Journey Through the New Testament part 1
Matthew 5:1 Jesus saw the crowds and went up a hill, where he sat down. His disciples gathered around him, 2 and he began to teach them: 3 “Happy are those who know they are spiritually poor; the Kingdom of heaven belongs to them! 4 “Happy are those who mourn; God will comfort them! 5 “Happy are those who are humble; they will receive what God has promised! 6 “Happy are those whose greatest desire is to do what God requires; God will satisfy them fully! 7 “Happy are those who are merciful to others; God will be merciful to them! 8 “Happy are the pure in heart; they will see God! 9 “Happy are those who work for peace; God will call them his children! 10 “Happy are those who are persecuted because they do what God requires; the Kingdom of heaven belongs to them! 11 “Happy are you when people insult you and persecute you and tell all kinds of evil lies against you because you are my followers. 12 Be happy and glad, for a great reward is kept for you in heaven. This is how the prophets who lived before you were persecuted.
I’m going to be 100% honest with you. I’m not certain I understand all of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. I do not know what he means by ‘spiritually poor’. Still, this sermon is one of the greatest things ever said. This is some of the first teachings that Jesus did. We should seek to understand it the best we can. We learn this life is not about what we have, or how well things are going for us, but in fact almost the opposite. Let us break it down in pieces.
“Happy are those who mourn; God will comfort them!”
We know from Jesus that God will bring us to Heaven some day. The knowledge that your dead loved ones get to Heaven is comforting in itself. In fact when someone dies, they go to a better place than this life because there is no suffering. Not only is there no suffering in Heaven, there is great joy and happiness eternally.
“Happy are those who are humble; they will receive what God has promised!”
I don’t think there is anything wrong with thinking you’re doing a great job in what you’re doing on Earth. However when you think of yourself as great in comparison with others, you’re deceiving yourself because everything you have is a gift from God. one might think that they put in all the hard work to become a professional athlete, so it is on them, but God is the one who gave them their body, soul, and determination. Everything we have is a gift, so to call yourself great isn’t glorifying God, but a prideful statement. We should just do our duties as they come along. Whether we do small things or big things for God, we should give it good effort for we are serving the LORD in all that we do.
This current generation can see the positive feelings associated with pride. We’re told to have great self esteem. We’re bombarded with images and characters on TV and movies who have an attitude that is cocky, great, and above others because they’re supposed to be more cooler than thou. And in school, kids are bullied if they’re not cool themselves. So there is a lot of positive feelings for achieving that cool status in life. I would think it is almost a love-substitute to become popular or famous because a bunch of people you don’t know care about you. That isn’t what love is about though. To make oneself out to be great, or better words would be to fake yourself out to be great is not real and is superficial. Even in the music rappers are talking about the stuff they own and how great they are. I’m not sure why people would even listen to this music. Doesn’t a guy bragging about his cars, houses, women, and drugs make you not want to like the guy? Why even play that music. The 9th commandment even tells us we shouldn’t covet.
There are positive feels associated with humbleness too. The most positive one is knowing you’re in God’s will, “We will receive what God has promised!” Another positive thing is that you have satisfaction. No matter how small of a duty you’re doing, if it is helping out, you’re part of God’s big picture. If you’re doing your best without driving yourself to a spastic stress fest, you’re serving maximally. You don’t need to do everything yourself. God has everything in his hands. Just do what you can and you can feel satisfaction. This isn’t an excuse to lower the bar, but a way to be soul satisfied now.
“Happy are those whose greatest desire is to do what God requires; God will satisfy them fully!”
I’m not entirely certain what he means by full satisfaction past my own experience. When I was around 12, I promised God that if he let me know he is real for a fact that I’d take Christianity extremely serious and do everything he wants me to do. You see, when I was around 12, I didn’t know if God was real or not, which I think is common. I fell away from the church shortly after. I tried not to take the seat of mockers of God because on the off chance that God was real, I didn’t want to insult the guy. But that didn’t stop me from doing all sorts of sin. I was like,”I don’t think God is real, so I don’t need to worry about if I sin or not.” The truth is,”God is real, so don’t worry about your sins anyway” I found out God is real when I was 26. This is like 14 years gone by when I was apart from God :( And yes, I sorely wish I knew God was real for a fact back when I was young because I wouldn’t have made stupid decisions which affect my life today.
