Notes and reminders on the front of the handout… PRAY

Last week: Internal  External shift from first 4 to second 4 Beatitudes: more abstract descriptions of believers. Today: moving into the more concrete with vv13-20  Salt of the earth, light of the world, Jesus’ purpose and His thesis/main point for the sermon  13 “You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled by men.   14 “You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. 15 Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. 16 In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.     17 “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. 18 I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. 19 Anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. 20 For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven.

Example: Hunger: “an uneasy sensation, occasioned normally by the want of food” vs. “3 Billion people in this world living on the verge of starvation and dying at a rate of 26,000 per day.” Shouldn’t just talk about these characteristics (poor in spirit, merciful, peacemakers, etc.)…Must BE them, they have a function, a redemptive purpose in the world. So we need to take these things off the drawing board, out of the classroom and into the world…

We must put these characteristics into action and allow them to make us change agents in the world. Sometimes this happens naturally…most of the time  INTENTION (Dallas Willard)

Jesus says we are the salt of the earth, but what does that mean? Salt: preserves, seasons/flavors, makes thirsty, cleans (mildly/gargle), adds buoyancy (a stretch, but interesting applications) If you did your suggested Bible reading: all offerings were to be with salt, Elisha healed the water of Jericho with salt, we are to season our speech with salt.

Let’s talk about being a preservative first: the world is in decay. It’s not getting better. Late 1800s  convinced that Utopia would emerge. It hasn’t. It’s rotten because of sin. Followers of Christ: have a preserving & purifying nature – affect the world positively with our daily lives and conduct. Should have a positive influence on society: social, political, economic, etc. Medical fact: no salt in perspiration  retain water  bloated. We will become bloated and ineffective too  “lose saltiness”

Another function: adding flavor or seasoning things. Salt actually accentuates or draws out flavor that is already there, we should be drawing out the good in people as we lead them to Christ. Emeril: Kick it up a notch, BAM!

Salt also makes us thirsty and we should be making others thirsty for the living water they can only find in Christ. John 7:37-38 “On the last and greatest day of the Feast, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. 38 Whoever believes in me, as[c] the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him.”  Feast of Tab.: Priests/water from Siloam to Altar, each day, 7 days. 7x on the 7th. Jesus says this on the 7th day. We are not to try to satisfy people’s thirst, but to point them to the One who can.

Finally, a COMMON substance. Not gold/silver/jewels of the earth, but salt—common, but very valuable. God delights to use the common for very noble and important purposes. 1 Cor. 1:26-29 ”Brothers, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. 27 But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. 28 He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, 29 so that no one may boast before him.” We were made of dust and God breathed His life into us… How salty? (Preserve/Purify, season, create thirst) Undervalue yourself because you’re “common?”

“You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. 15 Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. 16 In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven. (14-16) Not just the light in the world, but the light of the world. The world receives it’s spiritual light primarily through us…

We should also notices that in these verses: Jesus telling us who we ARE, doesn’t say should be or could be… Evidence of a righteousness and value imparted to us by Christ, apart from our performance

We must see that we are not only in a decaying world, but also a world that is darkened, a world in need of light. Even 2000 years ago, Jesus said, “ This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. 20 Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. 21 But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what he has done has been done through God.” Light doesn’t make darkness it makes it felt. Perhaps this is why John 1:5 says “The light shines in the darkness and the darkness cannot overcome it…

Because Jesus is the actual light of the world, we have the opportunity to reflect His light. Like a dirty, filthy mirror, we cannot reflect as much as clearly as we can when we allow Christ to come into our lives, take control and start cleaning things up. Genesis 1:27 “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.” We are image bearers of God and God is light (John 8:12 “I am the light of the world.”) so we have the opportunity to reflect His light and to bear His image in this world. Imago Dei is Latin for “Image of God” Max Lucado “God’s Mirror” CEO/Owner & His Daughter…

If we are going to reflect God’s light, we are going to need to walk in it, you cannot reflect light when you are walking in darkness. I Jn 1:5-7 “This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. 6 If we claim to have fellowship with him yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth. 7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin.” Application: Walking in light? How much is reflected? Love darkness more than light? Avalon song: Don’t want to go somewhere…

Vv17-20 deal with Jesus and His relationship to the Scriptures as well as His purpose or mission and his main point or thesis for the entire sermon. Did not come to do away with the Scriptures, but to fulfill them. Seminary students are often cautioned not to idolize the scriptures…proper view of Christ as the Word  impossible to separate Christ from Scripture. We see Christ’s high value on scripture evidenced in how often He quoted it (defeated satan with it in Mt. 4) He believed it, submitted Himself to it taught that we should do so in the same way He did. He is the author, the subject and the authoritative interpreter of the Scriptures. Do you BELIEVE that?

Any thoughtful look at Christ’s life as we find it in the Gospels reveals the tremendous value He placed on the Word and that absolute authority it had in His life. In a way…Supreme Court, no higher appeal than the Word of God…verdicts are final and binding. When we question it, we really won’t like the answer…post-modernism: “Question everything, nothing can be known”…moral relativism: what’s right for you/me…Greg Koukl: “Feet firmly planted in mid air” Jot: smallest letter, tittle: a serif. All or nothing: 2 Tim. 3:16 “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, 17 so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.” This is why he cares so much that the entire Word of God be taught with authority and passion: v19 “ Anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven.”

