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Luke Simmons and Seth Troutt discuss cultural and theological questions through a biblical lens.
(upbeat music)
Hey there, welcome to
King Culture Podcast.
I'm Luke and that is Seth.
It's great to have you with us today.
Everybody talks these days, Seth,
about they're so blessed.
Man, I'm so blessed.
And usually that means I got a new job
or something really worked out
or gosh, I've been on
this great vacation.
People don't really use hashtags anymore
but this used to be the whole thing,
hashtag blessed.
And today we're talking
about the blessed life.
So is that kind of
what we're talking about?
More money, more great
vacations, more stuff.
More power, more sex,
that's the way it works.
That's what blessed means.
Hashtag blessed.
Hashtag blessed.
Yeah, the things that
people apply that to,
someone will do something immoral
and it'll be successful, hashtag blessed.
And it's disheartening
how a rich biblical word
gets tossed around like a big nothing.
And the word, so we're
talking about the beatitudes,
which I had to look up, what does the
word beatitude mean?
Because I think people think
beatitudes just means this,
but like that word came from somewhere.
Well, that's not a
word that's in the Bible.
It's a word that's used to describe
a portion of the Bible.
Yeah, but beatitudes
just means super blessed.
Oh really?
It comes from the old Greek,
oh, it comes from the
old word meaning beat.
Or the root of that is blessing.
So it's like, beatitudes can't just mean
the extremely blessed.
So beatitudes means the
extremely blessed list of things.
You know, if you have these things,
you're extremely blessed.
And then you get these beatitudes,
which are called or the
listings of the blessings.
And these are the things that Jesus uses
to kick off the Sermon on the Mount.
And let's just read them for the sake
of starting off reading them.
So this is Matthew five.
Matthew five, starting in verse one,
He went up on the mountain.
When He sat down, His
disciples came to Him
and they opened His mouth.
And He opened His mouth
and taught them saying,
"Blessed are the poor in spirit,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are those who mourn,
for they shall be comforted.
Blessed are the meek, for
they shall inherit the earth.
Blessed are those who hunger
and thirst for righteousness,
for they shall be satisfied.
Blessed are the merciful,
for they shall receive mercy.
Blessed are the pure in
heart, for they shall see God.
Blessed are the peacemakers,
for they shall be called sons of God.
Blessed are those who are
persecuted for righteousness sake,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are you when others
revile you and persecute you
and utter all kinds of
evil against you falsely
on my account.
Rejoice and be glad, for
your reward is great in heaven,
for so they persecuted the
prophets who were before you."
All right, so I got a
question around the gate.
Is it blessed or blessed?
You know, it's funny
as I start to read that.
Blessed are the poor in spirit.
Every other context in your
whole life, you say blessed.
But when you go to read the Beatitudes,
we wanna say, "Blessed are the poor."
Blessed are the, so it's either, I think.
Either way is okay.
I think if you wanna sound-
It's not like
revelations, which is always wrong.
Yeah, I think if you
wanna sound more serious
and religious, you say blessed.
Oh, okay.
If you wanna sound like a
regular person, you say blessed.
Oh, but hashtag blessed.
Hashtag blessed.
Doesn't have the same thing.
It doesn't work.
It doesn't work.
So this is gonna be
our next sermon series.
So we got a week on each one of these.
And at a minimum, you first read it
and it sounds
counterintuitive or the opposite.
And so Beatitudes means super blessed,
but what does blessed mean?
Well, the word is, this is probably good
just to nail down as Makai-Ras,
which could be translated
fortunate, happy, privileged.
Blessed is the way you
could translate that word.
Actually, in Eugene
Peterson's rendering of the message,
he translates it as lucky.
Lucky is the one.
You think lucky and
fortunate kind of go hand in hand
because he would say
that in the modern usage,
someone says like, I'm so
lucky to be married to you.
Like you're not necessarily referencing
kind of like an impersonal fortunate,
but like what a treat it
is, what a privilege it is.
I'm not lucky in the
sense of like just chance.
Like gambling lucky, but
lucky like blessed, fortunate,
it's a privilege to be with you.
And cause he understood
that that word blessed
sounds so religious that it
sounds other and distinct,
but blessed is a very ordinary word.
Makai-Ras is an ordinary word, happy.
Blessed is the child at Peter Piper Pizza
with an unlimited gamer card.
Like there's just a happiness.
There's a disposition of-
So in that sense, it's not wrong
when someone's had a great vacation
or they've gotten a raise or they-
What a blessing.
They have like a bunch of happy kids
and go like, man, I'm so blessed.
Like that's true.
It's absolutely true.
But then you look at
the rest of this list
and it's all stuff like the,
so you see these like
phases in these things.
