Matthew | The Character of Kingdom Citizens

Do you have your Bible with you? I'd like for you to open the

Matthew chapter 5. Matthew chapter 5.

Matthew 5 · chapter mention Matthew 5 · chapter mention

As we come to Matthew 5, we are stepping into a new section of

this series through the book of Matthew, which we've just called

the King and his Kingdom. Now up to this point, Matthew

has worked hard. He's labored hard to show us who

Jesus is, right? We've seen that he's the

promised son of David. He's the true son of Abraham.

He's the obedient son who passed the test in the wilderness.

He's the king who is announced repent for the Kingdom of heaven

is at hand. He's the king that has followers

now following him. And, and what, what's going to

happen now in Matthew 5 through 7 is we're going to hear the

king speak a lot. All right, He's going to open

his mouth and speak. Now, this is often called the

sermon on the mounts. But I want you to know it's

really more than a sermon. Not that it's less than, but

it's, there's more to it than just, hey, that's a nice sermon,

right? The, this is Christ sitting down

to teach. And so you might call it a

Kingdom manifesto, right? He's explaining to you what it

looks like in the Kingdom of God and what the citizens of the

Kingdom of God ought to look like.

So there's an authoritative declaration of what life looks

like under the king or under Christ's rule.

All right, so with that in mind, would you please stand?

I just had you sit. Go ahead and stand and honor of

the reading of God's Word. We're going to hear the words of

the king this morning, Matthew 5.

We're going to do verses one through 12 today.

OK, Sing the crowds. He went up on the mountain, and

when he had set down, his disciples came to him, and he

opened his mouth and taught them, saying, Blessed are the

poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.

Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for

they shall be satisfied. Blessed are the merciful, for

they shall receive mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart,

for they shall see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for

they shall be called sons of God.

Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness

sake, for theirs is the Kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and

utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.

Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven.

For so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

This is the word of the Lord. Fights.

Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we come to

Matthew 5 with great anticipation.

Lord, we have often read and heard the words of the Sermon on

the Mounts. So, Father, these things might

be familiar to us, especially the Beatitudes.

But Lord, I pray that You would open up our hearts and minds to

receive Your word. I ask that Your Spirit would

illuminate the text for us, that we might rightly discern it.

We may understand what it's saying and more Even so than

that, I ask that your spirit would apply these things to our

lives. Help us to be the kind of people

who bear fruits as a result of trusting in Christ, depending on

him becoming like him Father. And so we ask that you would use

your word today to make us more like your son Jesus.

To the name of Christ we ask Amen, Amen.

You may be seated. So every, every Kingdom has a

culture, right? Every nation has values.

Every movement has some sort of a a speech, right?

Some sort of a talk or a manifesto.

Every ruler produces a certain kind of people, right Now, if

you want to understand a Kingdom, you must look at its

citizens. So what does the Kingdom of

heaven produce that? That becomes the question before

us this morning. What, what does the Kingdom of

heaven produce? Many people will say they

believe in Jesus, all right. They'll say that they believe he

was a good teacher, he was a good man.

You know, things like that. They agree with a lot of the

moral things that he spoke about, especially in the Sermon

on the Mount. That's one that people often

appeal to. But and others will claim even

to belong to his Kingdom, right? More than just belief.

It's like I am a Christian. I belong to his Kingdom.

But Jesus does not leave the character of his people

undefined. All right.

We ought to know these people by the fruit that they produce.

And so here at the beginning of his public teaching ministry,

the King tells us what life looks like under his rule, all

right under what he says. And he describes it in really

startling ways. Now, it might not seem startling

because we're just reading it from Scripture and we expect

Matthew 5, the Beatitudes, to say the things it says.

But just think for a moment about what is being said, right?

The world says blessed are those who are strong.

Jesus says blessed are the poor in spirit.

The world says blessed are the self assertive, the go getters,

right? Jesus says blessed are the meek.

The the world says blessed are the comfortable.

Jesus says blessed are those who mourn, right?

So the king turns the value system of the world upside down,

or rather right side up, right? He, he, he paints it in a way

that looks drastically different to what we're naturally disposed

to. So another thing to understand

about the Beatitudes is these are not suggestions, right?

These are not personality types that he's walking through.

They're not optional virtues for those especially devoted

Christians over there, right? These are character traits that

they are the character of Kingdom citizens out of men and

women, boys and girls who love the Lord.

These are the kinds of things we ought to be becoming, all right.

And so here's the pressing issue for every one of us is, do our

lives reflect the rule of this king?

All right. Do our lives reflect what we say

about our allegiance to Christ or our submission to Christ?

Is there fruit of that evidence? So here's the main point.

If you're taking notes, you can write this down.

Submit to the king. Allow him to shape your

character into the likeness of his Kingdom.

I think that's what Matthew's ultimately trying to show us

here. Submit to the king and allow him

to shape your character into the likeness of his Kingdom.

So if Christ reigns over you, He will reshape you.

You're not going to stay the same on day one of salvation as

you are on day, you know 12,000 on salvation, right?

You're going to see growth, you're going to see fruit.

There's going to be evidence of faith because Christ is going to

reshape you by His Spirit, right?

The more you stare, the more you behold the glory of Christ, the

more you will be transformed into that same glory from 1° to

the next. So in these opening verses of

the Kingdom Manifesto or out of the Sermon on the Mount, we see

4 movements. First, what we see is that we

must come under the authority of the King. 2nd, we see we must

embrace the humble posture of Kingdom citizens.

Third, we see that we must display the merciful heart of

Kingdom citizens. And finally, we must be prepared

to endure the cost of Kingdom citizenship.

All right, this is life under the King's rule.

So before we ask whether we like these traits, which is really

kind of irrelevant, but before we start to appeal to our own

conscience or our own wisdom, right, and think, do I like what

the King's saying? Before we ask something like,

are these natural to me? We must ask, have I truly come

under the King's authority if I truly submitted my life to

Christ? All right, so we're going to

begin where Matthew begins, which again is setting up the

authority of the king. We've seen this a lot in Matthew

thus far, but verses one through 2, we see point #1 come under

the authority of the king. All right?

