower than you.

Is Uninformed. Sometimes a situation is too confusing to make a sound judgment without a lot of work. The writer of Proverbs gives us good advice:

“The person who tells one side of a story seems right, until someone else comes and asks questions.” (Proverbs 18:17)

For the past two summers, I have done teaching for an organization downstate that works with high school and college-age students. Two years ago they asked me to talk about COVID. Oh, boy. In one of my sessions, I offered this for discussion:

Person A has worn a mask all the time, social distanced, and sanitized because they did not want to get the coronavirus or spread it to others. Person B has been taking Vitamin D, some herbs, and essential oils, and they have been working on building their immune system naturally because they do not want to get the coronavirus or spread it to others. Do you think that:

1. A is living in fear.

2. B is living in fear.

3. A and B are both living in fear.

4. Neither A nor B are living in fear.

5. Maybe I shouldn’t rush to judgment.

Person A gets the vaccine because they do not want to get the coronavirus. They think that possible side effects from COVID-19 are worse than potential side effects from the vaccine, and they will take their chances. Person B does not get the vaccine because they think it will make them sick, create long term side-effects, or even kill them.

1. A is living in fear.

2. B is living in fear.

3. A and B are both living in fear.

4. Neither A nor B are living in fear.

5. Maybe I shouldn’t rush to judgment.

The answer is, of course #5. There could be lots of reasons people make decisions, and jumping to conclusions about what does or even should motivate people never ends well.

Lacks humility. Unrighteous judgment has a sort of, "This is the final answer" feeling. There is no room for, “I could be wrong, and I might need to reevaluate my perspective or opinion.”[3]When you lack humility concerning your perspective, that usually means a narrative has been created about what has happened and what the people involved were not only doing, but thinking and feeling. And when there is no humility, nothing will change the story you have in your head, fair or unfair.[4]

Judges the heart/motivations

In 2021 what’s being called ‘The Great Sort’ began.[5] When I do a puzzle, I sort through the pieces first and separate them by sameness. It was like that but with people and churches. What was once a local church box of followers of Jesus began to separate into piles. Those who study this movement usually cite three key reasons: COVID responses, the death of George Floyd and the rise of the Black Lives Matter organization and movement, and the election of 2020. Here’s where we talk about judging the heart/motivations.

• During COVID, it was so easy for those who felt it was responsible and loving to follow the guidelines and recommendations to see those who didn’t as unloving, proud or rebellious. And how can you be in fellowship with them? For those who viewed the guidelines or restrictions as unnecessary, unhealthy or oppressive, it was so easy to see the others as fearful sheeple. And how can you be in fellowship with them?

• In response to the death of George Floyd and the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement, it was so easy for those joining their voices to support those causes to see those who didn’t do the same as harboring at least some degree of racism. And how can you be in fellowship with them? For those whose had concerns about the official BLM organization or felt like political correctness was distorting the issue, it was so easy to see the others as woke Marxist stooges. And how can you be in fellowship with them?

• And then there was an election. And how can you be in fellowship with them, when they voted the way they did? Their hearts must be hard if not wicked; they clearly have lost all common sense. There can be no plausible reason short of them being moral idiots. And how can I be in fellowship with moral idiots?

Judging hearts and motivations of those within the church kills the unity and the witness of the church. When I do puzzles, all those pieces come back together to create the picture the puzzle maker intended. It turns out all that diversity in the same box was not only a good thing, but a necessary thing. May God do the same in His church.

Is hypocritical. Jesus noted this in the Sermon on the Mount, but here’s Paul in Romans 2:1-3:

“You, therefore, have no excuse, you who pass judgment on someone else, for at whatever point you judge another, you are condemning yourself, because you who pass judgment do the same things.  Now we know that God’s judgment against those who do such things is based on truth. So when you, a mere human being, pass judgment on them and yet do the same things, do you think you will escape God’s judgment?”

The point is not that Christians should never identify sin or call out injustice until they are perfect. The point is that massive self-analysis needs to be part of the process, particularly in the area one wants to address in someone else.

It’s like riding in a car with someone who bolsters your prayer life when they are driving, only to have them criticize a small mistake in your driving and give you advice on how to better help people feel safe. It’s so absurd. It’s like me challenging someone’s fashion choices or hairstyle. “I’m not sure that’s the right outfit for you.” Really?

But when the stakes get higher, it’s not as amusing. Jesus’ main point here has to do with hypocrisy in believers.

Something I am currently grieving is how the broader American church is perceived to be ignoring the beams in our eyes while calling out the specks in the eyes of the world. Poll after poll and conversation after conversation reveal variations on the same theme: Christians in the United States are viewed as hypocritical judges.

• They hear the church call out the culture for not loving well (which is a fair assessment of the culture), and then see Christians adapt an “us vs. them” mentality and treat “them” with contempt and fear, creating demonic monsters where they should be seeing broken image bearers of God who need God’s people to represent the hope and redemption of Christ.

• They hear us judge the culture for forsaking truth (and rightly so – it has), then see us spread ridiculously false and at times slanderous rumors when they paint a picture of a person, organization or party that we don’t like.

• They see us judge the culture for coarseness, incivility and dishonesty (which is a well-deserved critique) while we follow and applaud people who are coarse, uncivil, and dishonest.

Notice in every example I gave, it wasn’t the claims that were the problem. They all offered something valid. It was the judgments and the hypocrisy that accompanied them.

RIGHTEOUS JUDGMENT[6]

"Reproves, rebukes, and exhorts..." (2 Timothy 4:1-2). This is done to "turn a sinner from the error of his ways"(James 5:19-20). Galatians 6:1 notes: “Brothers and sisters, if someone is caught in a sin, you who live by the Spirit should restore that person gently.” In order to recognize that someone is caught in sin, we are exercising discernment based on the standard for righteous actions as outline in the Bible. To go back to my definition, this is when we use humble intervention motivated by a loving desire to see the other person stop sinful and destructive behavior, grow in maturity and holiness, and be restored in reputation and community.

Practices humility. Speaking of humble interventions, righteous judgment requires us to be aware that that our perspective may not be as closely aligned with reality as we think it is. And while this is subtle (and challenging to our ego), it is very important as it might change how we relate to a situation. Have you ever gone into a situation with a head of steam only to realize you entirely misunderstood? Yeah….

We don’t know everything. When it’s not a glaringly clear situation, we must consider that there are circumstances and context that to which we are not privy, and we might be about to render a thundering righteous judgment that’s going to leave us really embarrassed when all the details come out.[7] It’s a long and painful fall off that high horse we so excitedly saddled.

Protects victims. We are to "mark those who cause dissensions and stumbling" (Romans 16:17-18). I suspect the primary reason is to protect those impacted by sin. Note that it is a judgment of visible actions, of fruit we can see, by which the Bible says people will be known.[8] There are times when we must intercede for victims. The Bible is full of this admonition.

“Rescue the weak and the needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked.” (Psalm 82:4)

“Learn to do good; seek justice, correct oppression; bring justice to the fatherless, plead the widow's cause.” (Isaiah 1:17)

That doesn’t require us to weigh in on the motivations or the hearts of the people who do the things from which people need deliverance. It’s looking at how someone’s actions are landing in the world, then looking through the lenses of scripture to discern if it’s good or bad. The prophet Micah told God’s people that one thing God required of them was to do justice. This requires identifying what is just and what is not, and responding appropriately.

We do this with our children all the time: “Stop taking your brother’s snacks. Stop hitting him. Stop everything you are doing right now.” We can judge the action and do justice without judging the entirety of the child.  That principle does not go away just because people get older.

Settles arguments. Paul said a mediator should be appointed to "decide between his brethren" and settle a dispute (1Corinthians 6:1-5). Someone’s going to have a make a call. Sometimes, two parties can’t both be right. This is, once again, not a judgment on thoughts and intents of the heart, which only God knows fully and what His Word does in us.[9] This is about observable situations where God has given his image bearers the ability to discern truth from a lie.

Strengthens community. What I remember from the moments when friends exercised righteous judgment in my life is that I KNEW THEY LOVED ME. I knew they were for me. They wanted Anthony (and the people around him) to flourish. I knew they were not my enemy (and sometimes they used those exact words). I knew they came from a place of humility and love. It helped me mature, and it surely blessed those around me who have to put up with me.

WASTED RIGHTEOUS JUDGMENT: Protecting Holy Things From Desecration

As odd as it sounds, Jesus’ comment about swine and dogs provides a caution: it’s not always wise to help others remove the speck from their eye. It’s a caution found elsewhere in Scripture.

“Do not reprove a scoffer, lest he hate you. Reprove a wise man, and he will love you.” (Proverbs 9:8)

“Don’t answer a fool according to his folly, lest you be like him yourself. Answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own eyes.” (Proverbs 26:4-5)

Paul once said to an audience, "Your blood be upon your own heads! I am clean. From now on I shall go to the Gentiles.” (Acts 18:1-6)

When we put the beam/speck imagery together with the pearls/swine imagery, we see Jesus’ teaching in its entirety more clearly:

• Giving humble, gentle correction (righteous judgment) to someone in the church is like giving a valuable gift.

• First, check yourself to see what you need to deal with in order to approach them with integrity.

• Second, discern if someone will embrace what you offer or trample it, tearing you up in the process.

• If the former, offer it. If the latter, don’t. [10]

There are times when we don’t waste something of great value upon someone who is not willing to recognize that value. Sometimes, the wisest thing we can do is let a fool flounder in their foolishness until, like the Prodigal Son, they come to their senses.[11]

I imagine the disciples feeling overwhelmed at this point. “Okay, so, don’t judge unrighteously, but do judge righteously, but then not every time, and honestly I don’t think I'll ever not be hypocritical or a little prejudice, and I have no idea who the swine are.”

But Jesus isn’t done. The righteousness, sincerity, humility, and love to which the Sermon on the Mount calls us is beyond our abilities, but remember: when God calls us, he equips us. Jesus assures his followers that he provides the means for making the impossible possible.[12]

 “Ask [for the character to do this] and it will be given to you; seek [wisdom and discernment] and you will find; knock [at the Father’s house] and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened. 

“Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him! So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.

___________________________________________________________________________________

[1] The parable speaks of being blind to one’s own faults while judging others (compare Rom. 2:19–21).(Believer’s Bible Commentary)

[2] Romans 2:19-21  “If you stand convinced that you are chosen to be a guide to the blind, a light to those who live in darkness,  a teacher of foolish wanderers and children, and have in the law what is essentially the form of knowledge and truth— then tell me, why don’t you practice what you preach? If you are going to sermonize against stealing, then stop stealing.”

[3] Great point from Amber Campion. http://www.ambercampion.com/blogpost/judging-vs-discerning

[4] Why might we fall into the trap of unrighteous judgment? I found a list somewhere and I can’t remember where. So, just know this is not original with me.

§  Low self-esteem | If you are terrible, I feel better about myself.

§  Deflection | Your sin is “worse” than mine. Whew.

§  Peer pressure | My tribe judges like this, so to fit in….

§  Bitterness | I got called out on this issue, so you are going down too!

§  Pride| As I see it from my pedestal…

[5] https://outreachmagazine.com/features/leadership/68856-3-trends-shaping-the-post-pandemic-church.html

[6] I got the basis for this list from Ron Graham at simplybible.com. I have modified it for my purposes.

[7] Another great point from Amber Campion.  http://www.ambercampion.com/blogpost/judging-vs-discerning.

[8] See Matthew 7:15-20 as an example of how this works.

[9] Hebrews 4:12

[10] I built on the insights found in “Matthew 7:6 Meaning.” This is not the only place that talks about it, of course, but it’s a good, clear explanation. https://thebiblesays.com/commentary/matt/matt-7/matthew-76/

[11] Luke 15:17

[12] Expositor’s Bible Commentary

Harmony #24: Choosing A Master (Matthew 6:19–34; Luke 12:22-34)

19 “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. 20 But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal.21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

22 “The eye is the lamp of the body.[1] If your eyes are healthy (generous? sincere?), your whole body will be full of light. 23 But if your eyes are unhealthy (stingy?), your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness![2] 24 “No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.[3]

25 “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? 26 Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? 27 Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?

28 “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. 29 Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 30 If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith?

31 So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For the nations run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. Luke 12:32 “Fear not, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom. 33 Sell your possessions, and give alms; provide yourselves with purses that do not grow old, with a treasure in the heavens that does not fail, where no thief approaches and no moth destroys. 

34 For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.33 But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness[4], and all these things will be given to you as well. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

Heads up: I want to unsettle us this morning like Jesus unsettled his original audience. What he is offering here is an extended look at the connection between money, worry, and trust. Let me explain some of the imagery first, then we are going to try to let the weight and importance of what he said get into our souls.

THE EYE IMAGERY

The Jewish community used “good eye” to describe people who were morally sound, and often associated it with generosity:

'He who has a bountiful eye will be blessed, for he shares his bread with the poor' (Proverbs 22:9).

Sirach, a Jewish book of ethical teachings written about 200 years before Jesus was born, declares: 

Evil is the man with a grudging eye; he averts his face and disregards people. A greedy man's eye is not satisfied with a portion, and mean injustice withers the soul. A stingy man's eye begrudges bread, and it is lacking at his table.  (Sir 14:8–10)

The book of Tobit (which is included in the Catholic and Orthodox Bible), written a little before Sirach, notes this:

Give alms from your possessions to all who live uprightly, and do not let your eye begrudge the gift when you make it.. If you have many possessions, make your gift from them in proportion; if few, do not be afraid to give according to the little you have. So you will be laying up a good treasure for yourself against the day of necessity. For charity delivers from death and keeps you from entering the darkness; and for all who practice it charity is an excellent offering in the presence of the Most High. (Tobit 4:7–11)

Jesus is using imagery his audience understood. If the eye is healthy, it shows that someone is sincere, generous and helpful. When the eye turns bad, the person is stingy and envious, even to the point of wishing that the wealth of others be destroyed.[5]

After that image, Jesus describes those two contrasting kinds of people as serving two masters. In the final paragraph we read, note that all the sources of worry could be solved financially (food, water, clothes).

All this leads me to believe our Sermon on the Mount portion today is specifically about trusting God over our money and with our money. Though the application can be expanded, I want to keep our focus narrow this morning on how wealth competes with Jesus for our loyalty and trust.

Jesus is putting it on the line.. Either money will matter the most and you will let it order your life, or God will matter the most and you will let God order your life. You will live for one or the other. You will fix your eye on one or the other. Where your treasure is, there your heart will be. This isn’t the only time Jesus made this connection.

17 And as he was setting out on his journey, a man ran up and knelt before him, and asked him, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” 18 And Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone. 19 You know the commandments: ‘Do not kill, Do not commit adultery, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Do not defraud, Honor your father and mother.’”  

20 And he said to him, “Teacher, all these I have observed from my youth.” 21 And Jesus looking upon him loved him, and said to him, “You lack one thing; go, sell what you have, and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.” 22 At that saying his countenance fell, and he went away sorrowful; for he had great possessions. 

23 And Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, “How hard it will be for those who have riches to enter the kingdom of God!” 24 And the disciples were amazed[6] at his words. But Jesus said to them again, “Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! 25 It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” (Mark 10:17-25)

The issue is not that the man has money. Plenty of other people with whom Jesus interacted had money, and he didn’t call them on it. He’s calling out something in the ruler that was deeply attached to his money.

·      Was he wealthy because he wasn’t generous?

·      Did he find his security in his money?

·      Was it a point of pride?

·      Was he building trust in himself rather than in God?

The text doesn’t say. We just know that he was seriously committed to following God, but he had a huge blind spot that was keeping him from following God like he thought he was. Lest we think he was an outlier, the disciples immediate response is telling:

And they were exceedingly astonished (“dumbfounded to the point of emotionally ‘shutting down’), saying among themselves, "Then who is able to be saved?" (Mark 10:26)

It hit a nerve. Prosperity was often linked to God’s blessing in the Jewish community; now Jesus is warning that, if you aren’t careful,  prosperity might be the very thing that hinders you from fully following God. Jesus told a parable that riffs on a similar theme.

“Take heed, and beware of all covetousness; for a man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.” 16 And he told them a parable, saying, “The land of a rich man brought forth plentifully; 17 and he thought to himself, ‘What shall I do, for I have nowhere to store my crops?’ 18 And he said, ‘I will do this: I will pull down my barns, and build larger ones; and there I will store all my grain and my goods. 

