EPIC-2/9/03-Dependance on God
Begin a series I am going to call vintage Xianity. Why?
When we look @ the xian faith as it is practiced today it can appear to be clouded by century’s of tradition, in vintage xianity going back to the beginning.
Webster’s defines vintage as-being of old, recognized, and enduring interest, importance, or quality and gives syn. Classic, or classical
So in vintage xianity we are going to go back and look at the core, The way it’s supposed to be. Not what does our culture say it means to follow X, not what do I say, not what does our church say, but what did Jesus say it meant to follow Him. When X came He laid it out, very plainly how those who follow Him should live their lives.
Matt. 5-7-Augustine called the Sermon on the Mount
X began min. announcing repent the Kingdom of heaven is at hand-
Natural questions on the heart of every Jew would have been, “Am I eligible to enter Messiah’s kingdom? Am I righteous enough to qualify for entrance?” The only standard of righteousness the people knew was that laid down by the current religious leaders, the scribes and Pharisees. Would one who followed that standard be acceptable in Messiah’s kingdom?
Wasn’t telling them what the kingdom was, or how to get into the kingdom rather The sermon showed how a person who is in right relationship with God should conduct his life.
****Christ is describing what Human life and human community look like when they come under the gracious rule of X. They look DIFFERENT! A xian counter culture-that is vintage xianity
Begins w/ what are commonly reffered to as the Beatutudes. Each of these begins w/ the phrase “Blessed are” or God blesses those who .
The things that Jesus is talking about deal with the basic values which we as human beings adopt and live by. Jesus’ is saying that the values of this world do not lead to blessing. To His audience He was making the point that the values of your “religious leaders”, the Pharisees, do not lead to blessing.
Instead blessing comes through living by His values. Values that the world hates, but those are the values that reflect the heart of God the Father.
So there at the beginning of the Sermon on the mount we see Jesus, in these few verses, set up a new system of values by which His people, his followers are to live.
And those values require a rejection of the values which lie at the core of human civilizations and which shape most individual personalities.
Once again-****Christ is describing what Human life and human community look like when they come under the gracious rule of X. They look DIFFERENT! A xian counter culture-this is vintage xianity
Start w/ the first of the counter cultural values tonight-
Vs. 3-“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” -NIV “God blesses those who realize their need for Him”-NLT
NIV– literal trans.
NLT-interpretation of poor in spirit.
The poor in spirit would have been understood by those listening to Jesus as those who consciously depend on God, not on themselves; they are “poor” inwardly having no ability in themselves to please God (cf. Rom. 3:9-12).
The first Beatitude illustrates. “Blessed are the poor in spirit,” Jesus said. Blessed are those who do not approach life with confidence in themselves or reliance on their gifts and talents, sure that they are competent to meet life’s challenges. Blessed instead are those who approach life without such self-based confidence, “for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” Not, theirs “will be” the kingdom of heaven. But, theirs is the kingdom of heaven. In approaching life humbly, and with full reliance on the King, we open up our lives to His direction. We open up our present and future to Jesus’ kingly action.
Commitment to kingdom values brings us to the place where we ask the King to reign in our lives.
What reigns in your life? What is it that you rely on? $, power, job, status, car, house, popularity, drugs, alcohol
What is that one thing that you say, if only I had…., I’d be happy, content, successful, satisfied.
The poor in spirit know that the one thing is God and God alone.
The first step in following X is to be wholly committed to Him, Allow Him to rule in our lives, come before Him poor in spirit, realizing your need for Him, bow before Him and Him alone,
We must come before Him broken, knowing that on our own, we can never make it. We can never be good enough, on our own we’ll never get into His kingdom, on our own we’ll never be able to please Him, on our own we’ll never be able to live out the rest of the values X is going to lay out for us in the coming verses-the only way we can live out a vintage xianity is through coming to God poor in spirit, realizing our need for Him, coming broken knowing our need for Him, our total dependence on Him and Him alone.
We come w/ the Song of the Broken
Your chance now to respond and come broken before Him,
Whatever it is that you have been depending on, relying on in place of God-write that on the crown-what ever it is that you have been allowing to reign in your life come and bow before the lord and give that back to Him, come as one who is poor in spirit and bow before the lord tonight.
