Way of the King - Beatitudes (5:1-12)

INTRODUCTION

WELCOME

Good Morning - Release the Kids

Stand to Read :1-12

DISCIPLESHIP REVIEW

Bridge the two series

Discipleship

Review the definition...

“Worship Jesus through ongoing surrender?

Imagine sitting at Jesus feet to listen to him preach...

These aren’t just themes to broken done and restructured back together.

These are the words of Jesus - they are meant to be heard - they are meant to be treasured, they are meant to be followed

“With Obedience to God In Everyday Life”

Transformed Lives (Hands)

Anger

Lust

Marriage & Divorce

Oaths & Promises

Retaliation

Transformed Affections

Generosity

Prayer & fasting

Treasures of our Heart

Anxiety

Understanding the Setting

Jesus’ Temptation

Jesus is preaching

Jesus calls the disciples

Jesus continues preaching and healing the sick

POINT ONE - THE KINGDOM OF GOD

- Jesus’ Central Teaching

Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand

Wat does this mean? What is the Kingdom of God? Was this expected? How did the hearers receive this message?

If jump into Jesus Sermon on the Mount without first understanding this context then we risk missing the entire point of his sermon all together.

The First Kingdom

”Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth

God created Adam and Eve in his image

Placed them as rulers over his creation under God’s sovereign authority

To reflect his glory

- Adam And Eve rejected God‘s rule and reign and wanted the glory for themselves

Being picked on the playground, or in a pick-up game of basketball, the next promotion, etc...

The strong, educated, rich, beautiful

This brought sin, separation, and destruction

Biblical Language

Kingdom of this this age...

Kingdom of this world

Kingdom of sin and death

People of God

Among all peoples of the earth, God chose one from whom he said that he would be their God and they would be his people - so they might be a blessing then to all peoples and nations.

God led them to a Mountain where God spoke and gave them instructions for what it meant to be his people, his kingdom on earth:

So much more than the 10 commandments

The Rescue

God, their King, rescued the people from their bondage, slavery, brokenness.

He saved them from themselves

Brough them out of Egypt

Seperated the Red Sea as they passed through on dry land and then destroyed Pharoah’s army.

Song for the King

THEY SANG: “The Lord will reign forever and ever”

Then God led them to a Mountain where God spoke and gave them instructions for what it meant to be his people, his kingdom on earth:

We can’t pick a choose to keep only the parts we like

So much more than the 10 commandments

We like, “Don’t judge others” but let’s not talk about lust or divorce

Teachings of a King, both the authority and person of Jesus

The Rebellion

Israel did not follow God and they did not live faithfully under his rule and reign

Taken back into captivity

Ca

Future Hope

The prophets kept the hope alive that one day God will re-establish his kingdom

Though we see the brokenness and we are surrounded by the ruin of our own sin we look to the horizon with an expectant hope.

Standing there, with our eyes fixed outword we hear the echo of the words from the Prophet Isaiah:

Isaiah 52:7–12 ESV

How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness, who publishes salvation, who says to Zion, “Your God reigns.” The voice of your watchmen—they lift up their voice; together they sing for joy; for eye to eye they see the return of the Lord to Zion. Break forth together into singing, you waste places of Jerusalem, for the Lord has comforted his people; he has redeemed Jerusalem. The Lord has bared his holy arm before the eyes of all the nations, and all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God. Depart, depart, go out from there; touch no unclean thing; go out from the midst of her; purify yourselves, you who bear the vessels of the Lord. For you shall not go out in haste, and you shall not go in flight, for the Lord will go before you, and the God of Israel will be your rear guard.

Isaiah 52:7–10 ESV

How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness, who publishes salvation, who says to Zion, “Your God reigns.” The voice of your watchmen—they lift up their voice; together they sing for joy; for eye to eye they see the return of the Lord to Zion. Break forth together into singing, you waste places of Jerusalem, for the Lord has comforted his people; he has redeemed Jerusalem. The Lord has bared his holy arm before the eyes of all the nations, and all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God.

Isaiah 52:7-

THE KINGDOM OF GOD is the story of how God is taking back his world from us.

The Kingdom of God is the King’s power over the King’s people in the King’s place.

We Wait

Preaching the Word: Matthew—All Authority in Heaven and on Earth It’s about Ethics, Right?

Jesus’ ethical teachings are like the relationship between our bones and our bodies. If you took all that surrounds our bones—our organs, veins, muscles, flab, and whatever else there is—we’d die. The “bones” of Jesus’ teaching cannot be separated from the body of the Teacher or from his life, death, and resurrection as well as his theology—his view of God, humankind, and the necessity of new birth, repentance, and faith for one to enter into a saving relationship with God.

