The Beatitudes
Notes
Transcript
Intro
What is your attitude?
As we come together today, I want to begin by wishing you a Merry Christmas. Also, I am thankful that you are here today. Christmas is the day in which we celebrate Christ Jesus. In that, I am thankful y’all made the decision to worship Him this morning.
We are back in Matthew today. So, if you have your Bibles, please open with me to Matthew chapter 5. We are diving into the greatest sermon ever preached. This is the Sermon on the Mount. It is the greatest sermon ever preached because it was preached by Jesus Christ Himself. As we begin our series through this sermon, we will plunge the depths of Scripture and never find the bottom as Jesus displays the infinite wisdom of God in these chapters of Scripture.
I ask you this morning, what is your attitude?
Detail the attitudes of the world.
We will be reading the beatitudes which can be understood as the attitudes of the kingdom. We will seek to understand each one of these attitudes this morning as we see that they are the attitudes the believer must have as citizens of the Kingdom of God.
1 Seeing the crowds, he went up on the mountain, and when he sat down, his disciples came to him.
2 And he opened his mouth and taught them, saying:
3 “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
4 “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.
5 “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.
6 “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.
7 “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.
8 “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.
9 “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.
10 “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
11 “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. 12 Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
Pray.
Main idea: The blessed are those in Christ Jesus.
As we begin our dive into the greatest sermon ever preached, we begin with the Beatitudes. We can better understand them by calling them the kingdom attitudes. Jesus sits down on the mountain calling His disciples along with the crowd to Himself. He sits down signifying the significance of the moment. Rabbis would sit whenever they taught, so Jesus assumed the role of teacher and sat down on the mountain and prepared to teach those within listening range. As He teaches them, He expounds the realities of entrance into the Kingdom of God. Specifically, He details the attitudes of the kingdom. He turns upside down the teachings of the religious leaders during this time. The Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes, and Zealots were all teaching their own form of the Old Testament. The Pharisees were law-based legalists. The Sadducees were theological liberals. The Essenes were separatists. The Zealots were nationalists. Jesus preaches the true kingdom of God and the way in which one enters.
Explanation of the Text
Jesus begins His didactic sermon with eight statements beginning with the word blessed. We must first seek to understand what is meant by the word blessed. Some translators and commentators have determined that blessed means happy. However, I find that such a definition of the term is lacking. To be blessed is to have God’s approval. We are blessed whenever we are approved by God.
Jesus begins His teaching pointing out the first attitude approved by God.
3 “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
As some of you have heard the Beatitudes before, I have found that these verses can be and have been taken out of context quite often. In that, some have deemed that verse 3 speaks of God blessing the poor. Please note, this is not a statement that Jesus is making about the financially poor or physically poor. Notice what Jesus says. Blessed are the poor in spirit. Jesus is referring to the spiritually poor. God approves of the spiritually poor.
You may ask, what does that mean?
The spiritually poor are those that understand their spiritual condition apart from faith in Jesus Christ. Those that understand that they are totally depraved, meaning they can do nothing of spiritual good, are blessed. They are blessed because they come empty-handed before the throne of God. They recognize their total dependence upon Jesus Christ. There is nothing they can do to save themselves. They are spiritually bankrupt in need of a Savior. Therefore, the spiritually poor turn to the Christ. They turn to Jesus understanding that He alone can save them from their spiritually desolate condition.
By understand their condition apart from Jesus Christ, they cling to the Gospel. They cling to the blood of Jesus Christ poured out on the cross of calvary for their sin and His victorious resurrection from the dead. In doing so, they place their faith in Christ and the reward for those who are poor in spirit is the kingdom of heaven.
Jesus begins here because this is the starting point of salvation, and He will build further in the verses to follow.
Notice, verse 4
4 “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.
As the starting point of salvation is the recognition of our sinfulness and spiritually dead state, Jesus builds upon that with the next beatitude which is that of mourning. Understand, there are proper moments in life for mourning such as the loss of a loved one or grief from a life situation. However, that is not the context of this verse.
As Jesus is revealing kingdom attitudes, He is point out that those who are blessed or have God’s approval are those who mourn over their sin. They recognize their spiritual bankruptcy which causes them to mourn over their sin against a holy God. They are grieved because they have committed wrong against God, their Creator.
8 Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. 9 Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. 10 Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you.
However, notice the provision of God. Those who mourn over their sin shall be comforted. They receive comfort as they look to the cross of Calvary and see Christ who bore their sin and shame upon Himself for their sake. They are comforted knowing that their sins are atoned for by Jesus Christ.
The result of such poorness of spirit and mourning over sin is meekness.
5 “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.
The word meek is deemed as weakness by our culture and society. Our culture and society seeks to hold up attributes such as power, authority, or ambition. However, Jesus says blessed are the meek. The meek are those who have power under control. They are humble because they have been humbled by the reality that they need Christ. They have an attitude of gentleness because Christ had such an attitude. Moreover, in recognizing their spiritually poor condition and mourning over their sin, they now are humble toward God knowing that it is Him who has brought about the work of salvation in them.
Our salvation should not cause us to boast in ourselves. It should make us be humble and boast about what God has done for us.
Notice, God blesses the meek. The selfishly ambitious, prideful, and arrogant seek to inherit this world. However, in the world to come meaning when Christ implements His millennial reign upon His return, the meek, the Christian, will inherit the earth as he or she reigns with Christ!
Moreover, our humility through salvation causes for us to have a change in our desires.
6 “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.