19 And I will say to my soul, Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; take your ease, eat, drink, be merry.’ 20 But God said to him, ‘Fool! This night your soul is required of you; and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’ 21 So is he who lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God.” (Luke 12:15-21)

Jesus is not forbidding successful farming. He is calling out the pride that comes with arrogant self-reliance and the lack of generosity in the farmer’s heart. And as he points out in the end, what does it matter if you gain the world and lose your soul? [7]

Here’s where I note that Jesus never said that wealth itself is inherently evil, or that financial planning reveals a lack of trust. Money, wealth, and possessions have purposes in Scripture. The Bible: 

·      requires people to provide for relatives if they are capable (1Timothy 5:8)

·      commends work and provision for the future (Proverbs 6:6-8),

·      encourages us to enjoy the good things that God has given us (1 Timothy 4:3-4; 6:17)[8]

·      cautions not to hoard riches in the last days (James 5:2-3), which suggests it is a good thing to have accumulated resources to share.

·      Commands generosity to those who are in need, and that generosity comes from resources.[9]

Wealth is a tremendous gift if used properly, and a terrible master if not. Paul combines the upside and downside of wealth in his letter to Timothy:

“As for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be haughty, nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy. They are to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share, thus storing up treasure for themselves as a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of that which is truly life.” (1 Timothy 6:17–19)

You know I like Adam Clarke’s commentary. Here’s an example of why that is so:

“A heart designed for God and eternity is terribly degraded by being fixed on those things which are subject to corruption. "But may we not lay up treasure innocently?" Yes. First, if you can do it without setting your heart on it, which is almost impossible; second, if there be neither widows nor orphans, destitute nor distressed persons in the place where you live. 

"But there is a portion which belongs to my children; shall I distribute that among the poor?" If it belongs to your children, it is not yours, and therefore you have no right to dispose of it.  

"But I have a certain sum in stock, shall I take that and divide it among the poor?" By no means; for, by doing so, you would put it out of your power to do good after the present division: keep your principal, and devote, if you possibly can spare it, the product to the poor; and thus you shall have the continual ability to do good. In the mean time take care not to shut up your bowels of compassion against a brother in distress; if you do, the love of God cannot dwell in you.” (Adam Clarke)

I suspect God’s work of freeing us from the tyranny of the love of money – and freeing us from all the worries associated with it - is deeply intertwined with practicing generosity.  I want to bring this together by looking at what Paul wrote the church in Corinth about generosity.

2 Corinthians 8:1-9

 “Now, my brothers, we must tell you about the grace that God had given to the Macedonian churches. Somehow, in most difficult circumstances, their joy and the fact of being down to their last penny themselves produced a magnificent concern for other people. I can guarantee that they were willing to give to the limit of their means, yes and beyond their means, without the slightest urging from me or anyone else…     

 Now this had made us ask Titus… to complete his task by arranging for you too to share in this grace of generosity. Already you excel in every good quality—you have faith, you can express that faith in words; you have knowledge, enthusiasm and your love for us. Could you not add this grace to your virtues?  

     I don’t want you to read this as an order. It is only my suggestion, prompted by what I have seen in others of eagerness to help, and here is a way to prove the reality of your love. Do you remember the generous grace of Jesus Christ, the Lord of us all? He was rich beyond our telling, yet he generously became poor for your sakes so that his poverty might make you rich." (2 Corinthians 8:1-9)

The Corinthian church had going for it: faith, knowledge, diligent obedience, and agape love. Awesome! But there is a virtue missing from this list: generosity.  A couple things stand out in this portion of Paul’s letter.

The Macedonians gave as much as they were able  - and beyond.

The Macedonians could have said, "Don't talk to us about the problems in Jerusalem. We’ve got our own problems." Paul says that their lack of resources became a motivation for giving. They determined what they could comfortably contribute - and then went beyond this figure.  Basil (329-379), bishop of Caesarea, preached a blunt sermon on Jesus’s parable of the Rich Fool. In it he said,

“The bread that you hold back belongs to the hungry. The coat that you guard in a chest belongs to the naked. The shoes that you have left wasting away belong to the shoeless. The silver that you have buried in the ground belongs to the needy. In these and other ways you have wronged all those you were able to provide for.”[10]

1500 years later, Charles Spurgeon (1800s) received an invitation to preach at his rural church as a fundraiser to pay off some church debt. The man who contacted him told Spurgeon that he could use one of the man’s three homes (he had one in the country, the town, and by the sea). Spurgeon wrote back, "Sell one of the places and pay the debt yourself."

When we realize that others are in need, and we have the resources to alleviate that need, the Bible states that we should generously and joyfully do so. It is a sign that the Holy Spirit is at work in our lives.

Of course, it will cost something. David wrote in Psalms, “I will not give God sacrifices that cost me nothing.” The story is told of a man who was giving money for a good cause, and he said to a friend, “I think I can give $100 and not feel it.”  His friend said, “Why not give $200 and feel it?”

It’s a daunting challenge, but one that God uses for our good.

2. They gave entirely on their own, by a free choice.

They were not pressured into giving. Paul did not use guilt to motivate them.  It was gratitude in response to the grace of God. The actual amount is not mentioned. That’s because it wasn’t about the amount; it was about the heart. They didn’t even wait until they had a lot to give God; they gave from what they had. God is good with that approach.

“Jesus sat down opposite the place where the offerings were put and watched the crowd putting their money into the temple treasury. Many rich people threw in large amounts. But a poor widow came and put in two very small copper coins, worth only a few cents. Calling his disciples to him, Jesus said, “Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put more into the treasury than all the others. They all gave out of their wealth; but she, out of her poverty, put in everything—all she had to live on.”  (Mark 12:41-44) 

God cares about motives more than amount. God does not want you to be generous out of fear or because you are concerned about what people will think. You can’t buy favor with God, and you shouldn’t try to buy favor with others. These Macedonians gave because their hearts were moved by the generous grace of God through Jesus, and wanted to pass it on in a practical way.

Did you know that Paul never commands Christians to tithe? It is not a New Testament teaching. The tithe functioned much like a tax on the Jewish people (as much as 20% tithe some years, and perhaps higher). There is no tax on the New Testament.

This does not mean our money is ours. The opposite is true. God is no longer laying claim to 10%; He is laying claim to all of it. We are stewards of what we have, not owners. 10% is too simple. It allows us to pay our tax to God and then do whatever we want with the rest. When we do that, we miss the point.

The question is no longer, “How much do I get to keep after I give God his tax?”  The question is, “How much am I able to give back into the service of the Kingdom of God?”

10% let’s us off the hook. There is no need to analyze the thoughts and intents of our heart, to see if money is an idol, to be honest about if we are greedy or if we have placed our trust in material things rather than God.

10% lets us avoid how we think about money in our souls.  Jesus constantly moved The Law inside. It’s not just, “Do you kill people or cheat on your spouse?”  It’s, “What do you desire in your heart? What do you want to have happen? What are you really thinking?” We are to give generously and voluntarily as we understand and are moved by the grace and generosity of God.

Here’s my challenge this week: re-examine your relationship with money in light of God’s Word. Examine your heart. This isn’t about whether you are rich or poor; it’s not about amounts; it’s not about how you are doing compared to your neighbor.

It’s about whether our money is a tool we use for God’s purposes or a master that controls us. It’s about checking where our trust, our hope, our assurance is grounded.

Then, consider what God’s call is in your life to commit to generosity. I’m not going to tell you what that is, because I don’t know your situation or how God will lead you. You get to wrestle with God about what responsible stewardship looks like as you balance responsibilities at home and responsibilities in the church and community.

But one thing I know, because the Bible makes it clear: there are treasures of the Kingdom waiting for those who can let go of the love of treasures on earth.

 _____________________________________________________________________________________

[1] “The good eye looks to God as its “master” (v. 24) and fills the person with the “light” of God’s will. The bad eye looks to “treasures on earth” (v. 19) and admits only the “darkness” of greed and self-interest. The person’s whole life will be determined by the kind of “light” the “eye” lets in.” (Reformation Study Bible)

[2] “The eye (similar to the “heart” in Jewish literature) is a lamp that reveals the quality of a person’s inner life. A healthy eye (clear vision) suggests loyal devotion to God. A bad eye (impaired vision) suggests moral corruption.” (ESV Global Study Bible)

[3] Materialism may be God’s greatest rival competing for the allegiance of human hearts, not the least because constantly striving to secure one’s life via possessions produces anxiety. (NIV Biblical Theology Study Bible)

[4] By definition includes sharing one’s surplus with fellow Christians who lack the basic necessities of life or the ability to acquire them. When God’s people worldwide do this, “all these things” (food, drink, clothing) will be given to them as well. This is not a promise that faithful believers will never starve to death, but there need never be any poor among them (Deut 15:4)” (NIV Biblical Theology Study Bible)

[5] A contextualised reading of Matthew 6:22–23: 'Your eye is the lamp of your body.' Francois P. Viljoen. School for Biblical Science and Ancient Languages, North-West University, South Africa

http://www.scielo.org.za/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0259-94222009000100023

[6] “Dumbfounded to the point of emotionally ‘shutting down.’” (HELPS Word Studies)

[7] His warning in Matthew 16:26?

[8] Expositors Bible Commentary

[9] See “Bible Verses About Generosity,” biblestudytools.com

[10] I found this anecdote in John Dickson’s Bullies And Saints.

Harmony #23: The Reward of Righteousness (Matthew 6; Luke 11)

In Matthew 6, Jesus addressed three common Jewish practices of devotion to God: giving to the needy, prayer, and fasting. In each one, Jesus said of people who do things for show, “They have their reward.” Then he noted that for those who do them as genuine acts of devotion, “Your Father, who sees in secret, will reward you.”

Last week we noted that righteousness is not for show. It’s not a vehicle to impress others or to make our name great. We are called to live out our righteousness as a sincere and humble response to God’s grace. 

This week, let’s talk about how does doing these things “in secret” brings about a reward. I think that happens on two levels.

• The practice of righteousness has its own reward. God has designed in such a way that when we go through life as God intends, we flourish in ways we didn’t expect.

• The presence of God is a reward, as captured in the Lord’s prayer, the pinnacle of the Sermon On The Mount.  

 #1. The Practice Of Righteous Has Its Own Reward

GENEROSITY. When we sincerely practice generosity and compassion, it changes us.

• victory over the power of money and covetousness, possessions #commercialism #rat race

• victory over addiction to comfort (trusting money over God).

• growing prayer life when generosity requires faith for provision

• increasing love for the those toward whom we give our treasure, because "where your treasure is, there your heart will be also" (Matthew 6:21).

PRAYER. The discipline of prayer reorients us.

• our hearts will change as we fellowship with God #transformed #likenessofJesus Conversation + time = change that comes from experiential  knowledge.

• we gain a Kingdom focus, a break from the world’s priorities

• we find refuge, comfort and peace by giving God our burdens

• we become more aware of our need for God and more likely to recognize what He is doing #Hisstrengthperfectedinweakness

• our love for others grows as we pray for even our enemies

FASTING/SELF-DENIAL. I believe fasting can involve more than food, though food is certainly included. Bible first, then a Bible commentary. 

“Is this not the kind of fasting I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke? Is it not to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter—when you see the naked, to clothe him, and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?” (Isaiah 58)

“Fasting also is not merely abstinence from food, but consists of self-denial in all areas of life in order to escape the control of the passions. On the eve of Great Lent, we sing, “Let us abstain from passions as we abstain from food.” St. John Chrysostom writes, “What good is it if we abstain from eating birds and fish, but bite and devour our brothers?”  (Orthodox Study Bible)

When a believer practices Spirit-led self-denial, practical strength over the appetites of the sinful flesh grows; after all, the formative power of habits are a thing designed by God. Fasting, or other forms of self-denial, allow us to more fully experience the abundant life God offers to us.[1]

________________________________

#2 The Presence Of God Is A Reward

Jesus offered what we call The Lord’s Prayer[2] to his disciples as sort of a model. What Jesus offered was not was not new ground. Adam Clark (among many others) notes that every line of this prayer was already being prayed in common Jewish eulogies, such as this one:

"Our Father who art in heaven, be gracious unto us! O Lord our God, hallowed be thy name, and let the remembrance of Thee be glorified in heaven above, and in the earth here below! Let thy kingdom reign over us now, and for ever! The holy men of old said, remit and forgive unto all men whatsoever they have done against me! And lead us not into the hands of temptation, but deliver us from the evil thing! For thine is the kingdom, and thou shalt reign in glory for ever and for evermore."[3] 

While Matthew simply records the prayer, Luke records that the disciples made a common request from disciple to rabbi: “Teach us to pray.” Considering how Jesus compiles known prayers into a concise version (like when he was asked to summarize the law and the prophets), I think Jesus may have been affirming to his disciples that they already knew how to pray.

Remember last week how praying, fasting and giving were not the problem but it was the heart with which they were practiced? Jesus had just told them not to pray for show, not to try impress God with wordy, impressive prayers to get Gods attention. Just pray. You don’t need something new that will get God’s attention better. Just pray. Simple prayers can be profound and meaningful too.

Our Father, Who Is In Heaven…[4]

“Our Father” starts us off with good theology. God is not a deistic God, aloof and uncaring. God is not a pantheistic God that is just part of nature. God is not the Force. God is person who is a relational, immediate, and accessible God. The word for Father is a very relational and personal word, used only in a relationship of safety, trust, and love.[5] There is reward in remembering God is personal.

“Our Father” reminds us that he’s our father. Not mine; ours. We cannot forget when we pray this that we are raised from spiritual death into new life in a family, a Christian community. In this, we are recognizing that while God is for us, He is for all of us. I cannot be content to simply think of God in terms of “me and God.” It must be “us and God.” The Bible has no view of “loner” Christians disconnected from a local church. If we are going to pray the language of “us”, we must live the life of “us.” There is reward in remembering we are part of a community.

Hallowed be Thy Name

“Hallowed be thy name” is a plea, not a statement of fact. It’s saying, “Please, make your name  - character, nature and reputation -  revered or held holy.” It’s asking for God to start the process in a world full of people – including the one praying – who take Jesus too casually. It’s asking that God’s character and nature be recognized as great by all who dismiss, insult or ignore it. This should humble us, because that includes us.[6]

It’s a plea of both humility and hope. “Help me not to take the reality of who you are lightly or casually. Help me to appreciate the majesty of God. I want the entirety of my life to reflect the great weight and value I give to you; with your help, all I think, say and do will offer an accurate representation of you.”  There is reward in remembering the greatness of the God we serve.

May Your Kingdom Come And Your Will be Done, On Earth As It Is In Heaven.

This is another phrase of hope and humility. Whenever we pray for justice, mercy, hope, love, truth, and holiness, we are praying with hope that these heavenly realities will actually manifest here and let us see in part now what we will see fully in the life to come.

It’s humbling in that we are asking God to reign in our lives in ways He does not now in our emotions, desires, thoughts and commitments. We want His desire to be our desires; His will to be our will; His loves to be our loves; His holiness to be ours. It’s also a reminder that, at the end of the day, we want God’s will to be done, not ours.

It’s also challenging. What if I am the thing God uses in answer to someone else’s prayer?

• When the poor pray for finances, will I be willing to help?

• When the lonely pray for a friend, am I available?

• When the desperate pray for help, am I ready?

 This part of the prayer reminds us that others are praying this too. If we are excited to see God’s will for us accomplished through others, buckle up. It’s not possible for us to see all that God sees, so in many situations our best prayer is one where we show hope and trust, prayer in which we surrender our desire to the will of a God who has faultless wisdom, live and power.[7]

There is reward in remembering to align our heart, soul, mind and strength with the values, priorities and practices of the kingdom of God.

Give Us This Day Our Daily Bread…[8]

The word used is only found in the Bible in all of ancient literature, and it is used only twice, so there is some uncertainty about how to translate it correctly. Luke seems to focus on present, practical provision, while Matthew seems to ask for the spiritual bread we will share at the banquet in God’s coming kingdom.

