Slightly adapted from a sermon preached to Windsor Park Baptist Church April 14, 2013
Jesus lived in a very peculiar time in history. In the first century, there was this purveying wisdom that said . . If it looks good, it must BE good, and if it look bad, it must BE bad. They actually believed that good things were given by God to good people, which leads to the logical conclusion that bad things were ALSO given by God to bad people. Its fairly simple really, and while it wasn’t an exact science, it boiled down to an unspoken spectrum of blessings and pain:
- Those who want for nothing (healthy, wealthy, gainfully employed, with a quiver full of children) = Blessed.
- Those who were sick, needy, suffering, etc. = Not so blessed.
And as if this attitude wasn’t bad enough, people were actually esteemed or not esteemed based on where on the spectrum others perceived them to be. The wealthy were obviously highly favored by God, as such were treated with favor among men. Likewise, the sick and/or needy were obviously getting what God felt they needed, and well, who am I to get in the way of God’s judgment
As a brief intermission, let me offer a brief disclaimer, especially as it pertains to the wealthy in Jesus’ day. Not every rich person was considered “blessed” by God. None of the Jews would have considered well-off tax collectors such as Matthew or Zacchaeus as being “Blessed" by God. They had obviously acquired their wealth through ill-gotten gains.
As you already know, having 2,000 years to reflect on the Spectrum of Blessings in light of the teaching of Jesus, we no longer treat people the way we perceive God perceives them. We would never esteem someone because of the kind of work they do or the kind of car they drive, or what neighborhood they live in, or how much is in the their bank account. Likewise, we would never NOT esteem someone because of the kind of work they do or the kind of cars they drive, or what neighborhood they live in, or how little is in the their bank account. Right?
Okay, maybe things haven’t changed all that much in the past 2,000 years, but you already knew that. We are really no less susceptible to mentally placing ourselves and others on the Spectrum of Blessings, or treating others based on where on the spectrum we perceive them to be in relation to ourselves. The truly deceiving part about the “Spectrum of Blessing” is that the rubric is so subjective that there will alway be someone less blessed than yourself, likewise there will always be someone more blessed than yourself. Thanks be to God, that through Christ Jesus we are set free from this rat race of determining what is good or bad in life. God’s got it all figured out, and he gives us a fairly comprehensive list in Matt 5:3-12.
These verse comprise what is commonly known as “The Beatitudes”, and eight times in these verses, Jesus refers to a person as being truly “Blessed”. It's no coincidence that the word here for “Blessed” can also be translated as “Happy”. In fact, for centuries Christians have held these qualities up at the keys to happiness in the Kingdom, and while I think there is some truth to that, the word “happy” doesn’t sufficiently capture the heart of Jesus words.
I know this because if you changed the words to “If You’re Happy and You Know it” with any one of the qualities listed in the Beatitudes, the song would hold a completely different meaning . . . If you’re mourning and you know it, clap your hands. As you can guess, “happy” is not a sufficient understanding of what Jesus means by being “Blessed”.
When we look at the beatitudes as a whole, these is a serious temptation to divide the characteristic listed in the beatitudes into various “giftings” that some Christians have and not others . . .
“George, oh yes, he quite merciful, but He is also the most confrontational, stubborn person I know.“
It doesn’t work that way. Reading the Beatitudes is not like reading a newspaper where every article has is own flavor, perspective, and unique quality. No, the Beatitudes are the collective volumes of an epic novel, which examine various angles of the same protagonist. So to say to bluntly, yes, God desires that you exhibit and experience all of them--every last one of these qualities.
Another temptation is to think of these qualities as Jesus’ description of the ideal disciple. Actually, a lot of people of read the entire Sermon on the Mount and the conclude that Jesus is listing the standards for upper management in Kingdom of God. This is a serious and dangerous notion to hold, because it leads to attitudes such as these...
- “I’m a master Beattituder, why don’t you give me a real challenge.”
- “I’m only human, and God knows that. I’m covered by the blood, if I don’t show mercy, God will forgive me.”
- “If only people would live like this, the world would be a better place.”
I’m sorry to tell you that we don’t get off the Jesus train that easy. If you look at verse 2, it says that Jesus is speaking to all his disciples, not just the 12. These words are for those who are followers of Jesus who have already signed-up and are willing to truly listen and practice His teachings. The Beatitudes then are not some lofty ideal attainable by only the spiritually elite. No, they are the full set of characteristics that make up all Christian individuals.
