Blessedness Series

Blessedness

Jeffery Anselmi / General

Core 52 / Blessed; The Beatitudes / Matthew 5:11–12

The Beatitudes offer blessings where we would not think to look for them.

INTRODUCTION

- When you think of being blessed, what comes to your mind?

- Maybe you got the job you wanted, and rightfully so, you feel blessed.

- Life is good; I am feeling really blessed.

- I woke up not feeling like I got hit by a truck; I feel really blessed!

- In today's passage, under our microscope, we will see Jesus's take on being blessed.

- Our passage is part of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount, where He taught his disciples about the characteristics of kingdom living.

- This passage is part of what we call the Beatitudes.

- The word "Beatitude" is derived from a Latin word meaning "blessedness" or "happiness."

- In the context of the Bible, the Beatitudes are a set of teachings by Jesus presented in the Sermon on the Mount, which describes the qualities and attitudes considered blessed or favored by God.

- These "beatitudes" for the foundation of Christian ethics and moral teaching.

- Understanding what the word blessed means makes what Jesus shares in the Sermon difficult to embrace since what He says we need to do to be blessed is counterintuitive.

- The word blessed means fortunate, happy, and privileged.

- Being blessed is characterized by happiness and being highly favored, as by divine grace.

- In the Sermon on the Mount, when Jesus started a new thought, He began the sentence with the word BLESSED and followed the word up with what we can do to be blessed.

- He starts in verse one by saying those who are poor in spirit are blessed, those who mourn, the meek, those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, the merciful, the pure in heart, the peacemakers in verse nine, and then in verse ten, those who are persecuted for righteousness.

- Most of that list seems a bit undesirable on the surface.

- Mark Moore aptly points out in this week's lesson in Core 52 that we typically have a different list of what makes us happy.

- He states people seek happiness in four things: family, wealth, health, and security.

- I think that is a pretty accurate list.

- Our list looks a little different than God's list, don't you think?

- To top off the list from verses 1-10, Jesus decides there is MORE!

- Verse 11-12 marks the end of the Beatitudes section of the Sermon, and in a sense, Jesus saved the best for last.

- As we examine our passage today, context is so important for us to focus upon so that we do not make the verses say something they do not say.

- Let's turn to Matthew 5 and we will start with verse 11.

Matthew 5:11 (NET 2nd ed.)

11 Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you and say all kinds of evil things about you falsely on account of me.

SERMON

I. The unusual source of blessing.

- In the introduction, I listed some things that we would feel blessed if we had, and because of that, we seek them.

- Family, wealth, health, and security become our mission, and we will seek Jesus up to the point that He does not interfere with our quest for what we think will bring us blessings or happiness in life.

- That said, it is important to understand that family, wealth, health, and security are really nice things to have; however, if those things are the pursuit of our lives, we will end up missing them.

- It is kind of like when a hitter in baseball is struggling at the plate (or a whole team, not mentioning the Cardinals); when the bases are loaded, the struggling hitter is trying to focus on hitting a home run instead of hitting the ball somewhere.

- My Cardinals, for instance, have one hit in, I believe, in eleven bases-loaded situations this season, a few times when there were no outs.

- Instead of focusing on making contact, they are pressuring out, resulting in pop-ups or strikeouts.

- Home run hitters face this when slumping; they go to the plate looking for the home run instead of trusting the process of hitting.

- When we focus on the wrong thing in life, we may miss what we aim for.

- When we focus on Jesus, the other things will work themselves out.

- The stuff in verses 1-10 are difficult enough, Jesus us the ante.

- In verse 11, Jesus says we will be blessed when people cause us to suffer in three ways.

- The context of receiving the blessing is that these things happen on account of serving Jesus.