Joey and me, the beard brothers...lol
So, my son Rylan begged me last month to grow a beard...I guess I've been clean shaven for too long and it was a good time to do it because it represented my time apart from Sharon. So, yeah, she's not crazy about the beard and it had to go when she arrived home. If you want to see the beard transformation, check it out on instagram...lol @pastorjack9
Often we do things to create change in our lives and changing our appearance is certainly an easy one to create. The change that really takes effort is the one that is created from the inside out! Real, inward change is hard, difficult and challenging and Jesus raised the bar for change incredibly during His Sermon on the Mount as recorded in Matthew 5 -7
Some have looked at the expectation and
lifestyle set out in this message and have said that this message is an
exercise in hopeless depair. It is
impossible to live this way and really , it is, apart from a new birth and the
inworking power of the Holy Spirit.
Also, understand that this message is spoken to those who have
experienced forgiveness, who have found the pearl of great price, who have
experienced the “lavish” love of God. It
is a message for those who have been invited to the wedding, who know that they
are a new creation. In many ways this
sermon is the outworking of our faith, the gospel in its fullness.
The word blessed (the AMP defines it as
“spiritually prosperous” to be admired.
Here listed are eight fundamental attitudes. There is a present and future fulfillment
being spoken of in this passage. I would
like to present these eight into two sets of four. The first four focus on
Our Attitude Towards God
V3 The poor is Spirit - The
poor are the ones with a contrite and humble heart, those who have realized
that without Jesus they have nothing.
They are parched, seeking water with a desperation, looking for flowing
rivers of
An old hymn
Nothing in my hands I bring, simply to thy
cross I cling
Naked, I come to thee for dress, helpless I
look to thee for grace
Foul, I to the fountain fly, wash me Saviour or
I die.
It is the same experience that the church at
Laodicea felt although they weren’t aware of their condition. Here, this attitude is completely embraced by
the follower of Jesus.
It is the opposite of pride… where we think
that we have attained it somehow or have arrived spiritually. This teaching is only for those who realize
that they can’t possibly live by it in and of themselves.
The reward for being in this place of humility
is to have the riches and the resources of the kingdom at your disposal. It is
the confidence to know that you walk with the authority of the kingdom and be
spiritually prosperous in all that God sets before you.
V4
blessed are those who mourn
The context of mourning here is not in relation
to the loss of life or the loss of a family member, but in their repentance and
recognition of how far their sin can separate them from a loving relationship
with the Father. Paul groaned over his
own struggle with sin when he cried out, “oh wretched man that I am, who will
deliver me from this body of death” Romans 7:24
Jesus also wept over the sins of others and the bitter consequences in
judgement.
The recognition of the destruction of sin and
its far reaching consequences will allow to be in a place where we experience
the healing oil of Christ poured into our wounds. We also know that there will be a day when
Christ will wipe away ever tear and sin will be no more. Revelation 7:17
V5
blessed are the meek
These are the ones who
completely have become devoid of striving.
The don’t try to attain status or position out of their own abilities
and qualities. They lay down in a place of
servant leadership and trust God to lift them up.
Meekness as it is defined
here speaks to a gentleness that is under control. Again I love how the AMP
expands on this by stating they are inwardly peaceful, spiritually secure and
worthy of respect.
They will inherit the
earth – they are the ones who will be trusted with places of leadership and
lead from a place of care and genuine concern.
They are the ones who will truly reign with Christ.
Self-renunciation is
the pathway to real greatness because it places the needs of others before
itself.
God took on a powerful
journey of meekness in my ambition to become a pastor. My journey took me to a place where I
actually gave up on being a pastor. I had worked very hard to prove myself
through all my education, my ministry experience and my pursuit of
degrees. I had built up what I thought
was an impressive resume only to come up empty handed and confused. I was so confused that I thought I had made a
wrong decision and pursued teaching instead.
I was working with the young adults ministry in my church and during
that time the church posted two pastoral positions vacancies. I didn’t even apply because I was convinced
that I was on a different path. However, the path that God took me on was the
place where I completely came to the end of myself. It was then and only then that God used the
lead pastor to approach me about a pastoral position that I was ready to
serve. God made it very clear to me that
it was all about His timing, His enabling, His grace and I will never take for
granted a position that God places me in.
It wasn’t about my education, my experience, my training. While all those things were good and
certainly profitable in my journey, He needed to teach me meekness.
V6 blessed are those who hunger and thirst for
righteousness
It is believers who
are not caught up in the world’s system of all things material blessings. They are not chasing the self-fulfilling
dreams. Hunger is about appetite and
as Mary spoke in Luke 1:53 “God has filled the hungry with good things, and the
rich He has sent away empty-handed.”
What satisfies your
cravings?
How hungry are we for
change, how serious are we about our pursuit of righteousness. I recognize that even sometimes we have to
pray that the Holy Spirit would place in us real hunger for the presence of the
LORD. It is so easy to become lacksidasical
in our spiritual walk and become stagnant.
You know the attitude…I heard all
this before. Sometimes it takes a huge wakeup call in our life like when your
wife tells you that she doesn’t love you anymore or your boss tells you, I’m
sorry, we are downsizing and we are going to have to lay you off.
When I made the
decision to go to Bible School, I was hungry.
My brother Lloyd was certainly instrumental as well. I had come to a crossroads in my life and he
really challenged me about what my life pursuit was all about. He told me that all I was learning in HS was
secular humanism.