The main idea is this: trusting God to provide what we need to sustain us in every way now and into eternity.[9] We can take for granted that we can take care of ourselves. If that fails, our family, church or government will provide. This part of the prayer a reminder that everything happens under the sovereignty of God; all our blessings find their source in him. For that reason, we thank God ultimately for supplying for our needs.

It’s a constant reminder that life is saturated with the presence and work of God, and even in our greatest accomplishments or in the most generous deeds of others it is God who sustains and provides.

There is a future hope here as well. We are trusting that God will sustain us into and through eternity, which will require the true “bread of life,” Jesus Christ.

There is reward in remembering that our creator is our sustainer in the way that matters most both now and through eternity.

Forgive Our Sinful Debts As We Have Forgiven Those Who Have Sinned Against Us.

Here is the first acknowledgment: We have all sinned against God, broken His law and harmed others, and we are in desperate need of forgiveness of an unpayable debt we owe. This is a plea for God, in His mercy, to cover the cost of our sins. There is reward in remembering that God so loved the world… 

The second acknowledgment is that we must forgive those who sin against us. This is much tougher than praying that God forgives us of our sins. We must forgive those who have sinned against us: our spouse, our parents, cruel people at work or school. This list includes users and abusers, manipulators and liars. We all have sinned; we all are in desperate needs of God’s forgiveness. We want God to forgive us; as representatives bearing His name – if we are to ‘hallow’ his name -  we must offer forgiveness as well.

This portion of the prayer is what Augustine called “a terrible petition.” If we pray these words this while harboring unforgiveness, we are actually asking God not to forgive us. We would be saying, “I haven’t forgiven my friend/spouse/neighbor yet, so please don’t forgive me.” 

Forgiveness is a crucial spiritual marker that says something about the sincerity of our ongoing surrender and discipleship. There is, of course, a HUGE difference between moments of unforgiveness and a settled position of habitual and intentional unforgiveness. We must be committed to being deliberately and habitually forgiving.[10] There is reward in experiencing the freedom of forgiving and living in a community committed to forgiveness.

Lead Us Not into Trials (“trouble sent by God and serving to test or prove one's faith, holiness, character”), And Deliver Us From The Temptations (“an enticement to sin, arising from outward circumstances, within, or from Satan”) Of The Evil One.[11]

Sometimes God leads us into trials, because we are a proud and rebellious people for whom God in his love will send trials to refine and mature us if that’s necessary. Here, we pray for spiritual maturity in any other way, but just by praying it we acknowledge that our hard hearts sometimes need to be broken. Please, dear God, if at all possible, let this cup pass from me. Jesus prayed it; we can too.

But if a trial is what it takes to transform us into the image of Christ – if we must drink that cup -  keep us from giving into the temptation from the Evil One[12] that would turn those trials for our good into sins to our harm. It is so easy for a maturing test to push us away from God instead of toward God. Deliver us, Lord, from the Evil One, who would turn what you plan to use to bring us spiritual life into something that brings spiritual death.

But there is the hopeful reminder in this request: we know that God is a Deliverer. The Old Testament shows us that, time after time, God faithfully guides his people through trials and delivers his people from the snares of sin and power of temptation.[13]  There is reward in the purifying refinement of the fire.

For Yours Is The Kingdom, And The Power, And The Glory Forever, Amen.

N.T. Wright says,

“If the church isn't prepared to subvert the kingdoms of the world with the kingdom of God, the only honest thing would be to give up praying this prayer altogether, especially its final doxology.”

After focusing on our needs, our troubles, our frailty, we return to the glory of God. All kingdoms answer to God. All power comes from God. All glory belongs to God.  In a world where empires rise and fall, and power corrupts, and glory is tarnished and fleeting, it’s a reminder that God is uncorrupted, lasting, powerful and good, and true glory is found only in him.

* * * * * * * * * *

How should we pray?

Our Father, who is in heaven, hallowed be your name. May your kingdom come and your will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven. Give us this day the bread of life both now and for eternity. Forgive our sins as we have forgiven those who sin against us. Lead us not into times of testing, and deliver us from the temptations of the Evil One. For yours is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever and ever, Amen.

_________________________________________________________________________________

[1] Though I added some modificatons, the lists and the quote at the end are from Nate Holdridge, How Is A Relationship With God Rewarding? (Matthew 6:1-18).  https://www.nateholdridge.com/blog/how-is-a-relationship-with-god-rewarding-matthew-6-1-18

[2] To connect the Lord’s Prayer with the three practices of righteousness Jesus mentioned, praying reminds us that God’s name and Kingdom is to made great, not us and ours; generosity is God’s preparatory program for trusting him for provision; fasting is God’s preparatory program for times of testing.

[3] “In his book Jesus and the Judaism of His Time, University of Toronto scholar Irving Zeitlin cites line-by-line parallels between the Lord's Prayer and the Jewish mourner's prayer, the Kaddish ("May (God) establish His kingdom during our lifetime and during the lifetime of Israel"), the Eighteen Benedictions ("Forgive us our Father, for we have sinned" is the sixth blessing), Talmudic prayer ("Lead me not into sin or iniquity or temptation or contempt," goes one) and other Hebrew scriptures in which we find "Give us this day our daily bread." (“The Radical Truth Behind The Lord’s Prayer,” https://www.thestar.com/life/2008/02/23/the_radical_truth_behind_the_lords_prayer.html

[4] Galatians 4:6, “Because you are sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, ‘Abba, Father!’ ” Romans 8:15, 16: “You received the spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, ‘Abba, Father!’ The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children.”

[5] “Patḗr ("father") refers to a begetter, originator, progenitor – one in ‘intimate connection and relationship.’” (HELPS Word Studies)

[6] I pulled some ideas about the radical nature of the Lord’s Prayer from this excellent article: “The Lord’s Prayer Advert Has Been Banned For Being Offensive - Which It Is.” http://thinktheology.co.uk/blog/article/the_lords_prayer_advert_has_been_banned_for_being_offensive_which_it_is\

[7] Even Jesus prayed: “Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done.” (Luke 22)

[8] “In Luke’s version of the Lord’s Prayer the verb “give” in Greek is a present imperative, which means something like “keep on giving.”   Also the verb “day” is a Greek expression that means “each day.”  So this part of the Lord’s Prayer in Luke’s version says literally, “Keep on giving us each day our daily bread.” But Matthew’s Greek reads differently. In Matthew’s version the verb give is an aorist imperative, which in Greek is a one-time decisive action, which we might translate “Give us once and for all.”  Also, Matthew’s version uses a different word for “day.”  It’s not a phrase that means “each day,” but a word that means “this day, today, right now.”  So Matthew’s version, translated literally says, “Give us once and for all today here and now the bread of tomorrow.”   In Matthew, Jesus reminds us to pray for the bread of tomorrow, the bread we will share at the banquet in God’s coming kingdom.  Pray for that bread to come into our lives and world today. I think the Bible gives us two versions of the Lord’s Prayer because Jesus wants us to practice praying both.” (From a sermon called “Tomorrow’s Bread Today,” http://spcdesmoines.org/spcsermons/2019/9/3/tomorrows-bread-today

[9] Tim Keller suggests that it’s also a prayer for justice. If one does not have bread, particularly in Jesus’ day, it wasn’t because of a lack of resources. There was either oppression from the Romans or disdain from the Jews, whom the Law required to take care of the poor. It’s a plea for justice to be done to yourself; it’s a prayer for society.

[10] If we claim to love God and hate our brother, we are liars (1 John 4:20).

[11] Both these words use the same root word; translations will differ on the usage at times. http://biblehub.com/greek/3986.htm.  In this case, the commentaries I have been reading are noting that “lead us not into temptation” is better understood as “lead us not into trials”; the second part of the phrase focuses on temptation.

[12] Luke 4:13; James 4:7; 1 Peter 5:8

[13] Every weekday morning in synagogues around the world, Jewish People open their siddurs (prayer books) and read a prayer like this: “May it be Your will, HaShem, my God and the God of my forefathers, that you rescue me today and every day from brazen men and brazenness, from an evil man, an evil companion, an evil neighbor, an evil mishap, the destructive spiritual impediment [‘Satan’], a harsh trial and a harsh opponent, whether he is a member of the covenant or whether he is not a member of the covenant.” (From “Discover The Very Jewish Lord’s Prayer,” https://free.messianicbible.com/feature/lords-prayer-jewish-prayer/)

Harmony #22: Righteousness And Reward (Matthew 6; Luke 6, 11)

If you are a Bible nerd like me, or you think the art of good literature is really cool, you may enjoy seeing where we are at in the Sermon on the Mount. If you think of the sermon like a mountain (like the literal one Jesus ascended and descended at the beginning and end of the sermon), we are at the high point this week.

To add another layer of nerdiness/coolness to how this sermon is constructed, check out this pattern.[1] After starting with the Beatititudes, the rest of the sermon is unpacking them in reverse order.

We are at Matthew 6 today, which is unpacking, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.” Jesus is expanding on what it means to have righteousness that exceeds the Scribes and Pharisees.

Quick reminder: because of Jesus, the debt of our sin has been paid and we are placed in right relationship with God. This righteousness is a gift, freely by God’s grace, through faith in Jesus. The $10 King James word is that righteousness was ‘imputed’ to us by Jesus (2 Corinthians 5:21). 

In today’s passage, “doing” or “practicing righteousness”[2] has to do with participating in religious practices that are the outworking of the righteousness given to us. Think of how a doctor “practices medicine.” Doctors don’t practice medicine to become doctors; it’s what they do because they are doctors. That’s what this passage is talking about: in particular, what righteous people do in response to Jesus making them righteous. 

Jesus addresses three common Jewish practices of devotion to God: giving to the needy, prayer, and fasting. Don’t think of this as the only three things. It’s just three examples. You will see a pattern emerge. In each one, Jesus will say of people who do things for show, “They have their reward.” Then he will talk about how, for those who do them out of the spotlight, “Your Father, who sees in secret, will reward you.”

 (Matthew 6:1-18; Luke 6,11)

“Be careful not to display your righteousness merely to be seen by people. Otherwise you have no reward with your Father in heaven.

Thus whenever you do charitable giving, do not sound a trumpet before you,[3] as the hypocrites[4] do in synagogues and on streets so that people will praise them. I tell you the truth, they have their reward. But when you do your giving, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your gift may be in secret. And your Father, who sees in secret, will reward you.

 “Whenever you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, because they love to pray while standing in synagogues and on street corners[5] so that people can see them. Truly I say to you, they have their reward. But whenever you pray, go into your room, close the door, and pray to your Father in secret. And your Father, who sees in secret, will reward you. When you pray, do not babble repetitiously like the Gentiles,[6] because they think that by their many words they will be heard. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.[7]

9 “This, then, is how you should pray: “‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name,
 your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.  Give us today our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. (14For if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. 15 But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.) And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.[8]

 “When you fast, do not look sullen like the hypocrites, for they make their faces unattractive so that people will see them fasting. I tell you the truth, they have their reward. When you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, so that it will not be obvious to others when you are fasting, but only to your Father who is in secret. And your Father, who sees in secret, will reward you.”

I want to come back to the verse that started this section:

 “Be careful not to display your righteousness merely to be seen by people. Otherwise you have no reward with your Father in heaven.” 

Let’s talk about righteousness, and then reward. It’s going to take two weeks J

RIGHTEOUSNESS

Jesus assumed his disciples would do the things he talked about here, but he wasn’t asking the disciples to outdo the Pharisees or even give, pray or fast more than they were. Jesus was asking them to make God the only audience that mattered. Righteousness is not for show.  It’s not a contest to be won or a platform to build our brand and be noticed. It’s not a vehicle to impress others or to make our name great. We are called to live out our righteousness as a sincere and humble response to God’s grace.  This isn’t the only time Jesus talked about the danger of turning the practice of righteousness into a practice of arrogant hypocrisy. 

“Now then, you Pharisees clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside you are full of greed and wickedness….you love the most important seats in the synagogues and respectful greetings in the marketplaces.” (Luke 11:39; 43) 

As he taught, Jesus said, “Watch out for the teachers of the law. They like to walk around in flowing robes and be greeted with respect in the marketplaces, and have the most important seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at banquets. They devour widows’ houses and for a show make lengthy prayers.” (Mark 12: 38-40)

In other words, they were not people of integrity. Their inside and their outside were not integrated into a unified whole. They pretended to be something on that outside that was sharply at odds with what was on the inside because they loved the attention. They displayed what appeared to be righteousness merely to be seen by people.

Practicing righteousness is not for show or applause or to get the best seats at the best places. It’s not intended to give us bragging rights about how amazing we are. It’s the way in which we live in humble response to the righteousness we have been given through Jesus.

I looked up all the times the Apostle Paul talked about bragging or boasting (and it’s a lot). Most of the time, he’s boasting about others. The one time he points out that, in a boasting contest on worldly terms, he would win it, he says, “But I boast in my weakness.” Why? Because God’s strength becomes clear as God works through that which is weak and broken.[9]

In addition, Jesus’ first audience would have heard this teaching through another layer: the warning of their prophets about hypocrisy in the camp of God’s people. The prophets talked about this A LOT. I want to give you a couple snippets just so we understand that simply mentioning that a religious person was acting as a hypocrite carried a lot of weight.

The Prophet Amos

“The people of Israel have sinned again and again, and I will not let them go unpunished! They sell honorable people for silver and poor people for a pair of sandals. 7 They trample helpless people in the dust and shove the oppressed out of the way… At their religious festivals, they lounge in clothing their debtors put up as security. In the house of God,they drink wine bought with unjust fines.’ (Amos 2)

“Go ahead and offer sacrifices to the idols at Bethel. Keep on disobeying at Gilgal.
Offer sacrifices each morning, and bring your tithes every three days. 5 Present your bread made with yeast as an offering of thanksgiving. Then give your extra voluntary offerings so you can brag about it everywhere! This is the kind of thing you Israelites love to do.” (Amos 4)

“I hate all your show and pretense - the hypocrisy of your religious festivals and solemn assemblies.22 I will not accept your burnt offerings and grain offerings. I won’t even notice all your choice peace offerings. 23 Away with your noisy hymns of praise! I will not listen to the music of your harps. 24 Instead, I want to see a mighty flood of justice, an endless river of righteous living.” (Amos 5)

“Listen to this, you who rob the poor and trample down the needy!5 You can’t wait for the Sabbath day to be over and the religious festivals to end so you can get back to cheating the helpless. You measure out grain with dishonest measures and cheat the buyer with dishonest scales. 6 And you mix the grain you sell with chaff swept from the floor. Then you enslave poor people for one piece of silver or a pair of sandals.” (Amos 8)

The Prophet Isaiah (Chapter 1)

13 Stop bringing meaningless offerings! Your incense is detestable to me. New Moons, Sabbaths and convocations -I cannot bear your worthless assemblies. 4 Your New Moon feasts and your appointed festivals I hate with all my being. They have become a burden to me; I am weary of bearing them.

15 When you spread out your hands in prayer, I hide my eyes from you; even when you offer many prayers, I am not listening. Your hands are full of blood! 6 Wash and make yourselves clean. Take your evil deeds out of my sight; stop doing wrong.17 Learn to do right; seek justice. Defend the oppressed. Take up the cause of the fatherless; plead the case of the widow.

God has some opinions about what is acceptable in His house and in His people. Blatant hypocrisy is not okay. Keeping up a façade of righteous practice (prayer, offerings, meeting in the temple/church) over a self-corrupted and baldly chosen moral desolation - God has some opinions about that.

If you are like me, I find hypocrisy really annoying:

• The outspoken environmentalist whose carbon footprint is a big is a small town’s.

• The free speech advocate who tries to shut other people down.

• The fitness guru who says he’s built like a brick outhouse because he’s all natural – and you find out he’s loaded on steroids.

• Leaders in the church who lead a double life of abuse and corruption. 

• People of God who claim to love God and others and then build a reputation of name-calling and meanness, a bit like the disciples who asked Jesus if he would call down fire on a city instead of asking if they could go tell them about Jesus.

• I’ve worked with youth most of my life. One of the most heartbreaking stories I hear is, “I’m done with Christianity. I saw my parents show up and look good on a Sunday – everybody admired them and told us how lucky we were - but the rest of the week was a nightmare. If that’s the kind of people who fill up a church, I’m not interested.”

