Father. Mt. 5-7, Part Five of Seven.

Welcome back to week five of the seven week series studying Jesus' Sermon on the Mount as recorded in Matthew 5-7. We pick up newbies all the time, so just head on over to week one and start there. All the weeks are linked on the right sidebar should you fall behind.

For the optimal experience, make sure to join the facebook discussion group and befriend us on facebook.

This study should take no more than 90 minutes. This week will included a directed prayer time, so make sure that you are in a quiet place where you can appropriately concentrate before beginning. When you are ready, proceed onto lesson five:

week five. section one. father.

We are now moving onto chapter six in Matthew. If we aren't careful, we could begin to lose the flow of the Sermon by looking too closely at it section by section. Take some time now to re-read the entire passage of Matthew 5-7. As you read, note every time the word "Father" is used. How many "Fathers" are in the Sermon?

Read Matthew 5-7 and return.

The Sermon on the Mount could have been called something like "Seeing God as Father." Take ten minutes now to watch the following youtube link to Rob Bell's Nooma video called Rain:



Before Jesus it was uncommon for individuals to refer to YHWH as Father. It was understood that the nation of Israel itself was YHWH's child. God himself first made that clear during the exodus in this passage:

Exodus 4:21-23

The idea of God as Father for the Israelites is closely associated to the exodus (deliverance from slavery). Jesus the Revolutionary has come as the second and greater Moses to deliver God's child (Israel) back to his love and care within the reality of the Kingdom. Whenever the father/son imagery is used in the Old Testament it is normally associated with God delivering the Israelites out of Egypt. See the following example in Deuteronomy:

Deuteronomy 1:30-31

It is clear then that this Kingdom Jesus brings is a Kingdom of deliverance. In a real way, God's people are being freed and led into the promised land of Heaven through Messiah. For Jesus to use the term "Father" for God seventeen times (by my count) in this relatively short sermon is of great significance. It simply was not that common to address God as Father. Jesus only uses the normal word for God five times in the Sermon. He saying something most clearly - that God is fundamentally Father - not just the Father of Israel, but the Father of all humanity. Not just the Father of all humanity, but your Father. He is your personal Father. This, again, is revolutionary. It moves beyond exodus/deliverance language and into the realm of genuine familial love.

week five. section two. matthew 6:1-18

We will now look at the section in the Sermon devoted to addressing the three primary religious activities of the Jewish people in the days of Jesus: giving to the poor, prayer and fasting. We'll see how having God's primary identity as Father changes the motivations for these and other activities.

Read Matthew 6:1-18 and return.

Jesus will now show us the role of religion in the Kingdom. With all we have seen thus far, we might expect him to completely ban all religious activity. He does not. He assumes that people within the Kingdom will give, pray and fast. Just like with last week, these are examples of Kingdom life, not an exhaustive list of what good deeds or pious acts are permitted or expected in the new community. He assumes that many of his good Jewish listeners will continue to be good Jewish people who do these acts of righteousness. Just like the discussion of sins in the previous lesson, everyone of the three acts of piety boil down to the same thing for Jesus - inner motivation.

Giving. Matthew 6:1-4

Jesus is going to make a simple case for each act of piety: If you do your acts of righteousness for Father God he will reward you. If you do them for any other reason, like to be seen as holy, you will get your reward in full. Ie: your full reward will be people thinking you are holy. He starts with giving to the poor. He is not making hard fast rules about hiding your giving from anyone who may notice your actions, but he is saying that the second your motivation to give is about you instead of God, you've traded in your heavenly reward for an earthly one. Give because your Father first gave to you.

Notice one other thing here. Jesus makes it permissible to seek a reward from God. He doesn't say what the reward will be, but he does seem to leave it open as a motivator. This isn't pure asceticism in that light. He assumes that we will all desire rewards from time to time. In the Kingdom we desire rewards from God our Father more than rewards from people.

Prayer. Matthew 6:5-15

Here are some interesting examples of prayer:





I thought I'd show you a few of my favorite actors pretending to pray because Jesus actually uses one of the greek word for "actor" in this passage. He says, "do not pray like the hypocrites." Jesus was likely the first to use this word with a negative religious connotation. "Hypocrite" was the word for a stage actor. (Full disclosure - your online teacher is a proud member of the screen actors guild.) Actors are professional pretenders. Some in Jesus' day would actually see them as professional liars. In the century following Jesus, actors were often forced to quit their careers before they were allowed to join the church. In short, actors were seen as frauds. Jesus is saying that there is no place for pretending to talk to God in the Kingdom. No room for dramatic, showy monologues. God is here and he is your Father. He doesn't need your theatrics. If your motivation is to be heard by your Father, he will certainly hear you and reward you in the quiet place. If you pray to be noticed by anyone other than your Father, being noticed will be your full reward.

Then Jesus teaches his disciples what we have come to call "The Lord's Prayer." Luke records a simpler version of this prayer, causing some scholars to think that Jesus would often teach this as a pattern for Kingdom prayer. The prayer has a flow. I have come to believe that the prayer is a mantra of sorts. The prayer is meant to be lived more than to be said. If you could live every word of the prayer, you would be living in the Kingdom of God. I will post a link to a message series on the prayer as the extra link at the end of this study. For now, let's just summarize:

Our - The prayer must come first from the new community. In the Kingdom, prayer is abut "us" first and "me" second. There is no Kingdom prayer without community.

Father - As we have seen in this study, there is no Kingdom without God as Father. This one word tells us who God is, who I am (his child) and who the other members of the new community are (my brothers and sisters/his other children.) The prayer and the Kingdom are all about family relationship.

