How can anyone read the Sermon on the Mount and not be changed? The message Jesus gives in Matthew chapters 5-7 is a remarkable masterpiece. Jesus’ main point in his message in these chapters is to piece together what the OT scriptures had been saying all along. As he said, he came not to abolish the law, but to fulfill it. He came to bring it to life.
Many times this message is hailed as revolutionary, and new. But if one closely examines the Bible, much of what Jesus says comes straight out of the Old Testament. Isaiah 61 says that God will comfort those who mourn. Psalm 34 says that God is close to those who are crushed in spirit. Psalm 37 says, “the meek will inherit the earth.” And also in Chapter 37, David says, “a future awaits those who seek peace.”
I could go on, but I think you see the point. Jesus didn’t come to bring some crazy, new, revolutionary way of thinking. He came to shed light on something that had been misunderstood. The law had been used over the years as a means to obtain righteousness. It was used as something to stand on and show off how good a person was. But that wasn’t its true message. As Jesus said, our righteousness must be greater than the Pharisees’ if we want to get to heaven.
Everything in our world today that we think is important and we chase after to live the good life loses its status in the kingdom of God. Power, popularity, wealth, comfort, strength, health, looking good; all these fall short when one lives in the kingdom of God. In His kingdom, things like mercy, grace, forgiveness, and meekness are what lead to life. And not just any life, the good life!
It’s in this message that Jesus establishes what his kingdom and its citizens look like. His invitation to all of us is to join his kingdom and to be citizens of the upside-down kingdom where the least will be the most, and the first will be the last.