Blessed Disciple, Admiring Crowds-Matthew 5:1-16

Blessed Disciples (powerpoint). Disciple vs. the Crowd (video). Recent topics from the Sermon on the Mount were anger, lust, marriage, worry and our treasure. Today the question is: What is the difference between disciples and the crowds? Disciples willingly come to Jesus while crowds admire Jesus. Jesus knows (sees) the crowds (Mt 5:1a). He had compassion on them, or felt sorrow for them. The difference between the crowds who admire Jesus and his disciples is his disciples’ willingness to “come to him” on the mountain (Mt 5:1b). Doing so puts them at risk because they cannot avoid being directly addressed by Jesus. As Israel was taught by Moses who ascended to Mt. Sinai, Jesus, the new Moses is surrounded by his disciples so that they may be taught (Mt 5:2).

Might there be tension between the disciples and the crowd? This tension is developed throughout Matthew. Jesus called the disciples from the crowd and sent them to preach repentance to the people.

“Jesus’ disciples have visibly left the people (crowds) to join him. He has called each individual one. They gave up everything in response to his call. Living in renunciation and want, they are the poorest of the poor, the most tempted of the tempted, the hungriest of the hungry. They have only Jesus. Yes, and with him they have nothing in the world, nothing at all, but everything with God. So far, he has found only a small community, but it is a great community. Disciples and the people (crowds) belong together. The disciples will be his messengers; they will find listeners and believers here and there. Nevertheless, there will be enmity between the disciples and the people until the end. People’s rage at God and God’s word will fall on the disciples, and they will be rejected with him. The cross comes into view…one can already see the whole history of suffering of Jesus and his community.” Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

Are Jesus’ teachings in TSOM to be followed literally? Does Jesus really think that it is possible for us to live without lust? Or anger? TSOM is unintelligible and cannot but become a law, an ethic, if it is abstracted from Jesus and isolated from its context within Matthew’s gospel. When the sermon is isolated from the one who is the exemplification of righteousness, it is natural to ask if all Jesus’ teachings must be followed literally. Does Jesus really think that it is possible for us to live without lust? How would we run the world if we do not resist evildoers?

Is it possible to live according to TSOM? If such questions determine how we read TSOM we avoid thinking that it applies to our lives. We may think it should govern our personal lives, but not public affairs. Or we think it is useful only to make us feel guilty. Some suggest TSOM is law or ideals meant to drive us to recognize our sin and our need for forgiveness. So whether we live or do not live the way TSOM seems to suggest we should live does not determine the character of our faith in God, i.e., our faith in God is still real even if we give in to anger and lust, because it’s just not possible to not give in to anger and lust.

Can you be “saved“ without discipleship? When we question whether Jesus’ teaching in TSOM are meant to be followed, it reflects our separation of the person and work of Christ. We view salvation construed in individualistic and pietistic terms. When the church is at home in the world, we easily think that we are “saved” while avoiding the radical character of discipleship depicted in TSOM. Jesus is my “personal savior” and TSOM is good and right, but even if I don’t live up to it (because nobody can) I am still “saved.” Bonhoeffer calls such salvation as “cheap grace.” It understands grace as doctrine, as principle, as system. It means forgiveness of sins as a general truth, tht God’s love is a Christian idea of God. Such an affirmation assumes that since the world is justified by grace Christians should live like the rest of the world–where anger, lust, violence is justifiable. Cheap grace is shared by both conservative and liberal Christians who otherwise think they are in deep disagreement. Both conservatives and liberals differ only in how they think Christians should conform to the world.

Is TSOM just teachings, ideals and ethics or something else? TSOM is the reality of the new age. Christians should never forget that the one who preaches TSOM is the Son of God, the Messiah, who makes all things new. We must not distinguish the sermon (it’s just ideals, ethics) from the one who delivers it (it’s the way Jesus lived and calls his disciples “Follow me.”). The demands of TSOM are but ideals if this is not the Son of God who became human. One could even argue that the demands of TSOM are profoundly immoral, demanding as they seem to do that we do not resist one who is evil (Mt 5:39). Yet if these radical demands are abandoned, we abandon Jesus, while still claiming to believe in Jesus/God. TSOM are the interpretation of Jesus’ life (not just ideals and ethics), and that same life is the necessary condition for the interpretation of the sermon.

