THE WORD 4 ev 1

Read Matthew 5 (click here for link)

Wow!!! How does a person sum up one of the most quoted chapters of Scripture in one little blog post? It would seem that doing so is about as hard as actually living out the text in our lives! How do you do these things? Cut off your right hand… Turn the other cheek… Remain pure in messy marital situations… Love your enemies… Be perfect as God is perfect…????

You would have to be Jesus to be able to do all of this. But maybe that is the point! In Galatians 2:20 the apostle Paul says, “I have been crucified with Christ, and it is not I who live, but Christ who lives in me.” Paul seems to be echoing Jesus words, “Blessed are the poor in spirit.” In fact, it is exactly this conclusion that one comes to (at least I do!) as one reads the Sermon on the Mount—you realize just how spiritually poor you really are because we all fail at pretty much everything Jesus mentions. Of course, we could try harder! Do better! Make better decisions! But the more I study the scriptures the more I realize that our Lord Jesus never really trusted our ability to decide anything (just remember where decisions landed Peter). So Jesus never really asks us to decide at all, but to yield to Him. These are absolutely very different things. When we hear the instructions from the Sermon on the Mount, the spiritually poor man or woman can see no alternative but to fall at Jesus feet. Furthermore, Paul makes it clear that as long as we have even a kernel of self-motivation or ambition that we can do it alone, we can never enter the kingdom of heaven. So it is that I must be crucified with Christ.

So, put that into practice in your life. Uhhh… well, that is not such an easy thing to do, because the Sermon on the Mount is not some practice of religion, it is a declaration of what will become of me when Jesus Christ has altered me and made me like himself. Jesus Christ is the only One who can fulfill the Sermon on the Mount. These words of Jesus are for the heart and not the head. If you try to understand them with your head you will only get a headache, and understanding them with your heart will always mean heartache (which is the law crushing us). That is what it means to be crucified with Christ.

So, what do I do about the man I saw yesterday holding the cardboard sign, whom I drove right by?

Well…

I guess I still have some struggling to do with these words. I plead the cross. Lord have mercy. Christ have mercy.

Lord, help me be poor in spirit. Amen.

Pastor Aaron

P.S. Thank you guys for your comments the other day. Remember, comments will always appear when the next day's devotion is posted. Also, remember that today is Friday, so no devotions until Monday (sorry... Pastors tend to be especially busy on weekends!).