Scott Freeman

Blessed Are The Oppressed

I’ve been preaching through the gospel of Matthew on Sunday morning. I was blazing a pretty good clip of about a chapter a week until I got to the Sermon on the Mount.
At that point we slowed to a screeching halt.
Over the last 6 weeks we have covered the first four beatitudes (one week was an introduction and one week I did not preach). The Sermon is just two important to rip through and the weight of the words of Jesus are far too complex to give a cursory examination.

Ultimately it is the most important and the often the most ignored sermon ever preached.

And when it is followed if often becomes something completely different from what Christ intended.

My approach to the gospel of Matthew has been from the view point that Jesus is a retelling of the Israel story. Is that Jesus is a recapitulation of all that God had intended for Israel to be. A people of love and compassion, of concern for the orphan and the widow. A refuge for the alien and the stranger.

So, when Jesus comes, steps into that same wilderness the Israelites trod and began to speak it was a call to be a distinct people, a people set apart. And He was the very epitome of how the called people were to live: as an alternative community. As part of the very Kingdom of God.

That prompts a different understanding than what has often been held about the sayings of Jesus. They are difficult to live out and a constant reminder of our incompleteness.

But the saying of Christ are not a series of pithy aphorisms or admonitions to bolster a personal morality code. Instead they are lived out in community with an understanding that the love of God and the love of people are the very foundations of a godly Kingdom.

As a result the first four beatitudes are not qualities that we aspire to but indications of the love and compassion of a God who desperately and passionately loves those who the nations of the world forget.

In the Kingdom of God the poor are cared for, the mourners are comforted, the meek are provided with land and those who hunger and thirst for righteousness are able to be satisfied. The focus on the beatitudes are not on us but on a faithful God. These aren’t qualities to aspire to but are instead indications of God’s concern for the marginalized.

If we are the true inbreaking of God’s kingdom then are hearts, our resources, and our time are focused on the poor, the mourners, the meek and the hungry. Jesus shows us how to care for and love these people. In God’s kingdom they will be filled, comforted, provided for and satisfied.

That is the call of the church. To be a recapitulation of the Christ story: to be the Kingdom come.

May we move beyond the self-centered focus on “Christian living” and be the alternative community of care, concern and compassion that Jesus showed us how to be.

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