This is the first in our new series on our Lord’s sermon on the mount. I will be giving a summary and overview of this sermon this evening. The text of Jesus’ sermon is found in just three chapters of Matthew’s Gospel starting from chapter 5. You could read it in just ten minutes, but it could take you ten years, even a lifetime to inwardly digest and fully comprehend.
Some people have called it a Christian manifesto, our political dogma; but to view it this way I believe would be a mistake. Jesus is not laying down a sermon for persuading people to follow him or to join his party. Our Lord’s purpose here is not Evangelism or gaining followers; it is not primarily intended for non-Christian ears. It is for those who are already born again, for those who have already accepted the Lordship of Jesus Christ.
Some parts of the sermon may be attractive to those who would not call themselves Christians. However understanding and accepting the challenges of the sermon cannot be done without first believing. First you must believe that it is true. Second you must believe that God’s ways are the best ways. And thirdly you must trust that God, who began that work of faith in your hearts, can provide all the grace and power that you will need to live a transformed life.
Today, in our media driven, rich, western world we can live a life that is far away from God’s ideal way and never really understand that we are doing anything wrong. If everything you see, everything you read, everything you hear tells you to follow that way of the world, that wide broad path. ‘Just go with the flow, follow the crowd, just do what you see others doing, if others get away with it so can you’.
But let me ask you this question: what is the meaning and purpose of your life? Is there any higher calling on your life, does God have a plan for you? Or does God want you to just follow the crowd? Do you even know what God wants from you? As a believer, a follower of Jesus, a person who is born again by the Holy Spirit of God, I hope that you understand, at least in part, that God has a path, a way for you that is not the same as the world’s way. It is a narrow way, a completely different way to that obvious and wide way of our culture and country.
This is the message of the Sermon of Jesus. We have God’s way on the right and the way of the world on the left; which path do you follow? However, the problem is that we live in this world, we are born in this world, we are immersed in this world and all the messages we hear are from this world. We have been shaped, by this world, into thinking and living a certain way.
The message of our Lord Jesus, is so radical, so alien to our natural thinking, so challenging to our way of life that our response can be either to reject it outright, or to try and ignore it. But know this that way leads to spiritual death. Ignoring or rejecting the ways of God leads to spiritual death.
We must, must embrace the purposes of God. We must seek first His will, His ways, His purposes and plans; we must first seek His Kingdom and His right way of living if we are to be fully and truly His followers.
The sermon deals with many themes, but I shall focus on just three: first a Christian’s character, second a Christian’s right way of living, and third a Christian’s resources.
1. A Christian’s character, Matt 5:1-16
These first sixteen verses of Jesus are well known, but little understood. Blessed are you poor…., Blessed are you meek … etc. Some people can read these verses as if Jesus was some kind of benevolent but ineffectual preacher; a preacher who was just trying to give some over-simplified and worthless drivel to his followers. No, no, this is not Jesus, let us get our thinking caps on, and open up our hearts to receive the challenges and truths that Jesus is putting before us.
But Jesus is saying something at the beginning of his sermon that is the bedrock of His Gospel message. A Christian’s actions, what they say, what Christians do, the way they live life starts with character. If underlying a Christian there is the right stuff, a true and right character within, then everything good starts from there.
And what is this right stuff within? Well it is honesty, humility and a hunger to live life the right way. It is not self-deception, not pretending inside that you are something that you are not. It is not saying one thing and thinking another, not saying one thing and doing another. It’s being sincere, first and foremost to yourself and to God. It is being undivided within, being whole. There should be no hypocrisy or self-delusion. Know that you have placed yourself in God’s hands; all that you were, all that you are, and all that you will be. God has us in his grasp. When we seek to purify our interior life, with true honesty and humility, God is happy with us and we will be happy in Him.
If this internal character is true then it must be shown in our outward life and in our concerns for others. The great challenge of the Jesus is not just for your inner life, it is for the whole of your life. There should be no division, no difference between what we think and what we do. So God’s light that is inside will shine in our dealings with others. Jesus says we should be like light and salt. Our light should illuminate the good in our country and our saltiness should seek to preserve the good in our communities. Our politics flow from our character.
In case you are getting worried that you are not living up to the mark, let me ask you this: when we fail to live up to the challenge of God do you know what God does? He shows us mercy and forgiveness. When we show ourselves to be imperfect God gives us an example, He shows us His lovingkindness; He always allows us to say sorry and return to the right way. Because God keeps on giving us chance after chance after chance we should be willing give people another chance: forgiving all wrongs done to us.
Jesus has shown us how we can be at peace inside; we should seek to bring peace to people who are not at peace. We are called by God to be peacemakers, reconcilers, bridge-builders, repairs of broken relationships and lives.
Unfortunately, even our best efforts at peacemaking can fail. Sometimes it is like swimming against the tide, it’s like running uphill or it’s like sailing directly into wind. Jesus reminds us that there will be opposition, and troubles, and maltreatment because we are trying to bring light and peace into a world that is seeking to go its own way. Christianity is not a soft or easy option, it is not for the faint hearted or weak willed. Jesus says it is a narrow way that few find.
2. A Christian’s right way of living: Matt 5:17-5:48
The problem with some religious people is that they have given the impression that faith is first and foremost about obeying the rules of religion. Conforming to these rules, at least in the eyes of other religious people, is the most important thing. If you want to be well regarded by your brethren you must show you are sticking to these rules.
At the time when Jesus was preaching, the religious people, the Scribes and the Pharisees were like this. However, the rules that they were trying to follow were a fusion of eccentric traditions and various historical interpretations of God’s law. They thought they were obeying God’s law but they had completely misunderstood the spirit of God’s Law.
