Category: Sermon on the Mount

The Sermon on the Mount (Part 8)

“You are the light of the world.  A city set on a hill cannot be hidden.  Nor do men light a lamp, and put it under a basket, but on the lampstand; and it gives light to all who are in the house” (Matthew 5:14-15).

Light and darkness is a huge theme in the teachings of Jesus and the letters of the apostles.  Light equates with life.  And walking in the light is experiencing the life of Christ, His life in us.

Darkness represents being lost.  Lost without Christ.  Walking in darkness is missing the light and life of Christ inside because it was never there.  Darkness equates with spiritual death.

“In Him [Jesus] was life; and the life was the light of men.  And the light shines in the darkness; and the darkness did not comprehend it” (John 1:4-5).  Jesus’ promise in the Sermon on the Mount is that some will “comprehend it” and literally become “the light of the world.”

Later in the gospels, Jesus identifies Himself as the light of the world.  “Jesus spoke to them saying, ‘I am the light of the world; he who follows Me shall not walk in the darkness, but shall have the light of life’ “ (John 8:12).  And we who believe have become His sons, sons of light.  “Jesus said to them, ‘For a little while longer the light is among you … While you have the light, believe in the light, in order that you may become sons of light’ “ (John 12:35-36).

In Matthew chapter 5, Jesus is looking ahead to a day when we will be more than light followers.  He is announcing that a time is coming when those who believe in Him, the Light of the world, will literally become lights themselves.  How can we and Jesus both be the “light of the world?”

This can only happen when all distance and separation that once existed between us and Jesus is taken away.  And that separation ended at the cross.  It became real in you and I when we believed the gospel message of Jesus Christ.  When you believed, the light of the world became the light inside you.  You are more than a light bearer, a light reflector, a light follower.  By virtue of Christ in you, you ARE the light of the world!

And God’s design is for His light that dwells in you to be on display in the world.  Your light belongs on a lampstand where it can “give light to all who are in the house.”  There is no pride in taking your place on the lampstand, because the light inside you is a pure gift of God’s grace.  You did not become the light by your talent, ingenuity, good works, smarts, or whatever.  The light came to you because Christ paid the price for your sin, rescued you out of the darkness, and filled your insides with light the minute you believed.

“For God, who said, ‘Light shall shine out of darkness,’ is the One who has shown in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ” (II Corinthians 4:6).  Shine on, my friend.  May the world see the glory of God shining forth from your pure heart.  And may the world see the face of Christ in your countenance today!

The Sermon on the Mount (Part 7)

“Blessed are those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:10).  We often see this verse as being persecuted for being a Christian or being persecuted for living a righteous life.  And this could very well be Jesus’ point.  But I wonder if there could be another angle to this verse based on the word “righteousness”.

At the heart of the gospel message is the proclamation that you and I are made 100% righteous when we believe the gospel message of Jesus Christ.  “God made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” (II Corinthians 5:21).  “But by His doing you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification, and redemption” (I Corinthians 1:30).  “For as through one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, even so through the obedience of the One the many will be made righteous” (Romans 5:19).

That we have been declared righteous in the here and now by faith in Jesus is settled fact in the New Testament.  But that message is not always well-received even in the church.  It was happening in the apostle Paul’s day and is still with us today.

In Acts chapter 13, the apostle Paul launched into a powerful sermon that concluded with this promise, “Therefore let it be known to you, brethren, that through this Man [Jesus Christ] is preached to you the forgiveness of sins; and by Him everyone who believes is justified from all things from which you could not be justified by the law of Moses” (Acts 13:38-39).  The gist of Paul’s message?  You are justified, declared righteous, by believing in Jesus.

While many hearers rejoiced at this gospel message, the end of the story is a familiar one.  “But the Jews stirred up the devout and prominent women and the chief men of the city, raised up persecution against Paul and Barnabas, and expelled them from their region” (Acts 13:50).  This is a common theme in the book of Acts.  Paul faced persecution many times for proclaiming that the forgiveness of sins and being declared righteous was fully found through faith in Christ, apart from the Law.