If this is true, even a little a bit, then the Beatitudes are a violent upheaval of every notion of blessedness that resides in my head. In fact, this sets the tone for the whole Sermon on the Mount. In my opinion, these verses make up a disturbingly concise summarization of the entire Sermon on the Mount. If the sermon on the Mount were a cold front that imposes itself on a warm April afternoon, then the Beatitudes are the sudden, turbulent gusts that announce the unforgiving cold front which follows.
So, there are many ways in which we try to soften Jesus’ words or excuse ourselves from not applying them to our own lives, but I truly believe Jesus intends to teach us how to live as citizens in the Kingdom of God. I want to give you fair warning, I’m going to do a lot of Kingdom talk for the next few moments, because ultimately I think these words are about life in the Kingdom. Before we move on, let me offer this as a description of the Kingdom: The Kingdom of God (or the Kingdom of Heaven, as Matthew prefers) is the place where God’s reign is whole, unfettered, and without opposition. There is a sense in which we should think of the Kingdom as a distant, “otherworldly” place where God and his angels reside, but Jesus announces that the Kingdom is “at-hand”. In fact, in both Matthew and Mark’s Gospel, the first thing Jesus has to say to the masses is “Repent, believe, for the kingdom of God is at hand.”
If the Kingdom of God is the place where God’s reign is whole, unfettered and without opposition, and if Jesus proclaims that the Kingdom is at-hand, then our present age is full of what I like to call . . . Kingdom Bubbles. Small pockets of God’s unfettered reign floating throughout creation everyday.
Now let me pause a moment, to say, yes God is sovereign and ultimately, always accomplishes his will, but the Kingdom is the space where God’s Will is unopposed. In other words, we produce our own little Kingdom Bubble every time we live in accordance with God’s reign, but remember these bubbles are wafting over a bed of nails which eagerly desires to burst God’s bubbles. We live in a hurting, broken world that knowingly, and unknowingly opposes the reign of God.
So, when we get to the beatitudes, what we have is a description of what the air is like inside of each and every Kingdom Bubble. Think about it for a moment, there is nothing special about the air inside of a bubble. After all, it is the same air that was once outside the bubble.But the movement of the bubble makes visibly known that the bubble is being carried by an outside force. The air inside of a Kingdom Bubble is very much the same as the rest of world, but it is enveloped inside of a sweet, soapy solution of God’s presence and is carried by the movement of God's will. This is what makes us truly blessed, not because of what we do or what we experience, but because of the God who is near and presently active in creation and ultimately in each of our lives.
We are blessed because the Kingdom is at hand, available, accessible to all who will surrender to the Holy Spirit, and God’s work of salvation in creation. Jesus says we are blessed because we have access to the most valuable assets of the Kingdom today, and we will experience them all the more in the future consummation of the kingdom.
It is for this reason that . . .
We are blessed when are spiritually bankrupt, with no hope or ambition, because it is at that moment we experience the reign of God, because we no longer oppose the Kingdom with our false sense of security.
We are blessed when our hearts are burdened with sadness, pain and loss, because God is present and actively working to deliver us from our sorrows.
We are blessed when we find our strength in God, for He freely shares his victory with us.
We are blessed when we deeply long for God to set the world to rights, because God loves to pull back the curtain and satisfy our longing by showing us his work.
We are blessed when we go against conventional wisdom and offer forgiveness to others, because guess what, God has also forgiven you.
We are blessed when we are physically, spiritually, and emotionally untainted by the world, for that is when we see God most clearly.
We are blessed when we work to produce peace in the world around us, for this proves that we are sons and daughters of God.
And finally, we are blessed when the world can’t stand you floating around in your Kingdom Bubble. Try as they may to burst your bubble, they cannot stop you from living unopposed to the present reign of God. Take comfort in knowing that the manifold witness of Christians throughout history is that nothing can separate us from the Love of God that is in Christ Jesus.
There are a lot of happy people in the world, and a lot of people who feel greatly blessed. To be happy, to feel blessed or be considered blessed is not a bad thing in the least. But feeling blessed pales in comparison to being stamped with the eternal seal of “Blessed”. Because this blessedness comes only from God, and it is only experienced by those who actively seek to live in the floating bubble of the Kingdom. Every moment that we chose to live lives unopposed to the reign of God, we experience the full blessing of being citizens of the Kingdom.
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