Thursday, June 7, 2012

Light in Dark Places: Beatitudes Part 8: Matthew 5 Cont'd


light up sign night


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.”

“Truth without love is too hard; love without truth is too soft”
-John Stott

This is what separates the Christian from the blindness of optimism or pessimism. We are not a people with the luxury of a pre-fabricated response to everything, God asks us to use the mind and the Spirit He's given us to discern.

You may have heard the phrase “Hope for the best and plan for the worst;”Jesus calls His followers to seek first the things of God (Matthew 6:33), though never forget this regularly conflicts with the world's “common sense” and can lead to our peril.

At the writing and reading of these words, there are individuals all over the world, caged in cells, awaiting certain death, their crime: loving Jesus and sharing His teachings with others. We must not forget our persecuted Christian brothers and sisters in our prayers. They are the ones who many times pay the ultimate price for following Jesus to the cross. 

Jesus explains here, to His disciples, that He is not providing them a five step plan on How to Quickly Rise in Popularity and Offend the Least People Possible. He is offering them God's Truth, that remains true regardless of what others think. What Jesus is not asking us to do is be belligerent and purposely offensive.
Let's clear up another misconception: Christians are not to seek controversy and contempt with society at large. Anyone with a significant amount of time in the faith can likely relate a story in which followers of Christ have chosen to demonize a specific class of people or specific action (“Those [fill in the blank] are taking over, [fill in the blank] is the top problem of this country”). What results is monsters in our mind that were once people, the delineation is important, because monsters can't be reasoned with.

No, there are no monsters on earth, just sinners, none of us worse than the other. We don't need to make up enemies to fight, for our war is not with flesh and blood but against the powers of spiritual darkness(Ephesians 6:12). We hate and can be completely disgusted by what people do, but our quarrel is not with them, but the darkness driving them. This is why the light we carry as believers is so important, as we will soon see later on in Matthew 5.

Questions:
  1. How can the follower of Christ best keep themselves from demonizing others?
  2. Earlier, Christ tells us to be peacemakers,yet follows up with telling us persecution is a likelihood in our lives. How do you reconcile that?
  3. How can followers of Christ dialogue responsibly and yet truthfully with those they disagree?
  4. Is there an example in your life that illustrates this?

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