Is TSOM addressed to individuals or to the community? This may not be noticed in an individualistic society, but TSOM is not addressed to individuals but to the community that Jesus begins through the calling of the disciples. It is the constitution of a people. You cannot live by the demands of the sermon on your own. The demands of TSOM are designed to make us depend on God and one another in community.

Is TSOM what you do or what happens to you/your community? TSOM is the evidence of the reality of the kingdom. The sermon is not a list of requirements, but a description of the life of a people gathered by and around Jesus. To be saved is to be so gathered. The Beautitudes are the interpretive key to the whole sermon–precisely because they are not recommendations. No one is asked to try to be poor in spirit or to mourn or to be meek. Rather, Jesus is indicating that given the reality of the kingdom we should not be surprised to find among those who follow him who are poor in spirit, and those who mourn, and those who are meek. Jesus does not suggest that everyone who follows him will possess all the Beautitudes, but we can be sure that some will be poor, some will mourn, and some will be meek.

Should the church be visible? For the church to display the Beautitudes requires the visibility of the church. To be salt, to be light for the world (Mt 5:13-14), is a call for the church to be visible (Mt 5:15). “Jesus’ followers are the visible community of faith; their discipleship is a visible act which separates them from the world–or it is not discipleship. And discipleship is as visible as light in the night, as a mountain in the flatland. To flee into invisibility is to deny the call. Any community of Jesus which wants to be invisible is no longer a community that follows him.” (Bonhoeffer.) Thus, as a disciple there is no such thing as “I keep my faith to myself.” “Any community of Jesus which wants to be invisible is no longer a community that follows him.” (Bonhoeffer.) Christians are tempted to justify their invisibility with the surrounding culture in the name of not offending their friends and neighbors. Such invisibility is Constantinianism, which describes the strategy of Christians when they become an ally of Caesar (of being American). In TSOM Matthew challenges all attempts to make invisible what it means to follow Jesus (Mt 5:14-15).

Before Constantine it took exceptional conviction to be a Christian. After Constantine it took exceptional courage not to be counted as a Christian. Establishing Christianity had the ironic result of making paganism attractive and compelling. This resulted in “the invisibility of the church” (John Howard Yoder). No longer was being a Christian identified with church membership, since many “Christians” in the church had not chosen to follow Christ (those born in the church; their decision to be Christian was made for them), and thus are not salt and light for others.   The church must be visible yet the righteousness of the disciple is hidden from the disciple (Mt 6:3). To be visible does not mean that those who follow Jesus do so that they may be seen (or to show off). Nor are disciples called to be different in order to be different. Jesus clearly says that disciples WILL be different. But that difference is because of who he is–the Son of God. Visibility and difference is the result of being pulled into the way of life made possible by Jesus. So TSOM is a description of a way of life of a people, a people of a new age that results from following this man.

What it means to be blessed. No one normally thinks that the poor in spirit, those who mourn, the meek, those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, the merciful, the pure in heart, the peacemakers, those persecuted for righteousness sake are “blessed” (Mt 5:3-12). But that Jesus declares such people “blessed” indicates that the transformed world of the kingdom of God has begun (Mt 4:17). Each Beautitude names a gift, suggesting that the diversity of the gifts will be present in the community of those who have heard Jesus’ call to discipleship. Indeed, to learn to be a disciple is to learn why we are dependent on those who mourn, or who are meek, though we may not possess that gift ourselves.

What kind of person is the exemplification of each Beautitude?

• “the poor in spirit” (Mt 5:3) exemplify the virtue of humility
•  “those who mourn” (Mt 5:4) repent of their sins
• “the meek” (Mt 5:5) imitate the gentleness of Jesus and endure offense rather than retaliate
• “those who hunger and thirst for righteousness” (Mt 5:6) desire nothing but God’s justice
• “the merciful” (Mt 5:7) exemplify compassion for the poor
• “the pure in heart” (Mt 5:8) have been cleansed of fleshly desires
• “the peacemakers” (Mt 5:9) preserve the unity of the church as well as seek the peace of the city
• “those who are persecuted” (Mt 5:10-12) endure hardship for the sake of the gospel.

These characterizations have merit and are useful for our edification, But Jesus must be the source of any understanding of the Beautitudes. “Jesus confirms all of the beautitudes he speaks in the Gospel, and he justifies his teaching through his own example. ‘Blessed are the meek’ is what he says of himself. ‘Learn of me, for I am meek’ (Mt 11:29). Who is a peacemaker like my Lord who is our peace, who made enmity to cease and destroyed it in his flesh? ‘Blessed are they who suffer persecution for righteousness’ sake. Jesus displays all the beautitudes as being realized in himself. ‘Blessed are those who weep,’ he wept over Jerusalem…” (Origen).