In Heaven - actually, in "the heavens." Now that we know more about Heaven, this should mean more. God is where Heaven is...and Heaven is both here now and not quite here yet. God is here in new real way through Jesus...and he will one day be fully present with his people.

Hallowed be your name - Father is holy. Personal but royal. His name is both his reputation and his prophetic destiny. He has many names, but we are now most aware of one of his names - Father.

Your Kingdom Come - This can't mean come into existence since Jesus has already announced its availability. It rather means, come into fulfillment. The prayer is for the Kingdom (God's presence and reign) to fill every inch of all creation.

Your will be done on earth as it is in Heaven - A qualifier to the request that the Kingdom come. When Kingdom comes all of earth will be as Heaven - God's total reign.

Give us today our daily bread - The prayer that is meant to be lived is entirely practical. In Jesus' day many estimate that as many as 75% of the people did not know where their daily food would come from. We ask God for our needs, and our Father meets them. For many of us, the fact that we can no longer pray this prayer legitimately should cause reflection on how we can answer this prayer for those in our world who are right now praying this prayer.

Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors - Debts/debtors is by far the superior translation. These are economic words. We can assume that this also means forgiving trespasses, but the point is first an economic one. We forgive those who owe us money because we have been forgiven completely by God. For more on this I highly recommend John Howard Yoder's classic book, The Politics of Jesus.

Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one - This should beg the question, "What is the real temptation in light of what we have learned thus far?" I would propose that the ultimate temptation is to not believe the prayer itself - that God is Father and his Kingdom comes.

Jesus trails the prayer with a thought attached to the forgiveness language. "Who are you to not forgive anyone after how much you have been forgiven?" In the Kingdom, we forgive because we were first forgiven.

Fasting. Matthew 6:16-18.

Nothing new in this section. It's the same idea as giving and prayer. When you fast, do it for Father and he will reward you. Do it for others to be seen as one fasting and that is all the reward you get. In all three examples, Jesus uses the imagery of the hypocrite. No Academy Awards for piety in the Kingdom of Heaven.

week five. section three. prayer experience.

Below is a 20 minute prayer experience. It is a video that will lead you through Luke's version of the Lord's Prayer. It was originally created for a church service, but will work where you are. You'll want to be alone in a place where you won't feel awkward praying. You will also need something heavy to hold - something about the size and weight of a brick. When you are ready to begin the experience, click the link below:

Lord's Prayer Experience.

week five. section four. assignments.

1. Pray the Lord's Prayer every morning for seven days. As you do, think through all that you have learned about each phrase of the prayer in this study. If you want, come back and do the prayer experience each morning.

2. Post something in your twitter or facebook status about what you learned in this lesson.

Extra, extra:

Listen to yours truly speaking about the Lord's Prayer at this link.

Kingdom Snapshots. Mt. 5-7, Part Four of Seven.

Welcome back to the virtual Bible Study. This is week four of seven studying Jesus' Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5-7. Today we will finish chapter five. If you are new, I recommend the following:

Join the facebook discussion group and befriend us on facebook.

Make sure to go back and do the study in order. I won't spend much time reviewing and each lesson builds on the other. The lessons are linked in order in the sidebar to the right.

This lesson may take up to 90 minutes. When you are ready to proceed go onto lesson four:

week four. section one. transformation.

We are going to look at the life that becomes possible once the Kingdom of Heaven begins to break in through Christ. Start by watching this video:



Does the video leave you with mixed emotions? Would you like to be transformed like this or would you rather just be left the way you are? Does it bother you that the final image isn't true to "real life"? Take a few minutes and write whatever you are thinking in this moment. You can use a paper journal or just open up a word processor on your computer. If you want, jump into a discussion about the video on the facebook group page. When you have finished, return to the study.

We will now enter the part of the Sermon where Jesus paints a picture of daily life within the community of transformed kingdom people. It will be a temptation to see Jesus as giving rules or laws in this section. If simply keeping the laws and rules could transform people (and the world) Jesus would have no need to separate himself from the Pharisees. Jesus is going to show us vivid, practical, real-life examples of what it will be like to live within the earthly reality of the Kingdom of Heaven. As you read this section, you will likely think, "but I can't do that." Perhaps that is the point. You cannot change your behavior by trying to change. So often we approach this section of Matthew having neglected or forgotten all that we have previously examined in this study: Messiah has come. Heaven (God's presence) comes with him. Therefore we repent and turn to him for help. He blesses us and makes us a blessing to the world. He tells us that our righteousness must surpass the most religious among us and be a righteousness rooted in love for God and others instead of laws and rules. Then he starts vision casting with six examples of Kingdom life beginning with the phrase, "you have heard that it was said, but I say..."

The same underlying message runs throughout this section we are about to study: God wants to change you. (And He clearly can because He is now with us through Christ.) Dallas Willard often puts it this way, "God is less concerned about you keeping the rules and more concerned that you become the kind of person who wants to keep the rules." That's a big distinction. Jesus is about to paint the picture of personal and communal transformation. Think of the video we just watched as a metaphor for the life of the Pharisees. They want to be right (look right) so they work very hard to make themselves look as right as possible. God wants us to be right even more than we do, but when he transforms us, he does it for real and forever - no masks or makeup or digital trickery. He changes our heart (insides) and that, in turn, changes our face and body and mind. Maybe spiritual growth is a lot like physical growth in that God put into a tiny embryo all the details that became who you are. He made you from the inside out and wants to re-make you as his child again. So, lets look at Matthew 5:21-48 as Jesus' practical vision statements as to what can happen when a new community forms within the reality of the Kingdom of Heaven:

week four. section two. matthew 5:21-48

Let's begin by reading our entire section now. Then return to the study: Matthew 5:21-48.