And what I want to highlight
is the difficulty of interpreting these
because the history from
early in the church fathers
through the
Reformation up to modern time,
there's big disagreement
about how to interpret,
how to package, how to
imply, how to apply these things.
Well, because not all
of them on the surface
feel like the kind of good life.
Yeah, you go blessed
are the pure in heart.
Well, duh.
Yeah, that seems right.
Obviously.
But blessed are those who mourn.
Seems like-
Happy, lucky.
Happy are those who are sad.
Yeah, right.
It feels like a contradiction.
Happy are those who are sad.
A fortunate are those who are poor.
That was the less fortunate.
That was unfortunate.
And then you get into some of them
and they feel less intuitive.
Blessed are the meek.
So meek is like quiet strength.
They'll take over the earth.
And it feels like
there's a contradiction here.
I thought it was a strong
who take over the earth,
but it's another meek
who inherit the earth.
And so you get into
these debates about how we,
like what we know-
When you say you get into debates,
it's not like most of us
are having debates about it.
I mean, church history debates, yeah.
But throughout the history,
commentators and theologians
have really broken these down
different ways.
Yeah, so there's different
ways of understanding it.
I would say the first way
would be the legalistic way,
which is be this so you can get that.
That's number one.
Blessed are the poor in spirit
for there's the kingdom of heaven.
You go, okay, I want
the kingdom of heaven
and therefore I will
become poor in spirit.
So it's be this in order to get that.
So it's if I do blank,
then I will get blank.
Blessed are those who
mourn for their comfort.
I want to be comforted, I better mourn.
Blessed are the meek
for the inherit the earth.
I want the earth, so
I better become meek.
I want satisfaction, so
hunger is righteousness.
And so that way could
be called the works way
or the legalistic way.
And when you say legalistic or works way
that automatically pings me as like bad.
Yeah, well, so that-
So maybe we'll come back to that,
but I just like that
is a very negative way
to describe that approach.
Yes, yeah.
Like another way that
would be less negative
would be consequential.
Yeah, or reap what you
sow or something like that.
Yeah, so the legalistic
way, which is like the
if this, then that, I want
that, so then I'll do the if.
And this is basically, I'll
do what the first part says
so that I can get the second part.
And that's what
happens, that's how I do it.
That's way number one.
And that's the most common way.
Like that's what's taught
in most Roman Catholicism.
That's what's taught in most,
at least north traditions,
like if you want to be godly,
then you have to be godly.
If you want to be with
God, you better be godly.
And so you must ascend.
So they tend to quote, in Isaiah it says,
"Come, let us ascend
the Mount of the Lord."
And then Jesus here
goes up on the mountain
and then he teaches, like he's in like,
here's how you ascend
the Mount of the Lord.
If you want to come up to where God is,
here's how you climb that mountain.
You be this way.
And so it was prescriptive, you do this,
and you get that, that's the first way.
That's the, I'll call
it the legalistic way.
The second way is the, we'll
call it like the Lutheran way,
which is that this law is
designed for you to read it,
feel like a pile of garbage,
and realize you need Christ, right?
And- Or I could say like the Ray Comfort
way of the master kind of way.
Yes, yeah, it's, wow, I
am none of these things.
And even when I try, I'm not good,
and hunger, and you're self-aware,
and you're reading these things,
you realize I'm not that.
And you're supposed to
be cut off at the knees,
realize you need Christ.
And the argument from that
comes later on when Jesus says,
unless your
righteousness exceeds the scribes
and the Pharisees, that's in the same
sermon on the Mount,
you will not inherit the kingdom of God.
And so- Which you're
supposed to hear and go,
well, my righteousness
doesn't exceed theirs,
because those guys are like paying
attention to everything.
Yeah, so if they're the most righteous,
and they're not even righteous enough,
I better be, and so- And I can't be,
so I need grace.
Yeah, so the whole
school of thought there is,
this is designed to make you realize
how far from godliness you are,
and so that you turn to
Christ and cling to Him.
Okay. So I'd call it the Lutheran way.
The third way, I would
call it like the Reformed way.
Ooh, I was hoping it
was gonna start with L.
Because we had legalistic and Lutheran,
I was hoping we had a-
Yeah, an L, another L
word. Anyway, L word.
Yeah, I'm trying to think.
The Reformed way. Reformed way.
A couple of the L words.
You haven't yet showed us
your cards of what you think,
but you're explaining
these ways of understanding
throughout history, so the Reformed way.
The Reformed way is saying,
if you are in Christ,
this is true of you.
So if you have come to
Christ in faith and repentance,
you are a poor in spirit,
yours is the kingdom of heaven.
If you have come to Christ,
you have mourned your sin,
and you'll be comforted by Christ.
If you've come to Christ,
you realize that you're dependent on Him,
then you are make, and
you'll inherit the earth.
And so this is like, this is
yours in an increasing way,
live into who you are.