Only Jesus enables us to be the beautitudes. It is from Jesus that we learn what it means to be “poor in the spirit.” Paul commends the Philippians to have “the same mind . . . that was in Christ Jesus” (Phil. 2:5–8). Paul does not assume that our poverty of spirit is the same as Jesus’s self-emptying, but rather that Jesus’s poverty has made it possible for a people to exist who can live dispossessed of possessions. To be poor does not in itself make one a follower of Jesus, but it enables you to discover the kind of poverty that frees those who follow Jesus from enslavement to the world. Too often we fail to recognize our accommodation to the world that causes us to fear losing our wealth.

Mourn, meekness, thirst, mercy, peacemaking, persecution. Perhaps no beatitude is more christocentric than Jesus’s commendation of those who mourn, for they are, like him, prepared to live in the world renouncing what the world calls happiness and even peace (Bonhoeffer). Like Jesus the disciples endure injustice with the hard meekness that still hungers and thirsts for righteousness. Yet the righteousness of this new people is blessed by the mercy seen in the forgiveness that Christ showed even to those who would kill him. Such a people are capable of peacemaking because they are sustained by the purity derived from having no other telos (agenda) but to enact the kingdom embodied in Jesus. Yet such a people may well be persecuted, as Jesus was persecuted, because they are an alternative to the violence of the world that is too often called “peace.”

Virtues possible only through Christ. That each of the Beatitudes is accompanied by a “reward” does not mean that a disciple might, for eg., try to be poor in spirit in order to inherit the kingdom of heaven. Such an understanding of the Beatitudes betrays that they are gifts. That those who are merciful receive mercy simply indicates the kind of life made possible for those called to live in Jesus’s kingdom. Virtue may be its own reward, but for Christians the virtues, the kind of virtues suggested by the Beatitudes, are names for the shared life made possible through Christ. The Sermon on the Mount is a description of a way of life of a people, a people of a new age that results from following this man.

Jesus‘ disciples are God’s sign for the world. Therefore, those who live in a manner described by the Beatitudes should rejoice and be glad when they are falsely accused and even persecuted “on my account.” Persecution follows the tradition of the prophets. The prophetic office has now fallen on this new community, who has become salt and light for the world. Just as the prophets were God’s presence to and in Israel, now those who follow Jesus become God’s sign for the world. There’s no place for false humility in disciples. The cross is what illumines the works of the disciples even for the Gentiles to see the good works that give glory to the Father in heaven (Mt 5:16).

Jesus is the fulfillment of the law and the prophets. Therefore he calls his followers to keep the law, and that their righteousness should exceed that of the scribes and Pharisees. What could this possibly mean? This is not easily answered. But Christians should not disregard the law, but must welcome the ongoing challenge concerning what it may mean for us to observe the law. Jesus criticized the Pharisees and scribes for hypocrisy (Mt 15:1–9), for neglecting the weightier matters of the law while emphasizing minutiae (Mt 23:23), for greed and self-indulgence (Mt 23:25–26). The prophets similarly criticized Israel’s failure to observe the law. Yet it is crucial that Jesus’s criticisms of the Pharisees and scribes not overlook the challenge of the politics of the observance of the law. The righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, their desire to be holy, was their attempt to be God’s faithful people even when they were in exile or occupied by a foreign power. Yet too often Israel sought to be faithful in a manner that would not challenge the powers, in particular the power of Rome. The Pharisees tried to observe the law without that observance being recognized as subversive to those who ruled them. Similarly might Christians today be afraid to clearly identify themselves as putting Christ first, ahead of cultural expectations?

A society like no other society the world has ever seen. Yet that is exactly what Jesus will not let those who would be faithful to God’s calling of Israel, those who would be his disciples, do or be. Jesus does not seek to violently overthrow Rome, because his kingdom is an alternative to the violence of Rome as well as to those who would overthrow Rome with violence. His kingdom, however, cannot avoid being subversive. That subversion is the righteousness that exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees and as such is a subversion that will result in his crucifixion, for rather than violently overthrowing the old order Jesus creates a people capable of living in accordance with the new order in the old. The antithesis that follows his admonition that his followers are to be salt and light for the world is but Jesus’s description of the order of this new community. Yoder observes (1971) that Jesus does what God had done in calling Abraham, Moses, Gideon, or Samuel. That is, he gathers people around his word so that a society comes into being like no other society the world has ever seen:

