The Beatitudes

Why is dark spelled with a K and not a C? You can’t C in the Dark.

How can I remind People of their value?

Main Point: The Christian Life is not self-improvement; it is spirit produced transformation.

This morning we are going to be starting a brand new sermon series I have called Summer on the Mount, and look at what is probably Jesus’ most famous compiled sermons. As we start let us set up where we are and what we are going to be doing over the summer, first their are a couple of differing views on what is going on in these sermons. Historically most scholars believed this was a continuous address - Jesus climbed the mountain, set down and begin to give deep ethical instruction. However, most scholars now believe this is a compiled list of Jesus teachings. The thoughts are the topics are so intense the disciples would have never been able to keep up with all of these sermonettes in one sitting, also there is such a vast variety of topics it seems more appropriate to be a compiled list across time.

Now to really understand this we have to understand this is a Gospel, written by Matthew, to a Jewish audience to really get a picture for what is going on here. First, lets tackle what a gospel is, in this time period a gospel would not have been the same as a biography as we see it today. Let me explain, it was not necessary for the writers of a gospel to put events in chronological order; it was perfectly acceptable to move events around in a persons life if you were trying to make a point for the reader. This seems to be exactly the case for Matthew as he is writing here, he is trying to make the case for Jesus as the new Moses to his readers. Remember, for these Jews Moses was the savior, redeemer, deliverer of the Jewish people leading them from Egyptian captivity. In the Old Testament we see Moses going up the mountain to receive the law. Here, in a parallel we see Jesus going up the mountain and sitting down to speak the description of what Kingdom citizens will actually look like. While not giving law, he is showing us how we will look and live if we are a part of his kingdom.

Matthew 5:1–2 NASB95

1 When Jesus saw the crowds, He went up on the mountain; and after He sat down, His disciples came to Him. 2 He opened His mouth and began to teach them, saying,

So, to make his point even stronger, Matthew compiles this list of how we will look and live in the kingdom into 5 different discourses matching the 5 books of Moses, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. It seems Matthew is really doing his best to speak through the narrative to these Jews in a way most of us don’t pick up on in our culture. So Jesus is sitting on the mountain, and he is the authoritative teacher, much in the same way the people would have viewed Moses after his mountain top experience with God and the Ten Commandments.

I think one of the easiest ways we can talk about the Sermon on the Mount is viewing it much in the same way we talked about a few weeks ago in the book of James. This is the mirror in which we are to look to see if we are living a true Kingdom Life. If we are a part of the Kingdom, this is the way our life will look, this is how everything will run.

Yet, understanding the Old Testament and what is going on makes all of this so much more beautiful.

All of this is the backdrop for where we will be over the next few weeks.

Can I ask you a question this morning? In our society, what are the qualities we would celebrate as successful or blessed?

Wealthy. This one is probably pretty obvious, our society is wrapped around the american dream and having more and more, and when we see someone who seems to have more than most, we think they are blessed.

Families. When people have tight knit families, we tend to think of them as blessed, because they haven’t been destroyed like most of our families we see around us in our society.

Status. We live in a society where we are fueled by views, likes, comments, followers, etc. THe more we have the better we are, the more we have the more blessed and successful we are.

However, this is not what we find Jesus telling us here in the very beginning of the Sermon. He instead says the following about what makes us blessed.

Matthew 5:3–11 NASB95

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 gentle, 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 have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 11 “Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of Me.

I have always thought it was weird how we pronounce that word differently when we read it here than when we say it in our lives. In our lives its just, “blessed,” but when we read it here we say, “Bless ed.” Maybe that is just for people of certain age bracket, the young people may not change the way they say it unless they have been around a bunch of us old heads in church a long time.

There are a lot of things going on here, the last time I preached on the Beatitudes it took me ten weeks to run through them all, one a week, because there is so much depth in each one, but we will try to hit all of these this morning in the sake of time to be able to move on next week.

1. Blessed are the Poor in Spirit

Matthew 5:3 NASB95

3 “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

A few weeks ago as we were in James, we talked about money a little bit and how James told us those in a low position should find themselves in a high position, and how it isn’t about what we are given monetarily, financially that identifies us, because all of what we have is his anyway, but its about how we change our perspective on how we see what he has given us. This though, isn’t taking about our finances, instead, Jesus is telling us the people who are blessed are those who are poor in spirit.

Mostly, when we come to this verse we like to talk about the person must be humble, but it is so much more than just humility. This is about supreme spiritual poorness, this is a place of letting go of ourself and allowing God to take care of the need and realizing we have no self sufficiency spiritually. So while it takes some humility to get to this place it is deeper. This is realizing we cannot do it on our own, and need his help.

