Matthew 5:1-12 - You Are Unconventionally Blessed - February 2, 2020

Have you ever found yourself “blessed” in a way that you or the world at large doesn’t normally consider a blessing – red hair, freckles, greater than average height or smaller than average feet? In time you may come to see how God has blessed you with these characteristics, but still, they remain unconventional blessings – they are blessings precisely because most don’t see them as blessings. They make you unique, special – they often lead to both unconventional challenges and opportunities. At first glance, that’s how we might see our Lord’s blessings in the Sermon on the Mount: Blessed are the poor, who mourn, who are gentle, who hunger and thirst, who are merciful, who are persecuted and insulted. You’re blessed if this describes you? Really? That’s, by definition, unconventional. The dictionary defines unconventional as “not based on or conforming to what is generally done or believed.” [1] As we receive our Lord’s blessing this morning, we will grow in our appreciation of our blessed status before God, especially since they seem so unconventional and backwards to the world.

Jesus begins with a single word: Blessed. In Greek, makarios. It’s not an emotion. It’s not “being happy.” It’s a condition, an umbrella under which you live. You are blessed, Jesus says to his disciples, and he repeats this word 9 times, each time looking at it from a different angle – like turning a diamond to view its different facets. The first four relate to our relationship with God. Blessed are the poor…those who mourn…the gentle…those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. Luther summarized these thoughts well in a note found next to his death bed. Before God: “Wir sind alle bettler. Hoc est verum.” “We are all beggars. This is true.” [2]

Ah, but that’s not what the world wants you to believe. Even more terrifying, that’s not what pop Christianity teaches. Their message is quite the opposite. Blessed are the rich in spirit. Blessed are the glad and the happy. Blessed are the strong and powerful. That’s the conventional message, isn’t it? That’s the core message of every religion other than orthodox Christianity. The whole point of God is to use him to become a winner. Placing faith in God is like hiring a consultant to improve your life. God is only useful if he helps you get your life in order, maximize your potential, raise your self-esteem, help you be all that you can be.

That’s conventional. Follow the rules and God will reward you. Believe in Jesus hard enough enough, work hard enough, “name it and claim enough big things” – and it can all be yours: health, wealth, happiness, love. After all, it worked for the mega-pastor on the stage, didn’t it? He’s the picture of success. Nice suit, luxury car, pretty wife; squeaky clean, honor roll kids. The message is clear even if no one says it out loud: God is on the side of winners. The Super Bowl is tonight. Isn’t it funny how God will only be found on the side of the winning team? “I’d like to thank God for helping me make that game-winning catch or last second field goal.” You never hear anyone say “I’d like to thank God that I missed the tackle that could have sealed the game; for allowing me to drop the game-winning catch.” But from a human perspective, those are the types of blessings Jesus is giving us today.

Blessed are the poor in spirit. Not poor, financially speaking, but the poor in spirit. The spiritually bankrupt. Blessed are those who have nothing to offer God but their sin, their messed up lives, their broken hearts, their dysfunctional families. Blessed are those who understand that they can’t please God. Blessed are those who realize they haven’t kept a single commandment perfectly. Blessed are those who, like the tax collector in the temple, can’t even lift their eyes to heaven but beat their breasts and can say nothing but God, be merciful to me, a sinner (Luke 18:13).

Blessed are those who mourn. We saw a nation in mourning this past week, didn’t we? Mourning over the loss of the “Black Mamba” – Kobe Bryant. You mourn when someone has died. Blessed are those who experience the pain of death? Yes. Those who weep over the awful results of sin in their lives and the lives of others – up to and including death. Why? Why is a grieving person blessed? Well, consider this: when is person most likely to come to church to receive the Word and Sacrament? When everything is going great in their lives? When their career is on cruise control and their families are perfectly Instagram worthy? No. It’s when sin intrudes and ruins everything; it’s when someone they love dies. When they are grieving the effects of sin, then they are ready for the Gospel, then they are prepared – like soil that is plowed up and turned over (Matthew 13:8) – to be comforted. Blessed are you when you mourn, for the comfort of the Gospel is yours!

Blessed are the gentle. No, that’s not the way it is. Blessed are those who rant and rave in order to get their agendas pushed, their expectations met, their way or the highway. Jesus’ logic is obviously backwards, isn’t it? If you want to make the world your oyster, you’ve got to squeeze it; demand your rights to it; trample others to get it. But Jesus says that you get the earth by inheritance, as a gift. It’s so unconventional. It cuts against the grain, the way we run our lives. We want to be strong, in charge, in control. Gentle? When have the gentle ever won?

Well, if you’re here it’s because you believe that Jesus is the ultimate winner – and he was not only gentle, he wore it as a badge of honor. Come to me all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, because I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls (Matthew 11:28-29). Jesus is gentle – and that’s where his strength lies. It’s the unconventional kind of strength – that turns the other cheek (Matthew 5:39), that blesses the persecutor (Matthew 5:44), that lays down his life for his enemies (John 15:13). And here we get the hint we need to properly interpret these Beatitudes: these blessings are first and foremost about Jesus. None of these blessings are ours by nature. But they describe Jesus perfectly. And through faith we receive these blessings that rightly belong to him.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. No, it’s not just being hungry or thirsty. You can fill yourself with food and drink – and many of us will tonight during the Super Bowl. But you can’t fill yourself with righteousness. You can’t make yourself holy. Oh, you can do outwardly righteous things, but you can’t make yourself righteous. You can’t cleanse your own heart or your own past. We are only blessed when we hunger and thirst for a righteousness that is not our own. When we hunger and thirst for Jesus, as Paul says God made him, who did not know sin, to become sin for us, so that we might become the righteousness of God in him (2 Corinthians 5:21). What we hunger and thirst for as sinners, what man-made religions and philosophies and virtue signalers are really looking for – even though they don’t know it – can only be found in Jesus. He’s the only one who can fill us with the righteousness we crave.

