The Sermon on the Mount

Throughout the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus consistently challenges the status quo, inviting His apprentices to live out his Kingdom. The final section of Jesus’ sermon offers three warnings that iterate a similar idea– put Jesus’ teachings into practice.

In Matthew 7:7-12, Jesus invites his apprentices to ask anything of God. Christ’s disciples can foster a life of prayer that goes to God with everything and then extends that goodness to all through the golden rule.

In general, many of us are hypercritical, unaccepting of differences, and quick to pass judgment. In Matthew 7:1-6, Jesus confronts that hypercritical posture, not with undisciplined acceptance, but by first taking a hard look at our own life.

At surface value, Jesus’ words in Matthew 6:25-24, “do not be anxious” can seem dismissive. Upon further investigation, within the context of his life, Jesus is offering us a framework of faith to not just cope with the anxieties of life but to truly become a non-anxious presence.

Monetary dissatisfaction and the desire for more possessions are not new phenomena. in Matthew 6:19-24, Jesus gently confronts his disciples’ desire for more beckoning them to redirect their desires’ toward those things of eternal value.

To be human is to experience a complex web of appetites and desires. Many of those desires are healthy and natural; while others are more nefarious, corrosive, and wrong, and in many ways, those desires can master us. For millennia, fasting, going without food and drink for a period of time, has been a core practice of the Church. This is in part because it brings our body and spirit into alignment and clarifies our desires.

Jesus envisions a life energized by prayer for his disciples, so much so that it is difficult to imagine a life of apprenticeship to Jesus absent of a healthy prayer life. But if we are honest, most of us would acknowledge that prayer is a weak point in our apprenticeship to Jesus. In Matthew 6:5-15, Jesus comments on two misunderstandings of prayer and then will give one of the most profound teachings on life with God in the Lord’s Prayer.

There is a distorted vision of righteousness that puts performative action over sincere motivation. In Matthew 6:1-4, Jesus addresses our righteousness prompting us to ask the question, “what’s is my motivation?”

In a world in which we are encouraged to hate our enemies, Jesus offers a radically different way. His instructions, and his example, are to love those who hate you and to pray for those that actively plot your demise.

Humanity has long suffered under the perpetuation of violence and revenge. Jesus desires for his followers to take action that breaks this cycle of violence, and create opportunities for those who were once our enemy to be transformed into our neighbor.

In the first century, the Jewish community had developed a complex hierarchy of oaths and half-truths to get around the command to manipulate and lie to their neighbor. Jesus confronts these practices by compelling his followers to be committed to simple, straightforward honesty.

Jesus’ teaching in Matthew 5:31-32 confronts the easy divorce culture of his day, and our own, that oppresses women and weaponizes divorce. The announcement of his coming Kingdom is always good news for those who have been wounded by divorce.

Some of Jesus’ harshest criticism and difficult instructions center on the topic of sexual immorality. In Matthew 5:27-30, Jesus extends the divine prohibition on adultery and extends it to our hearts and imagination.

We live in a moment that can be described as the "Age of Outrage". Harboring anger, retaliation, and contempt for others has become normalized. However, Jesus calls his followers to a different way of embracing reconciliation over outrage.

At the heart of the culture wars, church division, and Christian conflicts lies the Bible. The most well-read book in human history. Jesus shares his understanding of the Bible in Matthew 5:17-20.

In Matthew 5:13-16, Jesus describes his followers as salt and light in the world. This metaphor articulates a Jesus-vision for his followers to be visible disciples showing up to the places we live, work, and play.

Jesus' Sermon on the Mount begins with the discourse commonly known as "the Beatitudes"; a list of eight types of people who are blessed by God, and it isn't those we expected.

The words that begin the ministry of Jesus are “Repent, for the Kingdom of heaven is at hand”. Repentance has come to mean something like “be more spiritual”, “clean up your act”, or a moral revival. While repentance may include those things – they are an incomplete depiction of repentance. As Jesus used it, “repent” is to change your mind or to rethink–– it is a rethinking that has a profound impact on your life and who you are.