So it's more of a positional promise
that the disciples come to
Him and Jesus is telling them,
because you're in me,
this is who you are.
And so in this sense,
it's still a moral prescription,
but not unto attainment,
but unto pleasing the
Lord or something like that.
And then there's the patristic way.
Oh baby.
That really doesn't serve with hell.
Early church fathers.
So the Augustinian
and the Gregory of Nyssa
has a big way about this.
And these are the oldest interpretations,
and they really have nothing
to do with salvation per se.
Like whereas all three
of those kind of have,
through a little bit with salvation,
like how do you know
if you're saved or not,
and how do you know if
you're in or not saved, not saved.
It's more just a
recipe for how to progress
in the Christian life.
So it's more about the
spiritual formation lens.
And so I was doing
some research about this,
and I wanna talk about it a little bit.
So I wanna talk about
Nyssa and then Augustine,
because I think this is interesting.
And I think these things are part of it.
And so me show you
the cards type of thing.
I'm definitely a combo of,
and there's one other
school of thought after this
we can talk about later,
which is the hyper modern one.
But Gregory of Nyssa-
Well, it's funny, because so far,
we didn't have the L's,
but I do think of like
some alliterations sound wise
of like, I think about it as,
the first one was conditional.
Yeah.
The second one's impossible.
The third one's positional.
Yeah, there you go.
And the last one's formational.
There you go.
And even as you, I
mean, they all sound like-
Well, now that you say that,
the word for the last one,
I'm gonna call it invitational.
Oh, okay.
So there you go.
There you go.
The invitational one, which is-
So conditional,
impossible, positional, invitational.
Yeah, and invitational is-
Are you saying you think
maybe it's a little bit
of all the above?
I think so.
So Dallis Willard is the
one that people are probably
most familiar with if
they've studied this,
because not a lot of
people have written on it.
But he argues that this isn't
prescriptive at all.
It's all just descriptive,
that Jesus is gathering around
a bunch of people who
felt like they had no place
in the kingdom of God.
And Jesus is like, he
imagines him kind of motioning
to them and saying,
blessed are you, who mourn,
for here is the kingdom.
Blessed are you, hunger
and thirst for righteousness.
And he says that the main message of this
is the free availability of
God's rule and righteousness
to all humanity through
reliance on Jesus himself.
So he's just saying all the people who
thought they weren't
in on the basis of their life sucks,
on the basis of the
religious system of the day,
excludes them, you're
in, or you can get in.
So that's Dallis
Willard, he's not a patristic.
He is not, he's very modern, yeah.
So like for example,
he says, the merciful,
blessed are the merciful,
for they shall obtain mercy.
The worldly wise will
say woe to the merciful
for they'll be taken advantage of.
And outside heaven's rule, that's true.
But the merciful who
are taken advantage of
are included in the kingdom of God.
Like that's kind of the
way he reads some of that.
Are you putting him in
one of those four buckets?
He'd be invitational,
meaning everyone's invited.
Nobody's excluded on the basis
of what their life has been like,
or whether they're
materially blessed or not.
So you're tempted to
think, well, if God loves me,
then I'd be more financially well off.
And Dallis Willard is
going, no, blessed are the poor.
And so you can get on this.
But the Gregor of Nissa
one is the formational piece.
And this is one that's kind of probably
outside the box for Ironwood,
but I think it's really interesting.
And I'm not sure if I
agree with it, but I minimum,
I hope you'll agree
that it's interesting.
It's worth maybe thinking about.
Yeah, so he and the
fathers envisioned what they saw
was like this kind of
three part progression
in the Christian life.
Part one, so this is
like after you've signed up
to be a disciple of
Jesus is the purgative
or the purgative phase,
where you're emptying yourself,
renouncing the world, it's
the putting off of worldliness.
Then there is what's
called the illuminative stage
where you're putting on
and you're having eyes
for what God has eyes for,
and you're desiring the
things of heaven in a greater way.
And then you're renewing your mind.
Yeah, the renewing of the mind.
And then there's the unitive stage,
which is where you become more like God,
you become godly.
You lean into your union with Christ
such that you walk like he walks
and you talk like he talks and you're
becoming more godly.
So now I definitely see
that as like a progression
that people follow in the sacred Christ,
but you're saying he's
mapping that onto this.
Yeah, and so Nissa, we had a discussion
about the wisdom literature,
and that's where they map that from too.
So the purgative phase is Proverbs,
the illuminative phase is Ecclesiastes,
the unitive phase is Song of Songs.
That's how they kind
of thought through that.
But Nissa sees that progression here.
So he would argue that
these beatitudes are a pyramid
and there's a foundation
and you build upon them.
So these aren't eight isolated things,
but these are eight
phases in growing in godliness
and progressing in the
Christian life in immaturity.
