Be-Attitudes
Notes
Transcript
There is a rich and valuable tradition of reading Jesus’ Beatitudes as desirable or meritorious conditions to pursue. Jesus’ original hearers heard them as provocative declarations of the radical new availability of the Kingdom. The Kingdom of God is even available to the spiritually bankrupt. Our response is not to pursue spiritual bankruptcy, it is to joyously receive the Kingdom of God… and boldly proclaim the gospel of the Kingdom to our spiritually bankrupt friends and family. Theirs is the Kingdom.
Statue of Liberty
Statue of Liberty
Just a couple days ago, Logan and I were at the statue of liberty. Awesome experience, I had never been, he had never been.
Erected in 1876, it was certainly there when my great grandfather immigrated to the country in New York… probably the first thing he saw coming into the harbor. Written on that pedestal, there’s a plaque with these famous words:
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-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!
After that we visited Ellis Island. Ellis island was opened just a year or two after my grandfather came over, so he didn’t come there, but 12 million folks did over the next 62 years. We spent a couple hours there, too long probably, the stories and pictures of people coming in.
They called it the isle of hope, isle of tears. It was pure hope for 98% of people coming through who were let in to America… but the brutal stories of the 2% sent home or hospitalized and then dying on the doorstep of America.
That was heavy...
But can you imagine the inspiration of traveling for days, a week or more, cruising into a beautiful harbor and seeing that welcoming you?
And reading those words, or at least hearing about them? “Hey… that’s me! I’m tired, I’m poor, we are huddled.”
The incredible promise of new life in a new country.
The Gospel of the Kingdom
The Gospel of the Kingdom
Well here comes Jesus
23 And he went throughout all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom and healing every disease and every affliction among the people.
24 So his fame spread throughout all Syria, and they brought him all the sick, those afflicted with various diseases and pains, those oppressed by demons, those having seizures, and paralytics, and he healed them.
25 And great crowds followed him from Galilee and the Decapolis, and from Jerusalem and Judea, and from beyond the Jordan.
1 Seeing the crowds, he went up on the mountain, and when he sat down, his disciples came to him.
So he had this great crowd. And he climbed up a hill. “Mountain” here in the ESV is a bit much. “Mountain” has me picturing a dude hundreds of feet up yelling words you can barely make out.”
“Mount” is better, and so we say “Sermon on the Mount.” Good name.
He is not away from the people, he is right among the people, his disciples crowding up to him, but his voice carries literally over their heads so they can hear it.
This is a picture I took from the hill that the “Church of the Beatitudes” is on.Near Capernaum, above the lake. Tradition says this is the spot. The Eucalyptus tree almost certainly wasn’t there, though that would be cool.
So we have the breeze coming over the lake, the people gathering in to hear the words of life from the master of life.
2 And he opened his mouth and taught them, saying:
What’s he going to say????
3 “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Ooooooooooooh. Oh. What does that mean????
But… you already have well formed ideas about what that means, don’t you?
Poor in Spirit -
Poor in Spirit -
When Pastor Rod first came to the Denver area in 1999 and became the pastor of this church, you know what his first sermon series was? Sermon on the Mount.
I know that because, as I emailed y’all, 12 years later, in 2011 he revisited that same sermon series. Because the Sermon on the Mount is important, this is Jesus, the Master of Life teaching us.
And in his first sermon of 2011 he mentions his earlier sermon series almost 12 years prior to that in 1999. That was before I moved to Denver, so I wasn’t here for that. But some of you were.
And, this is just a cool God’s timing thing. I had no idea of that timing when God laid it on my heart over the last few years to do a series through Matthew, focusing especially on the Sermon on the Mount… and that the “fullness of time” ended up being this year.
Because 2011 was how many years ago? 12. So apparently, God has scheduled us to hear from Jesus on the Mount every 12 years! How cool is that!!!
There is a thing Pastor Rod says over and over in his sermon series on the Sermon on the Mount.
The Beatitudes are the norms, values, conditions and expectations of citizens of the Kingdom.
The Beatitudes are qualities of character that God expects for those who are citizens of the Kingdom of Heaven. And He says what the reward is who would have that quality of character.
Citizenship in the Kingdom of Heaven is for those of us who understand how poor in spirit we are - how utterly sinful we are as compared to God.
-Pastor Rod Henry
God creates out of nothing. Therefore until a man is nothing God can make nothing out of him.