So verse one through 2, seeing the crowds, He went up on the

mountain, and when He had set down, his disciples came to him

and he opened his mouth and taught them all right, so before

Jesus describes the character of Kingdom citizens, Matthew makes

sure we see the authority of the one who's making the

descriptions, right? The Beatitudes only make sense

if you understand who is speaking.

Otherwise it becomes like a checklist in which you think I

have to try to measure up to these things and you'll see them

and you'll think I need to muster up the strength to become

that. You have to 1st see who is

speaking. All right, We need to understand

Christ. So all the first things that

Matthew shows us is that the King ascends the mountain,

right? Seeing the crowds that were

around him, right? He gained this great falling

because of all the miracles he had been performing.

All these people are coming out to see him, right?

We talked about last week that not all those people who came to

see were genuine believers. They're just there for the show,

right? This disciples are there.

There's probably some there who are believers.

And then there's a large crowd of people who are just checking

this guy out, seeing the crowds. He went up on a mountain.

Now, the, the detail of the mountain is not accidental,

right? Matthew is a, he's a careful

theologian. He's inspired by the Spirit of

God to write right? He's telling us things we should

know or we need to know. So why are mountains important?

Why is it important that Christ went upon a mountain?

Well, throughout Scripture, mountains are places of divine

revelation. All right, Currently the

Pharisees would teach. They would sit down and teach in

the synagogues. Jesus goes up onto a mountain

which has historically been a place of divine revelation.

You think about Abraham who offers Isaac on Mount Moriah in

Genesis 22, you see. You think about Moses and

receiving the law on Mount Sinai in Exodus 19 and 20.

You think about Elijah encountered the Lord on Horeb

right in First Kings 19. Mountains have been where God

reveals himself to his man at the moment of the moment, right?

And now Jesus ascends a mountain.

But here's the difference, right?

Moses went up to receive the law, but Jesus goes up to give

the law that to speak it right. Moses was a servant in God's

house. Christ is the son of God's house

or over God's house, as we see in Hebrews 3, five and six.

So so Matthew is presenting Jesus already as the greater

Moses, right? He's he's more than Moses and

and he's not merely delivering revelation.

He is the revelation. John one says he is the Word,

and the Word became flesh. All right, So it's Hebrews 1-2

says that in these last days God has spoken to us by his Son.

All right, So Jesus goes up to speak as the Son of God, of all

authority and heaven and earth, and he preaches right?

Now the mountain signals that what follows carries divine

authority. This is not a commentary on

God's word. This is God's word from God the

Son. All right, it's him speaking.

Secondly, we see here that the King sits to teach, all right?

And when he sat down, now in our culture, teachers stand and

speak, all right, This is how we go about it.

But in the ancient world, authoritative teachers would

sit. To sit was to assume the posture

of a rabbi. It was the settled position of

instruction. So Jesus is not wandering around

sharing his thoughts. He sits deliberately.

He teaches with authority. And later in the sermon Matthew

will tell us he was teaching them as one who had authority

and not as their scribes. Matthew 7.

What do the scribes do? Well, scribes quoted other

rabbis, right, that the Jesus speaks on his own authority.

He doesn't appeal to tradition. He does not say rabbi so and so

said this right, He speaks as the final authority.

So this is royal instruction. The the king has taken his seat

and he's going to speak. What else do we see in these

opening verses? Well, three, we see the

disciples draw near, right? The crowds have followed him,

but the disciples come to him now the sermon is addressed

first to disciples. Yes, the crowds are present, but

the teaching is for people who are following Christ.

The the beatitudes are not universal descriptions of

humanity. We'll we'll see that as we go.

I, I think you'll be convinced right?

They're, they're not natural human virtues.

They, they are characteristics of those who have drawn near to

Christ and who have submitted to his rule.

All right. So in other words, before we ask

whether we like the Beatitudes again, we must ask whether we

belong to the King. All right, what?

Your opinion on the Beatitudes is irrelevant if you're not

under the lordship of Christ, that you cannot detach the

character of the Kingdom from allegiance to the king.

You just can't do it right. The Scriptures and our

confession of faith reminds us that Christ has been given all

power and authority to govern his church.

So he's not a consultant for the church.

It's his church, right? He's the Lord of the church.

He's the Lamb that was slain for the church.

He's the King of all creation. But he's not a life coach for

Christians. He's not giving out mere

platitudes that we should think. You know, that sounds pretty

good. I think I'll give that a try.

No, when the king speaks, when the Lord speaks, we ought to

listen and submit because he's Lord.

The fourth thing we observe in his opening couple of verses is

that he opened his mouth. Disciples came to him, and he

opened his mouth, and he taught them again.

That may seem unnecessary. Of course, he had to open his

mouth to teach. But in Scripture, the expression

signals this solemn, weighty instruction.

And he opened his mouth, and it often introduces authoritative

or prophetic speech. Matthew knows this, and so he

writes this way. But what Matthew wants you to

do, I think it's especially important if you've been raised

in church. You're familiar with the Sermon

on the Mount if you've read it multiple times, it's easy to

just, like, just flow right through that thing.

What Matthew's trying to do for the readers right here is to get

you to slow down and to listen, right?

The king is about to speak. Listen.

Listen to what he says again. The Beatitudes are not ideals

for self improvement. They're they're declarations

from the reigning Son of God. And so when Jesus speaks, heaven

speaks, right? John Calvin wrote that in Christ

we see the living image of God. So what we understand about that

is that when Christ opens his mouth, the will of God is

revealed without any distortion. It's perfect.

It's not like when a preacher speaks or when somebody else

speaks and maybe they're saying true things, but there's this

distortion of the human nature and sin and flesh and all those

sorts of things that could get in the way right here.

We have Christ, fully God, fully man speaking.

There's no distortion here. So it should change how we hear

the sermon from our Lord. One final thing to note on this

is that we don't sit in judgement over these words.

All right, You understand what I mean.

We, we, we, we don't get to judge whether these things are

true or not. They are true.

And so what's really happening is in the words on the Sermon on

the Mount, those words are sitting in judgement over us,

right? They're they're searching our

hearts, they're revealing our conscience.

They're deepening our walk with the Lord of softening our heart

or hardening it, depending on how you see them, right?

But they said in judgment over us.

And so that should change how we hear Christ's words as well.