There's a lot in there - a lot of traditional debates and theological hot buttons. I'll address each area briefly later, but first we must see this section as a larger whole. My hope in this lesson is not to focus on the details, but rather on the bigger idea Jesus is getting across. N.T. Wright says this in his commentary, Matthew for Everyone: Chapters 1-15

"In this section on the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus takes the commands of the law and shows how they provide a blueprint for a way of being fully, genuinely, gloriously human. This new way, which Jesus had come to pioneer and make possible, goes deep down into the roots of personality and produces a different pattern of behaviour altogether."

Jesus is showing us how his disciples will react to real life as it unfolds before them. Each example begins with reminding them of the "old" paradigm, then contrasting it to the "new" paradigm in the new covenant within the reality of the new community. He is, in essence, describing Heaven on Earth and telling his followers that through his power, this life is available now and will someday soon be fully realized. Here is one way to look at the six examples:

Each of them starts with a real life issue, then he shows the old and new ways of overcoming the issue:

Issue One: "Another person irritates me."
Old Command: Don't kill them.
New Community Reality: Refuse to be angry, immediately reconcile and give generously to them.

Issue Two: "I'm sexually attracted to someone."
Old Command: Don't sleep with anyone except your spouse.
New Community Reality: Refuse to cultivate a heart that dwells on sexual misconduct.

Issue Three: "I'm unhappy in my marriage."
Old Command: Divorce a woman fairly by giving her a "pink slip."
New Community Reality: Stay married and learn to love.

Issue Four: "I want something from someone."
Old Command: Keep the vows you made when you were trying to get what you wanted.
New Community Reality: Just tell the whole truth from the start. Ask for what you want and mean what you say.

Issue Five: "Someone physically hurt me."
Old Command: Inflect the exact same injury on them - no more.
New Community Reality: Help the one who hurt you.

Issue Six: "Someone hates me."
Old Command: Hate your enemy.
New Community Reality: Love and bless your enemies, just like God does.

Before moving onto the details, we must see the themes that reflect the new upside-down kingdom people. God is transforming us, but into what kind of people is he transforming us?

1. We become like Jesus. He modeled the life he described in these six examples.
2. Love prevails. We love people the way God loved us - without reason or restraint.
3. Grace first. We remember who we were when Jesus called us into the Kingdom and treat others the way he treated us.
4. "Natural" behaviors change. Where we used to give into every instinct - to fight or have sex or lie or hate - we begin to have the opposite instincts by the power of God changing us from the inside out.
5. New Community. All of this only works if the new disciples actually form and live within the reality of a new community ruled by Jesus.

I'll now address a few details in each section of our text. I'll provide the biblegateway link before each section:

Matthew 5:21-26

Notes on Anger:



1. "It's not like I killed someone." Have you ever said that? Well, Jesus probably had heard that too. He starts in this first snapshot of Kingdom life by saying, "Actually, it is like you have killed someone." We have all been so angry with someone that we at least wanted to yell, curse or punch them. Jesus says here that in the Kingdom we move past that anger. (Anger is always rooted in feeling like someone treated you worse than you deserve. Jesus is replacing anger with grace. God is no longer angry with you, so give them the grace he has already given you.) I would note here that many of these examples (especially anger and lust) deal with our will. I don't think Jesus is saying to shut down all instincts to be angry, but there is always a spilt second after the first feeling of anger when we decide if it will escalate in our hearts. That's just enough time for any of us to remind ourselves of God's grace and replace anger with pity for the one hurting us. Just enough time for us to see that life isn't about fairness anymore. It is in that moment that, through God's power, we choose grace over anger.

2. "Raca" and "you fool" - Scholars I respect tend to disagree as to which slur Jesus uses is worse. Raca is an Aramaic word of distain. It's associated with spitting on the ground. "Fool" would be a much more disparaging word in Jesus' culture than in ours. Some commentators say it might be similar to the F-word. Perhaps the bigger comparison Jesus is making is between appearing before the Sanhedrin vs. being discarded in gehenna (hell).

3. We have as much baggage with the word hell as we do heaven. The word Jesus uses here is "gehenna" which was an actual trash dump located near where he was teaching. As a bonus, there's some interesting stuff on the Jewish perspective of Gehenna here: Jewish Encyclopedia.

I could do a whole study on Jesus and Hell..but we have more to cover in this lesson. Here's a quick video from N.T. Wright to get you thinking though:



4. Jesus seems to teach here that relational reconciliation trumps corporate worship. Again, it's about truly loving God and others within the new community more than anything else.

5. My take on the settling matters outside of court is not necessarily that Jesus is forbidding using the courts - that means something somewhat different to us than it would have to them anyway. (Again, I don't see these as new laws but examples of Kingdom life.) The idea here could certainly translate toward the reality of not suing someone who wrongs us, but it seems to me that the big Kingdom idea here is to make friends instead of enemies. Show grace, talk it out, be in honest relationship. Those are new community and Kingdom attributes.

Moving on: Matthew 5:27-37

Notes:

I've lumped the next three examples together (lust, adultery, oaths) in part because I have a suspicion that they interplay with one another. (If we lived Kingdom lives in the issues of lust and oaths, we'd probably see a lot less divorces.)

1. We see the same pattern for lust as we did with anger. To the one who can say, "at least I've never cheated on my spouse," Jesus says, "yes you have." He moves straight to intent. Many people who have never cheated on their spouse or had sex outside of marriage would choose to have sex with someone who is not their spouse if they knew for certain that nobody would ever find out.