And so the foundation
of the Christian life,
the beginning of it is
blessed are the poor in spirit.
Because that's like ground zero entrance.
That is where you're going.
Theirs is the kingdom
of heaven, they belong.
To get in requires poverty of spirit.
He calls it the kenosis or the emptying
of self-sufficiency.
This is the foundation of all.
Pride and
self-sufficiency must be evacuated
to make room for God.
Just as Jesus Christ was poor in spirit,
so also are we now poor in spirit.
In the sense that he, kenosis,
he emptied himself,
took the form of a servant.
I like that for one reason,
because that's also the foundation
of my masculinity
pyramid, which is humility.
I'm saying, as soon as you said pyramid,
I'm like, ooh, that's in.
I'm in on the pyramids,
I'm in on the pyramids.
So then that's layer one.
Then after layer one,
the poverty of spirit,
you seek to go to the next one,
which is blessed are those who mourn.
And this is called
apophatic or negative grief.
The soul has seen its emptiness
and now grieves the distance from God,
both in the past and the present.
This is sadness over
sin, sadness over the fact
that you've been
ungodly, sadness over good works
left undone.
And so first you go to porn spirit,
then you make room for God initially,
then you compare yourself to God,
realize that you have a
lot and you're comforted
and that's the comfort of grace.
So first you get in, then
you're hugged basically,
is that how it works?
And then, so that would
be the purgative phase,
is one and two is poverty and mourning.
Then you get into the illuminative phase
and I have blessed are the meek
and he calls meekness
the taming of the passions.
So it's strength under control,
it's not willy nilly, it's so meeknessy,
Going back to our
seven deadly sin series,
it's kind of turning from those things
and turning to something else.
Yeah, disorder and passions are now
ordered and stilled,
the soul becomes stable, not thrown about
or tossed about by temptation.
And so meekness is self-control,
meekness is not being
tossed about by those things.
And then after you
have the self-restraint,
the self-control of meekness,
strength under control,
then you go to
blessed are those who hunger
and thirst for righteousness
and he calls it the development of eros
towards the good.
So eros is like that kind of almost,
like eros is the erotic
love or the deep desire
or the lust for that
which is holy and good.
Like the itch that won't go
away is now for godliness.
He says the purified soul
feels the awakened desire
for God as the infinite good.
Hunger is not a sign of failure
but the engine of
epi-stasis or eros towards God.
The soul is drawn toward
into what it cannot hold.
And so there's this desire.
So if meekness is control of the self,
now eros is the ordering of the self
towards what is good.
So you're moving
toward Christian hedonism,
which we talked about recently.
Very Christian hedonism is
right in there with that.
And then the last phase
in the illuminative phase
would be blessed are the merciful,
which is philanthropia or philanthropy,
which is participating in divine love.
The soul begins to act
from the divine compassion
it has received.
Mercy is not a human achievement
but the overflow of that union,
the merciful receive
mercy as they receive mercy.
It's this kind of reciprocal thing.
I'm now treating people
like Christ treats me.
So this is I'm loved and now I love.
And, but that is after the
desire for godliness, right?
You see, and so then you
get into the last phase
which is the unitive phase,
which is what he says like
now you're beginning to
be peak spiritual maturity
and blessed are the peacemakers.
I'll just say on the front end,
the unitive language is really hard
in light of having just in
the last month or so studied
and preached on union with
Christ, which is by faith,
union with Christ is
not something you achieve
or eventually get to or progressed to.
It's something you
have if you're in Christ.
Obviously your experience
of the fullness of that union
deepens the more mature you get.
So I'm a little hung up on that,
but I'm trying to set
that aside for now and go,
he's not talking about
this how you get union.
This is how you experience
deeper communion perhaps.
Yeah, I think probably kind of like
in my sanctification
sermon, you are saints,
now live like saints.
That's kind of how I described it like.
You are united to Christ, live like
you're united to Christ.
Yeah, and experience
the blessings of that
in a day to day basis.
And so now as you're
getting into the unitive phase,
you have blessed are the peacemakers,
they're called sons of God.
And sons of God, he argues here are kind
of like little gods.
Their argument is that Matthew five
is not talking about
adoption of adoption,
but it's talking about
you're looking like little gods.
Like my kids look like me a little bit,
now we're kind of like little gods.
That's how Gregory is seeing it.
Yeah, Gregory, yeah.
And so the soul
participates in the divine peace.
Peacemaking is not a mere virtue,
but an attribute of the
divine nature now shared.
You're building bridges between people
and you are now doing
the work that God does,
which is the work of
reconciliation between people.
And which leads to the final stage,
which is suffering a persecution,
which he calls it the recapitulation,
which is you're now living Christ's life,
now people start to hate you.
This is when people start to hate you.