Remember I noted that the Sermon on the Mount was unsettling? I assume there was a lot of soul-searching going on in that first audience – and maybe this one. “Is that me? That’s not me…. Is that me? I’ll bet it’s Bob, but it’s not me. Is it? My hands aren’t full of blood. Is that an image for hurting people in lots of different ways?”

“I hate all your show and pretense - the hypocrisy of your religious festivals and solemn assemblies.22 I will not accept your burnt offerings and grain offerings. I won’t even notice all your choice peace offerings. 23 Away with your noisy hymns of praise! I will not listen to the music of your harps. 24 Instead, I want to see a mighty flood of justice, an endless river of righteous living.” (Amos 5)

I’ve been thinking about this a lot this week. Have I turned anything in my faith into a show about me?

• When I pray at the end of my sermon, am I more interested in if you think of me as a great prayer than I am in if God sees my prayer as a sincere act of communion with Him?

• When I sing or play during musical worship, is my physical response ‘virtue signaling to others or is it my response to God?

• When I’m part of small groups, do I show up the way I do or say the things I do to impress others or to faithfully present as I serve God?

• In conversation, do I choose words that make me sound more spiritual than I am? (Like saying I’ve been praying about something when all I’ve been doing is thinking about it).

• Do I misrepresent myself here? Am I the same Anthony here that I am at home and at the gym and coaching basketball or do I put on the kind of show I think a pastor needs to put on?

I guess I want us all to let those same kinds of questions simmer in us this week.

* * * * *

Here’s where I want to anticipate a question you may have - because I have the same question. This is going to be the point that brings the sermon to its conclusion.

“Does this mean that ‘going through the motions’ of practicing righteousness when I’m not feeling it puts me in this category of people that the prophets railed against? Or if I’m struggling during the week to turn my heart and mind toward Jesus, does this mean I shouldn’t bother showing up on Sunday because God’s disgusted with me?”

There is a world of difference between a principled commitment to “going through the motions” and a hypocritical deception of “going through the motions.”

Let’s say Sheila and I are angry and frustrated at each other, or we are in a season in our marriage where we feel distant and disengaged. Should I still treat her with all the loving actions I do when it feels like we are on a second honeymoon? Absolutely. I should care for her with my words, action and attitude. I should help with family responsibilities like I normally do. I should go out of my way to love and serve her.

Does that make me a hypocrite? I don't think so. It would make me a husband who knows how to honor my commitments. It would mean I have a principled commitment to displaying my covenant love, and so I do these things in spite of how either one of us feels. Am I going through the motions? Sure, but they are valuable motions motivated by a commitment to do the right thing. Meanwhile, Sheila and I shouldn’t be pretending everything is okay. It’s not. We can simultaneously not be okay and still be faithfully committed to honoring each other as we work toward being okay again.

That’s entirely different than if I start an affair and keep going through the motions at home. Now, my actions when I am with my wife say, “I am honoring our covenant with my actions,” while I am most definitely not. That’s a hypocritical deception of going through the motions. Jesus didn’t say,

“If you are struggling with questions or doubt, don’t be singing and praying until you get it all figured out.”

“If you don’t feel like giving to the needy, don’t help anybody in need until you feel like it.”

“If God feels distant and disconnected, don’t bother coming to church until you feel tight with God again.”

“That practice of self-discipline (fasting), it’s worthless if you don’t feel like it. Indulge until you feel like practicing restraint.”

That’s not what Jesus was saying. Hypocrisy and show is very different from a principled commitment to do the next right thing no matter how we feel. This is about being humble and honest about who and where we are in our relationship with God and others, and remembering why we committed do what we do in the first place. How do I know this? This parable.

To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everyone else, Jesus told this parable: “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood by himself and prayed: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other people—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.’ 

 “But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his chest and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner.’ “I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.” (Luke 18:9-14)

 Note that the problem with the Pharisee was not that he fasted and tithed. It was his arrogance. The tax collector brought no show, no pretense. He was honest. “He would not even look up to heaven” as he stood at a distance. The most important thing he brought was himself - in humility and transparency.

David wrote Psalm 51 after he took Bathsheba and killed her husband to cover up his sin. He notes in that Psalm of repentance that right then, God wasn’t interested in David sacrificing something on an altar in a formal, public display of righteousness. God was interested in David bringing the same thing the tax collector brought.

My sacrifice, O God, is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart
    you, God, will not despise.

Most of us can figure out the game of impressing people by taking good things – bible memory, prayer, singing, sacrifice for and service of others – and making them a show about us. If you want to bring a show, you’ll get the reward you want: people’s attention. It will chip away at your soul and your sanity and create a church that loves show.

What does God want? First and foremost, He wants you. When you go to God or come to church, you don’t need to impress anybody. We don’t form churches to build public platforms for popularity. It’s all about Jesus – seeing who He really is, surrendering our lives to His glorious work of saving us and making us new, then living in and living out the righteousness He has so graciously given us, and at such great cost. And in living like this there is great reward.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. That’s the reward we will consider more fully next week.

______________________________________________________________________________

[1] I could not figure out how and who to cite for this source, as I found it on a Prezi online.

[2] 1 John 2:29. “If you know that He is righteous, you know that everyone who practices righteousness is born of Him.”

[3] “Some learned men have thought that the word shopher, a trumpet, refers to the hole in the public alms chest, into which the money was dropped which was allotted for the service of the poor. Such holes, because they were wide at one end and grew gradually narrow towards the other, were actually termed שופרות shopheroth, trumpets, by the rabbins… An ostentatious man, who wished to attract the notice of those around him, would throw in his money with some force into these trumpet-resembling holes, and thus he might be said שופר σαλπιζειν, to sound the trumpet.”  (Adam Clarke) 

[4] This word referred to Greek actors who wore different masks in the same play to present themselves as different people.

[5] “The Jewish phylacterical prayers were long, and the canonical hours obliged them to repeat these prayers wherever they happened to be; and the Pharisees… contrived to be overtaken in the streets by the canonical hour, that they might be seen by the people, and applauded for their great and conscientious piety.” (Adam Clarke)

[6] Pagans repeated the names of their gods or the same words over and over without thinking (1 Kings 18:26; Acts 19:34). (ESV Global Study Bible)

[7] “Prayer is not designed to inform God, but to give man a sight of his misery; to humble his heart, to excite his desire, to inflame his faith, to animate his hope, to raise his soul from earth to heaven, and to put him in mind that THERE is his Father, his country, and inheritance.” (Adam Clarke)

[8] The very learned Mr. Gregory has shown that our Lord collected this prayer out of the Jewish Euchologies, and gives us the whole form as follows: -"Our Father who art in heaven, be gracious unto us! O Lord our God, hallowed be thy name, and let the remembrance of Thee be glorified in heaven above, and in the earth here below! Let thy kingdom reign over us now, and for ever! The holy men of old said, remit and forgive unto all men whatsoever they have done against me! And lead us not into the hands of temptation, but deliver us from the evil thing! For thine is the kingdom, and thou shalt reign in glory for ever and for evermore." Gregory's Works, 4to. 1671, p. 162. (Adam Clarke)

[9] https://bible.knowing-jesus.com/topics/Paul~s-Boasting

Harmony # 21: “You Have Heard It Said” (Matthew 5)

Envision, if you will, a mountaintop scene. Jesus is sitting and teaching, and his disciples are sitting around him. It’s a typical scenario 2,000 years ago for a rabbi and his disciples. The disciples are ready to receive wisdom.

But keep in mind that this kind of teaching was often intended to not only to convey truth, but to inspire discussion. It was going to stir up something in the audience. Unsettle them. At times they were going to think, “Of course. I knew it!”  Other times it was going to be, “What? Seriously?”  When this Sermon on the Mount was over, they were going to talk excitedly among themselves as they dissected and argued what had been said. Perhaps this sermon had pauses built into it so that conversation could happen while the sermon was unfolding.

Think, perhaps, of what we try to do here with Message+. We unpack the message: confirm, challenge, dissect, workshop it together. In fact, I will sometimes say in the sermon, “Let’s talk about that in Message+, but just hear me out for now.” I know there is much more to be said, but to follow all the rabbit trails would distract from the main point.

One way teachers during Jesus’ time accomplished this was through hyperbole, an “extravagant exaggeration.” I like this definition:

“Hyperbole is, without a doubt, the single greatest thing in the history of the universe.”

We use hyperbole all that time. It doesn’t lessen our communication; it enriches it with colorful and thought-provoking images. “I’m so hungry I can eat a horse.” “My feet are killing me.” “Those chili peppers are fire.”

Jesus and other biblical writers are simply reflecting how people talk when they used exaggeration or colorful imagery  to make a point.

• Mark said of John the Baptist (1:4-5) that “all the land of Judea, and those from Jerusalem, went out to him and were all baptized by him...”

• “Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated” (Romans 9:13) is the language of priorities.

• The Galatians were so generous that “if possible, you would have gouged out your eyes and given them to me.” (Galatians 4:15) 

• The Pharisees strain out gnats and swallow camels (Matthew 23).

• “The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil… sets the whole course of one’s life on fire, and is itself set on fire by hell.” (James 3)

• John said that if he recorded everything Jesus did, “even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written.” (John 21)

 This kind of hyperbole is at work in the Sermon on the Mount.  Here are some obvious ones, three we will cover today and two that will come up later.

• Gouge your eye out if it causes you to lust (Matthew 5)

• If someone demands your tunic, offer to give the rest of your cloths and go naked (Matthew 5)

• Give to EVERYONE who asks (Matthew 5)

• “But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing.” (Matthew 6)

• You have a log in your eye (Matthew 7) while others only have a speck.

 The point of hyperbole was to make a jarring point about a profound principle by using extravagant language or imagery. Because hyperbole is interwoven with literal language, it takes work to think through how Jesus intends us to understand his language. I think that part of the point.  This approach shakes people out of complacency and self-satisfaction and unsettles them, hopefully uprooting them from one place spiritually and moving them to a new place.

It almost certainly drove them to conversation: praying, thinking, reading their Scripture, arguing, agreeing, diving into the simplicity and complexity of what kind of people God would have them be, and what kind of life God called them to live.

So today I want to read from the Sermon on the Mount, starting with the Beatitudes again for context and then moving into new territory. I am going to work in the commentaries with the Scripture to help us better understand how the first audience of disciples would have processed this teaching. There are a boatload (#hyperbole) of footnotes that show my sources and add a ton J of information. Please, please read the un-commentaried version in your Bible in comparison to what I offer so it is clear where I am trying to add helpful commentary.

I’m not going to wrap it up neatly. I just want to let it set. I want us to let it unsettle us, and in that unsettledness drive us to process together in community.  To quote myself from earlier, “Let’s talk about that in Message+, but just hear me out for now.” J

* * * * *

"You are blessed, participating in life with God when you are poor and humbled in spirit, realizing you are no more than a beggar before God's door. The kingdom of heaven is made up of spiritually humbled folks just like you."

"You are blessed, participating in life with God when you are broken-hearted, mourning because you realize how far you are from what you should be spiritually. God will bring comfort by making things right between the two of you."

"You are blessed, participating in life with God when you are willing to meekly have your time and energy harnessed in the Kingdom.  You have become one of the true inheritors of the promise of God to humanity."

"You are blessed, participating in life with God when you are hungry for righteousness, with a burning desire for justice for all, for you shall be satisfied in that desire.

"You are blessed, participating in life with God when you reach out to others in merciful compassion, because in your turn you will receive compassion from others and from God in your time of need."

"You are blessed, participating in life with God when you view the world out of a pure heart that only God can give. You will begin to see the world as God sees it, and see Him at work in it.

"You are blessed, participating in life with God when you work to bring true peace and reconciliation, for then you are acting as what you are--a child of God."

"You are blessed, participating in life with God whenever people mock, insult, harass, and lie about you because you belong to Jesus. The kingdom of heaven is made up of people like you.

“You are the salt of the earth, a preservative whose virtuous life God uses to embody His kingdom.[1] Don’t lose this saltiness; it delays decay and compromise in the church and the world. If you lose it, how can its purpose be restored? Useless salt will be thrown on to the roads and be trampled on by people.”

“You are the light of the world, like a city on a hill cannot be hidden. No one lights a lamp and then covers it with a basket or jar or puts it under a bed, but puts it on a lampstand so that those who come in can see the light. In the same way, let your light of God’s truth and hope shine before people in a sin-darkened world, [2] so that they can see your righteous lives and give honor to your Father in heaven.”

Some of you have heard that I am here to overthrow the Law, but that’s not true. I have not come to overturn or do away with the law or the prophets, but to fulfill them, to bring them their intended purpose. I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth pass away not the smallest letter or stroke of a letter will become void or pass from the law until everything needed to fulfill the purpose of the law takes place.

You know to keep the ‘weighty’ commands (don’t commit idolatry, adultery, murder, etc).  Anyone who disregards even the most obscure of the “light” commands (like tithing your garden produce) and teaches others to do so will be called least in the kingdom of heaven. However, whoever obeys them and teaches others to do so will be called great in the kingdom of heaven.

Don’t confuse which are weighty and which are light – and be committed to them both.[3] I tell you, unless you understand what matters to God, and why, your righteousness will not go beyond that of the experts in the law and the Pharisees, and you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. And \now, I will tell you the standard of righteousness that matters to God.

21 As you know, long ago God instructed Moses to tell His people, “Do not take the life of the innocent; those who murder will be judged and punished in the courts.” 22 But here is the even harder truth: anyone who has a vindictive, fixed anger toward his brother or sister, desiring more to destroy the other person[4] than to make an offense right,[5]deserves to go before the court of seven[6] (Deuteronomy 16:18, 2 Chronicles 19:5) for his anger.

Anyone who taunts their friends, speaks contemptuously toward them, or calls them slanderously insulting names will have to answer to the higher court, the Sanhedrin. Anyone who calls someone a morally worthless fool, destructively attacking a person’s moral character[7] to kill their reputation is guilty enough in the eyes of the highest court to warrant the fires of Gehenna[8] in the valley of Hinnom.[9]

Anger contains the seeds of murder, abusive language contains the spirit of murder, and language that kills reputation and self-worth implies the very desire to murder.[10]23 With this in mind, you should also consider the potentially sinful anger that your actions may incite in others.

If you are bringing an offering to God at the temple and you remember that someone is angry at you or holds a grudge against you, 24 then leave your gift before the altar, travel whatever distance it takes to go back home to them (even if it takes days), and be reconciled so that (as much as in your power[11]) you convince them to dismiss their grudge against you[12]. Then return to the altar to offer your gift to God.[13]

If you have done wrong, be quick to admit it and make things right.[14] 25 If someone sues you because you have wronged them, don’t be defensive and make up excuses. Settle things with him quickly. Talk to him as you are walking to court; otherwise, he may turn matters over to the judge, and the judge may turn you over to an officer, and you may land in jail. 26 I tell you this: you will not emerge from prison until you have paid your last penny.

Speaking of wronging people, 27 as you know, long ago God forbade His people to commit adultery. 28 You men sitting here may think you have abided by this commandment, walked the straight and narrow because you never had an affair. Now I tell you this: any man who deliberately harbors a desire to fulfill his lust with a woman who is not his wife[15] has already committed adultery in his heart.[16] 

29 If your right eye leads you into this sin, and gouging it out and throwing it in the garbage[17] would save you, it would be better you lose one part of your body than march your entire body through the gates of sin and into hell. 30 And if your right hand[18] leads you into sin, and cutting it off and throwing it away would save you,[19] well, it would be better you lose one part of your body than march your entire body through the gates of sin and into hell.[20]

31 And here is something else to consider when it comes to how we wrong people and incite them to anger. You have read in Deuteronomy that any man who divorces his wife must do so fairly—he must give her the requisite legal certificate of divorce and send her on her way, free and unfettered.[21] You think following the letter of this pleases God, but it was not this way from the beginning.[22] Moses permitted this because your hearts were hard.

32  I tell you this: unless your wife has been sexually unfaithful, you must not divorce her. If you unjustly dissolve the marriage, she will be living as an adulteress when she remarries. Nor are you to marry someone who has been divorced unjustly, for you will be an adulterer when you remarry.