Not to abolish/do away with, but to fulfill. The Law is good, it is for our own good, things go well when we don’t kill each other…lie…adultery…sabbath, etc. Purpose Driven Life…never a life lived more on purpose than Jesus Christ’s

There are many ways in which we can say that Christ “fulfilled the law” but the primary one is the way in which He fulfilled the law by dying on the cross and thereby satisfying forever the demands of the law against those who would believe on Him. We know form Gal. 4:4 that Christ was born under the law and in the fullness of time. We know from Matthew 3:15 and Heb. 4:15 that He identified with us in every way as humans and fulfilled the law on our behalf. Rom. 8:3-4 “For what the law was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the sinful nature, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in sinful man, 4 in order that the righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the sinful nature but according to the Spirit.”

Jesus also fulfilled ALL of the prophecies from the OT about Himself. Matthew pays particular attention this throughout His gospel, which is written to a primarily Jewish audience. (Luke: Greek, Mark/Paul: Roman, John: Christian) Gen. 3:15 “And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring[a] and hers; he will crush[b] your head, and you will strike his heel.” Decisively on Cross—Col 2:13-15 “God made you[c] alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins,14 having canceled the written code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; he took it away, nailing it to the cross. 15 And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.) Gen. 22:18 “and through your offspring[b] all nations on earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed me.” All nations blessed through Christ and His sacrifice that brought redemption Gen 49:10 “ The scepter will not depart from Judah, nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet, until he comes to whom it belongs and the obedience of the nations is his.” Ps 22: Crucifixion, Isaiah 53: Suffering servant on our behalf.

As we finish up in v20, we get to the main point of the entire sermon as Jesus gives His thesis statement: “For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven.” Basically, we can never earn our salvation. If anybody could have earned it, it would have been the Scribes and Pharisees who had mastered the keeping of the Law. Jesus makes human attainment impossible with this statement  we need a savior, we need to be rescued, we cannot enter into the Kingdom of Heaven on our own. (Kingdom explanation?)

We need to really understand righteousness to know what Jesus is talking about in this verse. We touched on this in the first week’s lesson, but need to go a little deeper with it. The Greek word is dikaiosune and it really means Right standing with God in this sense—Jesus: Your right standing with God must exceed that of the Scribes and Pharisees (they didn’t have right standing at all…their hearts were far from Him. As a Greek word it also means those things about a person that are truly good.

It goes beyond virtue (arete) which is centered in human morality and ethics. Dikaiosune, as Jesus uses it here, is centered in a divine element. Dallas Willard notes the comparisons between the old righteousness of the law (don’t murder, don’t commit adultery) with the new righteousness that Christ articulates in the verses that follow this statement (don’t be angry, don’t be lustful). Virtue can be based on outward actions, True Righteousness must be seated deep within the heart of a person. As we have been seeing all along, we don’t need to do more/better, we need to become new, we need a new heart!

See if it is about legalistic adherence or human effort, a little more of either is all we would need is a little more of either one. But we are talking about an issue of Quality, not Quantity. No amount of human effort will be enough to satisfy the requirements of the Law. Christ brings a different level of quality to the righteousness equation and His is infinitely higher than anything we can do on our own. How much is Enron stock worth? Would getting more and more shares of it really matter much? That’s kind of like human righteousness—totally worthless compared to the infinite value of Christ and His sacrifice on our behalf.

And so we are left with an interesting balance sheet of sorts as Christians. One the liabilities side, we have miles of entries—millions of debts and yet the sheet balances when Christ—and Christ alone is on the assets side of the sheet…

So let’s start with a reminder of what it means to be bless-ed. Jesus turns blessing and happiness on their heads if He is just talking about feeling good when He talks about blessing in these eight verses. In reality though, He is talking about the state of the new heart in various conditions because of corresponding realities—not potential/possible outcomes. We’re going to look at four of them this week along with vv. 11 & 12 7 Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy. 8 Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God. 9 Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God. 10 Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 11 “Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. 12 Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

From the Abstract to the Concrete

a. Theoretical vs. Functional

b. Putting it into Action

II. The Salt of the Earth

II. a. Preserving a Decaying world

II. b. Adding Flavor

II. c. Creating Thirst

II. d. A Common Substance

III. The Light of the World

III. a. Who We ARE in Christ

III. b. A Darkened world

III. c. Reflecting THE Light

III. d. Walking in the Light

IV. Jesus and the Scriptures

IV. a. The absolute Authority of the Word

IV. b. Understanding Christ’s Purpose

IV. c. Fulfilling the Law

IV. d. Fulfilling the Prophets

V. Thesis: You Can’t Earn It!

V. a. Dikaiosune – Right Standing with God

V. b. Human Virtue vs. Divine Righteousness

V. c. Quantity vs. Quality

V. d. The Christian Balance Sheet

What is YOUR next step?

Questions???