LIving he Beatitudes

 

 

We’re told that Martin Luther originally had a hard time trying to live up to the demands of the Old Testament—even literally beating himself at times. Finally, he discovered that salvation was realized by grace and faith alone.  Through the lens of that discovery, he began to view the New Testament as “gospel” and the demands of the Hebrew Bible as “law.”  For Luther, it was crucial that Jesus had come to set us free from the “law.”  And he “wrote” this perspective into his translation of the Bible by placing books he didn’t care for at the end.  But Luther wasn’t the first or the last to try to “edit” the Bible.  I think the real problem for us is that what Luther did on paper, we do in fact.  Don’t we simply edit those portions of the Bible from actual use?  I think this especially applies to “laws” with their unrealistic demands.  

Jesus opens the “Sermon on the Mount” with the beatitudes, which while not really instructions for living, are a declaration of the grace that God is pouring out on all people through Jesus Christ. (Matthew5:1-12a) They are a declaration at the heart of Jesus’ message that the kingdom of God is at hand.  If you wonder what the kingdom of God is about, look at the beatitudes.  It means blessing, peace and comfort for those who have been trampled on in our world.  Right from the start of this “sermon,” Jesus makes an elaborate statement about the grace that God gives to all people who will open their hearts to it.  

While the Jewish religious leaders had sought to fulfill God’s demands by specifying the precise actions one could or could not do, Jesus called his disciples to obey God’s “commands” from the heart.  That would mean that while killing is an egregious offense, Understanding the root of and avoiding the anger and hatred that leads us to devalue the life of another, is the mark of a spiritual being. This mindful approach requires us to examine and know behavioral triggers that lead to uncontrolled anger and intercept them before they are acted out. This spiritual transformation leads to a proactive way of living the beatitudes.   

In reality, Jesus didn’t make it easier to obey God’s rules, he made it harder.  He went back to the original intention of the commands--to produce a people who would practice God’s justice, compassion, and mercy toward one another.  And they would do so not for fear of punishment or in order to gain some reward.  They would practice this kind of life because God’s grace had changed their hearts, and they could do no less. In other words, for Jesus, obeying God is not just a matter of what we do, it’s something that comes from the heart. And when we have that kind of relationship that comes from the heart, we can do no less than make every effort to practice the way of life defined in Scripture as “walking in God’s ways.” 

Adapted in part fromThe Waking Dreamer, Alan Brehm, “Light for the World,” February 12, 2014