Matthew Chapter 1 - Jesus is the king of the Jews

Matthew Chapter 28 - Jesus is the King of all peoples around the world

One year passes and then 2

then a decade, and a century, generations have now passed

700 years pass and maybe God forgot - maybe things are just too broken

JESUS APPEARS ON THE SCENE

Transform our Thinking (Head)

Transform Our Affections (Heart)

Transform Our Actions (Hands)

BIG IDEA

Surrendering to the authority of jesus as he establishes his kingdom on earth, as it is in heaven.

POINT ONE - The Kingdom of God

Repent, The Kingdom of God is at hand

Now is the time

I am him, the messenger who was promised.

Let the blind see, let the lame walk - the Kingdom of God is at hand.

You see him - imagine you are part of the crowd surrounding jesus at this moment.

Begin the passage...

“Jesus went up on the mountain...”

Some commentaries liken Jesus’ ascent to the mountain like that of Moses, as Jesus declares the nature of his Kingdom.

7x times in the book of Matthew we see Jesus on a mountain

(1) Temptation, (2) Sermon on the Mount, (3) Pray, (4) Healed & Fed Multitudes, (5) Transfiguration, (6) Olivet Discourse, (7) Commissioning.

“When he sat down...”

Sitting in the ancient world and sometime today is a symbol f authority.

Jewish Rabbis at the time of Jesus would stand to read from God’s Word and then sit to speak

Jesus does this in

Jesus is sitting in authority as the fulfillment of the Scripture

Sit to explain, sitting under authority of the Word together

Jesus is sitting in authority as the fulfillment of the Scripture

I’m sitting because I want you to feel the words from Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount

“His disciples came to him...”

Will you come - will you listen

“He taught them...”

What kind of people will God want for his kingdom…?

Tell me about the Kingdom of God - what is it like...

Being picked on the playground, or in a pick-up game of basketball, the next promotion, etc...

The strong, educated, rich, beautiful

Starts with the people of the Kingdom

POINT TWO - The People of the Kingdom

(1) “Blessed” Meaning

Doesn’t just mean happy, wealthy, and wise

It is not just a feeling but rather a statement of God’s approval.

However, if our goal is the approval of God, then we will also receive joy.

(2) Not Cause & Effect

God is the giver of the Kingdom, comfort

Beatitudes

“Poor in Spirit”

The cowering and cringing beggar

Not just in position but in our condition

“Mourn”

denotes lament, mourn - especially for the dead in some circumstances.

Some say this is to mourn our sin

But I wonder - also jaded vs tender to the brokenness in the world.

“Meek”

Restrained Strength

Inherit the earth

Hunger & Thirst for righteousness”

They shall be satisfied

“Merciful”

f

“Pure in Heart”

“Peacemakers”

Persecuted for Righteousness Sake”

The Overview

NOT the strong, self-righteous

It’s the needy

I can’t help but to be reminded of the final lines on the Statue of Liberty:

“Keep ancient land, your storied pomp!” cries she

with silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

Perspective for Sermon on the Mount / Kingdom of God

Word of caution as we begin this series through Jesus’ sermon on the mount. Misunderstanding of God’s Kingdom.

Ethics - Jesus is merely showing us how to live

End Times - The Sermon only speaks of what will be true after we die - “rejoice and be glad for great is your reward in heaven”

Exposing Sin - The only point is to say our righteousness is insufficient and we need a Savior.

All of these suffer from a reductionistic view - making a part of the truth the central truth.

“Not only did Jesus come proclaiming the kingdom unlike any of the Jews had every heard, He also came proclaiming Himself as the King of this new kingdom.

Jesus is the Messenger of the Kingdom

Jesus is the King of the kingdom

POINT THREE - The Call to the King

“Follow Me” (4:18-22)

“...On my account”

“Not all who say, Lord, Lord...”

Will you listen? Will you follow?

CONCLUSION

Questions for Personal & Communal Application

Thinking:

Affections:

Actions:

PURPOSE OF THIS SERIES

Transform our Thinking (Head)

Transform Our Affections (Heart)

Transform Our Actions (Hands)

Transformed Thinking

Memorizing and Meditating o God’s Word

“you’ve heard that it was said, but I say to you...”

Consistent, Incremental applications

Starting with the Beatitudes

Encourage you to memorize

During the remaining Sundays through the month of September we will recite these verses together from memory.

Memorizing the whole Sermon on the Mount

Transformed Affections

Silence & Solitude

We are created beings, made in the image of God. He rested from his work and so should we.

Don Whitney says in his book called Spiritual Disciples, “One of the costs of technological advancement is a greater temptation to avoid quietness. we have an addiction to noise.”

Start with 60 seconds this week -

By the end of this series - I want to help us grow to the point where we can take a full day or weekend for a spiritual retreat.

Congregational Silence

Transformed Lives/ Action

Prayer dependence - the intentional awareness of and dependence on God’s presence and power.

Silence and Prayer are not the same thing - Prayer is a conversation with God, us praying is speaking but in our silence we listen.

BIG IDEA

Surrendering to the authority of Jesus as he establishes his kingdom on earth, as it is in heaven.