Living The Blessed
Life
Now when he saw the crowds, he went up on a mountainside and sat down.
His disciples came to him, and he began to teach them. Matthew
5:1-2
Listen to this story, which sounds just wacky enough to maybe be true:
In New York
City, there are eight million cats and eleven million dogs. New York City
is basically just concrete and steel, so when you have a pet in New York City
and it dies, you can't just go out in the back yard and bury it. The city
authorities decided that for $50 they would dispose of your deceased pet
for you.
One lady was
enterprising. She thought, I can render a service to people in the city
and save them money. She placed an ad in the newspaper that said, "When
your pet dies, I will come and take care of the carcass for you for $25."
This lady would go to the local Salvation Army and buy an old suitcase for
two dollars. Then when someone would call about his or her pet, she would
go to the home and put the deceased pet in the suitcase.
She would then
take a ride on the subway, where there are thieves. She would set the suitcase
down, and she would act like she wasn't watching. A thief would come by and
steal her suitcase. She'd look up and say, "Wait. Stop. Thief." My guess is
the people who stole those suitcases got a real surprise when they got home.
1
The author of the story goes on to say that many of us are like those thieves;
we grab at what we think will bring us happiness only to find that it just
doesn't quite deliver.
There are some translations and paraphrases of the beatitudes that use
the word "happy", such as "How happy are the poor in spirit, for theirs is
the kingdom of heaven". The English word happy comes from the root word hap which means chance.
Happiness is a frail candle in the winds of life. It is always at risk
of being blown out.
With the death
of "Peanuts" cartoonist Charles Schulz, many commented on his ability to reflect
on the sadnesses of real life through the experiences of his characters. One
journalist talked about Schulz's admiration for the losers of the world:
With that theme
of loving losers—even Charlie Brown's baseball idol, Joe Shlabotnik, was the
worst player in the pros—came the corollary, losing at love. Every major character
has an unrequited love—Charlie Brown and the little red-haired girl, Lucy
and Schroeder, Linus and Miss Othmar. Even Snoopy got dumped at the altar.
Happiness may be a warm puppy, but as Schulz once said, "Happiness is not
very funny." Schulz infused the strips with his lifelong feelings of depression
and insecurity—he had his heart broken by a real-life red-haired girl—and
they showed, Camus-like, how one could feel lonely even in a crowd. Many
of his panels have two characters outside, at night, staring at a field of
stars. "Let's go inside and watch television," Charlie Brown says in one.
"I'm beginning to feel insignificant."2
Jesus doesn't use the word happy, he uses the word blessed.
Being blessed is the result of being blessed by God.
A far less lyrical way to express it is to say, "when you face life this
way you are facing it in faith and in a way which God approves, and God will
see to it that your choice is not overlooked."
Much more lyrical to say, "blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is
the kingdom of heaven."
Let's read them again.
Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs
is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.
Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will
be filled.
Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.
Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.
Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God.
Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs
is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all
kinds of evil against you because of me.
Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the
same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
But of course that goes completely against the grain of everything that
comes instinctually.
When we are mistreated we want to retaliate.
When we feel insignificant we retreat inside like Charlie Brown to watch
T.V. or we sometimes resort to behaviors that make us feel important.
We feel that showing mercy is showing weakness and that being humble is
just an invitation to being used.
Besides, being humble, merciful, peacemakers and such is a lot of work
and our natural instinct is to say that if it doesn't affect me or my family,
its not my problem.
But you know, Jesus was right.
It is the merciful who are shown mercy and friendship and gratitude.
To truly mourn our losses is good mental health. Bottling them up and putting
on a brave face is like throwing the trash in the broom closet. Sooner or
later you will have to deal with it. When we mourn God is there to comfort
us.
When you retaliate you just get more of the same back.
But as hard as it is to do, kindness wins far more battles than being a
bully.
It's a simple fact of life that the seed we hold onto is the seed that
will never germinate and produce a harvest.
The kindness we hold onto is never planted and never has a chance to show
what it can do when it comes to full bloom.
Those are true in the natural everyday world.
There are some truths that take a different pair of eyes to see.
These are the truths that depend on understanding the nature of God.
If you take what Jesus is saying at face value, you can reason back from
what he says to see what he is saying about the nature of who God is.
For example:
Blessed are the pure in heart for they will see God.
Who then is God? God is the person whose nature is transparency without
a shred of deception.
Blessed are the meek for they will inherit the earth.
God is the one who gives without asking what's in it for Him.
And honors us when we try to do what is right and are not obsessed with
just finding out what's in it for us.
You can do a lot of good when your ego is not at stake.
In a
letter written by Southern Baptist Missionary to Iraq, Karen Watson, prior
to leaving for the Middle East, lays out some of her thoughts. The letter
was dated March 7, 2003. Karen was killed, along with four other missionaries,
on March 15, 2004.
She writes to
them...
The Missionary
Heart:
Care more than
some think is wise.
Risk more than
some think is safe.
Dream more than
some think is practical.
Expect more
than some think is possible.
In his care,
Salaam, Karen4
You can't live that way without intimately knowing the care and love of
God.
You can't live that way without believing that your life is closely held
by God and that what you do is not lost. That God sees, and cares.
Even then that is an exceptionally high standard of life.
What Jesus is showing us is not some new unattainable standard, but what
realtionship with Him is like.
It is lying aside our ego and need for total independence and abandoning
ourself to trusting God.
Even that is not 100% possible.
So, yes what Jesus is saying is true. It's experientially possible to demonstrate,
but to live this way requires the sense of God's closeness so that when you
are alone looking up at the stars you can know that your God is big enough
to make all of that and caring enough to hold you as important enough to notice.
Interestingly, one of the ways to find out about the closeness and caring
of God is to experiment with the beatitudes.
Try putting as much of Matthew five into practice as you are able
and see what happens between you and your creator.
You can diet for a week and be certain of taking off a couple of pounds.
Put God's instructions into effect for a week and see what happens. Try
it and I am willing to go out on a limb and tell you you will happier with
what you find than just losing a couple of pounds.
Try it this week.
I think you will be glad you did.
Preached June 22, 2008
Dr. Harold McNabb
West Shore Presbyterian Church
Victoria, British Columbia
Notes
1. Scott Wenig, Preaching Today #182
2. James Poniewozik, "The Good and the Grief," Time (12-27-99)
3. William Barclay, "The Gospel of Matthew", The Daily Study Bible Series, Westminster
Press, 1975, p.88
4. "Keep Sending Missionaries," Baptist Press (3-24-04)
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