All Saints (Observed): Gospel, Matthew 5:1-12                        

Matthew 5:1-12

Blessed. It’s a word found myriads of times throughout the Scriptures. We tend to look at it mostly from the perspective of happiness. If you’re blessed you are happy. And I don’t mean only in the surface way, the way of the world’s pursuit. But a true biblical happiness would incorporate things like peace, security, contentment, and rest. In perhaps Jesus’ most well known sermon, He begins by highlighting the life of the blessed. It’s no worldly recipe. That’s certain. But when Jesus, the Lord speaks of blessedness, well I for one want to listen in. But with “good hearing.” 

Centuries before, yes hundreds of years before Jesus we have another description of living a blessed life in the very first chapter of the psalter. It’s prescription in a nutshell is this: know and love, cling to and surrender to the Word of God. A careful reading of Psalm 1 which includes not only a description of blessing, but an equally clear statement of its opposite, lays the foundation, you might say, of what Jesus expounds on the hill.

But now to “good hearing.” We are moralists at heart. And try as we may to grasp the truth that Jesus has “paid it all,” and brings us to the Father completely by His work, we want to contribute something that makes His work just a bit more secure on our behalf. Good luck with that. No, when we read these descriptions of the blessed life, we immediately begin to rate ourselves against the exhortations. Here’s the conclusion: it’s not pretty. But are we taking in what Jesus is truly saying? In most cases, I think not..

Jesus ends his section many verses later in Matthew 5 by declaring that we must “be perfect.” But perfection in the ways of God, that’s always God’s standard. My conviction is that in Matthew 5 and Psalm 1 Jesus is giving us an autobiography. He is the blessed man. He is the One, the only One who lives out the beatitudes. He is the One, the only One who meets the standard as one who loves the Word of God without reservation. And He wants us to realize that only in our being joined to Him may we know this great blessing.

The gist of the gospel reading for the week then, isn’t a “how-to” but a “who’s who.” And the who in question is both blessed and our blessing. That’s the message I hear.