You have been told that God expects us to abide by the oaths we swear and the promises we make.  34 But I tell you this: do not even swear the kind of oaths you are swearing.[23] The Law told you to swear an oath by the Lord.”[24]Now you swear by lesser things, thinking it gives you an out so that you don’t have to keep your word.

 You think you can manipulate the oath when you say, “I swear by heaven” instead of the Lord of Heaven—but heaven is not yours to swear by; it is God’s throne. 35 And you say, “I swear by this good earth,” but the earth is not yours to swear by; it is God’s footstool. And you say, “I swear by the holy city Jerusalem,” but it is not yours to swear by; it is the city of God, the capital of the King of kings. 

36 You cannot even say that you swear by your own head, for God has dominion over your hands, your lips, your head. It is He who determines if your hair will be straight or curly, white or black; it is He who rules over even this small scrap of creation.[25] 

37 When you swear oath its from an impulse to be dishonest and evil, not to establish trustworthiness.[26] Do you think we do not need to be truthful except under the oath sworn to the Lord? [27] Ideally, you should simply let your “yes” be “yes,” and let your “no” be “no.”[28] Let your character speak for itself. You don’t need an oath if you are actually trustworthy.

38 You know that Hebrew Scripture sets this standard of justice and punishment: take no more than an eye when your eye has been taken, or a tooth for a tooth, so that justice is equitable and the punishment does not exceed the crime. 39 But I say this: don’t take personal revenge[29] or seek restitution in court[30] against the one who is laboring in troublemaking[31] against you.

If someone insultingly strikes you on the right cheek, don't take him to court for insulting you[32]; offer him your left cheek.[33]  40 If someone connives to get your inner tunic,[34] give him your outer cloak as well.[35] 41 If a Roman soldier forces you to carry his gear for a mile,[36] walk with him for two instead.

 42 If someone asks you for something,[37] give it to him.[38] If someone wants a loan from you, do not turn away.[39][40] Lk 6:30 And do not ask for your possessions back from the person who takes them away.[41] 43 You have been taught to love your neighbor and hate your enemy.[42] 44 But I tell you this: The real direction indicated by the law is love, rich and costly, and extended even to enemies.[43] Love even those who are openly hostile to you.[44] Pray for those who torment you and persecute you.

 Lk 6:27 “I say to you who are listening: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, 28 bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat and persecute you,45 in so doing, you become like the peacemakers: children of your Father in heaven.[45] He, after all, loves each of us—good and evil, kind and cruel. In His common grace He causes the sun to rise and shine on evil and good alike. He causes the rain to water the fields of the righteous and the fields of the unrighteous. 

46 It is easy to love those who love you—even a tax collector can love those who love him. 47 And it is easy to welcomingly greet your friends—even the Gentiles do that! Lk 6:34 “And if you lend to those from whom you hope to be repaid, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, expecting to be repaid in full. 35But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, because he is kind to ungrateful and evil people.

48 Be perfect, as your Father in heaven is perfect.  You are designed for a higher telos, a higher end-goal: mercy and love in the power of the Holy Spirit, which is the consumation of the heart of the law that revealed a lifestyle of spiritual maturity.[46] Lovingly seek the well-being of your neighbor,[47] and thus fulfill the Law and the Prophets.[48]

_______________________________________________________________________________________

[1] Expositor’s Bible Commentary

[2]  Expositor’s Bible Commentary

[3]  ESV Global Study Bible

[4] ESV Global Study Bible

[5] HELPS Word Studies

[6] Expositor’s Greek New Testament

[7] ESV Global Study Bible

[8] Note the progression: “(1) Feeling of anger without words. (2) Anger venting itself in words. (3) Insulting anger. The gradation of punishment corresponds; liable (1) to the local court; (2) to the Sanhedrin; (3) to Gehenna.” (Cambridge Bible For Schools And Colleges)

[9] “This is Gehenna, the “valley of Hinnom,” a trash dump outside Jerusalem where fires burned constantly. It was notorious as the location of human sacrifices by fire during the reigns of Ahaz and Manasseh (2 Chr. 28:3; 33:6). Jeremiah called it the “Valley of Slaughter” a symbol of God’s fearful judgment (Jer. 7:32).”  (ESV Reformation Study Bible)  The noncanonical book of 4 Ezra describes the furnace of geenna being opposite of the paradise of delight. (NIV First Century Study Bible)

[10] Believer’s Bible Commentary

[11] Romans 12:18

[12] Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

[13] “Again Jesus depicts the situation graphically, since his Galilean hearers might have to travel a considerable distance to leave the Jerusalem temple and then return (vv. 23-24).” (IVP New Testament Commentary)

[14] Believer’s Bible Commentary

[15] ESV Global Study Bible

[16] “Jewish writers often warned of women as dangerous because they could invite lust (as in Sirach 25:21; Ps. Sol. 16:7-8), but Jesus placed the responsibility for lust on the person doing the lusting (Mt 5:28; Witherington 1984:28). Lust and anger are sins of the heart, and rapists who protest in earthly courts, "She asked for it!" have no defense before God's court.” (IVP New Testament Commentary)

[17] “Jesus is not advocating self-mutilation; not the eyes or hands cause lust, but the heart and mind. Christians must not only avoid the act of adultery (“hand”), but also those things that would lead to a lustful attitude (“eye”).” (ESV Reformation Study Bible)

[18] “The "eye" is the member of the body most commonly blamed for leading us astray, especially in sexual sins (cf. Nu 15:39; Pr 21:4; et al.); the "right eye" refers to one's better eye. But why the "right hand" in a context dealing with lust? More likely it is a euphemism for the male sexual organ.” (Expositor’s Bible Commentary)

[19] This borrows from rabbinic imagery about when a man should cut off his hand. Note that there is no record of this happening. It’s hyperbole to make a point. “The Jews enjoined cutting off of the hand, on several accounts; if in a morning, before a man had washed his hands, he put his hand to his eye, nose, mouth, ear, &c. it was to be "cut off" (b); particularly, the handling of the "membrum virile", was punishable with cutting off of the hand. Says R. (c) Tarphon, if the hand is moved to the privy parts,"let his hand be cut off to his navel".'' That is, that it may reach no further; for below that part of the body the hand might not be put (d); lest unclean thoughts, and desires, should be excited.” (Gill’s Exposition Of The Entire Bible)

[20] This is hyperbole. One-eyed and one-handed people can still lust. I mean, people can lust quite easily with their eyes closed. If indeed the “right hand” is a euphemism for a sexual organ, it’s still hyperbole: castrated people can lust too.

[21] “Deut 24:1, cited here, spawned a debate between the two main Pharisaic rabbis in Jesus’ day, Shammai and Hillel. Shammai required divorce (and permitted remarriage) only for sexual infidelity; Hillel permitted divorce for “any good cause.” Typically, only men could initiate divorce. Jesus is actually stricter than Shammai because he only permits divorce and remarriage; he does not require them, even for marital unfaithfulness (v. 32), as both Pharisaic positions did.”  (NIV Biblical Theology Study Bible)

[22] Matthew 19:8

[23] Jesus says not to take oaths (Matt. 5:34-37), but in the Old Testament, God tells his people to take oaths in the name of the Lord; Paul takes oaths at least three times (2 Corinthians 11:31; Galatians 1:20; Philippians 1:8).

[24] Exodus 20:7

[25] “Jesus is particularly concerned about the Pharisaic practice of swearing by something other than God himself to create a lesser degree of accountability.” (NIV Biblical Theology Study Bible)

[26] “This passage also forbids any shading of the truth or deception. It does not, however, forbid taking an oath in a court of law. Jesus Himself testified under oath before the High Priest (Matt. 26:63ff). Paul also used an oath to call God as his witness that what he was writing was true (2 Cor. 1:23; Gal. 1:20).” (Believer’s Bible Commentary)

[27] ESV Reformation Study Bible

[28] “The Pharisees developed elaborate rules governing vows, and only those employing the divine name were binding. Jesus associates their deception with the very nature of the evil one and teaches that a vow is binding regardless of what formula is used. The use of oaths is superfluous when one’s word ought to suffice. Oath-taking is an implicit confession that we do not always tell the truth.” (NKJV New Spirit-Filled Life Bible)

[29] ESV Global Study Bible

[30] ESV Reformation Study Bible

[31] HELPS Word Studies

[32] NRSV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible

[33] Some are insisting that Jesus is to be so understood when he says: "Resist not him that is evil: but whosoever smiteth thee on the right cheek, turn to him the other also" (Matt.

5: 39). But this utterance is only one of a class. Shall we then interpret Matt. 6: 3, 4 as forbidding all organized charity, Matt. 6:6 as forbidding all public prayer, and Matt. 6: 25 as forbidding all plans and provisions for the future?” (“Jesus Use Of Hyperbole,” The Biblical World,  https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/pdf/10.1086/472937

[34] “Although under Mosaic law the outer cloak was an inalienable possession (Ex 22:26; Dt 24:13), Jesus' disciples, if sued for their tunics (an inner garment like our suit but worn next to the skin), far from seeking satisfaction, will gladly part with what they may legally keep.” Verse 40 is clearly hyperbolic: no first-century Jew would go home wearing only a loincloth. (Expositor’s Bible Commentary)

[35] :The very poor might have only a single coat; in such cases, surrendering both the inner and outer garments might leave one naked. In this case, an element of hyperbole might be involved, and/or (as some suggest) it might include shaming one’s aggressor with such extensive cooperation.” (NRSV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible)

[36] NRSV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible

[37] Balance “Give to anyone who asks of you” (Luke 6:30) with “For even when we were with you, we gave you this rule: ‘If a man will not work, he shall not eat’ ” (2 Thess. 3:10). #discussion

[38] “A saint of the desert once found his hut being looted of its paltry possessions, and he knelt in the corner praying for the bandits. When they left, the monk realized they had not taken his walking stick. This monk pursued them for many days until he was able to give them the stick as well. Seeing his humility, the bandits returned everything to him and were converted to Jesus Christ.” (Orthodox Study Bible)

[39]  Likely has to do with interest-free loans (Ex 22:25; Lev 25:37; Dt 23:19) and a generous spirit (cf. Dt 15:7-11; Pss 37:26; 112:5). (Expositor’s Bible Commentary)

[40] “Since it is impossible to know whether the need is legitimate in all cases, it is better (as someone said), “to help a score of fraudulent beggars than to risk turning away one man in real need.” (Believer’s Bible Commentary)

[41] “They are not required to give foolishly (see 7:6), to give to a lazy person who is not in need (2 Thess. 3:10), or to give where giving would do more harm than good.” (ESV Global Study Bible)

[42] Side note: The OT never says that anyone should hate his or her enemy. In this case, “You have heard it said” included not just Scripture, but tradition. “Hatred for one’s enemies was an accepted part of the Jewish ethic at that time in some circles (cf., e.g., the Dead Sea Scrolls work, The Rule of the Community 1.4,10).” (NIV Case For Christ Study Bible)

[43] Expositor’s Bible Commentary

[44] “The fact that love is commanded shows that it is a matter of the will and not primarily of the emotions.” (Believer’s Bible Commentary) 

[45] “This must have left Jesus’ audience wondering if he was seriously advocating love of Gentiles, sinners and even Romans. No other voice from the first century quite parallels the radical vision of love outlined in these few verses. This certainly would have made little sense to the isolationistic Essenes or the radical Zealots.” (NIV First Century Study Bible)

[46] Luke 6:36; Matthew 7:12

[47] Tony Evans Study Bible

[48] “The OT prophets foretold a time when there would be a change of heart among God's people, living under a new covenant (Jer 31:31-34; Eze 36:26). Not only would the sins of the people be forgiven (Jer 31:34; Eze 36:25), but obedience to God would spring from the heart (Jer 31:33; Eze 36:27) as the new age dawned. Thus Jesus' instruction on these matters is grounded in eschatology. In Jesus and the kingdom, the eschatological age that the Law and Prophets had prophesied (11:13) has arrived; the prophecies that curbed evil while pointing forward to the eschaton are now superseded by the new age and the new hearts it brings.” (Expositor’s Bible Commentary)

Harmony #19: Fulfilling the Law & Prophets (Matthew 5:17-20; Luke 16:17)

In the Sermon on the Mount, so far we’ve had the following:

• The Beatitudes, in which Jesus talked about states in which we are blessed, because we participate in life with God.

• When that happens, we are salt and light, a people who function as a preservative in a world prone toward rot, and whose preservative presence shines like a light of hope in the darkness. Jesus ends his comments about light by saying, “Let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.”

Jesus connects the brightness of their light with the goodness of their deeds. God’s transformation isn’t just an inner reality; true transformation is inevitably expressed in an outer transformation. And it’s in the observation of these deeds – the proof of change - that God will be glorified by those needing to see the light of truth and hope that is found in Jesus. This brings us to today’s passage, which will build on the verse we just read.

“Do not think that I have come to overturn or do away with the law or the prophets. I have not come to abolish these things but to fulfill them/accomplish their intended purpose. I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth pass away not the smallest letter or stroke of a letter will become void or pass from the law until everything needed to fulfill the law takes place.[1]

So anyone who breaks/loosens/dissolves one of the least/smallest/most obscure of these commands and teaches others to do so will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever obeys them and teaches others to do so will be called great in the kingdom of heaven.[2] For I tell you, unless your righteousness goes beyond that of the experts in the law and the Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”[3]

So, let’s talk about the Law, and work our way toward Jesus fulfilling it.

First, when Jewish teachers sometimes spoke of the least and greatest commandments, it wasn’t to diminish the least commandments. For examples, some rabbis said that the least commandment was the demand that people free a mother bird (Deuteronomy 22:7), but that whoever kept this command received life, the same reward as one who kept the greatest command, honoring father and mother (Deuteronomy 5:16).[4] So when you hear this language, don’t think of it as dismissive. It’s honoring. Every little bit mattered.

Second, Jesus did not criticize the Pharisees for their strict observance of the law. He called them out in two very important areas that showed they didn't understand the purpose of the law, let alone how to fulfill that purpose.

• They didn’t understand that, while all of the law mattered, there were weightier matters of the law in the sense that breaking that law landed in the world in a heavier and more destructive way. In Luke 11, a Pharisee invites Jesus over for a meal – then gets deeply offended because Jesus didn’t wash his hands just right. This gets Jesus attention. “You are fastidious about tithing—keeping account of every little leaf of mint and herb—but you neglect what really matters: justice and the love of God! If you’d get straight on what really matters, then your fastidiousness about little things would be worth something.” (v. 42)

•  They emphasized what they did with their hands at the expense of what was happening in their hearts. From the same speech in Luke 11: You Pharisees are a walking contradiction. You are so concerned about external things—like someone who washes the outside of a cup and bowl but never cleans the inside, which is what counts! Beneath your fastidious exterior is a mess of extortion and filth. 40 You don’t get it. Did the potter make the outside but not the inside too? 41 If you were full of goodness within, you could overflow with generosity from within, and if you did that, everything would be clean for you.

The Dead Sea Scrolls (written 2 BC – 1 AD) refer to the Pharisees as “seekers after smooth things.” They accommodated and compromised the law to fit the way they wanted life to be – or how they wanted to live.

“The Sanhedrim had power, when it was convenient, to void a command…  to deliver many of the Israelites from stumbling at other things, they may do whatsoever the present time makes necessary… they even say that if a Gentile should bid an Israelite transgress anyone of the commands mentioned in the law, excepting idolatry, adultery, and murder, he may transgress freely, provided it is done privately.“ (Gill’s Exposition Of The Entire Bible)

That’s one way to “make the way smooth.”  You just change the understanding of what must be done with the hands in order to get what you want in your heart. A practical illustration has to do with divorce.[5]

Philo, Hillel and Josephus, contemporaries of Jesus, all said divorce could happen for any reason. It was a husband-friendly world, to say the least. Some rabbis went so far as to say husbands didn’t need a reason other than they were tired of their wife and wanted someone new. Shammai disagreed; it could only be adultery. Jesus, when asked, agrees with Shammia. In fact, when he makes this clear in Matthew 19, his disciples’ response is insightful about the mindset with which they were raised:  10 The disciples said to him, “If this is the situation between a husband and wife, it is better not to marry.”

That’s…insightful. They were used to the Law being workshopped until it made the way smooth and worked so they get what they wanted. They said they loved the Law, but they weren’t actually interested in the Law telling them what to do.