2. There is some tricky language here. The "looks lustfully" implies intent. I think it might be best translated, "anyone who looks at a woman for the purpose of lusting." All the statements above about anger apply - there is a natural instinct to notice sexual attraction. It is the purposeful decision to dwell sexually on that attraction that forms our heart. (As with anger, many of us don't even realize we make the second decision anymore, but we do willfully make it in a split second.)

3. Let's all throw our eyes into the fires of Gehenna. All the stuff about cutting off eyes and hands can mean one of two things. (I've been using N.T. Wright and Dallas Willard as primary sources for this study and they disagree with one another here.)

-Wright's view: Jesus is using over-dramatic hyperbole here as he does in other places. The main point is to aggressively and decisively deal with things that separate you from Kingdom living. Be ruthless.

-Dallas Willard's view as quoted from The DIvine Conspiracy:

"Jesus is saying that if you think that laws can eliminate being wrong you would, to be consistent, cut off your hand or gouge out your eye so that you could not possibly do the acts the law forbids. Now truly, if you blind yourself, you cannot look at a woman to lust after her, because you cannot look on her at all. And if you sufficiently dismember yourself, you will not be able to do any wrong action. This is the logic by which Jesus by reduces the righteousness of the scribes and the Pharisees to the absurd...the ultimate question always concerns who you are not what you did or can do. What would you do if you could? Eliminating body parts will not change that."

For me, I prefer Willard's take, but I can't eliminate Wright's.

4. Divorce. Be careful to build an entire position on divorce using only these two verses. What we see clearly is that divorce is not a normal Kingdom/new community practice. (Though Jesus gives reasons to accept it in the new community.) A Biblical study on divorce would include Paul's teachings and the other gospel accounts. Divorce in this culture was more of a business transaction than anything else. A man unhappy with his wife would dismiss her and she would have few options: homelessness, prostitution or returning to her father's house if he was living and accepted her. The revolutionary part of this example is the value Jesus places on women.

Stanley Hauerwas says this in Matthew: Brazos Theolgoical Commentary:

"What is crucial is not the question of when marriage will be dissolved, but given the new dispensation the question should be how Christians understand marriage. In similar fashion, the question is not whether a divorced woman should be allowed to marry, but what kind of community must a church be that does not make it a necessity for such a woman to remarry. If Christians do not have to marry, if women who have been abandoned do not have to remarry, then surely the church must be a community of friendship that is an alternative to the loneliness of the world."

For many in this study this is a deeply personal and painful issue. I regret not being able to spend more time here, but for now I should remind you that Jesus ultimately brings a new community of grace and love. Whatever answers you find will lead you back to that truth.

5. Oaths. Jesus seems to be referring here to the second of the ten commandments - not taking the Lord's name in vain. It was common to promise by God's name to pay back a debt, etc. In the new community of the Kingdom we don't need to do this. We tell the truth all the time. He'll come back to this idea in chapter six.

Last section: Matthew 5:38-48

Notes:

This contains the last two examples of Kingdom life in the new community: revenge and dealing with enemies.

1. Jesus is really messing with the way the world works now. The Law that demanded an eye for an eye, a tooth for tooth, etc. had as its goal to break the cycle of revenge. You get what you deserve and that ends it. No escalation to death or feuds or wars. Jesus isn't content with stopping the cycle. He wants to turn it on its head using his Kingdom-empowered new community. So we replace revenge with love. When we are unjustly attacked, we don't just take it. We fight back with radical selfless love.

2. Jesus uses three mini-examples inside the first example. They all are snapshots of Kingdom reality.

-Turn the other cheek. A slap on the right cheek would normally have meant a backhanded slap. This would have been a common way to discipline a slave, child or even a wife. It implies being lower status. Perhaps beyond the obvious Jesus has something to say here about worth. "I'll stand here and let you hit me like an equal - your right fist to my left cheek." Either way, there is no retaliation. Jesus rejects the power of violence and militant revolution here and elsewhere. Some say Jesus is using shame to show the attacker how ridiculous they are for striking them.

-Give your shirt and cloak. This could just mean simply going above and beyond, but it also could induce shame on the unjust one. These were the two main garments normally worn, so standing naked before your accuser could make them look foolish in public.

-Second mile. A Roman soldier could force anyone to carry a burden for one mile. A new community member would offer to go two...perhaps to show love to the soldier or just to blow their mental perceptions. Those looking for the "shame pattern" will assume that this might embarrass the soldier who can't shake the slave from trailing him.

3. Crazy Love. The last example deals with another real life lesson. The disciples would have plenty of real enemies - the Romans, the Pharisees, the Sadducees, etc. Jesus knows his enemies will mistreat his followers and kill some of them. They, in turn, will love their enemies and pray for them. Then he says something revolutionary again - We love our enemies because God loves everyone. To the Israelites, this would be challenging. They were God's chosen people, but now he reminds us at the close of this section what he taught us before it started. The whole world will be blessed by the new community in the Kingdom, not just Israel.

4. Be Perfect. greek "teleioi" is a hard word to translate for us. Perfect is a good translation in the since of wholeness or maturity. I think it speaks to "wholeness" or "completeness" in terms of how we treat everyone the same way - with love, grace and non-violence. Hauerwas says the following:

"We are called, therefore, to be perfect, but perfection names our participation in Christ's love for his enemies. Perfection does not mean that we are sinless or that we are free of anger or lust. Rather, to be perfect is to learn to be part of a people who take the time to live without resorting to violence to sustain their existence."

week four. section three. assignments.

1. Think of your own example of what you imagine Kingdom life in the new community is like. Write it like this, "You have heard it said __________________, but we say_________________." Post your snapshots on the facebook group page.