1. This was a voluntary society: you could not be born into it. You could come into it only by repenting and freely pledging allegiance to its king. It was a society with no second-generation members.
2. It was a society that, counter to all precedent, was mixed in its composition. It was mixed racially, with both Jews and Gentiles; mixed religiously, with fanatical keepers of the law and advocates of liberty from all forms; with both radical monotheists and others just in the process of disentangling their minds from idolatry; mixed economically with members both rich and poor.
3. When he called his society together Jesus gave its members a new way of life to live. He gave them a new way to deal with offenders—by forgiving them. He gave them a new way to deal with violence—by suffering. He gave them a new way to deal with money—by sharing it. He gave them a new way to deal with problems of leadership—by drawing upon the gift of every member, even the most humble. He gave them a new way to deal with a corrupt society—by building a new order, not smashing the old. He gave them a new pattern of relationship between man and woman, between parent and child, between master and slave, in which was made concrete a radical new vision of what it means to be a human person. He gave them a new attitude toward the state and toward the “enemy nation.”

The six antithesis. That is the visibility that is at the heart of Jesus’s calling of the disciples as well as TSOM. The details of that visibility follow in a series of contrasts: “You have heard that it was said, but I say to you.” These antitheses serve, just as the Beatitudes, to spell out, to describe, the kind of community that the law requires. Jesus has just told us that the law is to be observed, so murder, adultery, divorce, oaths, retaliation, and hatred of enemy are forbidden. Yet the community that Jesus calls into existence cannot be determined by what it avoids, but rather what is avoided is so because of the character of the community that is to exemplify Christ’s life.

Jesus’ life makes possible our reconciliation with the Father and with one another. That reconciliation creates a community of reconciliation, a community of peace. So we should not be surprised that Jesus admonishes us not to harbor our anger at our brothers and sisters, but rather we are to seek reconciliation with them. He does not say that we are not to be angry, but rather that we are not to come to the altar of sacrifice unreconciled to the one with whom we are angry (Mt 5:23-24). Anger and sacrifice were cojoined by Cain’s murder of Abel. Angered that God looked with favor on Abel’s offering, Cain killed Abel (Gen 4:1–16). Jesus now proclaims that the kingdom of repentance has drawn near (Mt 4:17), breaking the cycle of murder as sacrifice by commanding those who would follow him to be reconciled before offering their gifts at the altar. He not only commands that we be reconciled, but he tells us how we are to practice reconciliation (Mt 18:15–20).

The wrong is not against us but against the community. Jesus charges members of the church to confront those whom we think have sinned against us (Mt 5:23-24). He does not say that if we think we have been wronged we might consider confronting the one we believe has done us wrong. Jesus tells us that we must do so because the wrong is not against us, but rather against the body, that is, the very holiness of the church is at stake. Moreover, to be required to confront those whom we believe have wronged us is risky business because we may find out that we are mistaken.

Suffer a wrong rather than act against the community. In 1 Cor 6:1–8 Paul admonishes the Corinthians for taking one another to courts of law presided over by unbelievers. Paul reminds the Corinthians, a reminder that surely draws on Jesus’s admonition not to remain angry with one another, that we should be ready to suffer a wrong rather than act against the body of Christ, for nothing less is at stake than the church offering the world an alternative to the world’s justice. If such a community does not exist, then unbelievers will have no way to know God’s peace.

The church has rightly thought confession of sin, penance, and reconciliation necessary for the reception of the Eucharist. How could we dare come to the feast of reconciliation not in unity with our brothers and sisters? The name given that unity is love. The gifts of bread and wine must be brought by those at peace with God and with one another. If we are unreconciled, we best not receive; we dare not dishonor the holiness of the gifts from God.

You cannot will yourself of anger and lust. Anger and lust are bodily passions. We simply are not capable of willing ourselves free of anger or lust. Jesus does not imply that we are to be free of either anger or lust; he assumes that we are bodily beings. Rather, he offers us membership in a community in which our bodies are formed in service to God and for one another so that our anger and our lust are transformed. Too often attempts to free ourselves of anger or lust, make those passions posses an even greater hold over us.

Are you a disciple who visibly comes to Jesus or an admiring crowd? Is your faith distinctly visible to those around you? Are you tempted to live on cheap grace? What is the cost to you of following Jesus?