But Jesus won’t stop there. He goes on to challenge not just what they do, but how they feel and think. He’s going to demand something of their hearts. Jesus is in the process of restoring the true nature of God’s law as demanding total and radical holiness not just with our hands but in the orientation of our hearts.[6]

Jesus spells out the character of the kind of righteousness God is looking for in the six examples he gives in Matthew 5:21-48. In each case Jesus contrasts the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees (who understood the law as a mechanical legal requirement with which they could seek smooth things for themselves if needed) with the exceeding righteousness that God demands. Jesus shows that God requires obedience from the heart. I like how Adam Clarke explains what was happening. It was,

“the development of what is not completed into something higher, which preserves the substance of the lower. The fulfilling is “showing the right kernel and understanding, that they may learn what the law is and desires to have.” (Adam Clarke)

As Jesus continues his Sermon on the Mount, he gives plenty of examples to make his point.

          THE KERNEL                                                        THE TREE

Don’t murder Don’t desire to harm

Don’t commit adultery Don’t desire to commit adultery

Legally proper divorces Morally permissible divorces

Do oaths (so people trust you) Have unimpeachable character

Limit revenge Don’t get revenge at all

Love your neighbor Love your enemy also

Be generous Be humbly, quietly generous

Worship/pray Worship and pray with humility

Fast Fast humbly

The passage we started with today is basically a thesis statement for all those examples. Jesus says, "You thought the law was just about your hands. If you really want to be my disciples, give me your hearts."

Enter Jesus, who fulfills or accomplishes the intended purpose of the Law and the Prophets.

• Fulfills the specific predictions of a Messiah. The Law and the Prophets were always intended to point beyond themselves (see Romans 3:21; Galatians 3-4; Romans 8:4) to Jesus, which is where Matthew also intends the focus to be.[7] 

• Accomplishes the intended purpose of the sacrificial system. Sacrifices and other ceremonial laws foreshadowed events that would be accomplished in Jesus’ ministry in which he paid the price for the failed covenant keeping of Abraham and his descendants (see Galatians 4:10, Ephesians 2:15, and Hebrews 8-10).

• Fulfills God's will in all its fullness. Jesus establishes the true intent and purpose of the Law in His teaching and accomplishes them in His obedient life as the perfect lawkeeper (Matt. 2:15; 11:13; 12:3–6, 39–41, 42; Luke 24:27)[8]

• As the perfect lawkeeper, Jesus grants righteousness—the intended purpose of the Law—to us (Rom 3:31; 8:3, 4; 10:4).[9]

 So now, thanks to Jesus granting his righteousness to us, we can fulfill the purpose God intended the Law to accomplish in us. And it turns out that…the Law was intended to teach us how to love.

Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for whoever loves others has fulfilled the law. The commandments, “You shall not commit adultery,” “You shall not murder,” “You shall not steal,” “You shall not covet,” and whatever other command there may be, are summed up in this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Love does no harm to a neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law. (Romans 13:8-10)

 “In everything, treat others as you would want them to treat you, for this fulfills the law and the prophets. (Matthew 7:12)

Matthew actually provides a cool set of bookends in the Sermon on the Mount that explain what it means for the Law and the Prophets to be fulfilled.

Do not think that I have come to overturn or do away with the law or the prophets. I have not come to abolish these things but to fulfill  their intended purpose. (5:17)

“In everything, treat others as you would want them to treat you, for this fulfills the law and the prophets. (7:12)

When we disciples walk in love with the Spirit of God at work in us, we  share in the completion of the plan or outworking of God’s love, which is love. The commandments of the Law are simply examples of what it looks like, in day-to-day life and in various circumstances, to love God and love each other.[10] Tell me, in the examples Jesus gives in the Sermon on the Mount, does this not look like love?

• Don’t even desire to harm other people physically, emotionally, spiritually, reputationally.  Desire their flourishing in the good (hospitality of the heart and head J)

• Don’t even desire to commit adultery. Desire to honor you spouse even in your thoughts, not just your actions.

• Take your marriage vows very, very seriously. Love your spouse by offering the safety of covenant.

• Have unimpeachable character. Love others by being the kind of person they can trust.

• Don’t get revenge. Don’t demand en eye for an eye. Love those who harm you by challenging their evil with your kindness and goodness.

• Love your enemy. Pray for them, for their salvation and righteousness.

• Be generous, worship, pray, and fast, but be humble and do it in the way that doesn’t bring attention to you. Love other people by freeing them of the burden of comparing themselves to you.

 The Law was intended to teach us how to love, in the greatest ways to the smallest ways.[11]

_______________________________________________________________________________________
[1] In Shir Hashirim Rabba, are these words: "Should all the inhabitants of the earth gather together, in order to whiten one feather of a crow, they could not succeed: so, if all the inhabitants of the earth should unite to abolish one י yod, which is the smallest letter in the whole law, they should not be able to effect it." In Vayikra Rabba, it is said: "Should any person in the words of Deut. 6:4, Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God isאחד achad, ONE Lord, change the ד daleth into a ר resh, he would ruin the world."[אחר achar, would signify a strange or false God.] "Should any one in the words of Lev. 22:32, Neither shall ye PROFANE תחללו techelelu, my holy name, change חcheth into ה he, he would ruin the world." [Neither shall ye PRAISE my holy name.]"Should any one, in the words of 1 Samuel 2:2, There is none holy AS the Lord,change כ caph into ב beth, he would ruin the world." There is no holiness IN the Lord.]   (Adam Clarke)

[2] The rabbis recognized a distinction between “light” commandments (such as tithing garden produce) and “weighty” commandments (such as those concerning idolatry, murder, etc.). Jesus demands a commitment to both, yet condemns those who confuse the two (see 23:23–24). (ESV Global Study Bible)

[3] The scribes and Pharisees took pride in their outward obedience but they still had impure hearts (see 23:5, 23, 27–28). Kingdom righteousness works from the inside out as it produces changed hearts (Rom. 6:17; 2 Cor. 5:17).  (ESV Global Study Bible)

[4] NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible

[5] https://www.thetorah.com/article/when-is-a-man-allowed-to-divorce-his-wife

[6] ESV Reformation Study Bible

[7] Expositor’s Bible Commentary

[8] Thanks to the ESV Global Study Bible for these first three points.

[9] HT Orthodox Study Bible

[10] https://russmeek.com/2020/09/love-is-the-fulfillment-of-the-law-whats-that-mean-anyway/

[11] That is, the man that truly loves his neighbour, will contrive no ill against him, nor do any to him; he will not injure his person, nor defile his bed, nor deprive or defraud him of his substance; or do hurt to his character, bear false testimony against him, or covet with an evil covetousness anything that is his; but, on the contrary, will do him all the good he is capable of. Therefore. love is the fulfilling of the law.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Harmony #20: Salt & Light (Matthew 5:13-16; Mark 4:21; Luke 8:16, 14:34-35)

Let’s talk about salt.

• Salt has been used in many cultures as money. The word salary comes from “salt-money,” a Roman soldier’s allowance for the purchase of salt. People who earn their pay are “worth their salt.”

• In the times in which the Bible was written (and in that part of the world), businessmen would mingle the salt from their salt purses as a way of showing that agreements could not be undone anymore than they could take back their own salt from the other. Then they would eat salt together in front of witnesses to seal the deal.

• Salt is mentioned in reference to covenants in several ancient Near Eastern sources, likely because “its preservative qualities made it the ideal symbol of the durability of a covenant.”[1]

We see in the Old Testament several examples of what’s called the Covenant of Salt:[2]

• The Old Testament Law commands the use of salt in grain offerings for the “salt of the covenant” (Leviticus 2:13). “You shall season your every offering of meal with salt; you shall not omit from your meal offering the salt of your covenant with God; with all your offerings you must offer salt.” (Lev. 2:13)

• God promised to provide for the priests them through the sacrifices the people made: “Whatever is set aside from the holy offerings the Israelites present to the Lord I give to you and your sons and daughters as your perpetual share. It is an everlasting covenant of salt before the Lord for both you and your offspring.” (Numbers 18:19)

• King Abijah’s speech in 2 Chronicles 13:5 mentions it: “Don’t you know that the LORD, the God of Israel, has given the kingship of Israel to David and his descendants forever by a covenant of salt?”[3] According to the New Oxford Annotated Bible, "of salt" most likely means that the covenant is "a perpetual covenant, because of the use of salt as a preservative."

But the salt used back then had impurities in ways the salt we use now does not. When exposed to the elements, it would eventually lose its saltiness. It was not uncommon for it to be used like gravel on the roads, or for the priests to spread it on temple steps so people wouldn’t slip. [4]

This brings us to the next thing Jesus says in the Sermon on the Mount. Remember, he has just finished the Beatitudes. He has described what people are like when they live in the Kingdom of God as dedicated disciples.

 “You are the salt of the earth. Salt is good, but if it loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again or its flavor be restored?[5] It is no longer good for anything. It is of no value for the soil or for the manure pile; it is to be thrown out and be trampled on by people.”

Jesus compares a disciple who lives out the values of the Kingdom to salt that effectively does what salt is meant to do: preserve and protect. On the other hand, disciples who do not live out the values of the kingdom are like salt that cannot fulfill its purpose.

Jesus, in the next breath, gives another analogy that I think is supposed to make the same point.  He calls Christians the light of the world.[6]

 “You are the light of the world.[7] A city located on a hill[8] cannot be hidden. No one lights a lamp and then covers it with a basket or jar or puts it under a bed, but puts it on a lampstand so that those who come in can see the light. In the same way, let your light shine before people, so that they can see your good deeds and give honor to your Father in heaven.”

Just like salt, light is created for a purpose. Disciples who represent the values of the Kingdom shine in the darkness as God intends; those who do no represent the values of the Kingdom do not fulfill their purpose as God intends.[9]

* * * * *

“The question "How can salt be made salty again?" is a rhetorical question. It can’t. Just based on the context, I don't think Jesus was trying to make a point here about whether or not people could lose their salvation. He’s talking about being who God intends us to be.

“If Jesus' disciples are to act as a preservative in the world by conforming to kingdom norms, they can discharge this function only by retaining their own virtue.” (Expositor’s Bible Commentary) 

We see the virtue/integrity expressed in the light analogy: the light we shine is the works we dothat flow from our saltiness, which in turn glorify the God who makes that kind of  holy life transformation possible.  

It is not sufficient to have light - we must walk in the light, and by the light. Our whole conduct should be a perpetual comment on the doctrine we have received, and a constant exemplification of its power and truth. (Adam Clarke)[10] 

In other words, Kingdom values expressed in the lives of kingdom people produce kingdomwitness.

I have been reading a book called The Patient Ferment of the Early Church: The Improbable Rise of Christianity in the Roman Empire, by Alan Kreider.[11] In it, he stresses how the faithful, presence of the church in the first few centuries preached the gospel and made disciples. It’s a book about the importance of being salt and light, followed by practical examples of what it looked like when the church first started.

First, the importance of being salt and light. The early church leaders wrote extensively on behavior because of their Christian conviction that the way people live expresses what they really believe.

• Justin Martyr (100-165) notes that the effectiveness of Christian witness depends on the integrity of the believers’ lifestyles. In the business world, “Many have turned from the ways of violence and tyranny, overcome by observing the consistent lives of their [Christian] neighbors.”

• Origen (185-253) stated that Christ “makes his defense in the lives of his genuine disciples, for their lives cry out the real facts.”

• Cyprian (210-258) said that when Christians make their virtue visible and active, they demonstrate the character of God to the world.[12] “No occasion should be given to the pagans to censure us deservedly and justly… It profits nothing to show forth virtue in words and destroy truth in deeds.”

So, the overwhelming agreement was that Christian saltiness had to do with consistent virtue and the display of Christ-like character. This would not only be seen obviously in ones lifestyle; it would be profoundly compelling, more so than just the words that explain the Christian faith and its transformative power. 

However, when this words/deeds consistency wasn’t present, the salt would lose its saltiness, and the light would dim.

• A writing attributed to Clement (95-140) noted that when  Christians talked about loving their enemies, their neighbors had been interested. When they found that the Christians didn’t do what they said, they dismissed Christianity as “a myth and a delusion.”

• In the 240s, Origen wrote of Christians who were “completely disgusting in their actions and habit of life, wrapped up with vices and not wholly ‘putting away the old self with its actions.”

•  “By the early fifth century the problem had become so acute that some theologians updated the church’s theology of witness so that they no longer emphasized the Christians’ exemplary behavior.” (Alan Kreider)

That’s…sobering. Rather than addressing the importance of a redeemed lifestyle as a crucial part of the Christian witness, they just stopped talking about it. It was easier to develop an intellectual theology to think about rather than an incarnational theology to embody. It’s a lot easier to think about a cross than to take it up.

And yet many Christians did, in fact, commit themselves to this. And from the record that survives, the church in the first few centuries put a lot of thought into what it looked like to be effectively salty and shiny.

 What did this look like practically? How did the early church assume the first Christians would live their beliefs in a way consistent with the teaching of Jesus such that their very lives pointed toward Jesus?

I have been a bit haunted by this, so I want to pull you into this with me J I have quite a few examples. My sense is that, even though the early church wasn’t perfect and didn’t get everything right, there is a foundational application here from which we could learn much.

• Polycarp (69-155) thought that it was the Christian behavior as martyrs, not the words they might speak, that would convey the Christian faith to the watching world.

• Epistle to Diognetus (130): “Do you not see how they are thrown to wild animals to make them deny the Lord, and how they are not vanquished? Do you not see that the more of them are punished, the more do others increase?”

• Justin Martyr (100-165): "We formerly rejoiced in uncleanness of life, but now love only chastity; before we used the magic arts, but now dedicate ourselves to the true and unbegotten God; before we loved money and possessions more than anything, but now we share what we have and to everyone who is in need; before we hated one another and killed one another and would not eat with those of another race, but now since the manifestation of Christ, we have come to a common life and pray for our enemies and try to win over those who hate us without just cause."

• Justin Martyr (100-165): “We who were filled with war, and mutual slaughter, and every wickedness, have each through the whole earth changed our warlike weapons…and we cultivate piety, righteousness, philanthropy, faith, and hope, which we have from the Father Himself through Him who was crucified.”[13]

• Justin Martyr’s Apology noted that Christians share economically and care for the poor and the sick, widows and orphans; they engage in business with truthfulness and without usury; they are a community of contentment and sexual restraint; and they behave with love toward people of different tribes and customs.

• 1 Clement (130-140) gives a description of Corinth. “You were all lowly in mind, free from vainglory, yielding rather than claiming submission from others, more ready to give than to take. “

• 1 Clement (130-140) “Day and night you agonized for all the brotherhood, that by means of compassion and care the number of God’s elect might be saved. You were sincere, guileless, and void of malice among yourselves…You lamented the transgressions of your neighbors and judged their shortcomings to be your own. You never rued an act of kindness, but were ready for every good work.” [14]

• Athenagoras (170):  “For we have been taught not to strike back at someone who beats us nor to go to court with those who rob and plunder us. Not only that: we have even been taught to turn our head and offer the other side when men ill use us and strike us on the jaw and to give also our cloak should they snatch our tunic.”

• Tertullian (204): “If one tries to provoke you to a fight, there is at hand the admonition of the Lord:  ‘If someone strike you . . . on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.’ And if someone burst out in cursing or wrangling, recall the saying: ‘When men reproach you, rejoice… Let wrong-doing grow weary from your patience.”

• “The practical application of charity was probably the most potent single cause of Christian success.” (Henry Chadwick, quoted in the book). By the year 250, the church was feeding more than 1500 of the hungry and destitute in Rome every day.[15]

• Historian Rodney Stark points out that women were attracted to the churches because of the greater fidelity of Christian husbands and the church’s rejection of killing (abortion and infanticide).

• The Didache (1st and 2nd century): “Do not hesitate to give and do not give with a bad grace. . . . Do not turn your back on the needy, but share everything with your brother and call nothing your own. For if you have what is eternal in common, how much more should you have what is transient!”