Blessed are those who are
persecuted for righteousness sake,
for there's the kingdom of heaven.
And it's interesting how you,
the first one is
there's the kingdom of heaven
and the last one is
there's the kingdom of heaven.
And so that's kind of
like the inclusio of this,
that you attain it
through spiritual poverty
and then you must endure
in it to go on attaining it.
It's like his idea.
But the fully deified soul,
this is Eastern Orthodoxy language here,
which means like the
capacity of which humans have
to mirror the image of God.
So that as Godly as a
soul can get on earth,
sharing Christ's own suffering,
the first promise
returns and closing the hole,
not an end, but an internal beginning.
And so he sees this pyramid
at the top of the pyramid,
you're not doing what Jesus did
and people are hating you for it.
And that's like the goal of life.
And so it's interesting
to think about these things
as like building blocks
on how you go up and up
and the warnings they entail.
So, I'm not sure if I buy it,
but I thought it was interesting.
And that's like the
earliest kind of framework we have
for interpreting the sermon on the Mount.
So, like all of that is fascinating.
All four of those
perspectives are fascinating
and all of them seem to have like, okay,
you're not crazy for thinking it's that,
but Jesus meant something
when he gave this sermon.
And that's some of, as
we go through this series,
what we're gonna try to
discern is what did Jesus mean?
What did Matthew think
Jesus meant as he wrote this
and recorded it?
So, did he mean all of that?
How do you even begin?
I mean, so this is less about maybe the
beatitudes themselves
and more just like a
Bible study question.
How do you figure that out?
Well, this is why I started
researching some of this stuff
is I do think history of
interpretation matters.
And I'm not convinced that
what we just read from Nissa
is even a history of interpretation
as much as a creative application.
Like that's kind of how
he's thinking about it.
Like he's building a
spiritual formation framework
off of these texts.
But generally speaking,
when I'm trying to
rightly interpret scripture,
my first move is to go,
what's the history of interpretation?
What have people said?
How have they thought through it?
And I think that's helpful
to rightly orient yourself
in the streams of church history and go,
I'm not starting on square zero here.
I'm standing on the shoulders of giants
who've thought deeply
and wrote profoundly
about these things.
And so I wanna try and
wrestle with these things
with the light of the rest of church
history shining on it.
And so I started with Augustine
and he has an interesting framework too
but it feels very speculative.
And this is like where
there's a movement now
in online YouTube spaces
where we have this
like sense of reverence
for the church fathers
as though like
they're not men who can err.
And it's like
Augustine's whole framework.
I'll just wanna share
it with you real quick.
So he takes the seven beatitudes.
He chops off the last one
cause he sees as like a
summary statement of all of them.
And he maps them onto
the gifts of the spirit
in Isaiah 11, two to the three.
And he creates this another pyramid thing
where blessed.
Oh man, another pyramid?
Blessed are the peacemakers.
They'll be call sons of God.
That connects to wisdom.
From Isaiah 11.
From Isaiah 11, at the highest level
because wisdom is discerning between
and peacemakers discern between.
So that's the top of the pyramid.
Blessed are the pure heart.
They'll shall see God.
Understanding is the other one
which is seen between things.
So the pure of heart
sees with a single mind
understanding sees things where they are.
Blessed are the merciful counsel
or the two he connects right there.
The mercy and the counsel is the capacity
to see into the heart.
So hold on, on the pyramid,
are we building from the base up?
We're going top to bottom here.
So now we're going,
is it an upside down pyramid
or we're looking at the tip top first?
I just went top to bottom.
Oh, okay.
Just to make things
complicated and annoying.
For those listening, they're like,
I don't know how to
picture this in my brain.
Yeah, so then the next layer down
blessed are those who hunger,
there's a righteousness.
This is connected to might
because might or
fortitude is where he uses,
like hungering and
thirsting is like work.
You labor towards it
and you have fortitude
from the Spirit to do it.
Blessed are the meek connected to piety.
Piety is not in Isaiah 11.
It's only in the
Vulgate is like inserted.
It's not in Hebrew, it's not in Greek.
The Vulgate version of
Isaiah 11 has piety in there.
I don't know where it came from.
I don't know why it's there.
But Augustine sees the
Latin Vulgate and that's piety.
Doesn't exist in the Hebrew or the Greek.
He had what he had.
He had what he had.
So that's like an example of like,
you're gonna build a whole thing
of a guy who didn't even know Hebrew.
Layer two, blessed are those who mourn
connected to knowledge because he argued
when you know God and you know your sin,
then you will grieve over it.
And the baseline of his pyramid is the
seventh gift in Isaiah,
which is the fear of the Lord
is connected to poor in spirit
because when you fear the
Lord, you're poor in spirit.
And so that's like his
interpretation of it.
And it's like, sure, maybe.
