The beatitudes…part 1 – February 21, 2010
I’d like to do something a little different this morning. Today, rather than stand and preach, I would like to sit, and teach. In Jesus’ day, it was the custom for teachers in the synagogue to sit while they taught from the scriptures. The synagogues in that day were in every town that had at least 10 men living there. If that many, or more lived in a town, they would construct a building, out of stone, that faced Jerusalem, and in that synagogue (trans. House of instruction) the old testament scriptures were read and interpreted by a teacher who could do just that, explain the meaning of the teachings of the law, the prophets, and of course, the history of the Israelites. (John McArthur, ministry in the synagogues, http://www.biblebb.com/files/MAC/42-53.htm)
And the customary way was to sit, so today, I’m going to give this a try. You are sitting, so I will sit; hopefully we’ll all feel more comfortable this way…
Jesus is getting to be popular. If we were to follow all of His movements and teachings we would see that Jesus has done a fair bit of travelling already in these early days of His ministry. He has gone from Nazareth (hometown) to Cana (for the wedding, where He turned water into wine). He has gathered disciples and apostles. He has been to Capernaum, teaching there for sometime. He has been to Jerusalem where he drove the sellers out of the temple with a whip; Jesus was zealous for the house of God. He has healed many of all kinds of diseases. And He has driven out evil or unclean spirits from dozens of people. We’ll talk more about that soon. What I want us to realize is that people are hearing about this new rabbi in the area, this one who speaks with his own authority. This ‘man’ who performs miracles. Word is spreading, and throngs of people are following Jesus wherever He goes.
But in the midst of all this popularity, Jesus wants to teach his disciples. Jesus came to this earth to do some specific things. He came first and foremost as the One who would die for our sin so that we might be restored to the Father and gain eternal life. He came to fulfill the law and the prophets, all the things spoken about Him for centuries before He arrived in Bethlehem, born of a virgin, the Son of the Living God. He came to show us what the Kingdom of Heaven is like, and how we should repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is near.
But the one thing that Jesus came for and about which there is more written about in all the gospels, is to teach, to preach, and make disciples who would go and teach and preach the things that Jesus taught them; that the gospel would reach all nations, all people, in all places from one small nation on earth to every nation. Jesus was a teacher.
And because he wanted to teach his disciples he needed to get away from the crowds and focus on his close followers for a little while and give them some instruction on what it means to be a follower of Christ, a Christian. Let’s turn in our bibles to Matthew 5, verses 1-12 and listen to some of the first teachings given by the greatest teacher of all time…
Matthew 5:1-12 (NIV)
The Beatitudes
1Now when he saw the crowds, he went up on a mountainside and sat down. His disciples came to him, 2and he began to teach them saying:
3"Blessed are the poor in spirit,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
4Blessed are those who mourn,
for they will be comforted.
5Blessed are the meek,
for they will inherit the earth.
6Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness,
for they will be filled.
7Blessed are the merciful,
for they will be shown mercy.
8Blessed are the pure in heart,
for they will see God.
9Blessed are the peacemakers,
for they will be called sons of God.
10Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
11"Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. 12Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
The word ‘beatitudes’ comes from the Latin word beatus, which can be translated as happy or blessed. But the more I’ve read this and some commentaries on this passage, I understand it as not a ‘blissful joy’ like ‘I’m HAPPY!’ but rather a feeling of inner joy, completeness, a peace with God and a peace within myself. After all who would be just plain ‘happy’ to be poor in spirit, sad and meek?
John Macarthur explains the beatitudes in this way, and I think it’s one of the best descriptors I’ve seen in the days of studying this passage: The Beatitudes can seem to be sacred paradoxes. Their value system is in contrast to everything the world values. Note the progression of thought: Matthew 5:3 speaks of "the poor in spirit." A person who is poor in spirit has the right attitude about sin, which leads to mourning (v. 4). When someone recognizes his sinfulness and mourns over it he develops meekness (v. 5). That leads him to hunger and thirst for righteousness (v. 6). Such a hunger manifests itself in mercy (v. 7), purity of heart (v. 8), and a peaceable spirit (v. 9). A person who displays those attitudes can expect to be reviled, persecuted, and falsely accused (vv. 10-11). That's because that kind of life-style is an irritant to worldly people. But in the end believers will be able to "rejoice, and be exceedingly glad; for great is [their] reward in heaven" (v. 12). He who lives in accordance with the Beatitudes will be "the salt of the earth" and "the light of the world" (vv. 13-14).
This ‘progression’ is what makes this teaching so deep and yet simple at the same time. It is not that Jesus is saying these are easy things to live out, by no means. Living as a disciple of Christ is not easy, especially compared with what the world would, or the devil for that matter, would offer as an easier life; just do what you want, get the most out of life, accept who you are, and just ‘be’. That sounds simple, but that is not what we are called to be as followers of Christ. There are expectations for how believers should live, since we represent Christ to those who have not placed their faith and trust in Jesus, WE are the ones they are going to look to for the example of Jesus in this world today.
So what does it look like to be a Christ-follower? How do we apply Jesus’ teaching to our lives today…let’s look at each of these eight/nine beatitudes and see what we can learn:
1) Blessed are the poor in spirit. When we think of the poor we tend to think of those who are ‘less fortunate’ than we are. We think of it in terms of possessions, status or simply cash-on-hand. The poor are those with little to none of these things. They are looked down on by the rich, they are poor, and they know it. But all of us can be poor, when compared to someone else. The person living on the street with no home is poor compared to the one with a roof over their head at some kind of care-facility. That person is poor when compared to the person who rents or owns their own home. But that person is poor compared with the one who owns a mansion, or two or ten. And that person is poor when compared to the king who owns the palace, the land, and everything he can see…you see how it goes? Poverty is a comparison.