So the question is not, do I agree with what Christ is going

to say in the Sermon on the Mount?

Well, the question becomes, will I bow to the words of Christ in

the Sermon on the Mount? Will I submit to his authority?

You're going to hear some hard things in the Sermon on the

Mount is what I'm getting at. Not necessarily in the

Beatitudes. There'll be some stuff today.

But as we walk through this, that's a settled thing you have

to have in your heart is, am I going to bow to what Christ

says? I'm going to submit myself to

his lordship. So before you examine whether

you're poor in spirit, before you think about whether or not

you're merciful or not, before we examine whether we are

persecuted, all right, we must examine whether we have come

under the authority of Christ. Have you surrendered your

definitions of blessedness? Have you drawn near to Christ as

Lord? Not, not merely A savior from

your consequences, not merely as inspiration for living, but have

you drawn nearer to Christ as Lord and King?

Have you laid down your right to define the good life?

Because here is what this text demands of us.

If Jesus is King, then He defines reality.

He defines blessing, He defines righteousness, He he defines

flourishing for us. We, we don't get to define those

things. We we get to enjoy it.

We get to live in it as we submit to him.

They are gifts from God in the midst of living for him.

But we don't get to define what that looks like, right?

But if we resist his authority, then we are resisting his

character. That the first step in Kingdom

citizenship is submission to Christ, right?

That the proud heart cannot hear the words of Christ rightly.

The independent heart cannot receive this sermon rightly.

We must come as disciples today, drawing near, sitting under His

word, ready to obey what He says, and only then can there be

attitudes shape our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.

So now that we've seen the authority of the King, we're

ready to hear what the King has said.

And the very first word out of his mouth overturns every

worldly assumption. Blessed are the poor in spirits,

right? The Kingdom begins not with

strength, but with humility. And let's let's look at the

humble posture here of Kingdom citizens #2 embrace the humble

posture of Kingdom citizens, verses 3 through 6.

Blessed are the poor and spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of

heaven. Blessed are those who mourn, for

they shall be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they

shall inherit the earth. Blessed are those who hunger and

thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.

Again, here we're talking about embracing the humble posture of

Kingdom citizens. After Christ has established His

authority, the king speaks his first words.

Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of

heaven. Now that word blessed

immediately confronts us. It means more than happy, all

right. It speaks of divine approval.

Again, you may think of Psalm 1. Psalm 1 mentions the blessed man

who meditates on the word of God day and night, and at the end

it's said of him that the Lord is known by him.

The Lord knows his way. It's divine approval.

It it's covenantal favor, it's flourishing under God's rule,

right? Jesus is not describing some

fleeting emotion that wanes and waxes, right?

He is declaring who is approved by God and the first group he

pronounces blessed is kind of shocking.

I mean, these people existed. This crowd that's come, these

disciples have come. They've existed under the rule

of Rome. Rome was strong and mighty.

You would think that the first words out of Christ's mouth must

be blessed are the strong, but they're not blessed are the

influential. But it's not.

It's not the religious elite. It's not the political elite.

It's blessed are those who are poor in spirit.

This becomes the doorway to the Kingdom, right?

To be poor here does not mean financially disadvantaged.

The word describe someone who's reduced to begging, poor in

spirit, begging of spirit, destitute, dependent, empty, but

Jesus as the qualifier, right in spirit.

This, this is spiritual bankruptcy.

It's the recognition that before God I bring nothing.

I bring no merit of my own, no righteousness.

I have no leverage with God. I am poor, I am destitute, I'm a

beggar in his courts. I have nothing.

All right, Isaiah 66 two says, but this is the one to whom I

will look, says the Lord, he who is humble and contrite in spirit

and trembles at my word. So the Kingdom of God begins

where self-sufficiency ends, right?

We we must become poor of spirit.

The the Pharisees of Jesus's day believed blessing belong to the

externally righteous. And so they paraded their

righteousness around, they added laws to God's law.

They made themselves try to look more holy than God.

But Jesus declares that blessing belongs to those who know they

are spiritually bankrupt. And that's the foundation for

justification by faith alone. It's to recognize that you are

poor in spirit. You're spiritually bankrupt.

Calvin wrote this. He said he only who is reduced

to nothing in himself and relies on the mercy of God, is poor in

spirit. So until a man sees his

spiritual poverty, he will never hunger for the grace of God.

He'll never thirst for mercy. He'll never understand his

depravity. But notice the promise to those

who will. For theirs is the Kingdom of

heaven. It's present tense.

Theirs is the Kingdom of heaven. The Kingdom belongs now to those

who know they deserve nothing. They've come by faith.

All right, so we live in a world that again says climb, but we

serve a God, a king who says bow, go low.

The second thing Christ mentions here are those who mourn.

Blessed are those who mourn, for this shall be comforted.

Now, I want you to understand the Lord does comfort you in

sadness, right? He's a great comfort to you in

your sadness, your despair. And there's a lot of scriptures

that point to that. But we have reason to believe

that Jesus is not speaking merely of like a general sadness

here. It's not a generic sadness.

Jesus is not blessing every form of sorrow.

He's making a point here. This is grief that flows from

spiritual poverty, right? When a man sees his sin clearly,

mourning follows. Sadness follows.

He recognizes that he cannot measure up to the perfection of

God, that he is poor in spirit, and so he mourns over that.

This is more like Psalm 51, mourning right where David,

after he's been caught in the lie of what happened with

Bathsheba and the murder of her husband.

David cries out to God. He says against you and you only

have I sinned. It's a godly grief.

It's an understanding of the depth of depravity and sin in us

and our need for Christ. Paul distinguishes this further

in 2nd Corinthians 710 where he says this.

He says for godly, godly grief produces a repentance that leads

to salvation without regret. So worldly sorrow laments

consequences, right? Worldly sorrow is sorry because

it was caught, all right, but Kingdom sorrow laments sin

itself there. There might be a sorrow because

you're caught, but there's a deeper sorrow because you

sinned, you acted against the will of God, you disobeyed the

Lord. That's godly grief, right?

Thomas Watson, I think I quoted this last week, but it's worth

mentioning in here. Till sin be bitter, Christ will

not be sweet. Right?

That the promise here is that the mourners will be comforted.