Martin Luther
That’s good, isn’t it? And it’s true, there is great and profound truth in there!
3 “You’re blessed when you’re at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God and his rule.
I believe this is a very true thing… and many of you know I so often love the Eugene Peterson’s translation. There is a long and beautiful tradition in the Beatitudes of hearing the blessing part… and God is blessing these people… and then looking back at the first part thinking “there must be a reason that God is blessing these people.”
Searching for a “meritorious condition.” As in “what could possibly be good about being poor in spirit.”
And that tradition is SO rich, that you and I hear “poor in spirit” and we automatically translate it to mean something good, don’t we?
Poor in Spirit = Humble.
And we can find a THOUSAND texts about being humble, humble before others, humble before God. My favorite, Philippians 2, be humble-minded, considering others better than yourselves, be like Jesus, he was God and he humbled himself to be like us, serve us, die for us.
So EVERYTHING about this interpretation of Jesus lands in a true place. And I have been incredibly and deeply blessed by many sermons taking this perspective, God has brought His Living Word alive in me in this way.
But I’m going to do something a bit crazy in this sermon. I’m going to disagree with the more common interpretation of this passage and try on something else. Towards the end of Pastor Rod’s sermon series I actually got to talk about this with him for awhile.
He used one of his favorite lines, “I don’t know that I get it all, in fact I don’t get it all. But what I get… I like.”
Is Jesus giving a list of “conditions and expectations for the Kingdom?”
That said… I don’t think this is what Jesus meant and what his original listeners heard.
There are many ways to say “humble” in Scripture. This isn’t one of them. This word means:
Poor.
Needy. Worthless, miserable, shabby, desitute. Broke.
Broke in “Pneuma.” Spirit. Not “humble minded” or “humble in attitude” like in Philippians, or in Wisdom literature like Proverbs.
In fact, in the parallel in Luke, I think a different sermon, but Jesus is hitting these same notes, he skips the “spiritual” part and just says “Blessed are the broke.”
20 And he lifted up his eyes on his disciples, and said: “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.
Same word.
It isn’t a good thing. Being broke isn’t a good thing. It isn’t easy. It isn’t meritorious. Are all poor people good people? Nope.
What about being broke spiritually? Spiritually bankrupt?
Some of the folks in his audience actually have some spiritual wealth. The history of the Jewish people and God is actually full of ways to be blessed with spiritual wealth and abundance. Trips to the temple to worship, Psalms, prayers, sacrifices, knowledge of the Scriptures. What a GIFT, a spiritual gift they had available to them.
Jesus could point behind him to the synagogue where they could gather three times a week at least and here the Word of God. Spiritual resources, wealth, available to them. The weekly Sabbath, a spiritual gift available to them every week.
And there are those among the crowd who have drunk deep, filled themselves with as much of that wealth as they could get. What did Jesus call them? Scribes and Pharisees. (v 20). That isn’t an epithet. Those are the ones among them everyone acknowledged as spiritually wealthy.
And they are.
And it doesn’t preclude them from the Kingdom of God.
Is Jesus saying “Be humble and you’ll get into the Kingdom of God.” Is that how you get in? What about humble atheists? How about the Buddhist that spends all day contemplating and embracing his “spiritual poverty” as we are used to thinking about it?
They are indeed “spiritually bankrupt.” Broke. Is God blessing them because of their spiritual poverty?
NO!
They are blessed despite their spiritual broke-ness. What is Jesus’ message?
Two verses we should have memorized from Matthew 4.
Repent, the kingdom of God is “at hand” or “here.”
17 From that time Jesus began to preach, saying, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”
23 And he went throughout all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom and healing every disease and every affliction among the people.
So in his crowd are people who literally just experienced the Kingdom of God, the good news made real in their actual life. And they are looking at and hearing from the King of the Kingdom of God.
So he turns and points to a man in the crowd.
One who has never been to synagogue. Or only goes on Easter and Christmas… even though he doesn’t know what those are yet.
One who couldn’t quote a Bible verse to save their life
One who “doesn’t really get the whole God thing”
One who is “spiritual but not religious”
One who has chased after anything but God their whole life
One who is so wounded and angry at God they can’t hear anything religious without feeling physically ill...
But they are there… and maybe they just got healed, or their Mom did. Or they just had demons, spiritual affliction and oppression… and they are hearing and thinking and feeling clearly for the first time in years.