2. Post one of these in your facebook/twitter status: "I'm getting a makeover at http://facebookbiblestudy.blogspot.com" or "I have some opinions on sex, hell and war: http://facebookbiblestudy.blogspot.com" or make up your own...

Bonus? Seriously? This study was pretty long. Ok...just for laughs:

Salt, Light and Religion. Mt. 5-7, Part Three of Seven.

Welcome back. This is week three of a seven week series studying Matthew 5-7. If you are new, welcome to the party. Here are a few things to know: The study is best done in order. Each study takes about 90 minutes. If you haven't done week one, click here. If you have done week one, but haven't completed week two, click here. Though the studies are posted on blogger, they are best experienced as a member of facebook. Click here to become friends with Bible Study on Facebook. Additionally, click here to join the discussion group on Facebook. I cannot overstate how much these studies build on one another. I won't take much time to review from week to week, so make sure you have a grasp of lessons one and two before proceeding.

Once you are in a comfortable place and free of distractions continue onto lesson three below:

week three. section one. salt and light.

Let's start by learning about salt. Why not, right? Watch the youtube video below:



Let's now read the passage we will be studying this week. Click here to read Matthew 5:13-20. Then return back to the study.

The Sermon is wrapping up its introduction. The "beatitudes" show us statements of reality in light of the coming of the Kingdom of Heaven to our lives here and now. Because the kingdom has come, the spiritually bankrupt are blessed. These statements about salt and light are similar in intent to the beatitudes in that these statements express a current reality to his disciples: "You are this already." However they are also statements of judgement against Israel. Jesus' disciples are the salt of the earth and the light of the world because Israel is not - Israel has lost it's "saltiness" and become dark. Jesus is telling his disciples that they are the new hope for Israel, but only because the Kingdom (reign) of Heaven (God) has come upon them through Christ. They are now what Israel was always destined to be - salt and light.

Before we look at the twofold imagery of salt and light, let's review some of what we learned in lesson one.

There is this overarching, historically-rooted, real promise that God made to humanity. He made a covenant (promise) to Abraham way back in Genesis 12. At that point Abraham was just one man with no heir, but through YHWH he was about to create an entire nation. He embodied all that Israel would and should become. This is what God promised him. Read Genesis 12:1-3 and return.

Notice that the promise to Abraham is that 1.) He would be blessed, 2.) He would be a blessing and that 3.) All the people of the earth would be blessed through him. God's original idea in calling a nation to himself through the one man Abraham was to birth a blessed nation that would bless the entire world. In Jesus we come full circle. One man again contains the hope of God's people - and the hope of God's people is the hope of all people...God's people will be a blessing to the entire world. Though every disciple of Jesus would have known all of this, many were losing hope in the practical world that Israel could really become a blessing to the nations.

I have hopefully built a compelling case that Matthew is showing us Jesus as the revolutionary Christ - the one to bring Israel to a place of ultimate fulfillment - where they are blessed and a blessing. (Notice that Jesus starts the Sermon on the Mount proclaiming to his disciples that they are truly "blessed" in the present. They are blessed already, now he will teach them how to be a blessing.)

John Ortberg, who taught us last week via video, says it this way in his sermon entitled "Vital Signs," a primary source for this week three lesson. (I'll post it as the "extra" at the end of our study.)

"A lot of people think of Jesus as a kind of guru, who went around just dropping out these beautiful, but kind of random sayings, like they would belong in a Hallmark card or something. That’s not what was going on. The Sermon on the Mount, among other things, is a piece of brilliant thought. It’s designed to launch a movement in the face of powerful opposition from at least four factions, that Jesus was aware of...And, all of them had power, and money and reasons to get rid of Him. So, these words are not kind of happy little esteem boosters. They are dangerous."

Ortberg goes onto categorize the four factions of people in the world of Jesus into these categories:

1. The Romans - The Romans (occupiers) view of Israel was that of a place to be exploited financially. Israel existed to be enslaved to Rome and make Rome richer.

2. The Zealots - These were radical Israelite nationalists committed to the violent overthrow of Roman occupation. (From the Roman perspective they would have been seen as terrorists.) Their view of Israel was that God wanted Israel to rule the earth and that they should bring about the revolution by any means necessary.

3. The Sadducees - Mainly consisting of the priests, the Sadducees were modernists and liberal theologians. They denied the inspiration of the Scriptures and did not believe in the coming of the Kingdom or even the idea of God intervening much at all in human history. Practical realists, they viewed Israel as a captive nation under Rome. They managed to "make the best of it" and assume local positions of power and influence in their world as they played within the political system. They were ultimately collaborators with Rome.

4. The Reformers - These were the Pharisees and teachers of the Law. Like the Zealots, they envisioned a world where Israel fully reigned in God's name. Their strategy was much different though. They became pious isolationists. The thinking was that if they separated themselves enough from the Romans, Zealots and Sadducees by their good living and rule keeping God would eventually notice them and reward them by destroying both their enemies and the "sinners" in their own nation. Many saw Messiah coming as key to this. At first glance, Jesus would appear to have the most in common with this faction. However, as we have already seen, this is the group of people most commonly at odds with Jesus in the gospels.

Again, Ortberg puts it this way:

"So, these were the visions: Rome, they kind of were the world. And the zealots said: we exist to rule the world. Sadducees said: we ought to be like the world. And the reformers said: we ought to withdraw and isolate from the world. Nobody was talking about blessing the world. It was in the middle of this cauldron that Jesus comes. He stands on the side of the mountain, and He remembers how God said to Abraham one day, "I will bless you."