What kind of comfort comes to one who's mourning their sin

before the Lord? Coming to the Lord in faith,

coming to the Lord in mourning, seeking help.

What kind of promise exists? What kind of comfort comes to

that person? Forgiveness.

Forgiveness of sins. Casting your sins as far as the

east is from the West. Viewing us through the

perfection of Christ is now how the Father looks at those who

are in Christ, right? He became sin for us so that we

who knew nothing but sin might become the righteousness of

Christ. So there's forgiveness, There's

also reconciliation. But Second Corinthians 5 is very

honest about this, that you have become new creations in Christ,

that Christ through his death and resurrection has reconciled

you to the Father. He's restored the relationship

that we should have known, should have been enjoying since

the garden. What was ruined by the fall.

That's been restored through Christ.

We've been reconciled to God. And now you are there in second

five ministers of reconciliation.

You get to go share the good news of the gospel with others,

those that they might be reconciled to God also.

So there's reconciliation, there's restoration, there's,

there's restoration of life, there's restoration of holiness,

there's restoration of just a dependence upon God, there's

restoration of heart and spirit and soul and body.

So the comfort is not mere emotional relief.

It's emotionally relieving when you're in despair to have

someone come and to put their arm around you and to weep with

you and to pray for you. That's emotional relieving, but

it's also very spiritually helpful because they're taking

you to the one who provides true gospel comfort where your need

your your, your despair is solved in Christ.

Only those who mourn over sin will truly, truly rejoice in

grace. The third group he mentions here

is the meek, which we might say is strength under submission.

All right, blessed are the meat, for they shall inherit the

earth. I want you to understand that

meekness is not weakness. Meekness is strength under

control. It's controlled strength.

It it's strength under submission to Christ.

It's power under authority. It's the opposite of self

assertion, right? Psalm 3711, which Jesus is

echoing here honestly. Psalm 3711 says this, But the

meek shall inherit the land and delight themselves and abundant

peace. So the meek trust that God is

going to vindicate them, right? They're not grasping for

position. Jesus himself describes his own

heart in this way. He says I am gentle and lowly in

heart, right? The king describes the citizens

of his Kingdom with his own character here, right?

And So what is the promise for the meek?

Well, they shall inherit the earth.

The world fights for territory, but the meek and Christ receive

it. The proud grasp at things and

they lose, but the humble will trust and inherit what God

gives. This is what you would call

eschatological hope. That means it's N times hope,

right? That the renewed earth belongs

not to tyrants, but to the humble King and to the humble

ones of Christ. The 4th category of people he

mentions here is hunger and those who hunger and thirst for

righteousness. This is just a deep craving for

God. Blessed are those who hunger and

thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.

So Jesus is intensifying the language.

This is not mild interest in the Lord, right?

There's a whole crowd of people here who are mildly interested

in the Lord. What he's talking about here is

starvation language, right? It's dehydration language.

It's desperation. Blessed are those who hunger and

thirst for righteousness. Righteousness here includes both

justification and sanctification.

It's right standing before God and right living before God.

So the one who is poor in spirit mourns his sin.

The one who mourns his sin longs to be righteous, right?

I mean, isn't that what we get to isn't when we when we

understand that we're poor in spirit, we mourn over our sin.

And when we're mourning over our sin, we're really mourning to be

righteous. We crave it.

We we want to grow in righteousness.

I don't want to be a Sinner any longer.

I don't want to dishonor the Lord with my life anymore.

I want to honor Him. I want to glorify His great

name. I want to do good to my neighbor

and all those surround me, right?

The one who mourns a sin is mourning to be righteous.

And the promise here is beautiful.

They will be satisfied. They shall be satisfied.

I mean, think about the dichotomy that exists in our

world. The world hungers, and we do.

We're guilty of this, right? I don't want to just point to

the world. Like when I say the world, I'm

just talking about world's wisdom and how it influences our

living. The worldly wisdom teaches us to

hunger for wealth, to hunger for applause, to hunger for comfort.

And the more you get of that stuff, the more you realize

Ecclesiastes is one of the most brilliant books in the

Scriptures. It's vanity of vanities.

There is no satisfaction in it. So the promise here that those

who hunger and thirst for righteousness will be satisfied

is huge. Those who crave conformity to

God will be filled. Augustine famously prayed this.

He said, you have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our hearts

are restless until they find their rest in you.

So only righteousness. What Augustine's getting at with

Matthew's getting at here with reporting what Jesus has said,

right? Only righteousness satisfies the

soul, because only God satisfies the soul.

We've been made for him, and so our hearts are restless until

they find the rest in him. But notice the progression of

what Matthew has just done, what Jesus has just talked through.

There's spiritual poverty, there's grief over sin, there's

a submission to God, and then there's this craving of

righteousness. So you can see it's not 4

different personality types, right?

We don't need to go take the Enneagram and try to figure out

who we are on the Beatitudes. That's wicked, right?

What we need to see is, do I understand my depravity?

Do I understand I'm a spiritually impoverished before

the whole world? And as I'm seeing it, do I

grieve over my sin or do I try to explain it away and justify

it? You know what rationalize means?

It just means to tell yourself rational lies.

Do I submit to God? Do I crave righteousness?

Christ is painting for US1 portrait here.

He's describing conversion from the inside of the man, which is

interesting because a lot of the things he's going to point out

and the rest of the sermon are all about the inside of the man.

You're going to have a group of people who are sitting here and

saying, well, I'm not those things.

And Christ is going to show over and over again throughout the

Sermon on the Mount that you must have a transformed heart to

live for the Lord. The Kingdom begins in humility

before it will ever produce influence in the world, and that

cuts directly against the grain of our culture and our flesh.

Imagine for a moment a man who is dying of thirst but insisting

that he is indeed OK. Well, until he admits his need,

he will never reach for water, right?

The the Beatitudes begin by teaching us to admit our need.

We have a need for Christ. We are spiritually impoverished,

and only the empty can be filled, only the broken can be

healed, only the hungry can be satisfied.

So we have to examine ourselves carefully as we read these

things. Are we poor in spirit, or do we

subtly believe we bring something to God?

I'm useful to Him, He needs me, or I'm sufficient enough that

I'll just sprinkle a little bit of God into my life.

