The Character of Kingdom Citizens (part 2)

Illustrate: The posted speed limit is 55 mph and you are running 70 mph. You are breaking the law and if you are pulled over, your rightful judgment is a speeding ticket. If the officer gives you a warning ticket, you have just received mercy.

Argument: Believers have been redeemed from the slave market of sin by the mercy of God. We deserve the sentence of Hell for our rebellious spirit, but God, in His infinite mercy withholds the righteous sentence of Hell. God grants us mercy.

As those who have received mercy, we are called to extend it to others. Being merciful involves being compassionate for those who are in some type of need that is most likely a result of a mistake or error in judgment.

Example: clients at the Food Pantry. Some of the food-challenged are clients due to poor money management and / or sketchy life decisions (addictive behaviors). Do all of the clients deserve the gift of compassion in the form of free food?

Application: KC’s are merciful to others. Not to try to gain God’s favor, but because He has already extended His favor to us; we are blessed and we are called to be a blessing to others.

Believers are morally pure (Matt. 5:8)

Explanation: Jesus declares that those who are pure in a moral sense are the ones who are blessed, and the eventual reward for this group is that they will see God.

The Psalmist addressed this concern when he asked, “who shall ascend into the Hill of the LORD? Or who shall stand in His holy place?

He that hath clean hands and a pure heart; who hath not lifted up his soul unto vanity, nor sworn deceitfully (Ps 24:4)

Illustrate:: Purity is the quality of being free from contaminants or additives. In its natural form, gold has dross mixed with it. The refining process removes the dross and pure gold is the product. The chaff is separated from the wheat to gain a pure product.

Argument: Sinful man is incapable of morally cleansing himself in a way that meets the approval of a holy God. Only God can bring about this result.

The psalmist understood this when he declared: “He brought me up also out of an horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings.” (Ps 40:2)

When God reaches down and pulls us out of the cesspool of sin, He gives us a new heart, one that is pure with a single focus. This is the person Jesus is describing in Matt. 5:8 - the pure in heart are the ones with the single focus of pleasing God. A pure heart is an undivided heart in terms of loyalty. Believers are IN the world, but not OF the world - we live with a singular focus of pleasing the Master who delivered us from sin

Application: Do you have an undivided heart with the purpose of living for God instead of the world? Are you pursuing personal holiness in your life? This is not about doing better or trying harder, but intentionally pursuing holiness because it is your nature to do so as one who has been blessed of God (1 John 3:3)

KC’s are peacemakers (Matt 5:9)

Explanation: Citizens of the Kingdom are described as those who are actively seeking to bring about peace in the various situations of life that surround us. Jesus does grant believers inner peace, but the context of this statement lends itself to an understanding of being an agent of peace in situations of conflict.

Our model for this is God Himself. We are told that He initiated the reconciliation between Himself and sinful humans (Col 1:20; 2 Cor 5:18-19). Note v. 19 that informs that believers have been given the ministry of reconciliation. This does not mean that we have the power to save anyone - we do not. We do, however, have the ability to act as peacemakers by proclaiming the Gospel of Christ into arenas of conflict

Reflection Questions:

Do you believe you (YOU personally - not some generic believer) can make a difference?

Do you think you should get involved? It is easier to believe that it is simply not our business.

Are you fearful of the consequences? Possibly making it worse or being taken to task for interference.

This last can lead to the next beatitude:

KC’s will be persecuted for righteous living (Matt 5:10-12)

Explanation: Jesus reveals the natural consequence for Kingdom Citizens who remain in this fallen world. He tells those who are listening (and this includes us) that His followers will be persecuted. He includes this social component as part of being blessed!

Along with the first Beatitude (Blessed are the poor in spirit), Jesus places this last one about persecution in the present tense. The others are all worded with the future tense of shall (“shall be comforted;” “shall inherit the earth”). Along with being poor in spirit, the persecuted have the reward of being IN the Kingdom in the present. This is going on NOW. The emphasis leads us to understand that persecution by the world is the natural condition for followers of Jesus.

Argument: Even though most modern believers are not familiar with the past, Church History demonstrates that this has been the norm. The first 300 hundred years of the Church saw Christ-followers imprisoned, beaten, businesses destroyed and lives taken as they stood for the Truth of the Kingdom. From the world’s perspective, they were divisive and uncooperative, and needed to be silenced. From God’s perspective, they were Blessed saints who were living as pilgrims with a single focus (pure in heart) to please the King.

Conclusion:

Jesus adds to this final beatitude. In addition to the third person statement (Blessed are those …) Jesus personalizes it and says “Blessed are you . . .” He then gives us our expected response to this suffering for His Name: we are to rejoice and be glad. This does not make any sense in worldly terms. How is it possible to have joy when we are being imprisoned, beaten, facing job loss, or death?

John Stott tells us how NOT to respond to Christian persecution: “We are not to retaliate like an unbeliever, nor to sulk like a child, nor to lick our wounds in self-pity like a dog, nor just to grin and bear it like a Stoic, still less to pretend we enjoy it like a masochist. . . If we are persecuted today, we belong to a noble succession. But the major reason why we should rejoice is because we are suffering, he said, on my account (v 11), on account of our loyalty to him and to his standards of truth and righteousness.” [John R. W. Stott, The Message of the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7): p, 52.]

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