So when Jesus preached you might have thought He would just say “this law stuff, it’s a bit of a problem, we need to scrap it and start again” but Jesus didn’t. God never makes mistakes and God’s law is no mistake, not one dot or comma was to be replaced. Jesus, showed that only when your heart is right, your inner attitudes and character are right, that you understand the purpose of God’s law.
The law was originally given as a blue print for right living. Jesus, say plainly, look lets go back to the beginning. You must understand the true intension of God. The whole of the law can be summarised by one word, Love. We should 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. And Love your neighbor as yourself.' [1]
Jesus goes on to talk about real applications of the law of God. He considers the problem of anger, lust, divorce, lying, and the difficulties of building relationships and peace. I cannot cover all these today; I encourage you to read them for yourselves. But I want to talk about few briefly.
Jesus starts with the commandment ‘thou shall not kill’ I think we can all pretty much agree with this one, but then Jesus goes on look at the spirit behind this law. Murder stems from an angry heart; and it is the things that are in your heart that are just as important as the things that you do.
Listen to Jesus ‘22But I tell you that anyone who is angry with his brother will be subject to judgment. … But anyone who says, 'You fool!' will be in danger of the fire of hell’[2]. Anger at other people so damaging to relationships, it destroys peace, that it’s a killer! It’s just like literal killing. If you think you can come before God and praise Him with anger in your heart think again. If you have had a falling out with someone especially in the Church go and sort it out. Be that merciful, kind, humble, honest peacemaker that God wants you to be. God doesn’t want isolated individuals to praise Him, He want reconciled families to praise Him.
Later on Jesus gives us the greatest challenge of the sermon, the ultimate expression and unique message of Christianity. Our gospel, our good new is the message of God’s love for us and we should show love for others, even those who we don’t like and who don’t like us. But the love that Jesus talks about is not some platitude; it is not the kind of ‘love’ that in practice looks like indifference or carefully masked hate! The kind of love that is expressed through gritted teeth. Jesus, is calling us to something quite different.
When you fall out with someone you know. They upset you, or offend you, or hurt you, or even come up to you and slap your face! I mean they literally slap your face. What do you do? What do you do if someone imposes on your good nature and tries to take advantage of you? What do you do if they just make up lies about you, and wind you up so much that any normal person would get really mad? What do you do? Jesus, what do I do, must a love them, surely not.
Jesus, says you love them. You take the insults, the hurt, the upset and love them back. You seek what is best for that person; you try to be kind and helpful, merciful and peaceful. When they slap your face you offer up your open face to be slapped again! No, no, Jesus, hang on a minute, surely that’s not right, that’s not fair. Surely that’s not possible. That person has been nasty and horrible to me.
Here we have the very heart of Christianity. We have a God who went to the cross, literally died for us; and why? Not because we are good, not because we are lovely, not because we are living lives that please God, No. We were enemies to God’s way of thinking and living, self motivated creatures. We were happy doing things our own way. There is nothing in what we say or do or think that made Jesus die for us. He sacrificed himself for us because of who He is, not because of anything good that we have done.
He chose the cross out of His love for us. Simply this, God saw a way of reconciliation, a way of bringing us back into His loving family and He recognised that the cost was great but He believe it was worth it. This is the message of Christianity, love sacrificially, love without counting the cost, love in response to that great love that Jesus has shown us.
3. A Christian’s resources. Matt 6:1-7:29
This way of living, this right way is not easy. It can be hard and difficult. At times it is opposed to our nature. So how can we who are imperfect attempt to show perfect, Godly love? Well Jesus gives us some answers to this question in the later part of His sermon.
Jesus says your resources are found in God, simply asking for help. Your resources are found in having the right way of thinking, simply not worrying about your needs but looking to God’s purposes. Your resources are found through good, firm foundations, simply doing what you know to be the will of God.
Jesus said we are resourced through true prayer, honest, humble simple prayer. Asking things of God and receiving; seeking out the will of God and finding it; knocking on that door of God’s and letting God open up that door in our hearts. Jesus says your heavenly father God will give you good things if you ask. In Luke’s account Jesus says God gives the Holy Spirit to those who ask. The indwelling spirit of God is our resource, our helper, our guide, our counsel, our prayerful wise comforter.
In this final section Jesus, asks us not to be worried about food, money, clothing, etc. Our needs are already known by God, and he has promised to provide what we need. We are to worry about the kingdom of God, perhaps worry is the wrong word here, we are to seek God’s will and plans first and foremost and God will provide all the rest. We are to transform our thinking and refocus our ambitions. We are to believe that heaven is calling us, that we have a future and a hope, and when all the things around us pass away, we shall remain in the arms of a God who loves us.
Epilogue
In conclusions, our Lords sermon on the mount is the heart, the centre of Christianity. It is for those who accept Jesus’ word and trust what he says. Jesus urges us to have the right Christian character, humble, trusting, honest, hungry for God, merciful to others, peaceful and peace making, patient in enduring hardship, light and salt to others, showing Godly love to everyone we encounter. Jesus urges us into right living, free from anger and malice, free from lustful hurting of others, free from lying and deception, ready to go the extra mile in forgiving, ready to lay aside all self ambitions and plans for the sake of showing sacrificial love, Godly love. And in the final section Jesus reminds us that our greatest resources our found in Him, our God shall supply our needs. If we can live life like this with solid firm foundations, wise foundations, we shall understand the calling of God for our lives. We shall know God as we are known by God. We shall understand the meaning and purpose of life.