Do you mourn over your sin, your rebellion against God?

Do you mourn over these things or do you excuse them?

Do you rename them? We we live in a world that loves

to psychoanalyze everything and there's a diagnosis for every

sin under heaven. You're not a Sinner.

You're XYZ. Here's some medication for that.

Here's some therapy for that. That's not, I won't even qualify

the statement right? That exists in our world and we

fall prey to it often. We want to rename our sins.

We want to make them less than sin.

We want to minimize them as best we can.

We don't want to mourn over sin, but we ought to mourn over our

sins. Are we meek right, or do we get

defensive? Do we get self protective?

Are we quick to assert ourselves or do we practice meekness?

Do we hunger for righteousness or are we content with just

surface level spirituality, just blending a little bit of Christ

or the Bible or church or whatever into our lives, just

surface level things, or is there a real hunger and a thirst

for righteousness that's present in your life?

Well, here's the hard truth. You can't manufacture these

traits by willpower, right? That they are produced by grace.

They're evidence that the King is reigning in you.

If these qualities are absence, the issue is not your

personality. You have to hear that the issue

is not your personality, it is Lordship.

Have you come to the end of yourself?

Have you bowed before Christ because the door to the Kingdom

is low and you must stoop to enter it?

So when the king reigns in the heart, humility is born.

But when but humility does not remain hidden, it begins to

reshape how we treat others. And that leads us to the next

marks of Kingdom citizens, where we see mercy and purity and

peacemaking. All right, so #3 display the

merciful heart of Kingdom citizens.

Look at verses 7 through 9 again.

Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.

Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.

Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of

God. So if the first four Beatitudes

describe the inner transformation of the heart

before God, then the next three reveal how that transformed

heart expresses itself toward others.

Humility never remains. Prophets, all right, when the

King reigns within your heart, he reshapes how you relate to

him on the outside of everything you're doing.

All right, When you get the word in your head and in your heart,

then your hands are transformed. And so Jesus continues there.

Blessed are the merciful, blessed are the pure in heart.

Blessed are the peacemakers. These are not disconnected

virtues. They are the fruit of a heart

that's been conquered by grace. So look at the first one there

with me, the merciful. It's grace received and grace

that's given. Blessed are the merciful, for

they shall receive mercy. So mercy is action and

compassion toward the guilty and the needy.

It's not mere sentiment like Lord bless her heart, it it's

costly kindness toward those who do not deserve it.

And notice the order of the Beatitudes.

You you cannot be truly merciful unless you have first seen your

own spiritual poverty. Only those who have been

forgiven much extend forgiveness freely.

James 213 warns US judgment is without mercy to the one who has

shown no mercy. But mercy triumphs over

judgments. So the merciful are not earning

God's mercy. That's not what we're saying.

That's not what Jesus is teaching that that would

contradict everything we have just seen about spiritual

poverty. Rather, mercy becomes the

evidence that mercy has been received.

The showing of mercy becomes the evidence that you have received

mercy, Right. Calvin again is helpful here.

He said nothing moves us to mercy more than the knowledge of

our own misery. So if you stood before God

bankrupt and you've been forgiven you, you will not stand

over others harshly. It's a contradiction.

It cannot exist. And a heart that's truly been

transformed and the promise here, right?

Blessed are those who show mercy for what they shall receive.

Mercy. Again, this isn't transactional

salvation. This isn't you must muster up

mercy in and of yourself. No, you've received mercy, so

you're showing mercy and guess what?

You get more mercy. It's covenantal assurance is

what it is. Those marked by mercy show that

they belong to the God who delights to show them mercy.

Secondly, he mentions the pure in heart.

It's just undivided devotion to God.

Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.

So purity of heart is not external performance, is it?

No, it's internal integrity. You're pure in heart.

The the Pharisees Polish the outside of the cup, and Jesus

says here that it's important to address the inside of that

thing. Psalm 24, three through 4:00 ask

this question, Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord, and who

shall stand in His holy place? He who has clean hands and a

pure heart. So purity of heart means a

singleness of devotion, and I'm pure in heart.

It's undivided loyalty to the Lord.

There's no hidden compartments. I don't have part of my heart

going after God. And then other desires in my

heart want to do different things.

There's no double allegiance here, right?

The the word pure carries the idea of unmixed, like metal

that's been refined of its impurities.

So it's not to say that as you've received mercy, as you've

been justified by God, that you won't have impurity.

Still, of course you will. That's why I thought it was

important to read Romans 6 before Judas baptism this

morning. That's why Paul writes Romans 7

and Romans 8 for us. That's why 2nd Corinthians 3 and

4 points of this need for transformation, right?

That there's going to be transformation.

First Peter writes about literally how when your faith is

tested, then it's shown to be true because the impurities of

our faith are being burnt away in the fire, right?

So there's going to be struggle, there's going to be problems,

there's going to be issues, there's going to be sins to

overcome and put to death. All those things still exist as

a Christian, but now you have the power of the Spirit of God,

which raised Christ from the dead in you, to help you put

those things to death. You don't have to give up.

You can show up each day trusting the Lord, humbling

yourself before Him, mourning over your sins, asking God to

cleanse you, trusting that He is faithful and just to cleanse

you, as first John tells us, and then asking Him to rule your

life by His Spirit, to make you obedient to Him, to put to death

the deeds of the flesh. So the pure and heart are those

whose allegiance is not split between God and the world.

And what's the promise? Well, they shall see God.

That's staggering because in the Old Testament to see God meant

you died. But blessed are the pure in

heart here. Why or how?

For they shall see God. Yet here Jesus promises that the

pure in heart will see Him again.

This is going to find its ultimate fulfillment in

glorification. When Christ returns, or when you

go to be with Him in glory, we shall see Him as He is.

The apostle John writes in first John 32, but even now purity

clarifies spiritual sight. The sin is clouding the vision,

as I was mentioning a moment ago, but holiness is sharpening

our vision, and in the more undivided the heart becomes, the

clearer the sight of God's beauty becomes.

Again, Agustin prayed something really helpful here.

He said grant what you command and command what you will, even

purity. Then as a gift of grace, we also

see here the peacemakers. They reflect the reconciling

king. Blessed are the peacemakers, for

they shall be called sons of God.

