Turn with me to Matthew 4 vs 23.
Over the past few weeks we've been looking at idea of the 'Kingdom' which is absolutely central to Jesus’ teaching and ministry.
You'll recall that after years of thought and preparation, his first words in ministry were– “The time has come! The Kingdom of God is at hand! Change your minds (repent) and believe the good news”.
Jesus came not just to announce but to embody the Kingdom and he did so in a difficult context because his country was under occupation by Rome. A couple of weeks ago we looked at the four typical responses of the day to Roman occupation: (SLIDE)
Armed Struggle – Zealots
Compromise – Herodians
The Way of Purity and Observance of the Law – Pharisees
The Way of Withdrawal – Essenes
Over and above all those responses, Jesus proclaimed a different way, a different reality – the Reality that he called the Kingdom of God.
He used word parables to describe it, like the Parable of the Sower and the Soil
And at other times he used visual parables to say something about it, like when he drew a little child into the midst of the crowd and said that it's such as these who inherit the Kingdom.
But what we have before us in today’s reading, and in the remainder of Matthew chapters 5 to 7, is as close as we get to a clear manifesto for the Kingdom of God. And it’s my guess that though we probably know many of these words well, we might never have taken the time to dwell on them and realise just how countercultural and counter-intuitive they are.
So between now and Christmas we’re going to be looking at the beginning of this section in Matthew which is known as the Beatitudes – a word which simply means ‘Blessings’.
Matthew tells us in 4:23 that Jesus went all over Galilee teaching in the synagogues and preaching the Good news about the Kingdom.
And further on in verse 25 he tells us that large crowds followed him from Galilee and the Ten Towns, from Jerusalem, Judea, and the land on the other side of the Jordan.
And that’s significant. Matthew’s telling us that in that crowd were all kinds of people.
The Decapolis (or Ten Towns) was an area to the east of the Jordan, settled by Alexander the Great and it showed a strong Greek influence on architecture and culture and religion. Some in the Decaplois would have worshipped the gods of Greece and Rome.
Alongside them in the crowd - but presumably not too close! - were strict Jews, with their Moses and their law and their kosher food and their customs – people who shunned the Gentiles as being unclean and different.
There would have been country folk and city dwellers, priests and prostitutes, righteous and unrighteous, God-fearing and god-ignoring shoulder to shoulder. The whole smorgasbord of life in Palestine in those days gathered together to hear Jesus teach.
And Matthew tells us that on seeing those crowds, Jesus went up a hill, presumably for audibility, and sat down, which is the position a rabbi always chose when he was teaching his followers.
And so he began what is widely acknowledged to be one of the greatest orations ever delivered.
And it’s important, right at the outset, that we grasp that what Jesus is doing here isn’t giving us advice, or presenting a 7 step programme that will help make us better disciples. Or giving us something to aim at. The beatitudes aren’t a to-do list.
What Jesus is doing here is making an announcement. He’s telling us how things are in the Kingdom.
The theologian Tom Wright says that in the Beatitudes, “Jesus is not saying ‘Try hard to live like this.’ He’s saying ‘People who already live like this are in good shape” – they’re beginning to get a handle on what the Kingdom’s about.
It’s an announcement of the way things are in the Kingdom of God which is now at hand. So with that in mind – how does he begin?
Well the GNB translates v3 in these terms:
“Happy are those who know they are spiritually poor; the Kingdom of heaven belongs to them.”
Now let me say a few word about the terms “Happy” and “poor” before we go on.
The Greek word that the GNB translates “Happy” is makarios, which doesn’t really mean happy in the sense of having a smile on your face. That’s the word eulogetos in the Greek.
Makarios carries more of a sense of being fortunate or being blessed. It means that God’s on your side and is favourable towards you.
“Poor” here, is not materially poor, but spiritually poor. And the word Jesus chooses is not the Greek word “penes” which is used to describe the everyday poverty of a man who has to work hard to feed himself and his family, but instead the word ‘ptochos’ which means utterly broke, penniless.
So with that in mind, what Jesus is saying here is this: “Fortunate are you when you know you have precious little to recommend yourself to God with. God is on your side and the Kingdom of heaven is yours. Blessed are you when you know your need”.
Now – to whom is that word Good News in the crowd assembled there?
It seems to me that’s it’s Good News to everyone who realises that they are falling short of the mark and don’t make the grade, whether Jew, Gentle, righteous or unrighteous, It’s good news for everyone who feels condemned never to make the cut.
And it’s Bad News for those in the crowd who think they have it all together and can rest on their laurels.
It’s utterly counter-intuitive.
You see life tells us that it’s the successful who are blessed. Those who keep their noses clean. Those who work hard and pay their taxes. Those who never slip up, at least in public. Those who never break the rules. They’re the ones God blesses, and only them.
That was the religion of the Pharisees. Work hard, keep all the rules and maybe then God will hold you in some regard.
I grew up with something approximating to that gospel. But that is not the gospel of Jesus Christ. That’s a gospel of works.
Remember this image from two weeks ago? (Slide of Cycle of Grace) The gospel of the Kingdom begins with the Good News that we are loved by a gracious God even though we don’t deserve it. And accepting that basic truth about ourselves changes everything. It sets us on the cycle of grace.
We still need to change and grow and mature in our faith. There’s still sin that needs to be recognised and weeded out. But we do it in the full knowledge that we are loved and accepted by God and that he is on our side.
The gospel of Jesus Christ, the gospel of the Kingdom of God is not – “sort your life out and God will love you.” It’s “God loves you, so go and sort your life out.” Those two ways of viewing things are worlds apart.
“Fortunate are you when you know you have precious little to recommend yourself to God with. God is on your side and the Kingdom of heaven is yours. Blessed are you when you know your need”.
It sounds totally counter-intuitive. Maybe even offensive to religious ears. But stop and think about how many of Jesus stories, or his dealings with people gave out the very same message.
The prodigal son: profligate and disrespectful, welcomed back by his Father before he could do one thing to make recompense other than wend his weary way home.
Despised little Zacchaeus up a tree, finding grace and not condemnation in Christ, and finding his life transformed.
The parables where those who should have been in the know are invited to a feast, and when they decline for spurious reasons, the gates are thrown wide for all the undeserving and unexpected who want to come in.
And how many of Jesus’ sharpest words were reserved for those who thought of themselves as having arrived?
Remember the parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector? The one loudly paraded his virtue before God in prayer, while the other could barely raise his eyes to heaven in shame. But it was the Tax Collector and not the Pharisee who went home forgiven. One knew his need, while the other didn’t.
Blessed are you, says Jesus, when you know your spiritual poverty.
I wonder if there were some in the crowd who lifted their heads at those words.
Some who’d always felt beyond the Pale because of the hand life had dealt them; or because of poor choices that they’d made.
Some, genetically predisposed to worry or self-doubt and feeling like they never managed to get things right.
Others, maybe, exhausted in trying to live up to the expectations the Pharisees had placed upon them, and wondering if there wasn’t a better way to live a faithful life.
Blessed are you, said Jesus.
Says Jesus.
Blessed are you if you’re honest enough to know you haven’t got it sussed yet.
Blessed are you if you wish, deep down, you had the resources to do better at this thing called life.
Blessed are you if you long for things to be different, but you can’t even put a name to it yet.
Blessed are you in your spiritual poverty – For God is on your side, and the Kingdom of heaven is open to you.
No comments:
Post a Comment