Paul came back to this idea of being persecuted for his message of righteousness in this allegory from Galatians chapter 4.  “But the son [Ishmael] of the bondwoman [Hagar] was born according to the flesh, and the son [Isaac] of the free woman [Sarah] through the promise.  This contains an allegory: for these women are two covenants” (Galatians 4:23-24).  Paul goes on to explain that Hagar and Ishmael are a picture of the old covenant or the Law, and Sarah and Isaac represent the promise of the new covenant of grace.

Look now at Paul’s conclusion to the story.  “But as at that time, he who was born according to the flesh [Ishmael] persecuted him who was born according to the Spirit [Isaac], so it is now also!” (Galatians 4:29).  Did you catch the “so it is now also!”?  Paul is saying that those who see a need for a continued connection to the Law are persecuting grace teachers like Paul.

But what about today?  Is this still true?  I am afraid it is.  The law keepers are still persecuting the grace teachers.  Law keepers give an intellectual assent to grace.  They see grace as one part of the gospel.  But the message of the New Testament is that grace in the ONLY gospel.  And I say with sadness that friends of mine have lost their ministry position because of preaching too much of a grace emphasis.

I believe it is possible that Matthew 5:10, “Blessed are those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven,” may be a prophecy regarding those who are persecuted for proclaiming a message of righteousness, proclaiming a message of grace.  If so, it was being fulfilled in Paul’s day, and it is still with us today.

The Sermon on the Mount (Part 6)

“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God” (Matthew 5:9).  At the risk of being repetitive, just like our previous verse there is no progression of being a son or non-son of God depending on how well we are practicing our peacemaking.  A person is either a child of God or not a child of God.  It really is that simple.  If you have believed the gospel message of Jesus Christ, you are a child of God.

So thinking about this verse, we have another promise that is looking forward.  See it in the kingdom context of Jesus’ message.  We enter the kingdom through the new birth.  Through the new birth, we become a child of God.  So “sons of God” to use the phrase from Matthew 5:9 is who the new covenant believers will be.  Remember, when Jesus spoke these words prior to the cross, there were no “sons of God” in the new covenant sense.

The disciples were just as it sounds; followers of the Rabbi Jesus, learning from Him.  They were not “saved” at this point as we understand salvation.  They were merely learners, students.  Later, after the cross, His disciples now filled with the Holy Spirit began to be called believers or Christians.  They were literally sons of God.  And they became peacemakers.

The apostles and those of us who followed them in the faith are peacemakers because we carry the light of peace within us.  We carry the peace that Jesus promised to us.  “Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you” (John 14:27).

We are peacemakers because we carry the fruit of the Spirit in us.  And one of His fruits is peace.  Does our making for peace always shine through?  No, we can diminish our fruit bearing by our own foolish or sinful choices.  But the fruit is in there.  The peace is in there.

And peacemaking is part of our new mission as Christ’s ambassadors.  “Now all these things are from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation, namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed to us the word of reconciliation.  Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making an appeal through us; we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God” (II Corinthians 5:18-20)

Being reconciled to God is being at peace with God.  We become at peace with God through faith in Christ.  “Therefore having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 5:1).  “For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:26).

We have come full circle to “sons of God”, the same sonship that is promised to us in Matthew 5:9.  We became sons through faith in Christ Jesus.  Should we be peacemakers?  Yes, it is part and parcel of who we are as sons of God.  And living out this peaceful fruit of the Spirit will help those around us recognize us as sons of God.

The Sermon on the Mount (Part 5)

“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God” (Matthew 5:8).  Are you pure in heart?  Because of how we hear this verse through condemning ears, we might answer, “It depends on the day.  Some days my heart is kind of pure.  Some days it is awfully dirty.  But even on my best days, I wouldn’t say it is completely pure.  That sounds a bit prideful.”

These thoughts are complicated by preaching that incorrectly hold up these words in Jeremiah as the current description of your heart.  “The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked; who can know it?” (Jeremiah 17:9).  This is describing your old heart, a heart that left the scene when you believed the gospel.