Anyway, knowing God exists is part satisfaction. Him giving me a mission is even more satisfying. I don’t have to worry about the losses I took in life when they aren’t needed to do evangelism. If a man or woman seeks to do good for God their entire life, they either join the clergy, volunteer or they work for money they can help the poor. I’m sure there are other options, but if you’re living for God, every day you wonder how you can serve more. You love on everyone you can, and sometimes you get loved back, and that is nice. The servitude towards God satisfies a hole in people’s being that strives to give them purpose. When you’re living for God, you’re living to the highest calling there is, so your desire to be on a mission is fulfilled. God satisfies us fully!
“”Happy are those who are merciful to others; God will be merciful to them!”
Remember the LORD’s prayer: ‘Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors’, or as others say it ‘Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us’ Both have the same meaning. We’re called to forgive other people’s sins as God forgive us of our sins. We’re supposed to do perfect forgiveness. It is tough, but it is what we’re called to do.
“Happy are the pure in heart; they will see God!”
The trick is to not let your heart get corrupted. The wormwood and the gall of sin will seek to make you dwell on ugly sin. The trick is to simply not feed it. If you viewed porn for example, stop it immediately. Don’t look on ugly things, don’t let yourself get contorted out of shape. God forgives us our sins, so I’m sure if you stop sinning now, your heart can be renewed to a pure heart.
“Happy are those who work for peace; God will call them his children!”
Even non-believers understand the necessity of living in peace. We should love our fellow man even if we have to tolerate some unpleasant things. We’re supposed to seek peace the best we can. Scripture says if we go on hating and acting like savage animals fighting our fellow man, we will ultimately destroy each other. And I think even non-believers see this. If you hold onto hate and do not forgive, you can do great evils to others. We should not pay evil back with evil. But instead we should defeat evil by being good all the time.
“Happy are those who are persecuted because they do what God requires; the Kingdom of heaven belongs to them!”
This is certainly nice to know. The world can only witness as Christians get slaughtered here and there. Sometimes you don’t even hear about it. There is nothing the world can do to help someone who is crippled or dead from persecution. Thankfully God has more powers than we do on Earth. Thankfully this life isn’t all we have. God reminds us of this. Certainly we should avoid getting into situations that might lead into persecution if we can. We’re to be as shrewd as serpents and gentle as doves. But sometimes, duty calls to stand up for Jesus even under threat of persecution.
“Happy are you when people insult you and persecute you and tell all kinds of evil lies against you because you are my followers. 12 Be happy and glad, for a great reward is kept for you in heaven. This is how the prophets who lived before you were persecuted.”
We learn that it just isn’t physical persecution, but also insults and slander. Here this should be taken internally. People on the Internet especially should understand it. Every time some jerk tells you off, God is stacking up rewards for you in Heaven. Certainly we should do nothing to invite this type of ridicule. If in the process of telling the story of how Jesus loves everyone of us and someone curses us, we should be happy. The person who curses in today’s age probably doesn’t realize curses and blessings have real power. The Bible says that curses we do not deserve do not light on us. But in this verse, we realize if someone curses us for spreading the Good News, they are actually blessing us!
I’ve done my fair share of evangelism online. I’ve always opened up to everyone on the idea that they may want to become my life long friend, but about no one does this. Victor, my coauthor on this site has become a life long friend, but he was Christian when I met him. Since no one with opposing view points wants to be my friend long term, I tried to debate them. I quickly learned that in debate, most people turtle up from what you’re saying and will use every cheap tactic in the debating stratosphere to simply ‘win’. It isn’t about one person sharing knowledge and the other person rationalizing it. It is about ‘I’m right and you’re wrong’. Frankly it is sickening. This is why I stopped caring about debating, and I’ve learned the Bible teaches to not debate or argue with people. So I’ve finally settled on telling everyone I can, and who wants to listen, bless them! It is the numbers game. I know God loves us. Jesus is LORD. Who wants to listen?
-Jim Sager
Journey Through the New testament Part 2