When I need to find my way again, in my mind and in my heart, I instinctively go looking for the words of Jesus. I love the far-seeing vision of Isaiah and stand beside him gazing and trying to see what he sees. Who cannot be moved by the emotional honesty of the Psalms, giving words to our feelings and prayers to our thoughts? Over the years I've spent ages listening to Paul at his most passionate and argumentative, often enough being willing to hold his jacket as he fights for the truth about the gospel of Jesus. And I regularly climb the mountain of the Fourth Gospel to watch again the strange and beautiful glory of the Fourth Gospel, as the Light of the world dawns yet again above the mundane limits of my personal horizons.
But when what I need is a re-orientation of the heart, a reminder of the organising principles that shape my thoughts, I go looking for the words of Jesus. Yes, I know I've already said that, but hearing and doing the words of Jesus always helps me ask the right questions about how to live faithfully as a follower of Jesus in a world that is fluid, unpredictable, beyond my control, and is the given time and place in which I live.
This started very early in my Christian life. Converted in my mid teens, one of my first 'achievements' was to memorise the Sermon on the Mount in the old King James Version. Those rhythms of language still push to the fore when I'm quoting the Beatitudes, the Antitheses and especially The Lord's Prayer which still only 'feels right' when I speak it in that version complete with each Thou, Thee and Thine! I spent the first two years as a probationer minister doing a thorough exegesis of the Sermon on the Mount as my major project. Ever since, for well over 40 years, I've kept up with both the scholarship and the pastoral and spiritual treatments of The Sermon on the Mount.
Against this background, during this week of seismic change in the geo-political maps, the arrival of a new book on the Beatitudes seems more providential than coincidental. The Beatitudes are about the Kingdom of God. The dispositions and life situations they describe are counter cultural, and in our politically charged world, counter-intuitive. Meekness? Are you kidding? Where does meekness ever get you when life is all about making deals? Blessed are the poor? Really? Have you ever been down to your last slice of bread with hungry children and no money? And as for being merciful, if what is meant is letting people off with what they deserve, what's the good of that?
And so on. And on. Jesus' words are not meant to be self-help one liners towards being successful. In a world that has always had to deal with the use and abuse of power, the Beatitudes can read like a charter for the bullies. Not so. A year or two after the Beatitudes were spoken, Jesus added to Pilate's problems: "My kingdom is not of this world." In the face-off between Pilate and Jesus, for Pilate it was about control, expediency and power assertion.
The irony is, Pilate was never in control; indeed as John tells it the trial of Jesus becomes the trial of the powers that be, a test of the institutions of control. In the ways of the world power is structured, divided, and given executive functions over others. Those are the ways of the world and its kingdoms. But their power games are irrelevant to One who says, "My kingdom is not of this world."
What kind of Kingdom then? Back to the Sermon on the Mount, and especially the Beatitudes. Whose is the kingdom of heaven? Who will be shown mercy? Who will inherit the land and the earth? Who shall be comforted when life goes wrong? The ones who seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness. And that brings us back to where we are in the here and now of our lives.
At a time when power and authority are again being centralised, and when military power is an early response to conflicting interests, to whose kingdom do we owe our heart's allegiance? When economic power is increasingly concentrated in the hands of fewer people, and the global economy is destabilised and living standards uncertain, what does it mean to be merciful, compassionate, care for the poor, speak up for the welfare of a planet being stripped of the means of survival?
There are no easy answers. It will take commitment to contemplative prayer before God, imaginative intercession for a world of kingdoms hell-bent on growing in power, ways of being that take their inspiration and empowerment from Christ crucified and risen in whom power has been redefined, refocused and set loose in the world through resurrection, the coming of the Holy Spirit, and ultimately in the coming of Christ to redeem and renew Creation. The Beatitudes are unmistakably eschatological in their perspective and promise. But they are also descriptions of those who seek to follow faithfully after Jesus, as ideal disciples in the here and now of our days.
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