Horizons Bible Study. Confessing the Beatitudes. Lesson Summaries

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1 Horizons Bible Study Confessing the Beatitudes Lesson Summaries These summaries are pulled from each lesson of the Horizons Bible study, Confessing the Beatitudes. They provide you with a brief overview of the important aspects of each lesson. May these summaries help you as you participate and/or lead the Confessing the Beatitudes study! Introduction The Beatitudes are some of the most loved and familiar teachings of Jesus. They are also some of the most pointed, and as followers of Christ, we must be sure we don t miss their point! We must consider them in context. The Beatitudes are found in both Matthew and Luke, and we will examine both. Jesus teaches the Beatitudes to people living in Roman-occupied Palestine in the first century AD. The people who heard the Beatitudes experienced great oppression under the Roman Empire, and the Beatitudes reflect their experience of Rome s cruelty. They also reflect the good news of God s just and grace-filled response. One of the most exciting aspects of this study is the opportunity to write a group confession an ancient Christian practice of truthtelling in which we speak the truth about the glory and grace of God. Creating a group confession provides a concrete way for us to make the Beatitudes a part of our journey of discipleship as we move from confession to action. The Accra Confession, a contemporary, Reformed confession, will guide us throughout this study as we learn how to confess the Beatitudes!

2 Lesson One Greatly Honored Are the Poor! Jesus calls his disciples and us to honor the destitute, while he calls the wealthy to account. As we consider the Beatitudes, we must remember the cultural and historical context in which they were taught: first-century Palestine under the harsh rule of the Roman Empire. Through the Beatitudes, Jesus teaches us whom we are to honor in God s dominion and it is not always who we might think! Jesus calls us to honor the destitute because God s dominion is made of them and belongs to them. Jesus also teaches us that those who are affluent who have gained great wealth through the exploitation of the destitute are not to be honored. Rather, they are shameful in God s dominion. As we consider this teaching from Jesus, we pray it will lead us to confess the truth about ourselves and about God in light of the first beatitude. Joining our sisters and brothers in Accra, Ghana, we confess that we want to order our lives in ways that increase our understanding of poverty and wealth, and in ways that meaningfully honor those who are poor.

3 Lesson Two Greatly Honored Are the Mourners! Jesus calls his disciples and us to honor the mourners, and he calls to account those who live a life of laughter, unaffected by their neighbors tears. In Jesus time, as in ours, shame and death and grief were common. But the economic, political, and social realities caused by Roman control of the Mediterranean basin often worsened the grief of the people, and increased the likelihood that some of them particularly the poor and destitute would experience grief too soon and too often. Rome the Roman Empire made matters worse. Those who mourned in public were seen as shameful in the culture of Jesus day, but Jesus called the mourners honorable because he knew that public grieving functions as a protest against an unjust world. Jesus declares that God's divine reign will bring consolation and laughter to those who mourn a bold proclamation of a divine intervention into history that upends the status quo. Jesus also challenges those who live lives of unconcerned joy, lacking awareness of those who mourn. We cannot live lives of laughter when our sisters and brothers are mourning and weeping. We must seek to honor the mourners by listening to them, standing with them, and telling their truth when they cannot.

4 Lesson Three Greatly Honored Are the Humbled! Jesus renews God s promise to those whom society humbles, a promise that they shall inherit the earth. In order to understand who the humbled are, it is helpful to turn to Psalm 37, upon which this third beatitude is based. Here, we learn that though the humbled do not have power to stop their daily oppression, they are called to wait on God, for they shall one day inherit the earth. Jesus disciples would have understood his reference to Psalm 37 as a clear connecting point between the wicked of the psalm and the system of oppression that the Roman Empire brought with it to Palestine. The violent rule of the Roman Empire kept the affluent well-off and pushed the poor ever closer to destitution. Knowing that taxation had become so steep that people were not able to keep their inherited family lands, Jesus protests against this system of accumulation a system in which a few became wealthy at the expense of the many who were humbled. It is important to consider who the humbled might be today. When we consider unjust situations, such as the Democratic Republic of Congo, where violence is used to intimidate families and control mines producing minerals used by the rest of the world, we must consider our buying practices. Through praying for the humbled, standing with them in our buying habits, and calling for just policies, we find ways to honor the humbled here and now.

5 Lesson Four Greatly Honored Are Those Who Are Famished and Parched for Justice! Jesus promises sustenance to the famished, but calls the stuffed to account. In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus teaches that those who are greatly famished are honorable. The word he uses to express being famished refers to the chronic, deep-seated, life-threatening hunger that the poorest of the poor know on a daily basis. In Jesus day, these famished people would have experienced such desperation because what little nutritious food was available was sent to the colonies of Rome. In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus declares, Greatly honored are those who are famished and parched for justice. Justice, in this instance, refers to a right relationship with God and neighbor. Jesus honors those who long for right relationships among all people. Jesus promises that he will pasture (feed) both those who are famished, and those who are famished and parched for justice. He also declares that those who are sated or stuffed in the face of hunger are shameful. Using parallelism, Jesus reveals that the destitute, the mourners, the humbled and those who are famished are all honored not for what they are facing, but because God will intervene on their behalf. As Christ s disciples, we also are called to honor them with our prayers, our gifts, our voices, and our actions.

