Sermon On The Mount

In the first charge that Jesus brings against the Pharisees, Jesus discusses all the rules and regulations the Pharisees and scribes set into stone but do not follow themselves. Jesus charges them with overburdening the people and setting up impossible guidelines and regulations. The people of this day and age had so many regulations and rules and it was so much work that it became simply too burdensome a task to even complete or almost impossible. The Pharisees themselves were not even able to completely and perfectly accomplish these tasks which they so harshly required the "lesser" people to follow. These rules and regulations were man made and they did not bring relief, relaxation, or joy to anyone, which is what religion and a relationship with God and Jesus Christ should bring us, instead, the people were full of burden and depression.

In chapter 10, he turns the discussion to the Jews’ mistake in trying to establish their own righteousness before God in terms of meritorious obedience to the law instead of responding to the gospel of Christ by faith. God had not set Israel aside arbitrarily.

Jesus delivers the beatitudes and reveals God’s teachings during the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus compares humans to salt and light, expressing their individual and culminating worth. He mentions he came to earth to fulfill prophecies, and tells his followers that if they follow his teachings, they will enter the kingdom of heaven. Jesus encourages peace amongst his followers, and asks them to accept the lawful punishment of sin. He says simply looking at a women with lustful intent is committing adultery in one’s heart, and filing for divorce is also a sin. He commands his followers not to take oaths where they must swear to God, and tells them not to resist evil presences. He says to turn the other cheek to that who slaps you. Finally,

After reading Mk. 6-11, several things stood out to me. First, in Mk. 6: 50, when Jesus walks on water, the disciples are incredibly frightened. They think he is an evil specter. This stood out to me because the disciples trusted Jesus with their lives, but when he does something like that, which is beyond their understanding, they freak out. You would think that with the things that the disciples had seen Jesus do, that this wouldn’t really surprise them. Second, in Mk. 7:1-9 Jesus thought that the Commandments were more important than tradition, but the Pharisees didn’t. This stood out to me because the Pharisees were supposed to be religious leaders, but in some cases, seemed to disregard the Commandments in difference to their traditions. This mainly seemed to come into play with divorce and its rules. Third, in Mk. 10:2-8 Jesus taught that a husband and wife became one flesh. This stood out to me because I know that a husband and wife are supposed to be close, but Jesus teaches that they should become one. This has to be awfully hard to achieve because I know that sometimes a husband and wife have disagreements. The lesson that I learned in these chapters is that Jesus said, “Whatever goes into a man from outside can’t defile him, what comes out of the man defiles him.” This shows

an ironclad duty to guide those under their authority in the ways of rightness. God did not follow

The Sermon on the Mount is a sermon, that general is well accepted, by most as far as the moral standard are represented. Though the question that is still on everyone mind is, how much did the new covenant change the moral standard that Jehovah instituted, in the Old Testament? For many hundreds of years prior to the present time, if anyone wanted

When he dramatically told off the Pharisees, Jesus was not doing it to make fools out of them; instead he was honestly anger at the greed, dishonesty, and contempt they showed to others around them, especially the poor. Moreover, they were

His belief that people should and can “be perfect... as your heavenly father is perfect” (NOAB Matt 5:48) helps explains what he means when saying “…the kingdom of heaven has come near” (NOAB Matt 4:17, Matt 10:7); heaven will not come literally to earth as in the day of judgement, as Paul seems to believe will happen imminently (NOAB Rom 13:11, NOAB 1 Cor 7:26), but Jesus will bring the perfection that heaven symbolizes to mankind to hopefully accept.

In this chapter we are dealing with Sermon on the Mount in a general outlook. Here we will mainly see the Sermon on the Mount in the gospel of Matthew, its connection with the Old Testament and the New Testament setting of the Sermon on the Mount.

Outside of Scripture, Plato uses this word to refer to an inner order whereas Josephus, a Jewish historian, uses the term as virtuous, describing the Old Testament saints as well as God himself. It is not only used to describe characteristics of “people” but also describing correctness in things such as weights. The Old Testament usage influences the New Testament usage as well; whereas the Old Testament merely referred to righteousness in reference to obedience of law, the New Testament extrapolated that idea as God’s dispensation of His salvation that grants righteousness. The marrying of these two concepts is where Jesus picks up in His Sermon on the Mount.

This past Sunday, at Woodview Church of the Nazarene, we had the pleasure of hearing our senior pastor, Mark Walker, preach. Pastor Mark had been on sabbatical for most of August, all of September and the first part of October and has been back just a few weeks. This sermon was just the second he has preached since coming back from that sabbatical. Pastor Mark, preaching on All Saints Day, took the opportunity to preach a message on the importance of remembrance and anticipation. He choose the text of Revelation 21:1-8, a passage concerning the age to come. This was also tied into our monthly celebration of communion, although we frequently celebrate communion more often than that. Pastor Mark spoke on the inspiration of those saints that have gone before us, the future final redemptive work of Christ and the final judgment.

Today the opening words of the Gospel are: “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites!” Once again Jesus does not mince any words with these supposed religious leaders. And even though the Pharisees “tithed” and “kept the law” as they were required to do, Jesus soundly criticizes these pious men for neglecting the essential and important aspects of the law: judgment, mercy and fidelity. He scathingly calls the scribes and Pharisees “blind guides” who “strain out the gnat and swallow the camel”. These words were a powerful and public denouncement of the scribes and Pharisees.

Religion was discovered back in 2000 BC and is considered to be a trait common to cultures worldwide to this day. Some use religion as a way to cope, to connect, but few could use religion as a weapon against others. Since religion began, over 195,035,000 lives have been lost in tragedies brought on in the name of faith. Regardless of the brutality religion has created, it has also caused others to come together in order to speak out. As a result of religions regression in society, humans are able to progress for the sake of defending human rights.

As we have surveyed in the previous section, the ML and the Sabbath functioned as external manifestations of what God’s truly desires from humans: love and holiness. These are manifest in obedience, respect, honor, and a general alignment of the human will with God’s will. This is why Jesus had such an energetic disdain against external, legalistic, and pharisaic manifestations of the law: it corrupted the true meaning of the law and turned God’s commands into an external and mechanical recipe to gain righteousness—something it was never meant to be. Jesus uses colorful language to describe this attitude: he said they “strain out a gnat but swallow a camel,” that they are “blind guides,” “hypocrites,” “whitewashed tombs” full of “bones and all uncleanness,” “serpents,” “brood of vipers” destined to hell. For Jesus, keeping the Sabbath without love was sacrilegious. Jesus was always more concerned with the heart, with true faith, and with internal devotion, than with external “cleanness.” Jesus and his disciples were accused of violating the Sabbath in multiple occasions; however the problem resides in the interpretation and meaning of the Sabbath for Jesus versus what it meant to the Pharisees. Jesus was not laboring for economic gain, but doing good deeds for man’s benefit (Matt 2:27). The Pharisees instead turned the Law into an outward observance devoid of spiritual significance. In short, they misapply it to “score points” with God and gains

However, compared to what the law said, Jesus ‘teaching were deeper and more spiritual. The law dealt with people’s outward behavior, but Jesus looked at what people thought in their hearts.