But how you just like, it
seems like he read Isaiah 11
that morning and then read
Matthew five and was like,
oh, I can kind of make this line up.
And he just kind of threw it together.
So it's okay.
So it's great that obviously the history
of interpretation matters.
How much do you just go,
what did the people sitting there
at the mountain think he meant?
I think that's the whole goal.
That's why you're
trying to do this is you-
Well, the whole goal is really to go,
what did Jesus mean?
But one of the ways to that is to go,
what did the people
listening to it think he meant?
Yeah, yeah.
And-
How did they hear it?
Because they probably
weren't pyramiding it to Isaiah 11.
No, and the part of the
reason I share those things
is because I do think there
are some texts of the Bible
that are easier to
interpret and apply than others.
And I do think we're,
I want us to consider what
the church fathers have said,
but not overly revere them.
Cause they're fallible men who
were doing the best they could
with what they had,
but they're really
creative in the problematic sense,
I think.
There's a sense in which
like creative Bible teaching
is good.
And at a certain point we're like,
you're creating meaning
that's not there, that's bad.
And you're just kind of
extrapolating unnecessarily.
Well, it makes, again,
we mentioned the seven
deadly sins a bit ago.
And one of the questions
we asked when we were doing
our episode introducing that series was,
well, this list isn't in the Bible.
Why would we do this if
it's not in the Bible?
And what we said was,
well, this became a
helpful discipleship tool
for people fighting sin
and pursuing righteousness.
And so to the degree
you use those pyramids
as like, hey, this is a
helpful discipleship tool
that could be helpful.
It starts to become a problem.
I think perhaps if you're
saying this is what Jesus meant.
Yes.
So it doesn't mean
you can't learn from it,
but I do wanna, we do
wanna try to be clear.
Like, well, what did Jesus mean?
What does the Bible say?
What does it mean?
Totally.
And this is where I'm
sympathetic to Dallas Willard's
interpretation of this, where he says
like the goal of this
is just that everyone would
feel welcomed without exception.
But I do think that's
not the point of the sermon
on the Mount, because
he makes you feel like a,
like a nothing burger
pretty quick on there.
I think the main thrust
and purpose of the sermon
on the Mount is for Jesus to say,
you have heard it
said, be really righteous.
So you're talking about the whole sermon.
So now chapters five to seven,
of which this is the very beginning.
Yeah, the whole sermon on the Mount,
including the beatitudes,
is Jesus is basically saying,
you have heard it said, be super holy,
or you won't get into kingdom of heaven.
And Jesus is saying, yes,
but the standard is
higher than you ever thought.
It's higher than the Pharisees thought,
it's higher than the scribes thought.
You have no chance,
period, of pulling this off,
that you have been
building your houses on the sand.
And the sand is your own
attempts at righteousness.
You've been building
your house on the sand.
And the sand is
worldly approaches to success
and meaning and purpose.
You've been building
your house on the sand.
And the sand is trying
to please the Pharisees
and religious leaders.
And I'm telling you, you
build your house on the rock.
And the rock is Christ.
That-
So that sounds like the
Lutheran understanding.
And here's where I think
the Lutheran understanding
falls short.
Okay.
Is yes, you read this,
you're cut to the heart.
You realize there's no
hope for me, I need Christ.
And then you go, here's where the
Reformation tradition
I think is really helpful here.
Is you go, who perfectly did all this?
The Lord Jesus.
That when I rightly
understand, bless her the merciful,
I'm gonna understand
that as most preeminently
and perfectly embodied
in the person of Jesus.
Who's the greatest peacemaker?
Who's the purest of heart?
Who is the one who mourned?
Who absolutely, righteously
mourned suffering and sin,
not his own, but the sins of others.
He grieved over other
people's sin, not just own.
He had no worldly sorrow, which is
whoops, I got caught,
now I'm sad.
But he had this grieved at
the heart of God is grieved.
Like he's grieving sin, not his own,
but he's grieving at the
heart of God is wounded by sin.
And so when you see that
Jesus perfectly fulfills
all that he asked us to do,
and I now have the spirit of Christ,
and I should endeavor
to go and kind of do
what Gregor of Nissa said is like,
now go be like Jesus, do
my best to be like him,
not in order to attain,
but because I have attained,
not in order to receive,
but because I have received.
So I think that there's a
sense in which they're all right,
but the reform one I
think is the most right.
Dallas Willard
saying, everyone is welcome.
That's the point of this.
I'm like, well, I think
that's a true reality.
I'm not sure that's the point of this.
The Lutherans saying, this is
designed to make you feel bad
so that you turn to Christ.
I don't know if
Lutherans would hate the way
I'm summarizing that or
not, but I'm sure they would.
I go like, sure, on the one hand,
that's like the law as the
teacher that teaches you,
you're not good enough.