In the midst of this reality, Jesus calls together his small group of mountain climbing disciples and creates a "fifth faction" that will overcome and outlast them all. He tells his followers that they are the new hope for Israel. That they already are salt and light. That they already are the blessing to the world promised to Abraham. Ortberg continues...

"And the people respond, of course. Who, us? Insignificant us? Not the Romans, with all of their power and wealth? Not the Zealots, with all of their passion? Not the Sadducees, with all of their connections, not the reformers with all of their piety and religiosity? And Jesus says, no. He says they’re all wrong. The subjugators and the dominators and haters, and the collaborators and the isolators, they’re all wrong. And here’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to love them all. I’m going to love the Centurions. I’m going to have a Zealot become one of my people. I’ll love the priests, I’ll love the Pharasees, and I’ll love them all. But a lot of them won’t get it. They’ll fight me, they’ll oppose me, they’ll persecute me, and they’ll imprison me. Eventually they’ll kill me. And then, here’s the next step in the plan. You, my little rag-tag crowd, you will love them. And then they’ll fight you and oppose you and persecute you and imprison you. And kill many of you. And what will you do? Then you’ll love them even more. Isn’t that a great plan? Aren’t you all fired up about that plan? And, of course, a lot of people weren’t. But some people were."

These rag-tag disciples are the real fulfillment of Israel. They are God's people living in God's reign with God's King leading them. They are the rebels bringing blessing to the world.

They are salt. This salt business ties directly into God's covenant (promise) to Abraham to be a blessing to the world. Again, it evokes imagery from the Torah: Read Numbers 18:19 and return back to the study.

God has a "covenant of salt" with Israel. He has a promise of salt with his people. What it the world does that mean? First, it is important to not confuse our modern idea of salt with the ancient understanding. We generally use salt to add taste or spice to food. The ancients, especially the Romans, did this as well. However, the primary use of salt in the ancient world was to preserve meat and other foods. Salt was used to stop corruption and decay in a piece of meat. Salt saved. Beyond whatever other imagery we may pull from being the "salt" of the earth, I've come to believe that Jesus is primarily saying that Israel had a covenant of salt with YHWH, which they broke. They were to be true to Him and He was to use them like salt in the world. He would bless them and they would be a blessing. They would turn the corrupted world around and give blessing to the parts where decay had set in. Now, the Kingdom has come. Jesus can say, "You (my disciples) are what YHWH always wanted Israel to be. You are the salt of the earth."

In blessing his disciples, Jesus is also cursing the other factions. They have failed to be salt and lost their "salt-ness." This is a new day. A new covenant. A new salt covenant to radically fulfill the old one. Now the new deal goes something like this, "Messiah and Heaven have come to you. Repent from your old ways of thinking and your factions and God will overwhelm you with his rule and presence, making you salt like he always wanted to do - not just for you sake, but for the sake of the whole world."

Jesus doesn't just reference the salt covenant, but also light. Now read these verses from Isaiah and return:

Isaiah 42:6
Isaiah 49:6

Notice this word covenant again. Isaiah is seeing the day when the blessed/blessing covenant promised to Abraham is fully realized. Someday, he says, light will come from Israel to the Gentiles (the rest of the world.) Someday, Isaiah says, the Kingdom of Heaven will reign and a covenant/promise of light will be fulfilled on the earth.

Jesus says clearly in our passage, "that day is today" when he says to his early followers, "you are the light of the world." They had to know with these two covenant-packed analogies what Jesus was saying. They likely had a hard time believing it, but they had to know he was telling them that today begins the day we have all hoped to see for generation after generation. We are finally salt and finally light. The new covenant/promise/deal is enacted. God is reigning and He has chosen the least likely faction of all to bring it all about. He has chosen us - the nobodies. (Again there is back-handed judgement here for the four factions. They have hidden the light in one way or another, but now Jesus and his disciples will let it out from under the bowl.)

week three. section two. righteousness.

This concludes the introduction to the Sermon. Now Jesus will move onto his main idea, which we will look at in this lesson. Next week we will watch as he walks us through some different real-life scenarios to test his main idea.

Let's re-read the section we are studying presently as we move on to the latter verses: Matthew 5:13-20.

There must have been some rumor floating around that Jesus was blowing everything up - the Torah, the Law, the Prophets. Some most have been saying that he was starting a new covenant at the expense of the old one. He has to address this concern immediately after his introductory remarks. He speaks plainly: I have not come to abolish (get rid of) the old covenant, but to fulfill it. Jesus is going to focus in on faction #4 (the reformers/pharisees) to let his followers know what he does and does not have in common with them.

What he does have in common with the Pharisees:

He loves the Law (Torah/Scriptures) as much or more than they do. He has not come (like the Sadducees) to downplay the Scriptures but to elevate the promises and the heart of the practices within them. Like any good Rabbi, Jesus loves and values the Law and Prophets down to the tiniest of pen strokes within it.

What he does not have in common with the Pharisees:

Jesus placed love for God and people above obeying the rules and external compliance. This, again, is part of the revolution - the new covenant. Jesus put it this way later on in Matthew:

Matthew 22:37-41

Notice what Jesus is doing here. It is radical and must be wrestled with, not just in this passage, but throughout the Sermon. Jesus is redefining righteousness as love for God and people. He is working from the inside out vs. the outside in. And in this section he judges the Pharisees most viciously. When he says, "unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven," he is certainly not calling his disciples to be MORE religious or law-abiding or rule-keeping. (That is the Pharisees' faulty definition of righteousness.) By Jesus' own definition, he is calling his followers to a life of relentless love. He is not raising the bar on religious piety, but rather condemning the very pious who do not really love God or their neighbor. The irony is rich and thick. He looks over the crowd of whores, mobsters, ex-zealots, abandoned widows, religious nobodies, and the poorest of the poor. He's already told them that they are blessed. He's already informed them that they are entering the Kingdom of Heaven by accepting his invitation to repent. Then he tells them that they have a righteousness that exceeds the ones they have always thought were the most righteous people to ever live. He tells them that the Pharisees will have to become like them to see Heaven.