Notice he doesn't say peacekeepers.

He says peacemakers. Peacekeeping avoids conflict.

Peacemaking moves toward reconciliation.

God himself is the great peacemaker.

Alright. Romans 51 Therefore, since we

have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our

Lord Jesus Christ. What did God do to make peace?

He moved towards sin, right? He sent Christ.

And now we have been justified by faith.

We have peace with God through Christ.

Colossians 120 says that Christ made peace by the blood of the

cross. So the gospel is the ultimate

act of peacemaking. Those who belong to the king

reflect his reconciling work. Then we've been called to this,

as I mentioned earlier in Second Corinthians 5:00, we, we pursue

peace and relationships, whether it's your marriage, whether it's

a relationship with your children, whether it's a

relationship with someone in the church or someone outside the

church, right, We're seeking peace.

We're pursuing peace in relationships.

We seek unity in the church. We labor for gospel

reconciliation. And Jesus says that those who do

this will be called sons of God. So in Scripture, sons reflect

likeness to be called sons of God as to bear the family

resemblance. All right, Peacemaking proves

your father's identity. So, as the Scriptures remind us,

those who are justified have also been adopted.

You've been adopted as sons of God.

You've brought into God's family.

You've been conformed to his character or you're being

conformed to his character, I should say.

And so peacemaking is family likeness.

So again, notice how these are building.

Mercy flows from forgiveness received.

Purity flows from a heart that's been transformed.

Peacemaking flows from reconciliation that's been

experienced. So none of this is moralism, is

it? None of it's moralism.

It's spiritual regeneration. It's spiritual transformation.

When grace roots itself deeply in us, then fruit must grow

visibly. So imagine you take a a tree,

right, and you transplant it into rich soil, that the change

may not be immediate in appearance, but over time the

health of the roots show up in the fruit of the tree.

The Beatitudes are describing the fruit mercy, purity, peace.

These grow from the soil of humility and grace, and if the

fruit is absent, then the root must be examined.

So we should ask ourselves plainly, are we merciful?

Am IA merciful person, or am I sharp?

Am I critical? Am I quick to condemn?

Do you remember the depth of your own forgiveness?

We should ask too, are we pure in hearts, or do we have divided

loyalties? We have hidden sins, private

compromises? Would those who are closest to

you, those who live in your home, describe you as sincere

and undivided before the Lord? Are we peacemakers or do we stir

up division? Division in our homes, division

in the church, division in the community?

Do we avoid hard conversations that could bring reconciliation

or do we labor for unity as Christians?

Now this is searching of us because it's possible.

You have to hear me. It's possible to attend church

and yet not reflect the King. But where Christ reigns, mercy

must increase, purity must deepen, peace must spread.

You see, the world prizes dominance.

It prizes self protection. But the Kingdom of God prizes

mercy and reconciliation. And the fruit of that does not

always earn applause. In fact, it often invites

opposition, doesn't it? Well, guess what?

Christ knew that as well. Point #4 endure the cost of

Kingdom citizenship. We must endure the cost of

Kingdom citizenship. Verses 10 through 12 Blessed are

those who are persecuted for righteousness sake, for theirs

is the Kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when others

revile you and persecute you, and utter all kinds of evil

against you falsely on my account.

Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven.

For so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

Jesus concludes the Beatitudes of all things with something

that really ought to jar us just a little.

He has spoken of poverty of spirit.

He's spoken of mourning over our sins.

He's spoken about meekness and mercy and purity and

peacemaking, all these wonderful things that seem like the world

around you would love you for being this.

But now he says, blessed are those who are persecuted for

righteousness sake, for theirs is the Kingdom of heaven.

Persecution, really blessed persecution, blessed

persecution, blessed right? How?

This is where the Kingdom most clearly collides with the world

that you live in. You're persecuted for

righteousness sake. You have to notice the

qualification here. It's not just blessed for those

who are persecuted. No, it's blessed for those who

are persecuted for righteousness sake.

Not persecuted for being abrasive, though.

You don't get to walk around being what you might think is a

holy turd head, all right. You're not persecuted for

foolishness. You're not persecuted for

political alignment. No, you're persecuted for

righteousness sake. The the word persecuted carries

the idea of being pursued. They're after you.

You might think the persecution that David endures, he fled Saul

and he fled his son Absalom. He's being pursued, he's being

harassed, he's being haunted down.

That's what Christ is talking about here, and it implies

sustained pressure. Not just momentary discomfort,

but a sustained pressure from the world against Christians.

Why though? Why might a husband be

persecuted in his home by his wife if he's trying to live

righteously? Because righteousness exposes

darkness, Jesus will later say in John 320.

For everyone who does wicked things hates the light, everyone

who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the

light, lest his works should be exposed.

So why do they not come to the light?

Why do they hate the light? Because they don't want their

own evil works to be exposed. It's self assertion.

It's self protection. It's making them Lord of their

own life, what Kingdom citizens live with.

When Kingdom citizens live with humility and purity and moral

clarity, it unsettles those around them who love their sins.

Light provokes the sort of resistance.

And theologically that makes sense, I think.

Scripture tells us that the world lies in the power of the

evil one in first. John 5/19 There's an underlying

hostility toward God that exists in the hearts of everyone who's

an unbelieving Sinner. So when you live in allegiance

to Christ as a Christian, you step into spiritual conflict.

And so Paul says plainly in Second Timothy 312, indeed, all

who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be

persecuted. Indeed, you live for Christ, you

will be persecuted. It's not might be you will be.

So this might not always mean imprisonment, right?

You might look around and think, man, Kyle, we live in America.

It's fairly unpersecuted here, but but again, I'm talking about

the what when you live out your life as a Christian among people

who are not wanting to live their lives in submission to

Christ. You know what I'm talking about

when I talk about persecution. Again, it can be as simple as or

as close as. I'll say as close as not as

simple. It can be as close as a husband

who's seeking to serve the Lord in his home and a wife who

refuses to submit to that. It can be as close as a wife who

is seeking to submit to her husband and everything in the

Lord. And a husband who refuses to

love her the way Christ loves the church.

That's persecution. It's revealing sin.

