Matthew 5: 1-12

Matthew in the Margins…Epiphany 4…Revised 2020  

(It may be helpful to re-read LK’s ‘Beatitudes’ before launching into MT’s.) 

William Barclay’s comment ad loc., ‘the beatitudes are not pious hopes of what shall be, but congratulations on what is’, goes to the heart of the matter. It reflects Jesus’ consistent teaching that the Kingdom of God (‘Heaven’ in MT), is now on earth, ‘as it is in Heaven’! Not unlike the Celtic approach of the line between heaven & earth being a very thin one indeed. ‘It’s now or never’! God rules right now among those named ‘blessed’ by Jesus.

Do we need to unveil both our hearts & eyes to the world’s increasingly growing numbers of those who are poor in this world’s goods, rather than simply (?) poor in Spirit. Can we join the ranks of those Jesus calls ‘Blessed’ - in either sense - except by showing compassion to them? Compassion remains meaningless until it’s put into practice for someone.

Maybe we need to become mourners, not just at physical deaths, but the death of values that God in Jesus represents? Is talk of ‘closure’ (increasingly common today) really a form of escapism from death’s realities? What does this passage have to offer those who are spiritually dead although physically living?

Let’s not ever preach a Jesus who is ‘meek’ let alone mild! What a travesty! Can we make the earth more worth ‘inheriting’ by living out Jesus’ gentleness?

Are we hungry enough to do what’s right in God’s eyes & not simply mourn the lack of righteousness among us? (N.B. LK’s alternative form, also Thomas 54 & 69:2.) Could the old, discredited term, ‘God of the Gaps’ take on a new lease of life when we fill gaps, including stomachs? What do we need to do to go beyond mere pity to mercy & compassion?

How do we recognise a heart that’s ‘cleansed’ today? Is ‘cleansed’ a term that comes to mind about anyone round us, churched or not? Are we ourselves cleansed in heart, & able to see God clearly enough, to preach Him?

Can we break the cycle of talking, talking, always talking about peace by actually making it happen through living it? Let’s make ourselves worth persecuting & reviling by standing for God as revealed in Jesus!
Brian

Afterthought: Barclay gives another insight for our preaching when he sums up these Beatitudes as, ‘Jesus’ teaching distilled’. However we approach this passage, reflecting that the Beatitudes are ‘now’ as well as ‘then’ things, will serve us & our hearers well.

MATTHEW 4: 12-25 

Matthew in the Margins…Epiphany 3…Revised 2020

Light, introduced in vv.15-16, is the heart of our passage. Is this MT’s equivalent of JE’s, ‘I am the Light of the world’? To get to the heart of the matter we need to go further back than the IS passage MT is quoting. Right back to GN 1:1-2, where Light is the first thing YHWH creates. Making all else possible. Jesus, as God’s Light come into the world, makes the New Creation possible today! In the Light that Jesus is for the New Creation, &, God is calling us to be for the world!

Jesus’ testing out in the wilderness is immediately put to the test in the new situation He finds Himself in when JB is imprisoned. Jesus isn’t interested in mere theorising! How can we preach in down-to-earth terms, how can we live in down-to-earth terms rather than ‘in theory’? Live in a Way that lets Jesus’ Light shine out through us? If people stir over what they see as something that needs to be put right, do we jump in with both feet, either for, or against? Or, do we examine it in the Light Jesus shines on it & us, & act accordingly?

Change your ways / repent says Jesus. God’s Rule, the Light YHWH throws on every -thing through His Son, Jesus, has come near & remains near. As integral to the New Creation as God’s Light is to the original, ‘In the beginning…’.  What keeps it so? Or, better,‘Who keeps it integral? You & I do, as we absorb the Christ Light deeply.

God's Rule of Light certainly envelops the four first followers! Some of them have been ‘casing’ JB. Now they’re casing Jesus, too. Jesus, though, has been sizing them up, & turns the tables on them. Calling them so they have big decisions to make about their future direction. Does God's Light, God’s rule, ‘grab’ them & us enough to want in?

It's a big ask, still, to leave today's equivalents of boats & nets, & family. Proclaim-ing, teaching, & healing, though, all need to happen out there in the margins as well as in our churches. Outside the protective walls of our religious establishments. If people can't see the Light of Christ in us out there in life’s margins, not only are they living in darkness, but so are we!

Brian

Afterthought: There're at least two key differences between the way Jesus operates & the way JB did: You have to go out to JB, whereas Jesus makes home visits. And, where JB talks about sin, & repentance, or punishment, Jesus majors in compassion, acceptance, & healing.

MATTHEW 3: 13-17 

Matthew in the Margins…Baptism of Our Lord / Epiphany 1…Revised for 2020 

John is right to refuse Jesus baptism, & Jesus knows it. By insisting He demonstrates there's more going on here than meets the human eye. In the end, JB defers to Jesus. He knows, or is at least pretty sure, Who this really is, & has met his match! There is a pastoral question here: When do we dig in about something, & when let go for the sake of God's longer term plan for us?

At the outset of Jesus' ministry MT foreshadows what an enigma He’s going to be, & not only for JB. Is Jesus as Messiah still an enigma to some of us? What of those we are called to minister to who can’t get their head, let alone their heart, round Jesus any more than JB can at this point? Can we open people up to all the Jesus possibilities by being more open to them, & to Him? 

MT tells us Jesus sees the Spirit coming upon Himself after the heavens open. MK uses the term ‘torn open’, as MT does later of the Temple veil. How can we help our people grasp Christian Faith is no spectator sport. It’s a Spirited participation in the things of God, even the uncomfortable bits! Have we yet found our own personal point of entry to become a participant rather than a spectator?

In GN, the Divine Wind hovers over the waters as the Word calls Creation into being. Now, the same Word, but in flesh this time, calls into being a new chapter of God's eternal, ongoing plan for the restoration of a ‘fallen’ people. How can we ‘dust off’ the ‘old, old story’ & tell it on a stage further through our responses. When we stop telling it out in our own lives, the story stops with us. Stops short!

The voice of God acknowledges Jesus as ‘Beloved Son’ [PS 2:7], & ‘Servant’ [IS 42:1, etc.] as He accepts the role of the Anointed One. As beloved daughters & sons of God, we, too, are also to be servants, even suffering ones if necessary. Anointed in our own Baptism. God’s approval today is still “I'm delighted!” How well are we responding to God's loving delight in us?’ A relationship with Jesus that lacks enthusiasm is to damn Him with faint praise - or praise him with faint damns. Is there a hymn in there somewhere?

For all his greatness, JB is an enigma. He points to Jesus but doesn’t follow Him. So far as we know, JB never goes any further, comes any closer, than his enquiry, “Are You the One who is to come?” Are some of us, & some of those to whom we minister enigmas, too? 

Brian

Afterthought: Maybe JB is too individual a character to function within a group he himself doesn’t lead? Think of any group we belong to, church or otherwise: how is our ‘participation rate’?