• Lactantius (250-325): “We . . . make no demand that our God be worshipped by anyone unwillingly, and we do not get cross if he is not worshipped. We are confident of his supreme power.”[16]

• Lactantius (250-325): “There is no need for violence and brutality; worship cannot be forced; it is something to be achieved by talk rather than blows, so that there is free will in it… we teach, we show, we demonstrate… Religion must be defended not by killing but by dying, not by violence but by patience.”

• The emperor Julian The Apostate (300s) complained that Christianity, “has been specially advanced through the loving service rendered to strangers… It is a scandal that there is not a single Jew who is a beggar and that the [Christians] care not only for their own poor but for ours as well."

If there is a challenge here, it’s wrestling with the question of whether or not what characterized the early church characterizes the modern church. Our culture is different, so there will be, at times, different expressions of similar principle.  But there will also be plenty of times when there are similar expressions of similar principles. I wonder, if members of the early church were to visit, how they would think we are doing in our theology of witness? Would we be found salty?

If I have an encouragement, it’s this: being a faithful presence matters, even in the most ordinary of moments. The church exploded during this time period not because there were rock star preachers or singers, not because there were events in stadiums or social media campaigns, not because they had advocates in the Roman halls of power. It exploded because ordinary people who said they loved God and others lived like they loved God and others.  With the help of the Holy Spirit, this is within the grasp of all of us.

 ________________________________________________________________________________________

[1] Jacob Milgrom, Leviticus 1-16, 191, Jewish Theological Seminary

[2] Thanks to gotquestions.org for providing a handy list of these passages all in one place J

[3] The Metzudat David commentary of David Altschuler explains the phrase “covenant of salt”:“The establishment of the enduring covenant [with David’s house] is like salt, in that it endures and does not rot.” (Jewish Theological Seminary)

[4] I’m not sure where I found this anecdote, but here it is: “When asked what to do with unsalty salt, a rabbi once advised, “Salt it with the afterbirth of a mule.” Mules are sterile and thus lack afterbirth; his point was that the question was stupid. If salt lost its saltiness, what would it be useful for?”

[5] “Strictly speaking salt cannot lose its saltiness; sodium chloride is a stable compound. But most salt in the ancient world derived from salt marshes rather than by evaporation of salt water, and thus contained many impurities. The actual salt, being more soluble than the impurities, could be leached out, leaving a residue so dilute it was of little worth.” (Expositor’s Bible Commentary)

[6] He also spoke of Himself as “the light of the world,” (John 8:12; 12:35, 36, 46) so think of Jesus as the source of light and followers of Jesus as reflections of that light. 

[7] Per Adam Clarke, light of the world, נר עולם ner olam was a title applied to the most eminent rabbis. Jesus gives it to his followers. You don’t have be a highly trained theologian of Christianity to be salt and light. Being a true disciple is sufficient J

[8] “‘A few points toward the north (of Tabor) appears that which they call the Mount of Beatitudes, a small rising, from which our blessed Saviour delivered his sermon in the fifth, sixth, and seventh chapters of Matthew. (Matthew 5:5.) Not far from this little hill is the city Saphet, supposed to be the ancient Bethulia. It stands upon a very eminent and conspicuous mountain, and is SEEN FAR and NEAR. May we not suppose that Christ alludes to this city, in these words.’” (Adam Clarke)

[9] “If salt (v.13) exercises the negative function of delaying decay and warns disciples of the danger of compromise and conformity to the world, then light (vv.14-16) speaks positively of illuminating a sin-darkened world.” (Expositor’s Bible Commentary)

[10] “The emphasis is on the ministry of Christian character. The winsomeness of lives in which Christ is seen speaks louder than the persuasion of words.” (Believer’s Bible Commentary)

[11] The information that follows is mostly from his book. There are few direct quotes, but many indirect quotes.

[12] Lactantius (250–325) wrote, “People prefer example before talk, because talk is easy and example is hard. This is why God chose to send not disembodied words from heaven but an incarnate Son in a mortal body.”

[13] According to Origen, refusing to participate in “the taking of human life in any form at all” was a basic Christian commitment; it was a product of the Christians’ patience, their refusal to retaliate, and their understanding of the way and teaching of Jesus. On this matter other writers—Tertullian, Athenagoras, Minucius Felix, and Lactantius—agreed with Origen.

[14] Quote found in The Mission and Expansion of Christianity in the First Three Centuries, Adolf Harnack.  

[15] https://www.christianity.com/church/church-history/timeline/1-300/the-spread-of-the-early-church-11629561.html

[16] Christian identity emerged as relationships developed. “Casual contact” was the most common means of communicating the attractiveness of the faith to others and enticing them to investigate things further because of the Christians’ character, bearing, and behavior. Around 200, Tertullian, in Carthage, was concerned that members of his house church would “worship too vociferously,” bothering the inhabitants of neighboring apartments in what was evidently a large apartment building. It was not Christian worship that attracted outsiders; it was Christians who attracted them. Outsiders found the Christians attractive because of their Christian lives, which catechesis and worship had formed. (The Patient Ferment of the Early Church)

Harmony #19: The Beatitudes Part 2 (Matthew 5:1-12; Luke 6:17-26)

The first three beatitudes provide a foundation for makarios, blessedness:

• honest brokenness over our sin

• humble mourning that leads to repentance and salvation

• harnesssed servanthood that leads to flourishing

These are three requirements for entering into life with God and building the kind of Kingdom God has planned. [1]

The desire for righteousness is next.  This is a worldview shift.  There are lots of things for which to hunger: riches, money, power, physical pleasure. But hungering for righteousness is hungering to know how to be in the world in the right way, and how to use the things we have in the right way. That’s a simple definition of righteousness. A hunger for “right”ness as defined by God.  The fruit of brokenness, repentance and harnesses servanthood is a longing to live well in the path of rightness. And when we hunger to find this, “we will be filled." Our hunger has an answer: the righteous path of God as revealed in Jesus and in his word.

The more they see the good in the world that results from their harnessed labor, the hungrier they get.  They are not content to just remain as they are.  They want more. Once they get a taste of flourishing, they not only long for it in themselves, they long to see it in others.

In this beatitude, for the first time, we see people actively seeking for God.  They are glad God pursued them; they are now pursuing Him as well. They are not content simply to be. These people are blessed, because God will “reward those who diligently seek him.”[2]

These people have a passion for righteousness in their own lives; however, it’s more than that. They long to see honesty, integrity, and justice in the church and the culture. These people desire not only that they may wholly do God's will from the heart, but also that justice may be done everywhere, and they actively engage in bringing this about. All unrighteousness grieves them and motivates them to display the goodness of righteousness through the testimony of their lives.

In contrast, the miserable are those who are hungry for the same old thing that never satisfied them before….. unrighteousness, I suppose, which will always leave you with what C.S. Lewis called “an ever increasing craving for an ever diminishing return.”[3] Those who hunger after unrighteousness always want more too.  The difference is that what they are consuming is making them emptier. They “taste and see that X is fun, or entertaining, or gets me friends, or distracts me, or numbs me,” and don’t realize it is not good, and that it will never fill them, no matter how much they consume.

• If you hunger for money, you always need one more dollar.

• If you hunger for things, there is always one more toy or one size bigger of what you already have.

• If you hunger for pleasure, you will long for the next experience before you are done with the first one.

• If you hunger for fame, you need one more click on our website, one more follower, one more platform or you can’t rest.

• If you hunger for power, there will never be enough people you control, or enough promotions, or enough positions of authority.

If you find yourself beginning to notice that you are never satisfied, consider that a warning flag.

And there is a ripple effect here too. If the righteous long to see righteousness benefit the world and lead to the flourishing of others, the unrighteous build the opposite momentum.

• The longer they value systems or things over people, the more they will value things over people.

• The longer they don’t care about others, the less they will care about others.

• The longer they determine what’s right for themselves (#serpent #eden), the less they will care how their choices impact those around them.

This is why I keep saying that God’s righteous boundaries/path is for our good. Jesus didn’t come to squelch the life in us or take the joy out of the world; Jesus came that we might have abundant life. There is a reason that at Christmas we sing, “Joy to the world; the Lord has come.”

Jesus’s next category is the first category that gives a specific righteous action: In one ’s relations with other people — when one reaches beyond oneself toward another — one should be merciful.

All mercy requires is a position of the barest advantage over another, even for the most fleeting of moments.  Being merciful involves understanding the proper use of authority. Whenever the merciful are in a situation where their actions can have an impact, they show mercy.  With power comes responsibility, and the merciful are always thinking about how to pass on the mercy they were shown. They want to be a mirror of God to the world.

To be merciful means to be actively compassionate. We see it manifest in different ways: withholding punishment from offenders who deserve it, or helping others who cannot help themselves. God showed mercy in sparing us from the judgment which our sins deserved and in demonstrating kindness to us through the saving work of Christ. We imitate God when we pay this foundational mercy forward.[4]

In contrast, the miserable are the merciless, those who take every penny of power they have and try to turn it into a pound. Literally, they pound people with power. They are users of others to benefit themselves. If the merciful think of their responsibility toward others, the merciless plunder other people’s usefulness to them.  Jesus told a parable about this very thing as recorded in Matthew 18:23-29.

“Therefore, the Kingdom of Heaven can be compared to a king who decided to bring his accounts up to date with servants who had borrowed money from him. In the process, one of his debtors was brought in who owed him millions of dollars. He couldn’t pay, so his master ordered that he be sold—along with his wife, his children, and everything he owned—to pay the debt.

 “But the man fell down before his master and begged him, ‘Please, be patient with me, and I will pay it all.’ Then his master was filled with pity for him, and he released him and forgave his debt. But when the man left the king, he went to a fellow servant who owed him a few thousand dollars. He grabbed him by the throat and demanded instant payment.

“His fellow servant fell down before him and begged for a little more time. ‘Be patient with me, and I will pay it,’ he pleaded. But his creditor wouldn’t wait. He had the man arrested and put in prison until the debt could be paid in full.

“When some of the other servants saw this, they were very upset. They went to the king and told him everything that had happened. Then the king called in the man he had forgiven and said, ‘You evil servant! I forgave you that tremendous debt because you pleaded with me. Shouldn’t you have mercy on your fellow servant, just as I had mercy on you”?

When we think of the merciless or the exploitive, we might think of obvious things like human trafficking or slavery, but there’s much more common ways:

• It’s the boss who exploits her workers.

• It’s the predatory dater who sexually uses people over and over.

• It’s the landlord who soaks every last penny possible from his renters.

• It’s the friend who manipulates and controls and uses you.

As you might imagine, the unmerciful are cursed. What they sow, they will reap. The merciful are blessed because the mercy that they show to others will be returned to them. 

The next group blessed are the “pure in heart.” These are the uncorrupted. Their heart is unmixed, “holy”, set apart in the truest sense of the word. The Bible uses the language of metals and alloys to make this point.

“All of them are stubbornly rebellions…they are bronze (copper + tin) and iron (iron oxides); they, all of them, are corrupt. The bellows blow fiercely, the lead is consumed by the fire; in vain the refining goes on...” (Jeremiah 6:28-29)

“I will…refine them as silver is refined, and test them as gold is tested. They will call on My name, and I will answer them; I will say, ‘They are My people,’ And they will say, ‘The Lord is my God.’” (Zechariah 13:9)

For [God] is like a refiner’s fire and like fullers’ soap. He will sit as a smelter and purifier of silver, and He will purify the [priests][5] and refine them like gold and silver, so that they may present to the Lord offerings in righteousness. (Malachi 3:2-4)

Notice: the pure in heart are going to go through the fire. However, the pure in heart are blessed, because they begin to better understand God’s nature as they participate in His character.

In 2 Corinthians 3, Paul talks about how the “ministry of the Spirit…brings righteousness…we are being transformed into His image with ever increasing glory...” This is a state where not only our minds – our worldview – mirror God’s mind, but our allegiances do too. The reality of “Christ in us”[6] is becoming clear to all.

Miserable, then, are the devious, the corrupt in heart.  They do not think like God, they do not feel like God, and they wallow in it.  Even if they do good things, it is not because they want to. It is because they have to, or because they have found a way to blend self-serving acts with what appear to be good deeds.  They do not desire what God desires, and they don’t feel about the world as God feels.  No only are they negatively alloyed instead of pure, but they want to be.

The corrupt in heart will not see God, because they keep undermining their ability to see well.

• It’s like me sitting at a KFC buffet, reading an article about people whose arteries aren’t clogged, and muttering, “Why can I not have unclogged arteries too?“

• Here’s another true story: all the years I spent at the gym to lose weight, then go home and use the fact that I exercised as an excuse to eat what I wanted, then constantly being frustrated at the health industry: “They said I needed to exercise.”

Yeah, I have dual allegiances to my arteries and my belly: I want to be healthy, and I want to indulge. I’m just not going to see or experience the life I want because my heart is not pure – my heart is unified within itself in pursuit of a goal.

By the way, remember that Jesus is talking largely to a Jewish audience: the people of God. We see this later with Peter when he drew his sword in the garden. Jesus rebukes Peter, who was trying to protect Jesus. Why?

“Peter’s focus wasn’t pure, meaning it wasn’t singularly set on heaven’s agenda and heaven’s way of winning. It was divided, mixed, interested in heaven’s wisdom to some degree, but trying to make room for earth’s agenda and earth’s way of winning too.” (Jasmine Holmes)

The pure in heart see God because there is a unity of allegiance and purpose in their desires, which translates into their lifestyle. As a result, they “see God” in that they understand God more and more as they are increasingly transformed into the kind of image bearer God intended.

After the pure in heart come the peacemakers. If mercy has to do with the generous use of power, just as God generously used His power for us, a desire for peacemaking will reflect our desire to pass on the peace God, through Jesus, has made with, within, and among us.[7]

Peace Makers seek out hostile environments, and they make peace as far as it depends on them (Romans 12:18). We think of it often as what happens in war zones, or in genocidal countries, but it can happen in your house...in this church…. at school, at work, among your friends. We make peace by…

• leading with love

• speaking truth with grace

• healing brokenness with patience

• addressing sin with humility

• diffusing violence with compassion

• pointing toward Jesus while building a bridge between those who are at odds with one another

Peacemakers share God's peace with those around them by imitating Christ's sacrificial love and participating in His work.[8] Peacemaking can be difficult work. It cost Jesus a crucifixion; it will cost us too.  However, peacemakers are recognized as children of God.[9] This is not how they become children of God—that can only happen by receiving Jesus Christ as Savior (John 1:12). By making peace, believers will be recognizes as children of God. They bear the family likeness.[10]

In contrast are the chaotic, those who disturb the peace. They have not experienced the mercy or peace God has offered them, so they don’t pass it on. They leave a trail of discord behind them wherever they go.

• abuse of all kinds: physical, emotional, verbal

• manipulation and bullying

• cutting sarcasm, constant criticism, and the incessent highlighting of what wrong with everything but self.

• spreading gossip, lies and slander

• unforgiveness

• the love of drama and the creation of it when there is none.

It’s TV reality shows in real life.  Instead of seeking out situations in which to make peace, they seek out situations in which they can create strife.

But, if we persevere in peacemaking, we will be called children of God because there will be a family resemblance with the Great Peacemaker who bridged the gap created by our sin, granted us peace with him, and works in us so that we can introduce peace to those around us.

Jesus next mentions “those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness….when people insult you and persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me.”

In this group, we find those whose desire for right has been translated into action. They are bold; they have to be. This will not be easy.  Difficulties may follow, but they are dedicated to bringing Truth and Mercy and Peace and Life to everyone. They are willing to pay whatever it costs for the sake of the Gospel. The persecuted will be in the company of a class of people of whom the writer of Hebrews said the world is not worthy (Hebrews 11).[11] This is the bookend to the ‘poor in spirit’ who get this Kingdom of heaven; those who go through this will also inherit the Kingdom of heaven.

There are three different things that full under the umbrella of this beatitude:

• Persecuted (dioko) – hunted; put to flight

• Insulted (oneidzo) – mocked; disgraced

• Falsely say (pseudomai) – lie; willfully misrepresent

Some Christians have experienced all three; the majority of Christians have not had to deal with physical violence. All three provide an opportunity to respond with meekness, righteousness, mercy, and  pureness of heart. Remember, you participate in life with God when you experience this. “Rejoice…your reward is great in heaven.”