It's causing conflict. There's a thousand other

examples we could sit up here and give, and I have no time for

1000 examples. So it may not mean imprisonment.

It may not mean that you're literally going to be killed,

but it will mean that you could be marginalized for your faith.

You could be slandered for your faith.

You could be excluded from things because of your faith.

You can receive pressure because of your faith.

All right? I mean, persecution shows up in

a myriad of ways. It doesn't just mean you've been

martyred. And yet Jesus says, blessed,

blessed are you when you're persecuted, husband, for trying

to live for the Lord in your home.

Blessed are you, wife, when you're persecuted for trying to

live for the Lord in your home. Why?

Because yours is the Kingdom of heaven.

Notice he's repeating the promise of verse 3.

The Beatitudes here are bookended with the same

assurance. The poor in spirit possessed the

Kingdom. The persecuted possessed the

Kingdom. How do you think Christ was

intentional with His words? One.

Yes. All right, we got more work to

do. Strap in.

Yes, of course he was right. The Kingdom belongs to those who

bow low, and it also belongs to those who stand firm.

The second thing Christ points out here in verse 11 is those

who are personally reviled on account of Christ.

Now Jesus becomes even more personal here.

Blessed are you. It was.

Blessed are those. Now it's blessed.

Are you? He shifts from third person to

second person. This is no longer abstract.

He's being direct. Lester, you when others revile

you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you

falsely on my account. Now the defining phrase there,

the phrase you have to pay attention to on my account,

persecution for righteousness is persecution for Christ.

You think about Saul right before his conversion in Acts 9,

right? The Lord appears to him.

He's on the road to Damascus to do what?

Persecute more Christians? The Lord appears to him.

Saul, Saul, Why are you persecuting them?

No. Are you persecuting me?

They're being persecuted on account of their walk with the

Lord for being persecuted for the sake of Christ, for the name

of Christ. And who shows up to defend him?

Christ himself on my account. The world may frame it as

intolerance or extremism. Those around you may say that

you just don't get it, but at its core, those sort of things,

when you're persecuted for righteousness sake, at the core

that is hostility towards Jesus, not you.

That's a comforting thing for me.

He says in John 1520. If they persecuted me, they will

also persecute you. So union with Christ means that

we're going to share in the rejection of Christ.

We must. The Scriptures remind us

believers are united to Christ in his humiliation and in his

exaltation. If we share in His glory, we

must also share in his reproach. Calvin observed that believers

should not be surprised by persecution because he says the

cross is the badge of our discipleship.

So if the king was crowned with thorns before he was crowned

with glory, then you and I should not really expect a

different path. We should expect to walk the

same kind of path. So what do you do when you're

being persecuted for righteousness sake?

Look at the third thing Christ says.

Rejoice in eternal reward. Jesus commands something so

astonishing here. Rejoice and be glad.

The the language is strong. There's exuberant joy.

There's not denial. There's not some stoic

endurance. No, it's joy.

Rejoice and be glad. Why?

For your reward in heaven is great.

Who cares about the reward on earth?

That's what Christ is saying. Your reward in heaven will be

great. This does not mean that you earn

heaven through suffering. It means that heaven vindicates

your suffering. It means nothing endured for

Christ is going to be wasted there.

There ought to be some of you jumping up out of your chairs

because you're enduring some things for Christ right now.

There ought to be some joy here, right?

It means that Christ is vindicating everything that

you're going through as you suffer for his name's sake, as

you suffer for righteousness sake.

Paul echoes this in Romans 818. The Scriptures echo this a lot,

actually, especially in the New Testament.

This was a refrain. This is the thing that got me

through Winnie's death. I'll be honest with you.

It's just this refrain of eschatological hope.

Romans 818 For I consider that the sufferings of this present

time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be

revealed to us, the reward. As we're talking about reproach

here, the reward outweighs the reproach, but the reward also

outweighs the suffering, whatever it may be.

Could be health, could be marital struggle, could be

finances, could be the death of a loved one, could be anything

right. The sufferings of this present

time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be

revealed to us. Praise God and Jesus adds this

for those who are suffering under reproach.

For so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

What is Christ saying? Every man that I called by my

name to speak my word, who has gone before you, has been

persecuted. Do not think that you will get

out any differently, but blessed are you.

Blessed are you Now think about it.

Persecution for your faith places you in the company of the

faithful. The prophet Elijah was haunted.

The prophet Jeremiah was beaten. The prophet Isaiah, according to

tradition, was Psalm. And two, to suffer for Christ is

to stand in the line of the prophets.

Brothers and sisters, it's not a sign that God has abandoned you

at all. It's a mark of authentic faith.

Imagine a soldier who's wearing the uniform of his nation while

he's in hostile territory, right?

That that uniform makes him identifiable.

He's not with us. And so it also makes him a

target because I said it was hostile territory, but it also

proves who side he's on. Righteousness is the uniform of

the Kingdom. It draws fire from the enemy,

but it also reveals allegiance. Persecution is not an

interruption of Kingdom blessing.

That's what Christ wants you to see today.

It's evidence, it's evidence of Kingdom blessing, that the

Beatitudes do not move from blessing to curse.

No, they move from humility to hostility.

That's it. They declare that both of those

things are blessed, that the world may reject you, but heaven

claims you, right. The world may slander you, but

Christ identifies with you. The world may cost you comfort,

but Christ promises a reward in heaven.

So then we have to ask, when the pressure comes for my faith on

account of righteousness, do I retreat?

Do I soften truth so that I can avoid criticisms?

Do I hide my allegiance to Christ to maintain my

reputation? Or do we stand humbly,

graciously, firmly? I want you to understand some of

this passage is not calling you to be a persecution seeker.

You're not to become a hot head for Christianity.

You're not to go out looking for persecution, but it does call

you to expect persecution when you're walking faithfully with

Christ and when it comes. This passage is reminding you

that it is not failure, it's fellowship with Christ.

Brother, sister, if you've been mocked for your obedience, take

heart. If you lose influence because

you refuse to compromise with the world, take heart.

