A CHARTER FOR CHRISTIAN LIVING.

Homily for June 9^th, 2014: Matthew 5: 1-12.

          “When Jesus saw the crowds, he went up the mountain, and after he had sat down, his disciples came to him.” In the biblical world mountains were considered places especially close to God. We still have an echo of this idea in the expression, “a mountaintop experience” -- a time in which God’s nearness is clearly felt. Jesus is about deliver a summary of his message. Doing so from a mountainside gives his teaching special weight. And he does so sitting, because in Jewish thought that is the proper posture for a rabbi or official teacher. As we read the gospels, we see that Jesus is a teacher like no other.

          He begins with what we call today the Beatitudes, because of the constant repetition of the word “blessed.” The Greek word which the gospel writer, Matthew, uses is makários. In English that means “happy.” No surprise there: someone blessed by God is happy. Jesus is laying out a charter for Christian living. Being truly happy, he says, requires being concerned about, and bonding, with those who live on the fringes of society: the sick, the lame, the poor, and the hungry. These were the people who heard Jesus most gladly. Many of them would have been in the crowd which heard Jesus there on the mountainside. 

          Jesus is also addressing his words to us. If he were speaking to us today, in our rich and comfortable land, I think he might say: ‘Stop complaining, get up and do something about the poor, the sick, the homeless, those among you who are discouraged, those who mourn.’

          He also wants us to use the Beatitudes as a mirror; to ask ourselves, ‘Am I poor in spirit? Am I humble and merciful? Am I pure of heart? Am I a peacemaker, or do I contribute to conflict through malicious gossip, cynicism, and hate?

          The final Beatitude, the longest and the only one addressed directly to Jesus’ hearers, shocks us – or it would if it had not lost its sharp cutting edge through repetition: “Blessed are you when they insult you and persecute you and utter every kind of evil against you falsely because of me.” How can Jesus call “happy” those who suffer such treatment? Because ill treatment and persecution bring us close to Jesus. And above all because “your reward will be great in heaven” – far greater than we can ever imagine.