Seeing the Reality of Life – A Life of Treasures We start the new year/decade in Jesus’ teaching in the Sermon on the Mount. Seek God’s kingdom. Jesus is talking to villagers, farmers, fishermen, women who spin and weave. Life is survival. Too vulnerable to care about abstractions, meaning. (Pyramid of motivation) Jesus goes straight for deep-high meaning. These hardscrabble people have treasures. The question: where they/we put treasures. What gives meaning/value? Where my heart is. Earth – things that pass away. God’s realm – things that can’t be destroyed. But both are here and now. It’s a challenge of vision. How do I see the world/life. My ability to see the world and people as God’s realm can become distorted, dark or give light. Jesus focuses on a difficult “choice.” Who do I serve? God or Mammon? A personification of Money, power, control, and all their embodiments in structures, relationship, stuff. Mammon’s the most powerful god we can create. Mammon is our human replica of God, the kind of god we think God should be. Pragmatic, real. Visible (not hidden). Powerful. Equipped with full theology. Daily rites to shape my choices. Able to save and destroy.
Sermon Series
Seeing Life Through Jesus’ Eyes
01: No Worries–Seeking the Kingdom of God
Matthew 6:24-34 MP3 | Sermon Notes
02: Learning to Pray with Jesus
Matthew 6:5-15 MP3 | Sermon Notes
03: Fasting and Giving with Jesus
Matthew 6:1-4, 16-26 MP3 | Sermon Notes
04: Seeing Ourselves Clearly with Jesus
Matthew 7:1-12 MP3 | Sermon Notes
05: What’s So Wrong with Getting Angry
Matthew 5:21-26 Sermon Notes
06: Lust, Temptation, and Divorce
Matthew 5:27-32 MP3 | Sermon Notes
07: To Tell the Truth
Matthew 5:33-37 MP3 | Sermon Notes
08: The Other Cheek & the Second Mile
Matthew 5:38-42 MP3 | Sermon Notes
09: “But I Don’t Want to Love My Enemies!”
Matthew 5:43-48 MP3 | Sermon Notes
10: Salt of the Earth, Light of the World
Matthew 5:13-16 MP3 | Sermon Notes
11: The Hard Road to Jerusalem
Matthew 7:13-20 MP3 | Sermon Notes
12: Blessed, Happy, Poor, and Mourning!
Matthew 5:1-9 MP3 | Sermon Notes
13: Building a Life Solid in Jesus
Matthew 7:21-29 MP3 | Sermon Notes
14: Blessed When Reviled and Persecuted?
Matthew 5:9-12 MP3 | Sermon Notes
15: Great in the Kingdom of Heaven
Matthew 5:17-20 MP3 | Sermon Notes
Jesus and Our Life of Prayer
Matthew 6:5-25
Seek First the Kingdom of God
At the beginning of the year, we started with Jesus' fundamental guidance: "Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness." [Mt 6:33] A way of seeing everything with God at the center of reality. Seeking that reality amid all claims for other gods like Mammon.
Prayer for Jesus is a profound expression of that seeking. Prayer is engagement / connection with the God of the universe. Jesus, himself, often had refreshing, renewing times of prayer.
"When You Pray" -- Taking God Seriously
Even truly good things are vulnerable to corruption/distortion from little gods. When prayer is for public display it becomes work for pay, fully paid. A closed circle, no God involved.
Jesus urges a core of private prayer. The "Father in heaven" is not far away but very close. Trust God as knowing and caring. He is intimately acquainted with us and loves us.
What's So Wrong with Getting Angry?
Matthew 5:21-26
"But I Say to You..."
Jesus taught in a striking, authoritative way that amazed people (7:28-29). In Mt 5:17-20 he affirmed the Law and emphasized righteousness exceeding "the scribes and Pharisees," teachers noted for rigorous obedience to every commandment -- a 'fence around the law.' The law was moral / civil / criminal, enforceable by public courts and subject of debate.
If judgment found you in the right, you were right with God. Biblical code plus tradition.
Jesus' language creates an expectation that he sets up a more rigorous fence. Then Jesus gives a series of contrasts that use that expectation but undermine and transform it. Jesus is not giving new law, rather showing us a new starting point for thought & action, a new default.