And here is the King, God Himself and if they don’t know it yet, they know something… And he says. “GOOD NEWS!!! You, yeah you, the spiritually bankrupt one. The Kingdom of God is yours!”
Bwah!!!????
Then he proceeds down the front row of his audience. And we will hit more of these in future weeks. The merciful, yes, you get the Kingdom. The mourners, yes you get the Kingdom and comfort in it. The meek, yup, you to.
That isn’t why they are blessed. Is that how you get “the Kingdom?” By being poor in spirit?
Nope. You get in the Kingdom if the King says you are in. By faith alone, by grace alone, by Christ alone. They get the Kingdom because Jesus says they get the Kingdom… despite their unworthy condition. Despite their spiritual broke-ness.
Jesus’ Oprah Moment
Jesus’ Oprah Moment
Jesus is introducing his big theme. Getting their attention. You know what helps? Some shock value. Say something provocative.
This is his Oprah moment.
“You get a car, you get a car, everyone in this studio audience gets a car!!!”
“You get the Kingdom, you get the Kingdom, everyone in this moment has the RADICAL new opportunity to be fully a part of, present in the Kingdom of God. You get full citizenship, full BLESSING of it!”
It’s just like the “Statue of Liberty”
It’s just like the “Statue of Liberty”
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-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!
It isn’t good news that they are “tired, poor, huddled masses.”
It is “Good news, you are in a new country, a new way of living, new opportunities.”
Whether or not America fully lives up to that promise, Jesus does. The Kingdom does. E’ry time!
How Then Do We Live?
How Then Do We Live?
There is a danger in reading the beatitudes as “meritorious and desirable conditions.” The danger is that they become a new legalism, a series of steps you have to take to be a citizen of the Kingdom. And what if you aren’t all of them? Or they could be shortcuts, if you are one of them, you’re good. Some cults take this view and go and get persecuted on purpose. Boom, just earned the kingdom of heaven. Nope!
There is nothing for you to “do” here.
Jesus is announcing good news to them and good news to you.
Receive the good news.
Are you spiritually bankrupt? Broke? You’re in the right place.
And far from a thing to pursue, I hope if you’ve been following Jesus for any length of time, you aren’t spiritually broke anymore. You have deposited many of God’s blessings and your spiritual treasury is growing. Not to inflate your ego, you know it’s by the grace of God, the gift of God, but you can see the riches of His blessing, the fruit of the Spirit breaking out in you, treasures of heaven in the here and now.
Do you then lose the blessing of the Kingdom? No! That is part of the outpouring of the Blessing of the King! Congrats! Blessings!
As Jesus enriches his disciples with spiritual blessings of every kind, as He brings them out of “spiritual poverty” what does he tell them to do?
Go and proclaim the good news of the Kingdom. Not “go and pretend to be spiritually poor still...” Go and tell others who might be spiritually broke the good news. Theirs is the Kingdom!
Proclaim the good news.
Do you have any “spiritually broke” friends? They don’t get God… or they do their own thing… or they just aren’t interested and never have been.
Or they wish they could be good but they know that they’re not “one of the good ones.”
Or they pretend to be “good” or “nice”… and only they know they are living a lie before all.
They think Jesus isn’t for them.
But you are sitting on some GOOD NEWS!
The Kingdom of God is theirs.
If it could be yours when you were spiritually broke or broken… and we all were… well it can be theirs too.
Hallelujah! Good news! The gospel of the Kingdom.
We were broken vessels. Spiritually broken. Fundamentally broken. He welcomes us into the Kingdom, fixes us and restores us, fills us with spiritual treasure beyond every expectation. Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me.
Communion
Communion
On that day, on that mount, Jesus announces that the unworthy are welcome in the Kingdom of God. They didn’t know the price of entry.
Much like the immigrants coming to America, many of them went into indentured servanthood, temporary slavery, to the Captain of the ship they came in on. They couldn’t pay the price.
But, this is a beautiful thing. Some established immigrants would go down to the docks and find folks immigrating from their homeland, even folks they didn’t know before. And they would pay their debt so they could enter new life free and clear.
Jesus is, at the start, the only member of the Kingdom of God. But one by one he welcomes us into the Kingdom. And for absolutely every immigrant to the Kingdom… he pays the price of our entry.
“Take it; this is my body, broken for you.”
“This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many.”
Welcome to the Kingdom of God.