For Christians, times that the going gets tough because of our righteous reflection of God is not cause for fear or anger. It’s too be expected. Empires don’t like Kingdom citizens. The way of the Lamb threatens the way of the Dragon (#revelation) and spells its doom. I’m afraid I too often see Christians (especially online) panicking: “What is happening!!??” Life. Life is happening. And yet Jesus says, “Rejoice. The Kingdom of Heaven is yours!”

Why?  We will see next week that the very next thing Jesus says introduces the two most common images for Christians: “You are the salt of the earth….light of the world.”  

The rise of moral decay and spiritual darkness in the world are reasons to mourn, but not to fear or lash out. It’s more opportunity for followers of Jesus to go into the world to bring the preserving and enlightening hope of Jesus. It’s what we were made to do.

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[1] I recommend two books on the beatitudes. The first is called World On Fire: Walking In The Wisdom Of Christ When Everyone’s Fighting About Everything. By Hannah Anderson, Jada Edwards, Rachel Gilson, Ashley Marivittori Gorman, Jasmine Holmes, Rebecca McLaughlin, Jen Pollock Michael, Mary Wiley, and Elizabeth Woodson. The second is What If Jesus Was Serious, by Skye Jethani.

[2] Hebrews 11:6

[3] HT C.S. Lewis

[4] Believers Bible Commentary

[5] “sons of Levi”

[6]  Colossians 1:27

[7] “Some Judeans and Galileans believed that God would help them wage war against the Romans to establish God’s kingdom, but Jesus assigned the kingdom instead to the meek, the merciful, the persecuted, and those who make peace.”  (NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible)

[8]  Orthodox Study Bible

[9] In the light of the Gospel, Jesus himself is the supreme peacemaker, making peace between God and us (Eph 2:15-17; Col 1:20) and among human beings. Our peacemaking will include the promulgation of that Gospel. It must also extend to seeking all kinds of reconciliation. Those who undertake this work are acknowledged as God's "sons". In the OT, Israel has the title "sons" (Dt 14:1; Hos 1:10). Now it belongs to the heirs of the kingdom who are especially equipped for peacemaking and so reflect something of the character of their heavenly Father. (Expositors Bible Commentary)

[10] Believers Bible Commentary

[11] CBS Tony Evans Study Bible

Harmony #18: The Beatitudes (Matthew 5:1-12; Luke 6:17-26)

Then Jesus came down with them and stood on a level place. When he saw the crowds, Jesus went [back] up the mountain. After he sat down his disciples came to him. Then looking up at his disciples, he began to teach them by saying:

Blessed are the poor in spirit, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to them.

Blessed are those who mourn or weep, for they will be comforted and laugh.

Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst now for righteousness, for they will be satisfied.

Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.

Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.

Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called the children of God

Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to them.

Blessed are you when people hate you, and when they exclude you and insult you and reject you as evil and persecute you and say all kinds of evil things about you falsely on account of me. Rejoice in that day and jump for joy because your reward is great in heaven. For their ancestors persecuted the prophets before you in the same way.

There are two Greek words that Matthew could have used for blessed; Matthew chose the word makarios. This word was used by the Greeks for the kind of happiness and well-being the gods themselves enjoy. When Jesus talked about the makarios, the blessed ones, he meant those who participate in life with God, as God intended.

The “blesseds” follow an interesting pattern.  Starting with the poor in spirit, they seem to lay out a progression of how to move into deeper spiritual, relational, and emotional life. We are only going to cover the first three this morning, but I think you will see that progression emerge.

You might also notice that the qualities described and approved are the opposite of those that empires typically value.  Per A. W. Tozer:

“A fairly accurate description of the human race might be furnished one unacquainted with it by taking the Beatitudes, turning them wrong side out, and saying, ‘Here is your human race.’ ”

So as we go through the Beatitudes, we are going to look at what characterizes a blessed Kingdom life with God, and by implication, what characterizes an unblessed life without God. 

We begin with the “poor in spirit.” These are the ones who understand their spiritual situation: they are broken. They are struggling with the chains of sin; they are in a spiritual battle against principalities and powers, and they have at times fought with the enemy instead of against him. But in spite of this, they are living in a blessed state. Recognizing the problem is the first step in inheriting the Kingdom of Heaven.

The fact is that each person was once dead in sin and will continue to take damage points from sin on this side of heaven. As Switchfoot would say, “There ain’t no drug to make me well, ‘cause the sickness is myself.” The first beatitude gives the correct diagnosis: we need a doctor, not just to save us from death, but to continue to heal us. We have to see this to find life. We will see this later in Luke’s gospel.

He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt: “Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.’

But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.” (Luke 18:9-14)

I think this first beatitude is meant to be one on which the others are built. If the original sin was pride; the original virtue – humility - is the opposite of it. And, I might add, a powerful way to engage in spiritual warfare.

The most powerful weapon to conquer the devil is humility. For, as he does not know at all how to employ it, neither does he know how to defend himself from it. (Vincent de Paul)

Kingdom people recognize their own inadequacy and insufficiency apart from God. To quote from the first step in a lot of recovery groups, “We admit that we are powerless, and our lives have become unmanageable.”

This kind of humility or ‘poorness of spirit’ is not self-loathing. It’s not incessantly focusing on our weakness, or thinking of ourselves as less than we ought. We are, after all, image bearers of God. If we are a follower of Jesus, we are an ambassador, a son or daughter of God, a temple – so much language in the Bible explaining our worth.

Humility involves not thinking more highly of ourselves than we should. It’s being realistic about the broken and sinful parts of who we are. It’s knowing the limit of our abilities; it’s seeing where we are weak and acknowledging it. The poor in spirit are very much just…honest about themselves.

The opposite is pride. The proud live in a cursed state; they think they are okay, that they are all put together. They would say, if they were in a group, “I admit that I am powerful, and my life will be what I make it.”[1] They don’t see how they are damaged and enslaved by sin, or how this unaddressed sin is hurting those around them.

If there is one sin which God hates more than another, and more sets Himself against, it is the sin of pride. Like a weed upon a dung-heap, pride grows more profusely in some soils, especially when well fertilized by rank, riches, praise, flattery, our own ignorance, and the ignorance of others…

Those, perhaps, who think they possess the least pride, and view themselves with wonderful self-admiration as the humblest of mortals, may have more pride than those who feel and confess it. (J.C. Philpot)

One of the hardest things to deal with is people who say, “I’ve got this!” when you know they don’t got that. The hardest kids to coach are not the ones who knows they are terrible; it is those who can barely dribble who think they have a shot at the NBA. The hardest person to counsel…the hardest musician to train…the hardest spouse to live with… they all follow this pattern. They have so much to prove; so much weight of being amazing; so much perfection to defend.

Here’s how C.S. Lewis describes God’s plan for the poor in spirit:

[God] wants you to know Him: wants to give you Himself. And He and you are two things of such a kind that if you really get into any kind of touch with Him you will, in fact, be humble—delightedly humble, feeling the infinite relief of having for once got rid of all the silly nonsense about your own dignity which has made you restless and unhappy all your life.

He is trying to make you humble in order to make this moment possible: trying to take off a lot of silly, ugly, fancy-dress in which we have all got ourselves up and are strutting about like the little idiots we are.

 I wish I had got a bit further with humility myself: if I had, I could probably tell you more about the relief, the comfort, of taking the fancy-dress off—getting rid of the false self, with all its 'Look at me' and 'Aren't I a good boy?' and all its posing and posturing. To get even near it, even for a moment, is like a drink of cold water to a man in a desert.

Only by stopping my attempts to rule in the Kingdom of Me, where I must increase while God and other decrease, can I enter the kingdom of God. Only by being humbly and desperately dependent on the saving and transforming grace of God can we become what God has created us to be.[2]

Next come the mourners. The context indicates that these are mourning over sin and evil; they especially mourn their own, but they also mourn the failure of mankind to live righteously.[3]They have moved beyond being aware of the problem to bemoaning the broken state of the world. The godly remnant of Jesus' day wept because of the humiliation of Israel as a result of their sin, both personal and corporate. Weeping for sins, to the Israelites, was a deeply poignant[4] act that covered personal as well as societal sin and all who participated.

Mourners are not only thinking about the situation the way God thinks about it, they are feeling about the world the way God feels about it. God grieves over the sin and brokeness of the world (Ephesians 4:30; Mark 3:5), and we should too.

This is not sadness that leads to despair (see 2 Corinthians 7:10), because God has promised comfort to his people (Isaiah 40:1; 51:3; 61:2 – 3; 66:13).  Holy sorrow is part of repentance, conversion, and virtuous action.[5] We are blessed as this drives us to the comfort of salvation. When know we are sick, and we want the cure, and we find the right doctor, we will be okay. 

In contrast, “Cursed are the hardened.” They know there is a problem, but they think it is too hard to address it. They convince themselves that they will be okay, or that’s it’s nothing to be worried about, and they detach the proper emotion from this reality, and off they go with a smile fixed on their face. They distract themselves or drown their emotions in a flood of parties, distractions, and work projects. Even if they see the diagnosis, they don’t hate the sickness enough to take the cure.

Because - let’s be honest - the cure is hard. It requires mourning. If you know anything about Old Testament precedent, it was sackcloth and ashes, and fasting. Who looks forward to mourning brokenness and failure? But….not mourning is hard too. The hardening of our lives has its own consequence. The things we use to drown our emotions will eventually drown us. The walls we build to wall off parts of ourselves we want to avoid will eventually be walls that separate us off from others, because - let’s be honest - people who refuse to address their own issues are hard to be around.

Two paths, both of which are hard. Choose the one that leads to life.

 “Which is better, to laugh or to cry? Is there anybody who wouldn’t prefer to laugh? Because repentance involves a beneficial sorrow, the Lord presented tears as a requirement and laughter as the resulting benefit…So crying is a requirement, laughter the reward, of wisdom.” - Augustine

If we want laughter (think ‘joy’) the beatitudes teach that we begin by embracing transformative sorrow. Counterintuitive, I know. But it’s the way to life, because God is at work in the midst of that process. In fact, the word used for “they shall be comforted” is parakaleo, from which we get parakletos, the Holy Spirit, our comforter who is also an advocate[6] for those whose mourning has led them to repentance and into salvation.

These first two beatitudes deliberately allude to the messianic blessing of Isaiah 61:1-3, which we have seen used by the gospel writers before. It’s the one Jesus read in his hometown to announce who he was. Here it is again:

The Lord has appointed me for a special purpose. He has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to repair broken hearts, and to declare to those who are held captive and bound in prison, “Be free from your imprisonment!” 2 He has sent me to announce the year of jubilee, the season of the Eternal’s favor: for our enemies it will be a day of God’s wrath; for those who mourn it will be a time of comfort. 3 As for those who grieve over Zion, God has sent me to give them a beautiful crown in exchange for ashes, to anoint them with gladness instead of sorrow, to wrap them in victory, joy, and praise instead of depression and sadness.

That’s where mourning is headed: gladness, victory, joy, and comfort. But it starts with mourning.

Then there are the gentle, or meek or humble.  The same word is used in the Greek in a variety of ways:

• bulls that pull a plow

• horses that pull a chariot

• the image in Job 39 of the war horse pawing as he waits for his rider before entering the battle.

The meek are the ones who are willing to be harnessed into the service of the Kingdom. Our pattern for meekness or gentleness[7] is Jesus, who submits to the will of His Father.

“Meekness is His enabling strength to do what His Word prescribes. It is genuine, quiet strength comfortable with self by making peace with God.” (Donald Hanna)

Though Jesus set the pattern, we need this harnessing in ways Jesus did not in order for us to flourish in this blessed life. Unharnessed, we are wild and untamed. The humble (the poor in spirit who mourn the effect of sin) know they need to be controlled, because on their own they will just tear things up; they know that they need a yoke; they know that if their life is harnessed in the right cause, they can be strong in the service of something greater than themselves. They began to gain a sense of what their life might mean to others.

In meekness, we see the beginning of a sense of community.

Because the meek are God-controlled, the Holy Spirit brings about the strength to have mastery over passions and emotions. Meekness is not passive weakness, but strength directed and under control. The meek don’t become emotionless; they have emotions harnessed to bring about good. The meek don’t become weak; their strength is harnessed to bring about good.  

• If you physically bully people, the problem isn’t that you are too strong; it’s that you use your strength to break the world instead of fix it.

• If you verbally abuse people, the problem isn’t that you can speak; it’s that you use the power of your words to bring death instead of life.

• If your emotions lash out in a way that manipulates or wounds people, the problem isn’t that you have emotions; it’s that your emotions are unharnessed and destructive.

The problem with Hurricane Ian wasn’t that there was wind and rain; it was that it was untamed and destructive. It left devastation in its wake. None of us look at that think, “Well, rain was a terrible idea.” No, we look at it and say, “Two feet of rain in a hurricane is a problem.”

So it is with the things constrained by meekness. Holy Spirit empowered meekness orders our lives for our good and the good of others. The whole world flourishes when we surrender to God’s constraint to fulfill His design.

In contrast, it is a curse to remain wild, living an unconstructive or an unstructured life. The wild don’t want authority over them; they want to do their own thing, follow their own heart, put their strength toward themselves and not bring their lives into submission to others.  They are all about the self.  I remember years ago watching a video for a Bon Jovi song called “It’s My Life.” It starts with, “This ain’t a song for the broken hearted,” so, well, shots fires toward the poor in spirit. The chorus notes that, “Like Frankie said, ‘I did it my way,’ and concludes with “It’s my life.”

Catchy song, entertaining video that tells a story of young man doing anything he can to make it to a Bon Jovi concert. But if you watch the video, the main character who embodies the song leaves a trail of chaos in his wake. The simplest is how he scatters a pack of dogs a lady is walking. He disrupts a race. He creates havoc as he runs through traffic. He vandalizes cars by running over them. He almost causes a semi with what looks like a load of fuel to crash because he jumps in front of it.  He’s mayhem from the commercials.

When I teach my ethics class at NMC, a key question that keeps coming up is this:  “What would it look like if everybody lived like you?” or “Would you like other people if they lived by your standards?” It’s a way of talking about the Golden Rule: “Do to others what you would like for them to do to you.”

The meek have a sense of community. They see how their lives are situated in the midst of the lives of others. The meek seek to live out the Golden Rule: they want those around them to live with constrained power that brings about the flourishing of everyone, so they do it to.

The law of meekness is: If thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, not only give him drink, (which is an act of charity), but drink to him, in token of friendship, and true love, and reconciliation; and in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire upon his head, not to consume him, but to melt and soften him, that he may be cast into a new mold. (Matthew Henry)

The meek, the harnessed, the blessed, will experience reward.[8] The earth that the meek will inherit is not power or possession in this world, but the new earth, which is everlasting (Rev 21:1).[9] One day the owner of the earth will pass an inheritance on to them. The ones who know what it’s like to be stewarded know how to steward well in turn, both in this life and the next. [10] 

* * * * *

The first three beatitudes lay a foundation:

• honest brokenness over our sin

• humble mourning that leads to repentance and salvation

• harnesssed servanthood that leads to flourishing

We see here three requirements for entering into life with God and building the kind of Kingdom God has planned.

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[1] Psalm 10:4 “In his pride the wicked man does not seek him; in all his thoughts there is no room for God.”

[2] The kingdom of heaven, where self-sufficiency is no virtue and self-exaltation is a vice, belongs to such people. (Believers Bible Commentary)

[3] They mourn over both personal and corporate sins (see Ezra 9:1–4 as an example from the Old Testament).

[4] Ezra 10:6; Psalm 51:4; Daniel 9:19-20)

[5] Orthodox Study Bible

[6] It’s not like God doesn’t know about our repentance and salvation. It’s an earthly analogy (the biblical audience knew what a parakletos was and did in society) to illustrate a spiritual reality.

[7] The same Greek word is translated “gentle” elsewhere.

[8] The specific OT allusion here is Ps 37:9, 11, 29. Entrance into the Promised Land ultimately became a pointer toward entrance into the new heaven and the new earth, the consummation of the messianic kingdom. (Expositors Bible Commentary)

[9] Orthodox Study Bible

[10] The ultimate fulfillment of the promise to Abraham, whom Paul calls “heir of the world” (Rom. 4:13; cf. Heb. 11:16). (ESV Global Study Bible)