This week, Michael writes: Jesus said, I’ve come to introduce you to a new kingdom. The children of Israel thought that Jesus would not just be their spiritual messiah delivering them from sin and hell, but would also be their political messiah ... the one sent to deliver them from under the oppressive thumb of the Roman Empire. However, His new kingdom was not of this world ... but from heaven above. This kingdom was not founded on worldly political power and the might of earthly armies. His was a kingdom based on the love of Almighty God.
From the world’s perspective, the kingdom of our Lord is an upside down kingdom. The world taught that you should hate your enemies and seek retribution against those who wrong you. However, Jesus said in John 13:34-35, A new commandment I give unto you, That you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this shall all men know that you are my disciples, if you have love one to another.
The Church, the converted body of Jesus Christ, is the transformed abiding temple of God, God’s dwelling place. The journey to the inner chamber is the journey to the heart of God. Jesus came to live with us and within us He dwell ... that we would be born again, not of corruptible seed inherited from Adam, but of God’s Holy Spirt. To live the Christian life is to live from the heart, of Christ’s heart behind our hearts. Believers who enter into the inner chamber of God’s Holy Spirit come to the understanding that His spirit of life in Christ has cleansed us and delivered us from the sinful darkness of this world.
Jesus taught the sermon on the mount so that those who follow Him would live according to His righteousness, godly in this present age according to the blessed assured hope of His return. He taught His disciples by His example how to live with Him and within Him (God with us) .... motivated by the love of God.
The first lesson of the sermon on the mount is the absolute need for His Holy Spirit living within us. When we are "born again" (reborn, converted, transformed from above) of God’s Holy Spirit, we can see and perceive with godly spiritual discernment from Christ’s eyes behind our eyes. Though Him gospel message of salvation is clearly broadcast to all, Jesus did not come to minister to the unbelievers who would reject him, but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel who would choose to accept spiritual life on God's terms, not the God-rejecting world’s. Without being born of God’s Spirit we cannot love God because love is beyond our own natural ability ... love is empowered by His gift of the Holy Spirit, therefore supernatural ... spiritual.
Titus 2:11-14 says, “For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world; Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ; Who gave himself for us, that He might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto Himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.”
The second message of the Sermon on the Mount is that those who are blessed live according to the beatitudes .... Jesus Christ’s blessed beautiful attitudes. The blessings are “the kingdom of heaven” for those who are meek to receive His word. The blessing is in God’s comfort for those who mourn. It is in God’s mercy and grace for them who are merciful. The blessing is in seeing God and being called the sons and daughters of God for peacemakers and those who are pure in heart. The blessing is for those who have been persecuted, wounded, reviled and slandered for Jesus’ sake, for great is their reward in Heaven, the Kingdom of God.
The third message of the Sermon on the Mount is our witness of evangelism ... the good news of the gospel of salvation by grace alone through faith alone, in Christ alone. Living the gospel message is the way of an evangelist. Disciples make disciples that make disciples sharing the Good News of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. As Paul said, you are our epistles, God’s love letters, known and read of all men and women.
Even though the Christian church looks for better methods, God looks for better men and women. The best evangelistic method is to live as a testimony for the Lord ... to live according to the sermon on the mount as an example of God’s love made manifest and tell your personal story of finding and living in the love of Jesus as Savior and Lord. Instead of praying for revival, we need to be the answer to Jesus’ prayer ... that God sends us as laborers into His harvest, making disciples of all nations through the power of God’s Holy Spirit. God send people to tell the world about You, your love, your mercy, your grace, your Gospel of Salvation with forgiveness of sin through the atoning sacrifice of your Son Jesus Christ, and may the first one you send be me.
Christianity is a rescue mission for desperate men and women. When men and women come to the place that they are starving, hungering and thirsting after righteousness, then God can fill them with the power of His Holy Spirit. When men and women become desperate enough to to forsake the pain, suffering, strife, contention and confusion of this world and run to the Lord for deliverance, Our loving Heavenly Father will run to embrace them.
You can’t have a testimony without a test. We are saved from something, to something. The trials and tribulations of this world bring us to the place where we understand that we cannot overcome the pain and pressure on our own. Christianity is a rescue effort for desperate men and women. When we approach God's throne of grace with a broken and a contrite heart of repentance, He will save us, rescue us, and deliver us from trials and temptation ... from the darkness and depression of this fallen world. Yet, we grow and mature by having experienced and gone through them.
When others see the God’s transformation in our lives ... when we turn around from the inside out and live according to Christ’s heart behind our heart, this will win others to the Lord ... for it is God who works in us to will and to do of his good pleasure. Be sure to tell those others the source of your love, joy peace patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control that they see in you. Everyone longs for the fruit of the Holy Spirit.
In an upside down world, what the world meant for evil, God meant for good. When we see things from God’s perspective, we realize that He’s concerned for our honesty, integrity and righteousness as we set our affections on things above and not on the things of this world. When we live according to the blessed attitudes of the Lord's Sermon on the Mount, we will live according to His purpose in order to live to the praise of the glory of His grace!
Your brother in Christ, Michael
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