I started reading the
book of Matthew and I came to chapter 6, a latter part of the sermon on the
Mount and the focus was on treasure and what are we really going to chase
after. I read v21 “for where your
treasure is, there will your heart be also” and I knew at that moment that I
didn’t want to be caught up in pursuing earthly gain. I had found my life verse
and knew that my heart’s desire (hunger) was to focus on things that would last
for eternity. In the end that wasn’t
things, it was people. I prayed and told
the LORD, I want to invest my life in people.
I want to see people come to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ.
God can give you a burning
sense of satisfaction out of the calling He has placed on your life, don’t
ignore it.
The first four of
these beatitudes follow a natural progression that presupposes the one prior to
it. We are taken on this journey to a
complete and total sense of spiritual bankruptcy before God. We come before Him
POOR
-empty, IN MOURNING - sadness,
MEEK – helpless and HUNGRY
–desperation…
We have to get to the place of our own
emptiness before there can be a filling of the Spirit. It is a feeling of personal desperation, a
sense of coming to the end of our own resources that allows us to come to faith
and trust in Christ.
And then God says, alright! Now you are READY to be used and the shift is
on in the beatitudes to our
Our attitude towards others
Luke 4:18,19
The Spirit of the LORD is upon me…
V7
blessed are the merciful
Mercy has been defined as compassion for those
in need. Mercy in many ways deals with
the pain, the misery and distress of sin.
We can’t just stand pat and be happy that our
sins are forgiven, mercy cries out to our heart and tells us to get involved in
the mess and the brokenness of the lives of others.
It is the very reason our ministry has formed a
“To.Get.Her” team. They enter the strip
club as part of our Manor ministry that Sharon and I have been involved with
for the past six years. It’s a messy
ministry, but there they were faithfully reaching out to the dancers, bouncers,
servers at the club and displaying the love of Christ. They have had meaningful opportunities to
reach out to the girls and gained their trust so much so that when they are not
there, the bartenders tell our team that were missed. As a team, we have taken them to rehab, sat
beside them in the hospital with their daughter, helped them move on numerous
occasions and brought them to special events where they have felt so
loved.
Where is God calling you to? Who is God calling
you to?
We will receive mercy in our time of need
because we are all broken and we all have baggage that we are working through
and it is my firm belief that there is a safe landing for the person of mercy
that they too will find a place of refuge, a place of inner healing, a safe
place to cry out and be heard.
V8
blessed are the pure in heart
The pure in heart is not so much a reference to
having our lives cleansed with the blood of Jesus. It is more than just a focus on our inward
cleansing. It is more precisely focused
on our heart attitude while in the midst of serving others. There is a genuine love for others, a
completely sincere desire to care without recognition.
The realization that it is the place that maybe
you feel overlooked and not even seen that God sees you and you have an
incredible revelation of God Himself in that secret place. So, don’t loathe the place where God has put
you in even if it feels like it’s an obscure place, a very ordinary place, an unseen place,
because He sees you in your faithfulness and He will reward you.
V9
blessed are the peacemakers
The transition from a place of purity to a
place of peace is seamless. Purity of
heart enables us to deal with conflict.
It is when we come from a place of openness and transparency, a place where we can be trusted to bring real
reconciliation.
Peace-making is divine work and in its ultimate
fulfillment we see Jesus Christ reconciling us to God through his death on the
cross.
When we listen, we listen sympathetically,
seeking to understand both points of view.
We also seek the wisdom that comes from the Spirit of God to enable us
to be wise in our discernment.
A revelation that the Spirit gave my wife,
Sharon, while facing criticism from others was to see it for what it really
was. Doing a time of conflict in her
life with those who were opposed to her teaching on the Holy Spirit of all
things was a prayer for insight. So, God
gave her a dream and in that dream she noticed how the ladies around the table were picking her dessert
apart. She then tried to look at see
their faces but she couldn’t. However in
the dream she recognized the way that they spoke and there was fear and anxiety
on their part. As she reflected on the
dream, she realized that she wasn’t fighting against these ladies, it was
actually the spirit inside of them.
There was almost a change in the way that she saw them recognizing that
they were speaking out of a spirit of fear and anxiety.
When we learn the art of reconciliation we are
doing exactly the ministry that we are called to as followers of Jesus. Ultimately our desire should be to reconcile
them to the heart of the Father.
We are the sons of God, the ones who are an
extension of His family, doing His work.
v10-12
blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake
We
should not be surprised if anti-Christian hostility increases, but rather be
surprised if it doesn’t
John
R.W. Stott 1978
It was also Luke who said, “Woe to you, when
all men speak well of you.” 6:26
It was Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the great
theologian who wrote the classic “The Cost Of Discipleship” who never wavered in his outspoken
disapproval to the Nazi regime. It
brought about his imprisonment, the threat of torture to his family and his
death being executed under the direct order of Heinrich Himmler in April 1945
in the Flossenburg concentration camp only a few days before it was liberated.
The persecution of the believer for taking his
stand for Christ will be an opportunity to “show forth the supernatural
radiance of the Christian life” James
Montgomery Boice
This was
seen more clearly from the life of Stephen in the book of Acts.
It is one of the most powerful recognition and
demonstration of our identity with Christ.
There reward will be great in heaven!
The Sermon on the Mount calls for a pure
righteousness that can only flow from a regenerated heart that has experienced
the filling of the Holy Spirit.
The secret to blessing is first recognizing we
must give up trying to achieve it through our own effort.
The next realization is that it begins from a
place where we experience the forgiveness of our sins.
Continue to work out your salvation with fear
and trembling for it is God who works in you and through you.
For it is by grace through faith…for we are
God’s workmanship