Let me give you an example, the Pharisee and the tax collector in Luke 18, the pharisee is talking about all the things he wouldn’t do spiritually, trying to prove how humble he is in the eyes of men because he is keeping himself away from all of these things. However, the tax collector, the one who society would look down upon both the jews and the romans, Jesus says he is “justified rather than the other,” because, “He who humbles himself will be exalted.”

You see the tax collector saw himself for who he was, a sinner, and realized he needed God to have mercy on him, because without that Mercy he was nothing. This is what Jesus is talking about here, “Blessed are those who see their spiritual need for what it is, and come to Jesus for theirs will be the Kingdom of Heaven.”

Basically what we are seeing here, is we cannot come to Christ while we are clinging to self sufficiency, we must let go of all we think we can do on our own to get to Him.

2. Blessed are those who mourn.

Matthew 5:4 NASB95

4 “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.

When we talk about mourning Biblically it doesn’t always look the way we may think it does. This mourning is not about hopeless despair it is about leaning into God as opposed to drawing away from him. These kinds of verses are hard for people in our society because we seem to see mourning as a weakness all too often, but this is not the picture we are having painted here.

This has a lot to do with mourning over our own brokenness and feeling the weight of our own sin. We talked a few weeks ago about getting to that place in our lives where we first come to Christ and realize our need for him. We see that without him we are nothing and the only way we can be made right is through the sacrifice he made for us, and when we get there he comforts us, and gives us new life.

The same is true as he sanctifies us in this life, he will bring sin from the darkness to the light and our hearts should break as we see it and instead of our mourning pushing us away, it should have us draw closer to want to be more like Him, and he will comfort us in those moments and help us to put that sin behind us.

3.Blessed are the Meek

Matthew 5:5 NIV

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

Meekness is strength under control. Meekness is choosing to lay yourself down in times when we wouldn’t have to to follow the ways of the Lord.

This reminds me so much of the big huge clydesdale horses. When we were in southern Indiana pastoring there was a man in our church who raised these horses to pull for tournaments and things of that nature. In fact, I guess his horses were pretty good because someone shot one of them in the hip while he slept one night, in an apparent attempt to make it not as strong as it once was. Anyway, the point here is these animals are around 6’ tall at the withers and weigh between 1700 and 2200 lbs. They are beasts of an animal, and could have their way with just about anyone, but when they are harnessed and doing their job they are completely under the control of the one who has the reigns, strong, but meek, not weak.

This is the idea when we see meekness being spoken of here in the Bible, not weakness, but laying ourselves down for what God wants in our lives and allowing him to take the reigns and lead us.

4. Blessed are those who Hunger and Thirst for Righteousness

Matthew 5:6 NASB95

6 “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.

Have you ever been really hungry? I am sure there will be a day that my kids tell me they hate when I tell them they aren’t starving when they tell me they are, because its only been 4 hours since they’ve eaten. I always tell them, “you’re hungry, but you’re not starving.” Honestly, can you remember when you were starving and you didn’t even care what it was you’d eat just about anything to satisfy the hunger inside of you? For some it may be after a time of fasting, whether for the Lord or for some medical test. Or maybe you worked really hard physically that day and you’re body just needs to replenish itself and its letting you know.

This is kind of what we see Jesus talking about when he is talking about Kingdom living, he is saying, “Those who are living the authentic Kingdom life will have a deep hunger inside of them for righteousness.” He is telling us if we are living for him we will want our life to be more holy. Maybe the question you are asking is what is righteousness, what is it I should be hungering after and my soul longing for. The dictionary defines the word righteousness as, “the quality of being morally right or justifiable.” So if you want to talk about that in contemporary language you may say, “They are hungry for a life that reflects the heart of God.”

He is telling us if we are living Kingdom Life, our hearts will desire to live a life that resembles the life of Christ, and this shouldn’t surprise us, because we talk all the time about how Jesus doesn’t want to only change the things we do, but change the things we want to do. This is what is going on here, its about desiring to live a life that isn’t the same, that wants to be more and more like him every day - this is how we know we are part of the kingdom when we no longer want to live the old life, but pursue the holy life he has called us to.

5.Blessed are the Merciful

Matthew 5:7 NASB95

7 “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.

The word we use here for merciful is the word eleas (El eh ahs) and is the opposite of the word for wrath or justice orgay and this is a crazy idea because you and I live in a world where what we really want is justice. While as good Christians we may never admit it; we like karma. We like the idea of giving things and then it comes back to us. See mercy is completely different than that. When you are showing mercy you are not letting happen in someones life what is supposed to happen. You are not giving them what justice would be or what they deserve.

