© Rev. Lance Carrithers, all rights reserved.  Permission required to copy any portion of this message by any means. Email for permission: lance@firstchurchdc.com

"Congratulations!"

Matthew 5:1-12 

 ³Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

 ⁴Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted.

 ⁵Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth.

 ⁶Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.

To a child, it sounded like Jesus was simply telling good people that God loved them.  As a child I didn’t pick up on the nuances of "poor in Spirit."  The word "meek" was probably unfamiliar. But, whoever these people were, the "bless - ed" part said God was on their side.  What could be simpler than that?  But children grow up.  We grown-ups tend to make things complicated.  We're suspicious of simple ideas and straightforward words.

In an adult discussion of the Beatitudes we start to pick them apart.  I have a confession; I’ve been planning a sermon on the Beatitudes since last January, when they were part of the lectionary readings.  But the more I tried to analyze them, and figure out exactly the meaning of each one, the more muddled my thought and consequently, my sermon became.  I tried again as we began our stewardship campaign, and even used the passage as our lesson for the Monday morning prayer group.  But again, the more I studied them, the more complicated they became.  What does poor in spirit mean anyway?  Is it someone who is lacking in spirituality?  Or is it someone who is impoverished and whose spirit has been depressed by that?

  Then, there is the whole thing about trying to decide whether these are ideals to which we all are supposed to aspire.  Maybe we should try to be poorer in spirit that we might be bless-ed.  We supposed to be meek.  God wants us to be peacemakers.  But then…that presented problems of its own.  We must all try to live up to this standard, and rely on God's mercy when we fail. Which we're bound to do, because the ideal is so far beyond our reality.  And then there was the issue of wondering if God’s blessings dependent upon our works?  That didn’t seem to square with the rest of the gospel and the doctrine of being saved by grace through faith.

Becoming the blessed people of the Beatitudes starts to sound like hard work. So we find ways to pare them down to a list of suggested attitudes. Options. Possibilities.

Sometimes we can be meek, and sometimes we have to be aggressive. Sometimes we can be merciful, and sometimes we must be tough. Depends on who we are, and where we are, and who our neighbor is.  We grown-ups are good at explaining words until they grow so big we can't manage them anymore.

Maybe the better way is the child's way: To listen to the words, and hear Jesus tell good people that God loves them.  God doesn't love them because they're good.   So they need to know God loves them. Need to know they're blessed.

The word that we get hung up on is "blessed." We usually say "bless - ed." That takes it up a notch, from just being blessed– as we all are, in one way or another– to being holy– which we aren't, most of the time, and may not want to be.  The world tells us who the blessed are.  And the world’s list of the blessed sound very different than Jesus’ sermon:

"Blessed are those with custom-made golf clubs and the time and ability to use them well.

“Blessed are the celebrities and stars with their huge paychecks and lavish lifestyle

“Blessed are they who wear designer clothes and drive luxury cars

"Blessed are the sexy, the intelligent, the athletic, the sharp dealers.

"Blessed are those who live the lives of people in financial-planning ads, sailing and dancing without a care in the world.

"Blessed are those whose problems are a nice set of problems to have."

They don't sound very Biblical, do they? And yet those are the people whom our society often considers blessed.

The Greek word "makarioi" (the blessed ones) was originally used of the gods on Olympus.   What wouldn't we give to live like the gods on Olympus: to be beautiful, immortal, amoral, powerful, able to either meddle in human affairs or safely withdraw to focus on their own amusements?   Jesus points us to such a different set of values of what it means to be blessed.

Mother Teresa has recently gained the status of "bless - ed" on her fast track to sainthood.  It's the second-highest honor the Catholic Church confers.   We all have an idea of what a "bless - ed" person must be like. At least we know that a "bless - ed" person isn't like us at all.  But, that word we read as "blessed," and pronounce as "bless - ed," doesn't mean "holy."  Certainly not "holier-than-us."

K. C. Hanson suggests that we understand the bless - ed ones as people Jesus says are truly honored in God's sight.   The world in Jesus' time was divided between those who were honored, and those who weren't. Jesus turned things upside down when he told his congregation on the hillside that they were the people on top.

The disciples must have been deeply puzzled when Jesus said, "You know who I think is really blessed? The poor in spirit - the humble. They know that the world is God's and we're just living in it. You know who else is blessed? Those who mourn the state of the world as it is. They will see their dreams become reality."  And the peacemakers—proving that power is not simply a matter of military might and force.  And so on.

Hanson and others offer us a host of possible versions of "bless - ed."  

That word “makarioi.”    The word they suggest is closer to the meaning of the original word is “congratulations!"

Jesus congratulates the faithful people.  People who kept on doing what God had shown them was good, even when the world disagreed.  They may not even have been aware of their goodness.  People who are poor in spirit tend not to think too highly of themselves.

Jesus didn't deny that life lived toward God's kingdom could mean trouble. But the bliss of the bless - ed would cover the pain of rejection.

This is not rocket science. It's not a difficult path toward enlightenment. It's not a complicated religious system.

The wise and the religious people of Jesus' day . . . the powerful . . . the honored were offended when Jesus blessed plain folk with his presence. Spoke God's word to common people--made big promises to simple sinners.  Congratulated the nobodies of the world.

Some were offended.  But the poor in spirit? The bereaved? The meek?  The hungry?  Something tells me that they didn’t have any trouble at all figuring out what Jesus was saying.   Congratulations.