6 Lesson Five Greatly Honored Are Those Who Show Mercy! Jesus calls his disciples and us to imitate God by showing mercy through emotion, action, and dedication. The fifth beatitude of Matthew begins verse two of Jesus teachings, and describes a group of people who are less oppressed than those named in the first four beatitudes, but who are just as much the concern of God. The first characteristic of these people is that they show mercy. Mercy, in Jesus time, was understood as both covenant loyalty/steadfast love and pity/clemency. Holding both of these understandings together, mercy ultimately consists of three components: emotion, action, and dedication. One who shows mercy feels emotion when faced with the pain of another, takes action on behalf of that person, and demonstrates ongoing dedication to that person beyond the initial crisis. The God of Israel demonstrated such mercy, and so did Jesus, particularly in his explanation of the parable of the Good Samaritan. The promise of the fifth beatitude is that those who show mercy shall be shown mercy. Jesus teaches that those who are merciful will experience the compassion, intervention, and dedication of the God of mercy. We must dedicate ourselves to the practice of mercy that Jesus calls honorable.

7 Lesson Six Greatly Honored Are the Pure in Heart! Jesus upholds those who, with genuine hearts, wrestle with God, are changed, and live in a way that strengthens the whole people of God. When Jesus honors the pure in heart, he uses a Greek word that indicates something clean, unmixed, unpolluted, or genuine. An impure heart is dangerous not simply because it might produce thoughts that are the exact opposite of the traits listed above, but also because the actions that those thoughts can produce are capable of hurting others. Those who are pure in heart are the opposite of those with unclean hearts they have good or noble intentions that manifest themselves in good or noble actions. The pure in heart are not perfect people, but are genuine. The pure in heart are promised that they will see God, and scripture shows that, when one sees God, one is changed sometimes in painful ways, but always in ways that make the changed more genuine. The pure in heart live with integrity, calling themselves and their communities to account on behalf of the oppressed. We, the church, are called to live into that integrity before God and on behalf of our neighbors. When we fall short of this call to purity, the radical gift of redemption through Jesus Christ calls us back into the heart cycle of God, where we are purified and sent out once more.

8 Lesson Seven Greatly Honored Are the Peacemakers! Jesus honors those who work for shalom as sisters and brothers, children of God. Peace, shalom in Hebrew, is an all-encompassing word communicating wholeness and wellness for all of God s children. Peacemakers find ways to make shalom a reality they take steps to make sure that their communities are whole. Jesus identifies peacemakers as sons of God to communicate that those who make peace will receive the full inheritance of God, just as male heirs received their fathers property in Jesus day. The promise that peacemakers would be sons of God challenged Roman peace because, rather than the leaders of Rome being called sons of God (which was a common title for emperors), those who make peace were identified as the true sons of God. This kind of thinking disrupted the pax Romana, or Roman peace, because it challenged the notion that the civic religion of the empire, the people who ruled the empire, and the Roman military were capable of bringing peace. In honoring peacemakers, Jesus challenges us to be peacemakers, as well, to live into our identity as children of God. We are called to a cessation of violence against one another, and we are called to work for the cessation of all violence. Making peace means we provide for the needs of others, working for the wholeness of all our neighbors.

9 Lesson Eight Greatly Honored Are Those Who Have Been Persecuted for the Sake of Justice! Jesus calls his disciples and us to honor those who have faced persecution for the sake of justice. With the eighth beatitude, Jesus seems to say, Blessed are those who have faced the consequences of discipleship, for persecution may well be a consequence of Christian discipleship. Christians in Jesus day faced persecution in the family if they were to go against the beliefs of their fathers, and they were sometimes marginalized economically and socially in the local communities if they stood with the voiceless and powerless. Yet, the ultimate example of one persecuted for the sake of justice is Jesus, himself. Jesus life was the epitome of the teachings he gave the disciples from the mountain. Although we later followers understand Jesus death as redemptive, in his day, Jesus death was the ultimate persecution. The intent of his crucifixion was to shame him and his followers. Through the literary use of inclusio, Jesus reveals those who are to be honored in society the people described in the Beatitudes. God s heart, Jesus teaches the disciples, is with those who face shame because they are oppressed, or because they stand with the oppressed. These are the honorable ones in your community. They are honorable because, among these people, heaven chooses to make its dwelling. The God who calls us into relationship challenges us to face the consequences of discipleship.

10 Lesson Nine Greatly Honored Are You Who Put Your Honor on the Line for Christ s Sake! Jesus calls his disciples and us to take the joyful risk of putting their honor and their lives on the line for his sake and the sake of the gospel. With the final beatitude, there is a shift in the focus of Jesus teachings from Greatly honored are those who.... to Greatly honored are you when.... You when speaks directly to the future life of discipleship a life facing persecution for Jesus sake (in effect, a dishonorable life). Worse, Jesus does not say, Greatly honored are you if these things occur. He says, Greatly honored are you when these things occur. In the Gospel of Luke, this beatitude comes with a reproach: Shame on you, if you have a good reputation all the time. This kind of thinking would have upset the powerful, and likely would have led to persecution. Jesus final statement is even more shocking. He says Rejoice! Be overjoyed! Leap about! In God s justice, those who face persecution on behalf of the good news of Jesus Christ are no less the concern of heaven than those who are oppressed. Thus, the source of joy is the trust that God is faithful, and that, if we are faithful despite the hardships that discipleship will bring, God also will be faithful to us. We are called to live out the gospel of Jesus Christ, a gospel marked by overwhelming grace, to which we respond in faithful discipleship. With disciples of ages past, we follow the way of Christ, honoring those who are destitute, weeping, humbled, and famished for food and justice; patterning our lives after those who do mercy, walk with integrity, and make peace; and living into the outrageous joy that comes from the promise of the dominion of God, now and in the age to come.