“Now when he (Jesus) saw the crowds, he went up on a mountainside and sat down. His disciples came to Him, and he began to teach them, saying….”
Matthew. 5:1-2
I’ve been studying Jesus’ sermon on the mount again and I am struck by the simplicity of the Gospel Jesus preached. We have this great commandment before the Lord to love him with all our hearts and others even as we have been loved, my paraphrase. Our lives revolve around these two primary relationships, God (fully Father, son, Holy Spirit) and people.
Jesus comes to instruct and realign understandings about these relationships. His sermon on the mount provides us with a standard for our own time. If we followed His instructions, how different many of our relationships would be. As we follow them, we experience the fullness God has intended about being one; one with Him and one with each other. It is in the walking out that we find hearts exposed and opportunities to choose life.
Before we begin at the sermon, I would like to make note of Matthew. 4:17 as Jesus begins his ministry, “from that time Jesus began to preach, ‘repent for the kingdom of heaven is near.”
Following the death of John the Baptist, Jesus continues with Johns’ message. The word ‘preach’ is Kerussein from the Greek and is a word for a heralds proclaimation from a king. Keris in the Greek is herald and the herald was the man who brought the message from the King. Jesus as the herald, herald the message‘’repent’, turn from your own ways, and turn to God. It was this man and his message which drew the first disciples to Jesus.
This then is the beginning of that sermon, as Jesus takes his place to teach his disciples.
Within this very word ‘disciple’, we find our word discipline. Every disciple must discipline himself in the study and practice of his masters words. The crowds were hearers who ultimately separated at words which were to hard to hear, John 6:66. Israel at the mount of Sinai, experienced the same dynamic as recorded in Exodus 20:20.
Our Fathers plan is for us individually as well as corporately is to be discipled and disciplined by the Father of Spirit’s unto life. It is left up to us whether we will eat what he feeds us.
Jesus begins with ‘blessings’ that are found within this Kingdom He has come to demonstrate and establish. William Barclay’s Daily Study Bible on Matthew highlights some great thoughts on the word Blessed. First he notes,”the common expression from the Aramaic and Hebrew would read O the blessedness of…making them exclamations!!! The word itself “makarios” describes a joy which has its secret within itself. A joy that is serene and untouchable and self contained, independent of all the chances and changes of life.’
It is the joy Jesus proclaims in John 16:22 which no man can take from us. We could liken it to that state of joy unspeakable and full of glory which Peter wrote about in his first epistle.
Elliott's commentary notes —‘The word (blessed) differs from that used in Matthew 23:39; Matthew 25:34, as expressing a permanent state of felicity, rather than the passive reception of a blessing bestowed by another.’
Jesus tells us this blessed state where joy is to be found is never in the externals, but only in His kingdom, which is rather a mystical concept to those who are looking for a earthly King to save them from the oppression and tyranny of the now Roman Government.
We know now, from Paul’s writings Romans 14:17-18…..
“The kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Ghost because anyone who serves Christ in this way is pleasing to God and approved by men”…..
….but then, they were first learning new and different thoughts that had to be embraced as a disciple.
While our natural man looks for happenings to make us happy, Jesus defines nine conditions of this blessed state which imply a spiritual condition in a natural state; a synopsis of what our spiritual endeavours will produce. A defined pursuit of this character enables one to find the blessedness of life in His Kingdom in relationship with Him.
Jesus sets in order first. At the beginning of his discipleship training he deals with first things first. Disciples must hold a heart and pursuit for Him and His kingdom.
It is within this foundation laid Jesus now begins to address our relationships with one another.
To be continued…