Very similar, grace is giving someone something they don’t deserve. You hear the difference? Mercy is not giving someone something the totally deserve, grace is, “hey, let me give you something even though you don’t deserve it,” and mercy is, “hey, I am not going to give you this even though you totally deserve it.”

So we tend to live in this world of, you did this, you deserve that, and mercy throws a wrench into all of it. And he is telling us, if we are living in the Kingdom, we are people who are offering mercy to people when they don’t even deserve it, and our reward for all of that is we will receive mercy.

We need his mercy, and it is because he has been merciful to us, we can give mercy.

6. Blessed are the Pure in Heart

Matthew 5:8 NASB95

8 “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.

This is one that would have hit the pharisees right between the eyes with the way they lived their everyday lives. Remember, later in Matthew 23 Jesus will call the Pharisees white washed tombs, he tells them they clean up the outside, but on the inside they are dirty. He is telling them their heart isn’t pure, their motives are all wrong, they make themselves look good to people, but there motives and intentions are wrong so actually they are pretty dirty.

What Jesus is talking about is this difference between religious performance versus transformed hearts. HE wanted these people to know it wasn’t just about the the things they were doing, it had to start from the heart, their intentions and motives had to be right as well; the important thing was your heart is pure.

These pharisees were doing all the right things ritually, they were performing all the ceremonies correctly, they were doing everything tehy could possibly think of with the law, but it was all so man would praise how good they were. Their hearts weren’t pure and this is what Jesus tells us. Our hearts, our motives, our intentions should be toward good. We should want to be more like him because we truly love him and because all he has done for us, not because we want fire insurance.

Saw Alton Brown the other day, he said he calls himself a Christian because he grew up in the Baptist church, and while Heaven sounds miserable, “What am I going to do, sing in a choir for eternity,” Hell sounded even worse. Wrong heart, wrong motives, wrong intentions.

7. Blessed are the Peacemakers

Matthew 5:9 NASB95

9 “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.

Something quite interesting is if you do an internet search on peacekeeper, the thing you are going to come up with most is some sort of weapon, or war, or a soldier, or something of the sort. And what we can clearly see is there is a huge difference between peacemaking and peacekeeping. For thousands of years men have signed treaties in attempt to keep the peace, between nations, between groups, between any number of things, but what inevitably happens is people break those agreements and begin fighting again.

Thats why I love what John MacArthur says on this topic, he says most people are just trying to keep the peace through a truce and, “A truce just says you don’t shoot for awhile. (True) peace comes when the truth is known, the issue is settled, and the parties embrace each other.”

So, there is obviously a huge difference in being a peace maker and a keeper.

What He is telling us is if we are part of the kingdom, as peace makers, we are always looking toward reconciliation. We are trying to bridge gaps we may have not intentionally broken. We are trying to bring peace in all situations. We are trying to get to the place like Johnny Mac said, where we the issue is settled and we can come together and embrace each other afterwords.

Peacemaking is the exact opposite of chaos making. Let me explain, have you ever met someone and their spiritual gift of stirring the pot? That’s not a real one, just so you know, but these people are always looking for an argument, and whether they agree with it or not they just love the joy of arguing and seeing people get worked up? This is the exact opposite of what Jesus is talking about here in the scripture. Its hard to say we are peacemakers if that is what our favorite past time is.

While we are here, I think it is important that I pause and say being a peacemaker doesn’t mean we avoid every conflict. While I think it would be impossible to avoid every conflict, we also know its not healthy, and sometimes being a peacemaker may mean entering into the conflict so we can get to a resolution.

Sometimes we have to argue for our friends so they can be heard and protected.

8. Blessed are the Persecuted

Matthew 5:10–12 NASB95

10 “Blessed are those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 11 “Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of Me. 12 “Rejoice and be glad, for your reward in heaven is great; for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

This one is really tough, because Kingdom living obviously creates opposition. When we are living for God, it is important we know our lives will look vastly different than the world. When we are living so differently there will be some push back from the world around us.

Jesus tells us if we are are living this Kingdom life people will hate us and accuse us of being evil people. This immediately makes me think about the times we stand up for the Word of Truth, and people in the world call us bigots or homophobes or any other slur just because we actually believe the what JEsus told us. Let me pause and say, we should only be hated for standing up for the word and not our attitude becasue sometimes people have a problem with us not because of what we beleive but becuase of how our heart sounds when we say what we believe.

So he is tellign us if we are living a kingdom lifestyle we will be marked with these kinds of things in our lives, but we should have hope in him. Because just like James told us, we should rejoice and be glad in all these persecutions, because our reward is not in this world, our reward is in the world to come.

Conclusion