That's great.
But I think this what
the Reformed Church calls
the third use of the law, which is it
convicts you of sin,
it constrains your own righteousness.
And the third way it teaches you
how God actually wants you to live,
not as a means of earning righteousness,
but because I've been made righteous.
This is like the year of Satan,
I live like a saint.
So I think we should read
the Beatitudes as going,
be like this, I'm not, Christ is,
and now with his help,
work towards being like this,
which seems kind of the most
obvious way to read this text
when I think about the way
I understand the Bible works
and how I understand the gospel works.
And so I think there are approximating
different ways of doing that.
I also think there is a sense in which,
like the culmination of
this being blessed are you
and other people
persecute you for righteousness.
There is like a foundation of humility
that's building towards sharing in the
sufferings of Christ.
So I think there is something there
that's in the progression
like we grow these
bill on top of each other.
Well, part of what's
so interesting about it
is that Jesus isn't
saying, be poor in spirit
so that you'll
inherit the kingdom of God.
Yes.
None of these are commands, right?
These are all just declarative, not
imperatives, indicative.
This is just, this is what's true.
This is who's blessed.
This is what's right.
So it's like, no where's even telling you
here's what to do.
It's just saying, this is what is.
And if you wanna know--
This is the truly blessed life.
Yeah, and if you wanna know how to,
if you want to become poor in spirit,
read the rest of this sermon
because you'll become poor in
spirit if you really get it.
Yeah.
I got nothing, nothing in my hand I bring
simply to the cross I cling.
And guess what?
When you find yourself
there, yours is the kingdom.
That's great.
Plus for those who mourn, I
need to grieve over my sin.
Do you know how I get that?
Listen to the rest of the sermon.
Listen to the rest of the sermon.
I'm gonna start to be like, I feel sad
that I'm so unlike God.
And guess what?
When you get there, you'll be comforted.
And so I do think
these blessed statements
are mostly describing symptoms.
And there I go, well,
that just sounds like Jesus
is doing a good sermon introduction.
Yeah, yeah, so these first phrases--
He's giving you a
little roadmap of here's what
the rest of the sermon's gonna be.
Yeah, I think these first phrases,
they're not really commands,
but they are describing
the symptoms of people
who have done business with God.
Yeah.
And when you really encounter the Lord,
when you really sit under his teaching,
when you really recognize your need,
you eventually become these things.
And so these are symptomatic,
and here's what those symptoms mean.
And so I think it's best to understand
that when I really get to know Jesus,
when I really listen to his word,
I'll go, that's
compelling and I want that.
And I'll hunger and
thirst for righteousness.
And then I'll be satisfied.
So it's not if I want satisfaction,
manifest out of nowhere
some desire for righteousness.
Appetites don't work like that.
I can't just decide to like pico de gallo
because it's awful tasting.
It's like onions and
tomatoes, the two worst flavors.
But symptomatically, I could
acquire that taste over time
if I spend enough time
in Mexican restaurants.
You know what I mean?
But it's these acquired tastes.
And so I think reading
the first part is a symptom
and reading the second
part as a promised blessing.
The soundshroom and
that symptom is an idea.
But this is the privileged life.
This is why we wanted
to do this series, right?
The whole theme of this
year's preaching is the good life.
Help us to pursue the
truly good life of Jesus.
And it's like going,
well, what if there was a spot
in the Bible where Jesus
said, here's the good life.
Here's the blessed life.
Here's the lucky life.
Here's the fortunate life.
Here's the, this will
make you happy life.
And so we're like, hey,
this kind of sounds like it.
So yeah, that's how we pick this
and it'll be fun to go through.
Yeah, and my hope is
that, especially those people
who on the surface
just immediately identify
with poor, grieving,
weak, hungry, taking advantage
of single-minded bridge builders,
that they would recognize that the world
does not value these things
because they don't
create worldly success.
If anything, they don't create,
they like uncreate worldly success.
And when we operate on
the timeline of eternity,
we start to see that
maybe the way I'm counting
my profits and losses is out of whack.
Yeah, people have
described the kingdom of God
being a kind of upside down kingdom.
Yes.
And that's certainly, if
the sermon on the Mount
is Jesus' vision for the kingdom,
then he's, at least
here, he's going, hey,
this is different than you thought.
It's upside down from how you've
typically thought of this.
Yeah, and just the
backwards-ness of it all is wild.
Rejoice and be glad when
people do kinds of evil
and all kinds of evil and bear false
witness against you.
Right.
What are you talking about?
Again, and it's so counterintuitive,
it's so upside down, it's so backwards,
but that's, I think, part of the mystery
and beauty of Jesus is
when you're with him,
you'll start to understand
and agree with these things.
Because I think on the surface,
we might believe them, but
we don't agree with them.