The pure heart is not a goal to strive for.  It is a promise to claim.  A promise to believe.  A promise to celebrate.  Look at the back end of this promise, “for they shall see God.”  There is absolutely only one way this promise can come true.  Only those with a 100% pure heart will see God.  And this 100% pure heart came to us at our one-time belief in the gospel message of Jesus Christ; His death as our substitute in our place on the cross to take away our sin.

There is no ongoing aspect to this verse.  No in and out of a pure heart.  It is a prophetic statement by Jesus of the pure heart that is coming when we trust Him for salvation.  Our heart is now pure, not by works of righteousness but by the regeneration of the Spirit.  “He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior” (Titus 3:5-6).

“For by one offering He has perfected for all time those who are sanctified” (Hebrews 10:14).  He gave you a new heart that is perfect.  Don’t let “perfect” scare you.  We are not perfect in our thoughts or actions.  But our heart is perfect and clean.  “Let us draw near with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water” (Hebrews 10:22).  Regarding the Gentiles, Peter said, “and God made no distinction between us and them, cleansing their hearts by faith” (Acts 15:9).

So once again, I believe this Beatitude of Jesus is a prophetic word about life in the kingdom of God that Jesus came to usher in.  His promise of a pure heart is for those who will believe in His gospel message.  It is not a plea to constantly check and evaluate the purity of our heart.  It is already clean.  And those who believe, those with a pure heart received freely by grace, can rely on the promise that they will see God.

The Sermon on the Mount (Part 4)

“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied” (Matthew 5:6).  This is my favorite promise of the Beatitudes.  But again, we often get this turned around in our preaching when we put the burden on us to “keep” this promise.  Let me explain.

We often come to Matthew 5:6 with this mindset.  What is your level of “hunger and thirst” for righteousness?  How serious are you about living a righteous life?  I have even heard a radio preacher question our salvation if we are not feeling the “hunger” for righteousness.  This completely flips the promise around and puts the shame on us if we are not hungry enough.  How much hunger is enough?

At the risk of sounding crass, my “hunger and thirst” is now zero.  It has been completely satisfied in Jesus.  In the incredible great exchange, “God made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” (II Corinthians 5:21).  When you believed the gospel message, you became filled to the full with the righteousness of God.  There is no pride in this.  You had nothing to do with this level of full to overflowing.  It is a complete gift of God’s grace.

Do you see how this Beatitude is looking forward?  When Jesus spoke this promise, its fulfillment was still in the future.  It is pointing ahead to the day when through Christ’s death and resurrection the great exchange of our sin for His righteousness would be made available to us.  Jesus foretold this day would come in the gospel of John as well.

“Jesus said to them, ‘I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me shall not hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst’ ” (John 6:35).  And again in John chapter 7, “Now on the last day, the great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, ‘If any man is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink.  He who believes in Me, as the Scripture said, “From his innermost being shall flow rivers of living water.” ‘  By this He spoke of the Spirit, whom those who believed in Him were to receive; for the Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified” (John 7:37-39).

Notice the requirement for experiencing the river’s flow in John 7 is the same as the prerequisite for never thirst in John 6; believe in Jesus Christ.  That is it.  To experience the promise of never thirsting is only contingent on being a believer; embracing the gospel message of Jesus Christ.  There is no continuing or further requirement.  No level of spirituality.  No keeping a New Testament version of the law.  No expression of still being hungry or thirsty.  Only believe.

How does Jesus keep the never thirst promise?  By filling us with His Holy Spirit (John 7:39).  And this filling is not stagnant.  It is to play itself out every day as we experience the supernatural Christian life.  The Greek word for “rivers” in John 7:38 is often translated floods or torrents.  The Spirit is a rushing river of the all-sufficient power of the risen Christ.  Our role is not to strive to find the river, our role is to open the floodgates and allow the river – already rushing within us by the promise of Jesus – to flow out into our daily experience.

The word “never” is a powerful word.  I try not to use it very often.  The word “never” doesn’t allow for loopholes.  Yet, in John 6, Jesus makes the incredible promise that “he who believes in Me shall never thirst.”  It is a promise only Jesus can keep.  And it is a promise first delivered to us in Matthew 5:6, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.”  In Jesus, your hunger and thirst are fully satisfied!