Here though, Jesus is talking not of a lack of material possessions, but of spiritual poverty…or humility before God. The first thing we must realize to become a follower of Christ is that we have to come with a humble spirit, understanding that we really have nothing to offer the Creator of the Universe in order to receive the kingdom of heaven. Whether we have cash or not, none of that matters for salvation. We must come empty-hearted, not boastful or proud, but humbly kneel before a holy God accepting the FREE GIFT of salvation through Jesus Christ. That is being poor in spirit. The reward is the kingdom of heaven. The gift of God is eternal life, to all who would call on His Name. Just don’t come thinking, ‘I bet God’s glad to have ME in his kingdom.’ Rather come with a heart that says, ‘What have I done to deserve such love and acceptance? I am just a simple sinner who needs a saviour.’ That is the humility God is looking for.
2) Blessed are those who mourn. What makes us sad? What causes us to grieve? What breaks our hearts? Many things do; the death of a friend or family member, the breakdown of a marriage, tragedy on a global scale. These are all awful, depressing, sad situations that would make us mourn. But think about this; what makes God sad? What breaks God’s heart? Is it not when his children fall out of relationship with him, turning their backs on him, and live lives that are separate from him? Is sin not the one thing that keeps us apart from God? If that is his greatest sadness, shouldn’t it be ours? When we sin, when we neglect God’s rules for living and just do whatever feels right to us, it hurts God, and it should hurt us too. But if we don’t know God, if we don’t know HOW to live for him, if we have no feeling of remorse for not living for him, we can’t know what that sadness should be. But, as children of the kingdom of God, as Christians, sin in our lives should make us feel sorrow for hurting our Heavenly Father’s heart.
When a child is told not to touch something because it’s precious and fragile, they may break it, they’re expected to follow that rule. So when that child sees the parent leave the room and they think about touching that thing, just to hold it, and it slips from their tiny hands and smashes to the floor…what are they to do when mom or dad returns? They can blame someone else (it was baby brother over there in the crib), they can deny it (I didn’t do it), they can make excuses (you shouldn’t have left it there for me to touch), they can be arrogant (I hate it when you place rules in my life)…OR they can feel sorry for what THEY did, admit it, and accept the punishment that they know they deserve, realizing that they’ve disappointed their parents and broken the rules that were put there for everyone’s benefit.
Is this life we’ve been given any different? God has given us this precious thing called life, and we’ve been told to treat it carefully, respectfully, looking out for each other rather than just ourselves. But what have we all done? We’ve all sinned, we have all turned to our own way, we have all, like sheep, gone astray…we’ve all broken God’s rules, we’ve broken the precious relationship we should have had with him, and we’ve all broken his heart…and that should make us sad.
We should have feelings of remorse when we hurt others or hurt God. And that sadness should make us turn to God for comfort, and that comfort is the knowledge that God isn’t going to punish us for every wrong we’ve done. He’s not going to give us what we deserve (death) because Jesus paid the price for our punishment, he took our beating, he took our pain, he took our death…and we can KNOW that we have eternal life…IF we accept the gift he freely offers. There is a blessed assurance to know that we have peace with God, peace with others, peace with ourselves. That is true comfort.
3) Blessed are the meek. The meek are those people who exhibit self-control, gentleness, kindness, patience, love, peacefulness. They are not proud, arrogant, me-first types of people. The meek are folks who have learned that when someone strikes you on one cheek, you turn the other and say, ‘strike again if you must…’ In our world today though, meekness is often seen as weakness. To use the phrase milk-toast could be appropriate; just a floppy and undesirable nature…weak. People will take advantage of this trait and walk all over someone who doesn’t stand up for themselves. The comparison here is the landowner. In Jesus’ day and in much of ours, it the powerful and rich who own the choicest land, the grandest homes and have everyone work for them, the meek.
But Jesus is saying the meek will inherit the earth, the land, the Promised Land. They will be the ones who receive what is truly most valuable, a permanent piece of property in the eternal kingdom of God. It’s the opposite of how the world thinks, and that is what makes it so hard for some folks to be meek and mild. We want to be seen by others as strong and able to take on any task. The truth is, we are weak, we can’t do it all, we all need help, we all need a saviour, we all need Jesus, we cannot save ourselves. If we want to be in the kingdom, we need to realize we can’t work it out in our own strength, our own wisdom, our own abilities; we need Christ. If you want to learn about how to BE meek, then read Colossians 3 and read some of the ‘rules for holy living’ and ask God to show you where you need to improve on being more Christ-like in your daily life.
When Jesus comes again, and He will (5 minutes form now, today, tomorrow, or maybe we’ll die before that day comes), how will we stand before Him? Will we face Him and say, look at all I’ve done; I’m a good person who’s done good even great things. You should be so lucky as to have me as a citizen of heaven. Or will we humbly kneel before the King of kings and bow before the Lord of lords and thank Him for the indescribable gift of His love, His forgiveness, His substitutional death for the things WE did that hurt HIS heart?
What will we do TODAY to live more like a disciple of Jesus? How will we be more like Jesus, the Messiah tomorrow, and even more the next day…how can I be more like Christ?