Like, I go, well, Jesus
said it, so I believe it,
but I kind of don't agree.
It's like, that's
probably true for people,
but when I'm in that
situation, I don't know,
it sure doesn't feel like it.
Yeah, for sure, because
it sounds like rejoice
and be glad when that
person who's persecuting you
gets hit by a bus.
Right.
That sounds nice.
That seems like the more obvious thing.
And so, I think he's
undermining our assumptions
about what makes for a
happy, fortunate, blessed life.
And I think that's one
thing we for sure know
about our culture is
everyone's pursuing happiness
and people are not happy.
And so clearly we're
shooting at a target,
we've misunderstood
where the bullseye is.
And hopefully we'll get a better picture
of what the bullseye is
and that it'll make us
a happier people.
And I mean that in
the most biblical sense.
Well, one of my hopes
too for the series is like,
I mean, we're in a space
here in the Southeast Valley
where it's like, there's a lot of
politically conservative
people, socially conservative people.
And there's been a bit of a,
right, people called the
vibe shift, this kind of like,
hey, that side of the
cultural dynamic feels like
it's on the upswing.
And even there, you kind of go like,
well, the blessed
life is we're gonna win.
Yeah, political majority.
Yeah, the best life is like, we're gonna,
always get our way culturally.
And so I do think there's a,
even though I find myself
on that side of the aisle
and on that side of the cultural issues,
I more than that wanna be
like a Jesus person that goes,
whatever Jesus says is winning,
whatever Jesus says is the good life.
That's actually the good life.
And if that happens
to contradict what the,
what the politics or the
cultural look at things says,
then well, I'm gonna go with Jesus.
Yeah, I mean, just yesterday,
there's that Chicago Bulls player who
critiques Pride Month.
Right.
He said, Pride Month is a
celebration of unrighteousness
and I'm not about it.
And he was dismissed from
the team for conduct unbecoming
of the team or
something, which you go like,
wow, the vibe shift, I guess, isn't.
Not that strong.
Isn't that strong?
Yeah, but he's, he's gonna
lose millions of dollars,
probably. Yeah.
And the hypocrisy of that,
because how many NBA
players are, you know,
wife beaters and gambling
addicts and they do stuff
that's actually
detrimental to like the team,
but they're like, oh,
we'll accommodate it because,
so you see that what the
world calls unrighteous
or what is righteous, what
the world calls unrighteous,
we call righteous.
And there's just the double standard
or the wrongness of standard is there,
but, you know, talk to this
man and go blessed are you,
for you're persecuted and reviled.
Oh, he's reviled all over the place,
the whole internet, at
least before I recorded this,
was reviling him and
you go blessed are you.
And in an earthly material sense, is he?
But in eternal spiritual sense, is he?
And I think the answer on the
second one is obviously yes.
Yeah, sure.
And how that exactly
play out, I'm not sure,
but that's just a great example of,
until you're willing
to put it on the line
to identify with Christ,
you're untested at least.
Do you have any other hopes
for this series for our church?
I hope that we are people who are known
for having poverty of spirit.
I hope that Ironwood
Church's brand is meekness,
hungering and
thirsting for righteousness,
merciful, pure in heart.
Like there's a lot of church brands
that all like you
associate it with something.
Like how great would it
be if we were that church
with peacemakers,
pure in heart, merciful,
hunger for righteousness,
poor in spirit, happy with--
And yet if we were,
we wouldn't really care about our brand.
Yeah, and I use the word brand
in their tongue in cheek.
I know what you mean.
I hope that our friends and neighbors go,
oh, that's the place with those
hunger for righteousness people.
And that feels like Jesus.
Yeah, and we go, I don't
care that you think that
because I'm hungry and
thirsty for righteousness.
I'm not hungry and thirsty
for your approval of my hunger
and thirst for righteousness.
Right, sure.
But that
self-forgetfulness that would come from that
would be freeing.
Yeah.
And I hope that all of those,
like when I think about the purgative,
illuminative and unitive stages,
and I don't like the word
unitive, which is totally fine,
but it's just the freedom
that I think our church would feel
if we really leaned in and
through that purgative stage
to really grieve our sin,
to really be poor in spirit,
and then begin to
illuminate towards real hunger
and thirst for righteousness
over and above any other appetite.
Like what type of, we'd have freedom
because we wouldn't be pulled,
we wouldn't have that tension
and that would be the
blessed life, right?
And so, and I think there's this tendency
to be like two thirds in on Christ.
And I think we experience the blessed
life, the happy life,
the fortunate, the privileged life,
once we go from two thirds in on
to all in on hunger and
thirst for righteousness.
So that's my hope for me and for us.
Yeah.
Well, I'm thinking it'll
be a good series and yeah,
appreciate y'all listening
and we'll see you next time.
(upbeat music)