This radical idea will propel his message forward. Jesus will now start putting flesh to the bones of his new covenant. That is what we will cover in lesson four next week.

week three. section three. assignments.

1. Commit at least one verse in Matthew 5:13-20 to memory this week. Think about it daily.

2. Take some time this week to be alone with God. In a journal or notebook write this question, "God what things do I try to do or not do in order to be right with you?" Spend some time asking God to give you a heart that loves him. Then ask, "What things do you want me to do or not do this week?" See what comes to your mind and take a risk that maybe God is trying to show you something.

3. Type this in your FB/twitter status, "I'm part of a salt and light rebellion. You can join too at http://facebookbiblestudy.blogspot.com"

4. If you haven't yet, join the discussion on the Facebook Group Page.

This week's extra:

Follow this link to John Ortberg's sermon entitled "Vital Signs." Watch it for free by pushing the arrow button. (It was the primary resource for this week's study, so parts will feel like a review.)

Vital Signs Link

Lucky You. Mt 5-7, Part Two of Seven.

This is week two of a seven week study on Matthew 5-7. If you are new to the study, welcome! Each week's study is intended to take around 90 minutes. They are best done in one sitting whenever possible. If you have not done lesson one, do it before doing this one by clicking this link. These lessons will build on each other. Think of it like a kid making a tower out of blocks. Make sure your foundation is solid before moving onto the next study. If you rushed through last week's lesson, take time to revisit it. This one will be here whenever you are ready to proceed.

OK. Ready to go? When you are in a comfortable place with limited distractions continue onto lesson two below:

week two. section one. discipleship.

We must fearlessly move past our assumptions about Jesus and search for him anew in Matthew's words. Last week we began to try to understand the arching ideas of Messiah/Christ and the Kingdom of God (what Matthew calls the Kingdom of Heaven). Unless otherwise noted I will use the word "heaven" in the Matthean sense throughout this study. I will not be speaking of "heaven" as some other-worldly, postmortem happy state of being, but rather God's real and dynamic coming to earth through the presence and reign of Messiah Jesus. Heaven is partially here now and will be here fully when Messiah returns again to judge and reign. This, in my strong opinion, is Matthew's understanding of heaven. It includes the afterlife, because it is an eternal reign, but Matthew makes it clear that Jesus is abundantly more concerned with the present life than the life than proceeds physical death.

We concluded our last study looking at Matthew 4:17 as Jesus' primary message and agenda. He came to call his people to repent (stop and turn toward God) because the Kingdom of Heaven is coming toward them. Let's begin this lesson by re-reading Matthew 4:17-25. (Just click the link and return back when you have finished reading.)

Throughout the book of Matthew, Jesus finds himself surrounded by crowds of people. They come because he heals them, feeds them and entertains them. The crowd is a safe place to admire Jesus from afar. The following link will take you back to www.biblegateway.com. I've isolated everytime the word "crowd" or "crowds" is used in the book of Matthew. Quickly scan through the references. Jot down anything you notice on a piece of paper or in a word processor window on your computer. After that, return back to the study.

Click this link: Crowd/Crowds in Matthew (This link isn't working exactly right for some people. It may show you every listing in the Bible, not just Matthew. If it does, start with #20.)

Matthew makes it clear from the beginning that Jesus is going to accomplish whatever mission he has by calling disciples to himself. (Disciples are learners/students/apprentices.) Twelve of the disciples were chosen to be apostles, but there were more than twelve disciples. Jesus' disciples were those people who were called by him and fully accepted his invitation to enter a teacher/student relationship.

Again, go to the following link and read every instance in the book of Matthew where the world "disciples" is used. I'm not asking that you do an intense study right now. (You may want to later if this captivates you.) Just take about five minutes and read through the verses. What themes or patterns emerge? Based on your first impressions, do you see any contrasts between the crowds and the disciples in Matthew?

Click this link and return after reading: Disciples in Matthew

Let's look at some teaching on what it would have meant to actually become a disciple of Jesus. I'm trying to make the case here that Jesus' ultimate strategy for bringing the Kingdom of Heaven to earth was and still is through the process of discipleship. Watch the following two youtube videos from Rob Bell back to back. (Sorry about the subtitles...this was the best quality version on youtube.)





week two. section two. matthew 5:1-11.

Now, with the background from week one and the current teaching about discipleship let's (finally) dive into Matthew 5. Notice how the section we will be studying for the next six weeks begins:

Matthew 5:1-2

Jesus has hit the ground running with the long-awaited good news that the Kingdom of Heaven has come. Not only that, he has backed up his statement with amazing miracles to prove that God is on the move and breaking into humanity in a fresh and significant way. The early stirrings of what is sure to be a great popular revolt against Israel's captors has begun in chapter four. Then something happens to Jesus that will happen to him again and again throughout the gospels. He grows weary of the crowds. He must retreat from them. He literally climbs a mountainside to get away. The crowds would never climb a mountain to get to him. The crowds simply aren't that into Jesus. However, his disciples will - that's what disciples do. Disciples are not simple crowd members, they are relentless mountain-climbing followers. They are students, learners, apprentices. In the ancient eastern world of first century Palestine, a disciple has one job - to follow his teacher wherever he goes.

