{"id":275,"date":"2015-07-08T03:36:12","date_gmt":"2015-07-08T03:36:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/anglicanconnection.com\/?p=275"},"modified":"2015-12-09T20:13:16","modified_gmt":"2015-12-09T20:13:16","slug":"jesus-beatitudes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/anglicanconnection.com\/jesus-beatitudes\/","title":{"rendered":"JESUS&#8217; BEATITUDES"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"color: #333333;\"><span class='et-dropcap'>W<\/span>e don\u2019t remember great leaders simply for who they were or what they did, but also for the things they said. George Washington\u2019s Inaugural speech as president and Abraham Lincoln\u2019s Gettysburg Address, come to mind. So does Winston Churchill\u2019s speech in May 1940:\u00a0<q>I have nothing to\u00a0offer\u00a0but\u00a0blood,\u00a0toil,\u00a0tears and sweat<\/q>;\u00a0and his stirring and challenging words the following month: \u2018We will fight on the beaches\u2026 We will never surrender \u2026\u2019<\/span><\/p>\n<h2>BEATITUDES<\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"color: #333333;\"><span class=\"yellow\"><strong>The greatest speech?<\/strong>\u00a0<\/span>What we often overlook is that the speech of Jesus of Nazareth known as the Sermon on the Mount, is generally regarded as one of the finest speeches ever.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #333333;\">Significantly, Matthew has not recorded any words of Jesus before his \u2018Sermon on the Mount\u2019 thus giving it greater weight.\u00a0In the previous chapters (1-4) Matthew develops one vital theme: Jesus is God&#8217;s long-promised Messiah. Jesus, we find, stands in the line of the great kings of Israel: he is a descendent of the greatest of all Israel\u2019s kings, King David (1:1). Significantly, foreigners called the Magi, come and worship him as king (2:1-6). At his baptism (3:14-17), Jesus is called God\u2019s \u2018Son\u2019, a title uniquely reserved for the kings of Israel (Psalm 2). By the time we get to the end of Matthew 4, we learn that people have come to hear Jesus from every corner of the vast empire that David and Solomon had ruled in the golden age of Israel&#8217;s history (4:23-25).<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #333333;\">Now in chapter 5 Matthew introduces us to the first words of the king \u2013 what we might call \u2018The King\u2019s Speech\u2019.\u00a0<strong><em><q>Blessed are the poor in spirit,\u2026<\/q><\/em><\/strong><em>\u00a0<\/em>Jesus began. How easy it is to say these words. Yet as we will see over the coming weeks, they are challenging and disturbing.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #333333;\"><strong><span class=\"yellow\">What does it mean to be \u2018blessed\u2019?<\/span>\u00a0<\/strong>\u2018Happy\u2019 is a poor substitute. Those who are blessed will generally be profoundly happy, but blessedness cannot be reduced to happiness. To be \u2018blessed\u2019 means to be approved, or to find approval. When God blesses us he is approving us.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2>JESUS&#8217; CHALLENGE TO US<\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"color: #333333;\"><span class=\"yellow\"><strong>Jesus\u2019 first words challenge us to ask<\/strong><\/span>, \u2018Whose blessing do I want more \u2013 other people\u2019s or God\u2019s?\u2019 Do we covet more the blessing of family or friends or of a superior at work? Jesus wants us to see that God\u2019s blessing is worth infinitely more than anything else. If we agree with him, then his beatitudes speak to us very personally and very deeply.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #333333;\"><span class=\"yellow\"><strong>One significant feature<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0is that the first and last beatitudes promise the same reward. The first is:\u00a0<em><q>Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.<\/q><\/em>\u00a0The last is:\u00a0<em><q>Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.<\/q>\u00a0<\/em>To begin and end with the same expression is called an \u2018inclusion\u2019. Everything that stands between the two can be included under the one theme \u2013 here, the kingdom of heaven.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #333333;\"><span class=\"yellow\">Jesus\u2019\u00a0<strong><em>Beatitudes<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0<\/span>set out the standards that he, as the king, expects of his people. They serve to introduce the Sermon on the Mount which, taken as a whole, sets out what we might call the\u00a0<strong><em>constitution\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>of God\u2019s kingdom. Jesus is not interested in people who live a veneer of holy living. He is committed to seeing lives of integrity \u2013 integrity in the home, in all our relationships, in the world of commerce and on the field of play, in completing tax returns and in the use of the internet, in the movies we watch and the magazines we devour.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #333333;\">When, by God\u2019s grace we work at living out Jesus\u2019 words, then\u00a0<strong>we discover God\u2019s blessing<\/strong>.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>e don\u2019t remember great leaders simply for who they were or what they did, but also for the things they said. George Washington\u2019s Inaugural speech as president and Abraham Lincoln\u2019s Gettysburg Address, come to mind. So does Winston Churchill\u2019s speech in May 1940:\u00a0I have nothing to\u00a0offer\u00a0but\u00a0blood,\u00a0toil,\u00a0tears and sweat;\u00a0and his stirring and challenging words the following [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":570,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>JESUS&#039; BEATITUDES - The Anglican Connection<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The\u00a0Beatitudes\u00a0are 8 blessings recounted in the Sermon on the Mount in the Gospel of Matthew. 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