The next four beatitudes turn us to others. To our relationship with our spouse, children, parents, neighbors, etc. Blessed are the merciful…the pure in heart…the peacemakers…those who are persecuted. In these ways, we are imitators of Jesus, our merciful, pure-hearted, persecuted, peace-making Savior.

Blessed are the merciful those who love the unlovable, who take time for their enemies, who set aside their goals and aspirations for their spouse, their children, their fellow believers. Do you know what the most important expression of mercy is? Especially in marriage, in the family, in the church? Forgiveness! As we pray forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us (Matthew 6:9-13). God has shown mercy to you, by not punishing you as your sins deserve (Psalm 103:10). How could you not reflect his mercy to others – not holding grudges, not demanding a pound of flesh, not waiting for a chance to get revenge? Only believers can understand this verse. Unbelievers cannot understand mercy…not really. Only the forgiven can be forgiving. Only those who know God’s mercy in Christ can be merciful to others.

Blessed are the pure in heart. “Ignorance is bliss,” we say. Is that true? In this verse it is. To be ignorant, unfamiliar with evil is to be blessed. The person who leads a “Leave it to Beaver”, sheltered, naïve lifestyle is blessed by their distance from evil. That’s unconventional. I’ve heard Christian parents say that they don’t want to send their child to a Christian school because they don’t want them to be sheltered and naïve to the evil of the world. What sense does that make? What parent would say “I let my child drink spoiled milk because I don’t want to shelter them from toxins”? At the same time who can claim such purity? Proverbs asks who can say, “I have purified my heart. I am cleansed from my sinfulness” (Proverbs 20:9)? I can’t. Can you? Well, yes. Yes, you can, but not on your own. On your own all that comes out of your heart are evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, sexual sins, thefts, false testimonies, and blasphemies (Matthew 15:19). Only the blood of Jesus can purify your heart (1 John 1:7).

Blessed are the peacemakers. This isn’t an inner peace; this is making peace, bringing it to others. They shall be called sons of God because they are chips off the old block; clones of God’s only-begotten Son, Jesus. But that’s no who we are by nature, is it? Who wants to get in the middle of a fight between coworkers? Who wants to step into the breech between couple whose marriage is on the rocks? Who wants to mediate between fellow church members who are quarreling? You know what’s likely to happen if you do that, right? They’re both going to turn on you. Yep, but you do it anyway – because that’s what Jesus did. He stepped into the breech between God and us and we crucified him and God abandoned him to hell. But by his death he brought you peace.

Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. There are two important qualifiers in there: 1) blessed are you. You the disciple. You the baptized believer. This does not apply to unbelievers. And 2) because of me. Because of Jesus. No, you’re not blessed when people insult you because of your political beliefs, because you cheer for the Vikings or Bears in Packer country, or because you boldly assert your constitutional rights by your social media posts or use of firearms. You are blessed when you are insulted because you speak the truth of God’s Word to the world’s lies about abortion and homosexuality and transgenderism. You are blessed when you confess the true God as the one who will graciously take believers to heaven for Christ’s sake and will send unbelievers to hell – even when people like Aaron Rodgers mock such beliefs. [3] When those things happen – and they will happen – don’t be sad; rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven! When you face that kind of persecution for the name of Jesus, you are following in the footsteps of Moses, David, Peter and Paul.

These are unconventional blessings, aren’t they? They turn our whole world upside down. Why should we risk living in such an unconventional way? It’s not because by doing so we earn our reward in heaven. That’s conventional thinking. We risk living this way because our reward is already safe and sound in heaven. Remember, these beatitudes are first and foremost about Jesus. He is the one from whom all blessings flow. He is the One who became poor to make us rich. He is the one who left the glory of heaven to mourn with us in our sin. He is the gentle one, the one who turned the other cheek, who went as a Lamb to the slaughter. He hungered and thirsted for our righteousness, and by body and blood shed on the cross we are filled. His mercy knows no bounds. His heart is pure. He is the peacemaker, the One who brought peace between God and us by bleeding and dying. He is the one this world can’t help but persecute, who is hated to this day despite the fact that he died 2000 years ago.

Jesus is the Blessed One described in these verses. And because you are baptized into him, so are you. These are not commands. This is not a “to-do” list. This is who you are through faith in Jesus. You are richly, if unconventionally, blessed! Rejoice and be glad! Amen.  

[1]https://www.google.com/search?q=unconventional+definition&oq=unconventional+definition&aqs=chrome..69i57j0l7.4477j1j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

[2] Kittleson, James A. Luther The Reformer Minneapolis: Fortress Press. 1986. (296-297) – LW 54:474

[3] https://people.com/sports/aaron-rodgers-opens-up-about-religion-to-danica-patrick-i-dont-know-how-you-can-believe-in-a-god/