Stanley Haurwas puts it this way in Matthew (Brazos Theological Commentary on the Bible):

"David's kingdom is now present in Jesus...It is a kingdom that requires repentance. Repentance, moreover, requires a training called discipleship. So we should not be surprised that Jesus now calls his first disciples. He does not call his disciples from the powerful or the elites, but rather he calls fishermen, promising to make them fish for people. Throughout his gospel Matthew is unsparing in his description of the incomprehension of the disciples, but they do follow Jesus. In that respect Matthew contrasts the disciples with the crowds that are attracted to Jesus...Those in the crowds will often be in awe of Jesus, they will express amazement at his teaching, but at the end of the day they will shout, "Let him be crucified!" (Matt. 27:22-23)"

So in Matthew 5:2, Jesus is now all alone with his disciples. Matthew is showing us that there is no need for censorship. He can now speak plainly. This is the locker room speech, the war room planning session, the family meeting, the White House security briefing. This is where we cut to the chase - this is where Jesus can tell those whom he will eventually trust to fulfill his mission of rebellion how it will all come about. And this is how he begins the speech to launch a revolution:

Matthew 5:3-11

There is a popular understanding of this passage (commonly called The Beatitudes) that goes something like this:

These are a series of commands or suggestions given by Jesus as to how to live life. Helpful attitudes that can teach us how to be a "Christian." Some see the suggested actions as spiritual steps that build on one another. This popular understanding breaks down the actions something like this:

1. Be poor in spirt (humble)
2. Mourn (over your sin)
3. Be meek (gentle - restrained but powerful)
4. Hunger/Thirst (desire to learn from God or the Scriptures)
5. Merciful (show grace)
6. Pure in heart (personal holiness)
7. Peacemakers (help others get along)
8. Be Persecuted (endure hardship for Christ)

This is a rather difficult portion of the study to write because several of you have already written me saying that you are excited to study the beatitudes because they have so positively influenced your spiritual growth. I have no doubt that most of you who say that were taught some version of the above interpretation. However, I do not think that the above interpretation is an accurate understanding of Jesus' intent. (Now, I should state that the above eight ideas are all generally biblical. If teaching on humility or grace or holiness has helped you, that is because those concepts are true and life changing. You may have been taught right truths from the wrong text - no harm unless you have not been taught the alternative - and in my opinion, the more complete - interpretation.) I do not at all believe that the point of the "beatitudes" is to try to get people to act or behave in a certain way, but rather that they are direct expressions of a new reality to those living within the reign and rule of the Kingdom of Heaven under Messiah Jesus.

In other words, the statements should be read not like this:

Blessed are those who learn to be poor in spirit because they will someday receive the kingdom of heaven.

But rather:

The Kingdom of heaven now belongs to them - so blessed are the spiritually bankrupt.

This is a huge distinction that sets the tone for the entire Sermon. Jesus is telling his disciples that they are already blessed (happy, lucky) because he has given them the Kingdom of Heaven. The gift of the new life he is giving them is great news because the world is now upside down. In the world of the Pharisees, being poor is spirit (think: unspiritual, never goes to church, doesn't own a Bible, never tried to pray) is a bad thing. In the Pharisees' world, the spiritually rich are blessed, not the spiritually poor. In Jesus' new world order, the spiritually bankrupt are now happy because YHWH himself has decided to come and be with them in his Kingdom. They get God. They get him even though they don't deserve him. (Lucky are the losers, for they get God.) Matthew will begin to juxtapose this idea with the painful reality that the Pharisees, those who think they deserve to know God, will completely miss him as he walks around in their presence disguised as a radical homeless Rabbi.

So it is with those who mourn because they will be comforted. In other words, lucky are the very sad - like the widow grieving her dead husband. She is lucky now because Messiah has given her two new gifts: YHWH himself in her presence through Jesus and a New Community of disciples who will take her in as their own mother. (In the ancient world, widows were often destined for a life of prostitution or poverty. In the Kingdom, they get comfort.) So Jesus can say what is becoming true in that very moment on the mountainside as his followers learn to receive from him: Lucky are the mourners because they too have the Kingdom and will receive comfort from those within it.

I have been profoundly influenced by Dallas Willard on this point. (I recommended his book The Divine Conspiracy: Rediscovering Our Hidden Life In God last week.) John Ortberg is another teacher I have learned from in this area. John is the pastor of Menlo Park Presbyterian Church in San Francisco. Your next assignment will be to watch his message on this passage from a few months back. This will take a little over 30 minutes, so make sure you have time and energy to devote to it. Follow the link below and click the arrow to watch the teaching. (You can also listen via audio or read the manuscript, but I recommend watching it if at all possible.) When you have finished, return back here for some closing thoughts.

Watch John Ortberg's Message entitled "How To Be Really Well Off"

week two. section three. assignments.

All done? Move onto your assignments for this week below:

1. If you haven't yet, go to the Facebook GROUP Page. This is different from the original Facebook Profile Page. The group page allows for an ongoing discussion with the students. You have to become a member of the group by clicking "join this group" below the picture before you can post.

2. Post this in your facebook/twitter update to help spread the word: "I completely screwed up my life and then I got really lucky. More at http://www.facebookbiblestudy.blogspot.com"

3. Send a FB message, e-mail or letter to someone in your life who modeled true discipleship to you. Let them know what they taught you and how it has changed you. Tell them that they were being like Jesus when they took the time to let you learn from them.

Bonus Extra - for you high achievers:

I'm a big U2 fan. In part because they are becoming pretty fair Kingdom theologians. You can listen to their new album for free this week at www.u2.com. Check it out and post some thoughts on their lyrics on Facebook. Do any of the songs resonate with this study at all? (No real sense judging the music itself - you don't want to upset your teacher...)