The Beatitudes As A Pattern For Discipleship

Seeing the Beatitudes as Steps in Restructuring Your Heart

For the past few weeks, we have been thinking about what it means to be followers of Jesus. At the beginning of this series, we were challenged to step out in faith without looking back, just as Peter and the other first disciples did. When called, they set aside lesser concerns to follow Jesus, subsequently becoming fishers of men.

We were also challenged to not feel that we need to have extraordinary skills. It does not require special skills to follow Jesus—only the ability to say “yes” to ministering with loving kindness to those around us, especially those needing the healing touch of our love, forgiveness, and concern. No special skills are required to show kindness to others. However, closing one’s heart to the call to follow Jesus is an impediment, and I’ll talk more about that in just a few minutes.

But first, I’d like each of us to examine our hearts and minds just a bit and then ask ourselves if we are displaying in our thoughts and actions the traits of persons who are actually following in the footsteps of Jesus. And if we find ourselves wanting, and if we are able to admit that our personal growth in discipleship has been limited by selfishness, sinful pride, inadequacy and weakness, let us confess our sin and turn to God for healing so that like the Apostle Peter we too, each of us, can respond to his call to us to follow him with faith that even though we are sinful persons, the Lord can change us and make us whole. You are being called, each of you, to follow in the footsteps of Jesus. A scary thought, maybe, but remember that Jesus said, “Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light”, lighter than it at first might appear to be.

As we are called forward, we are going to discover certain things about ourself along that journey. Part of what we discover is the very thing that caused Peter’s initial reluctance to follow Jesus. When he was called to follow, Peter responded, “depart from me Lord for I am a sinful person”. When the Lord calls us to follow him, we may well become more aware of our personal sins and our sinful nature (something that is painful to look at and see), but if we will but step out and keep walking toward the light, we will also become more and more aware of God’s grace. Amazingly, each time we take a step forward in response to the call of our Lord we will be taking a step toward the restructuring of our heart. And when our heart has undergone restructuring, discipleship becomes easier and easier until the burden of discipleship has been transformed into a supreme joy. That restructuring of the heart is accomplished by the work of the Holy Spirit.

It is necessary for us to say “yes” to the Holy Spirit in order for the work of restructuring our heart to be begun, and it is necessary for us to continuing saying yes for that work to be fully accomplished. There is only one unforgiveable sin, the Bible teaches, and that is to say “no” over and over to the Holy Spirit until our heart has become so hardened that it sinks deeper and deeper into spiritual death. That particular sin, saying no to the Holy Spirit, is unforgiveable not because the Holy Spirit or God is angry with us for not saying yes, on the contrary God and the Holy Spirit are grieved. It is unforgiveable because when we turn away from the path that is set before us, when we say “no” to the call of discipleship, we are actually saying “no” and shutting the door to the healing and restorative work of the Holy Spirit. Restructuring the heart, our sanctification, is the ultimate goal of following Jesus, and it involves a process of learning to say yes to the Holy Spirit each and every day.

The Scripture from Luke that we read this morning is a portion of a sermon given by Jesus known as the “Sermon on the Mount”. This particular portion is known as the Beatitudes. The term “beatitude” is derived from a Latin word which means “a state of blessedness”, or to put in another way, “a state of supreme happiness”. I think the term “supreme happiness” is the best way of thinking about the meaning of the word “beatific”, from which the term beatitude is derived. How happy you will be after you recognize that you are poor in spirit, for in recognizing your poverty you will then open yourself to being filled by God’s spirit! How happy are you when you are hungry for something more than physical food, for it is then that you will welcome the spiritual food that God has provided, food and drink that satisfies your deepest longings! How happy are you when you weep over the fallen nature of this world, for are you then on the path to finding a better world! How happy are you when people hate and exclude you, for this is confirmation that you are not one those persons who are so very much at home in a fallen world, but rather one whose heart seeks a different world, an eternal world made not by human hands, but by God! Rejoice ye pure in heart! Your cross, the earthly sorrows you bear, confirm that you shall someday see the homeland of your heart.