If your name is misrepresented because you hold the Christ,

take heart. Christ has said theirs is the

Kingdom of heaven. If you've never suffered, even

in the even the slightest discomfort for Christ, then it

might be worth asking whether your life is distinct enough to

provoke notice. The King does not promise you

ease, but he does promise you himself, and he promises a

Kingdom that cannot be shaken. Remember, we have heard the King

speak today, Not a philosopher, not a motivational teacher, not

a political revolutionary. We've heard the King of heaven

speak. And what has he shown us?

Well, he's shown us that the character of those who belong to

his Kingdom looks like certain things.

We've seen, first, that we come under the authority of We must

first come under the authority of the king.

Secondly, we must embrace the humble posture of Kingdom

citizens to be poor in spirit, mourning over a sin, meek,

hungry for righteousness. Third, we've seen that we must

display the merciful heart of Kingdom citizens becoming

merciful pure of heart peacemakers.

And 4th, we've seen that we must endure the cost of Kingdom

citizenship, becoming willing to suffer for righteousness and for

Christ himself. That's life under the King's

rule. And here is what it what should

strike us. None of that is natural.

It's all supernatural. The world does not produce this

kind of character. Your flesh will not produce this

kind of character. Education does not produce this

kind of character. Only the reigning Christ

produces this kind of character. So the Beatitudes, then again,

it must be said, they're not a ladder that you climb to get

into the Kingdom, that they're a mirror that reveals whether the

king has claimed your heart or not.

And so I say to those of you in here who are believers, if you

belong to Christ, this passage should humble you and comfort

you. It should humble you because

none of us embodies this perfectly, right?

Are you always poor in spirit? No.

Do you consistently mourn over your sin?

Probably not. Are you relentlessly merciful?

No. We take offense.

We act out in aggression over those offenses.

Do you always hunger for righteousness?

No. What did that do for us?

It ought to drive us back to grace.

It ought to drive us back to the mercy seat of the Lord.

It ought to drive us back to fellowship with Christ.

But it should also comfort you because if you've seen it, if

you see even the beginnings of this character in your life,

maybe I'm not always poor in spirit, and sometimes I am.

Maybe I don't always mourn for my sin, but I have been broken

over my sins at times. Maybe I'm not always merciful,

but I do recall where the Lord led me to show mercy.

You see what I'm saying? If you see a growing hatred for

sin, a growing hunger for righteousness, a growing desire

for peace, well, that's evidence of the King's work in you.

These qualities are not the cause of your salvation.

No, they are the fruit of your union with Christ.

So continue to humble yourself before the Lord.

Continue to bow low. Continue to hunger and thirst

for righteousness. Continue to seek to show mercy

and when opposition for walking with the Lord comes, do not ever

even remotely think of it as God has abandoned you.

Instead, see it for what Christ says it is, it's identification

with Him. There's Christ says theirs is

the Kingdom of heaven. Not was, not will be, is.

Theirs is the Kingdom of heaven. Now, if you're an unbeliever,

you haven't submitted your life to Christ.

If you're able to examine your life honestly.

And none of these things describe you.

If pride defines you more than a poverty of spirits.

If sin doesn't grieve you. If righteousness does not hunger

in you. If mercy is foreign to you, if

the thought of suffering for Christ seems foolish, then this

passage isn't comforting for you.

It's confrontational, isn't it? Because it means you're still

living under another king yourself.

Now, the good news is this. The King who speaks these words

is also the King who went to the cross.

He perfectly embodied every one of these beatitudes.

He was truly poor in spirit. He was fully dependent upon the

Father. He mourned over the sin of

mankind, and He gave His life for it.

He was meek, He hungered for righteousness, He was merciful,

He was pure. He made peace by His own blood,

and He was persecuted unto death.

The only perfectly blessed man in the whole world became a

curse for sinners so that rebels like you and me could be brought

into His Kingdom. You do not enter his Kingdom by

reforming your character. You enter his Kingdom by

repenting of your sin and trusting in the king, laying

down your pride, bowing your knees to the Lord, receiving

mercy from him. If you'll do that, the King will

begin to reshape you from the inside out.

Church, the world is watching. Our culture is utterly confused

about what the good life is, but Jesus is not confused about it.

Blessed are the humble. Blessed are the merciful.

Blessed are the pure. Blessed are the persecuted.

That the Kingdom does not advance through dominance, it

advances through transformed people.

So let us submit ourselves to the King.

Let us embrace his definition of blessedness today.

And let us live in such a way that when the world sees us,

they see something different. They see the Father in heaven

who has rescued us, who has reconciled us to himself through

his Son. They don't see perfection.

We're not out trying to be Pharisees and act like we're

perfect. No, no, no, no, no.

They see the evidence of a reigning Christ.

Remember, Christ has said theirs is the Kingdom of heaven, and so

may it be evidence among us. Let's pray.

Heavenly Father, we thank you for your word today.

We thank you for the words of Christ this morning.

We thank you, Father, for all that he has said in the

Beatitudes and all that it reveals about the character of

the citizens of the Kingdom of God.

And God is believers. We ask that you would continue

your good, gracious, merciful work of conforming us more and

more into the image of Christ, the only perfectly blessed man.

God. Would you help us to walk

faithfully with him? And Father, I pray for those who

may not know Christ is Lord, whether they're young or old.

God, I pray that is they've seen the words of Christ today, that

they have been examining their own heart.

I pray, Father, that You would use Your word to draw them to

yourself, that nothing would hinder them from coming, that

You would take them out of darkness and place them in

marvelous light. By Your great grace, your mighty

salvific hand, they would grant to them new life.

They might walk in accordance with your word, with your

teachings, with the life that you intend us to live, a life

close in fellowship with the God of all creation.

Father, would you save them today?

I'm going to give you a moment now in your seat to pray, to

seek the Lord, to respond to the message, or to reflect how the

Lord leads you by His Spirit this morning.

Take a moment and do that now. Heavenly Father, we give you all

the glory and the praise and the honor for every good work that

you're doing in the hearts of your people today.

We thank you again for your word.

We thank You that you are faithful always, that You're

steadfast, abounding in love. Father, we thank you that you

save sinners from their sins, to grant them new life, and you

mature them in that life. You sanctify them.

You cleanse them. So Lord, we thank you for your

work and our own hearts today. The work and the hearts of those

around us today. We thank you for your word.

Father, it's Christ name I pray. Amen.