Restart

Those of you who own computers know that, occasionally, you just have to turn it off and restart. And when you do that, 99% of the time, whatever was the problem before is now “cured”. It seems strange, but it’s not unheard of.

You mechanics, have you ever been working on a motor and you get done (you think) and it’s still not right, so you start over?

Or, maybe you go to the doctor and as he’s examining you, he starts asking questions like, when did this start? And maybe he eventually traces it back to some event quite a while back, or to some other problem.

Or, you golfers, ever have a great game? One that leads you the next time out to try and remember what you did right so as to repeat last time’s success?

Whatever field or venture you want to talk about, we’ve all experienced this. Something we were doing—or wanted to do—that lead us to “go back to square one”.

Or, maybe, we’re starting something new and we want to start it off right. So we go to the library and check out a book, or we go on-line and find a video that tells us how to do it, or we go find someone who can teach us.

Here at NPCC I’m really excited about the way things are going. Our attendance is slowly getting larger. We’re going to have three (3!!!!) baptisms later today. The youth group’s getting going. We’re trying to get everyone plugged in. I think this is great!

As I was getting close to the end of Psalm 23, I started praying about what to preach next. My thought was that I would come up with several ideas from Scripture then kind of sift through them. But over and over again, I kept coming back to the passage of Scripture we call “The Sermon on the Mount”. This led to more praying because I wanted to make sure I was preaching what God wants me to preach. Somehow, I kept coming back to this same passage.

Why?

I think it’s what I was just talking about. We’re not really restarting NPCC, but we are embarking on a new era, with many new people. Just like we had the class back in June (and we’ll offer it again) about the basics of what we believe, I think we as a church need to see how Jesus began his ministry. What did he start out with?

He’s the Son of God and I don’t think Jesus does anything by accident. Why, then, did he preach what he preached to start off his ministry?

Now, if you are in a game of Bible trivia and the question comes up, “What was Jesus’s first sermon?” most of us will answer “The Sermon on the Mount.” Now, if we get the question, “Where is the Sermon on the Mount located,” most of us are going to answer Matthew 5-7 or Luke 6.

And how does it start? Most of us would answer that with, “The Beattitudes.” Let’s read those:

Matthew 5:1-12
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, saying: "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." (NIV)

In Luke, they read much the same way, though a little shorter (which is a good description of Luke’s take on the Sermon in general). Except that at the beginning, Luke says they were on a flat place.

Some detractors have pointed to that and said, “Well, which is it, Christians? Was he on a mountain or a plain? HUH?” As if this invalidates what Jesus said. But if you look at Matthew 5 and Luke 6 there’s really no indication that these are the same event. In fact, we know from Matthew 4 and Luke 5 that Jesus was traveling from town to town and preaching. Perhaps, like many a speaker through the years—especially in the days before recording devices—Jesus preached the same sermon more than once. Not necessarily word-for-word the same each time. Maybe the differences between the two records of the sermons are because Jesus, who knew men’s hearts (see John 2:24-25) tailored his sermon to speak to the particular hearts in attendance that day. Or, maybe the sermons were identical but Matthew and Luke were touched differently and wrote accordingly.

Even then, though, neither Matthew 5 nor Luke 6 is not exactly where the sermon begins.

I used to take TV guide. I stopped because it got to be that there were so many stations they didn’t have room to tell about the shows anymore. When they did, though, sometimes the descriptions of the shows were pretty laughable. “Gilligan accidentally foils attempt to leave island.” “Gomer irritates Sergeant Carter.” Or, even more recently, “The CSI Miami team finds a dead body at the beach.” That doesn’t really tell me much, does it?

Sometimes, though, the description had more details and it either interested me and led me to watch the show or (and maybe this is why they stopped describing the shows) it made me think I wouldn’t be interested so I skipped that particular episode.

I mention this because, back in Matthew 4, we get the “TV Guide Teaser to the Sermon on the Mount” in verse 17:

From that time on Jesus began to preach, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near." (NIV)

Occasionally, there would come a listing in TV Guide for a show I didn’t normally watch, but the listing made me think, “I wanna see that!” If it were a listing for a comedy, I was intrigued because it sounded especially funny. For a mystery, because it sounded particularly thrilling.

"Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near."

What’s so intriguing about that? Well, you have to remember where Jesus was and who he was talking to. He was in first century Israel, a land occupied by the Romans. The people were oppressed. On the other hand, they were the only God-fearing people around and it seemed like that virtue should be good for something.

So along comes this guy saying “Repent”, which could be taken to mean, “You’re not good enough. You have to change.” That’s going to get folks’ attention.

“For the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”

Jesus had prefaced these sermons by quoting from the prophet Isaiah: "Land of Zebulun and land of Naphtali, the way to the sea, along the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles—the people living in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of the shadow of death a light has dawned." (Matthew 4:15-16, NIV)

People are people. We can see now that a politician can get quite far by speaking of change. Initially, some of the people who came to hear Jesus probably came because he was speaking of something different. Maybe they thought he meant an immediate end to Roman rule, or that the kingdom of David would be returned right away.

Whatever their thoughts, Jesus has their attention. And his message of repentance is attracting crowds. Makes you wonder if it might do the same today. We’re told we live in a post-modern world without absolutes, but we all see poll after poll saying that the people of our nation overwhelmingly realize something is wrong.

And Jesus’ message of repentance isn’t just hellfire and brimstone. It’s not, “Repent because you’re doomed.” It’s, “Repent, for there is something wondrous at hand and you don’t want to miss it!” Jesus was attracting people because he didn’t just point out the bad (lots of people do that), he was providing an eternal solution!

What Do I DO with This?

As we go through this series, I want us to start thinking about how we can present Jesus’s message to our friends and neighbors. How can we be salt and point out the bad, while still being light and showing the good of God’s love?

Comments? Email me at npccsam@windstream.net