At the Mount of the Beatitudes

I preached this sermon last January during a pilgrimage to the Holy Land with people from Good Shepherd Lutheran in Gaithersburg, Maryland. We were on the spot at the the Sea of Galilee where many believe Jesus taught the Sermon on the Mount. We had just been to Caesurea Philippi where Peter confessed Jesus to be the Messiah, and he responded saying that meant he and his followers would have to bear their crosses.

The Sermon on the Mount

Around this lake Jesus had called his friends to a different kind of fishing. They left their livelihoods, their families, their homes to help him teach and heal. We sometimes think of these as two different ministries, but in reality his healings taught and his teachings healed.

Later perhaps in this place or one much like it he looks out on the crowd that had gathered to hear his wisdom. He would have seen poor people. Luke says they were financially poor, Matthew says they were at least poor in spirit. The wealthy In their society paid them low wages, taxed them terribly, and took their money off shore.

He would have seen people mourning, weeping, for they had lost much. The resources of their land had been placed on ships and taken to Rome. He would have seen meek people, freedom- loving people who had been oppressed by the great world powers for most of 700 years, 700 years.

These were people who felt cursed. The foreign troops who occupied their nation literally cursed them. The authorities treated them as if God cursed them. These were people longing to hear good news, for hope.

And Jesus proclaimed God blesses you. You are not cursed. In spite of the fact that you are poor, mourning, and meek, God has blessed you.

He recognizes that you hunger and thirst to do right by him in a corrupt world, that you long for justice and mercy. In one sense being poor, mourning, and meek, being mocked, reviled, and persecuted is the price you pay for extending mercy to the weak, remaining pure in heart in an evil world, and seeking peace when everyone else wants war.

The rest of the sermon makes clear Jesus is not talking about cheap blessing. God blessed Father Abraham so his family could bless all nations. So, too, he blesses us, so we can bless one another until the whole world is blessed. He gives to us, so we can give to others. He loves us, so we can love other people, He forgives us, so we can forgive those who sin against us.

This is not the way of the zealots like those on Masada who took up arms to drive out the Romans. Jesus taught love the enemy.

Not the Way of the Essenes at Qumran who went to the wilderness to seek a self righteous purity. Jesus says Love your neighbor who shares your everyday life.

Not the way of the Saducees who counseled cow- towing to Rome so you could worship in the temple. Jesus said if you are in the temple and remember you have not loved someone enough, leave your gift at the altar and mend the relationship.

And not the way of Pharisees who warned God blesses only those who rigidly obey the Torah law. If John the Baptist demanded those who had two coats should give one to a poor person! Jesus said love enough to give give the coat off your back.

No, Jesus offered a way of life that heals us all. The entire New Testament defines love as returning good for our evil. We are not to allow ourselves to be overcome with evil but we are to overcome evil with good. Where there is hatred, we are to sow love.

Love always includes forgiveness. Loving forgiveness heals our broken world. It frees the victim from remaining chained to the past, in bondage to hurtful memories, caught in a web of resentment and revenge. It gives hope to the sinner who is in danger of being perverted by his sin.

Forgiving love always involves some kind of sacrifice, so we learned at Caesarea Phillippi that the messiah must suffer, Jesus lived this life he taught. He suffered for returning good for evil. He was poor, he wept, he was meek, he was mocked, reviled, and persecuted, even executed. for hungering and thirsting for justice and mercy in all the earth.

The Gospels profess God himself wiped away his tears. And according to John after death he reappeared right here along this lake. After blessing his followers with breakfast, he walked with Peter asking him. Do you love me? Then feed my sheep.

So, too this morning, he feeds us and asks us, Do you love me?”  We know to love God and feed his sheep means self denial and sacrifice of some form as the passage we read at Caesurea Phillippi continued- to follow him means taking up our own crosses.

But Revelation promises God himself shall wipe away our tears as he cares for us, just as he cares for fragile flowers and birds, God blesses everyone of us.

Tags: Beatitudes, Return Good For Evil, Sermon on the Mount