God approves of those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. I love how Jesus describes it here. Food and water are necessary for physical life to continue. Moreover, Jesus uses terminology like hunger and thirst which bring about the feeling of starvation. A starving person passionately seeks out something to eat and drink. Just as food and water are necessary for physical life so righteousness is necessary for spiritual life. The Christian is declared righteous in Christ Jesus. Upon our salvation, the Holy Spirit begins working in our lives causing for us to look more like Jesus as He convicts us of sin and changes our desire to desire the things of Jesus above the things of sin. The Christian hungers for more of the Word and time spend with God. He or she hungers for more patience, joy, peace, love, and goodness. The Christian is consumed with the desire to be righteous or right before God.
Those who seek for righteousness will be satisfied. They are satisfied by Christ Jesus. God declares us righteous before Him because of what Jesus has done on our behalf. Satisfaction is found in Jesus’s finished work.
Each of these first four beatitudes deal with man’s relationship to God. Now, Jesus turns to address man’s relationship to fellowman.
7 “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.
As God has done everything to save us, we are to be poor in spirit, mourn over our sin, be meek in our demeanor, and be consumed in pursuit of righteousness.
Because of God’s work in us, the Christ now is to extend mercy to others. The Christian has received mercy.
Explain what mercy is: not getting what we do deserve.
As we recount how God has been merciful to us, we extend mercy to others that are without faith in Him. In doing so, we will be blessed. Please understand, this does not mean that others will be merciful to us. That is not how the sinful world works. There may be moments in which others are merciful in return; however, the world will not be merciful in return. The mercy that we receive is from God through Jesus Christ.
8 “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.
God approves of the pure in heart. Only those purchased by the blood of Jesus Christ are pure in heart as they have a regenerate heart. The Holy Spirit takes the heart of stone away that was hostile toward God and inclined to sin against Him relentlessly and replaces it with a soft heart that has been and is being transformed by the work of the Spirit to desire the things of God. Being pure in heart is being purely devoted to God. The Christian is not devoted to any other person or sin as much as they are to God. In this devotion to God there are no splits of loyalty or turning back. The complete transformation has taken place in which sin is abandoned and Christ is championed.
In having a singular focus upon God, the promise is that the Christian will see Him. The Christian will see God in the past, present, and future. As one has such focus upon God, he or she can look back on their life and see the handiwork of God as He providentially orchestrated everything to draw them to salvation and worked in various instances in their lives. The Christian sees Him in the present as He is working to make them more into the image of Jesus Christ and conforming them. Then, we know that we will see God in the future because of the salvation that we have in Christ Jesus. We will see God face to face.
9 “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.
Peace is desired by everyone, yet few find it. Likewise, it is difficult to make peace. To make peace takes work. Wars last for years, even decades, before peace is made. Strained family relations can continue to fester without peace being accomplished. However, for the Christian, God approves of the peacemaker. As believers in Jesus Christ, we have a peace. We have the peace of God that is give to us through our salvation. At one time, we were at enmity with God, yet through Christ’s atoning work on the cross and His resurrection He made us at peace with God. Now, through the sustaining work of the Holy Spirit in our lives, we can have peace with others. Furthermore, we should fight for peace with others. More importantly, the ultimate way to be a peacemaker is through the spreading of the Gospel.
As humanity is at enmity with God, the Christian is a peacemaker when the Gospel is proclaimed and others come to faith in Christ Jesus. Oftentimes, peacemaking is looked at as only conflict resolution between two people. However, the biggest conflict that can be resolved is the sin conflict between God and man. The only way in which it can be resolved is through faith in Jesus Christ and His death, burial, and resurrection.
In taking the Gospel and seeking to be peacemakers, the peacemaking Christian is blessed by being called a son of God. This speaks to the Christians adoption into the kingdom of God. Upon our salvation we are adopted into the kingdom of God as His children.
3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, 4 even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love 5 he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, 6 to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved.
We are adopted by the good pleasure of God’s will. We can rest in that as believers. Then, Jesus presents the toughest beatitude in my opinion.
10 “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
11 “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. 12 Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
God approves of those who are persecuted for righteousness sake. Notice, the reward is familiar to us. The reward is that the persecuted will possess the kingdom of heaven. This was the same reward that Jesus offered at the beginning of this passage for those who are poor in spirit. Jesus does this for emphasis. From the beginning to the end, those who are in Christ will inherit the kingdom of heaven. However, this inheritance is not without persecution.
Jesus says that one is blessed whenever they are reviled, persecuted, and have evil uttered against them. This does not sound like blessing to me. That is if we have worldly mindset. For those who are in Christ Jesus, persecution is a blessing because it lets us know that we are members of the kingdom. Our reward is great in heaven. We do not look to this earth for our reward, we look to heaven.
Conclusion
This morning, you may be thinking that was not a Christmas sermon at all. Well, Christmas is about the Christ coming. You see, the beatitudes reveal to us the attitudes of the kingdom of God. These beatitudes would not be given or known had it not been for Jesus Christ coming to earth.
He came to earth with one sole purpose.
10 For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.”
In coming to seek and to save the lost, Jesus came to seek and to save me and you. The way in which He came to save us was through the giving of His life as a servant.
45 For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
5 Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, 6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. 9 Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
Jesus came to earth in the form of a servant. He took on human flesh, was born in a manger, and came with the intention of dying on the cross for you and me to be raised from the grave on the third day.
That Gospel message should cause us to be poor in spirit as we recognize our sinful condition, mourn over our sin against a holy and gracious God, be meek in our demeanor, be consumed with seeking righteousness, be merciful as we have received mercy, be pure in our devotion to our gracious God, be peacemakers through Gospel proclamation, and rejoice in persecution as we are persecuted on our Saviors behalf.
Today, what is your attitude?
Is your attitude that of the kingdom? Or, is your attitude that of the sinful condition?
Pray.