The Beatitudes

Epiphany 4A

In the Name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Well, the playoffs are over, and the teams for the Super Bowl are all set. Next Sunday, the Green Bay Packers and the Pittsburg Steelers will play in the 45^th Super Bowl, to determine just who is the best team in Professional Football.

Millions of people all around the world will be watching the game; and when it is over, one team will be crowned as “World Champions” – and the Steelers, I mean the other team will be labeled as “Losers”. One team will be celebrating and talking about going to Disney World, while the Steelers… I mean the other team will go home with heads low and hearts even lower.

The Fans will also have plenty to say about the game, with accolades and cheers for the winners, and sneers and scorn for the Steelers, I mean the losers. They will be called bums, and all kinds of excuses made for how they were robbed, and for why they didn’t win the most important Football game in their lives.

Life if full of winners and losers isn’t it; and there are those who seem to win at everything… and others who seem to struggle with everything. We often try to put a spiritual twist to these things, by equating winning and success and prosperity with being “blessed” – and losing and struggling and poverty with not being “blessed.”

We ask God to “bless” us and to “bless” our endeavors, and when those endeavors succeed, we convince ourselves that we have been “blessed” – but when those endeavors fail to meet our expectations of “success” we often wonder why God didn’t bless us.

It’s very much like praying for your favorite team to win the Super Bowl. Some will pray for the Packers and others will pray for the Steelers. At the end of the game, if the Packers do win, people in Wisconsin will be convinced that God is a Packers Fan and the Steelers can just go to the devil, and vice-a-versa for the folks in Pittsburg if the Steelers win.

We look at the world around us, and equate success and prosperity with being blessed; and in so doing, we make huge assumptions about people and about the way God works. Even in Church, we bring these assumptions with us, along with a warped view of how God works in our lives. We often see poor folks around us, and make the assumption that they must not be “blessed” – that they must not be doing something right or God would bless them and their life would be different. We see successful and prosperous folks at Church, and we assume that they must be doing everything right, and are being blessed by God. This is a twisted and sad view of how God works, how Faith works, how Grace works. We even hear this view preached and proffered by many televangelists and religious hucksters, who convince the weak and gullible that if they “Give” – especially to their TV Ministry, that God will “bless” them… will make the rich… will pay their bills… will solve their problems. So people will “seek” God’s blessing by giving something or doing something, convinced that if they do so, God will bless them.

Well, to that I say, “Utter Rubbish!” Success and prosperity do not equate to being “blessed” any more than being poor and humble is tantamount to not being blessed. I have known many prosperous and wealthy people in Church, who are hateful, greedy, selfish, and some so crooked in their business dealings that they will have to be screwed into the ground when they die. I have also know many poor and humble and meek people in Church, who are the most loving, most giving, most caring, most sincere people one could ever meet. Are the rich church members “blessed” and the poor and humble Church members not blessed and ignored by God? Certainly not!

My friends, Christianity is not a football game, and it most certainly is not in line with our sad and misguided views of “winners and losers” or “prosperity or poverty” as measures of God’s favor and blessing… nor is it about the self-seeking, avaricious, greedy and grasping notion that we can seek and earn and somehow garner God’s favor and God’s blessing. For the truth of the matter is that the blessings of God do not come to those whom we would expect them to, nor do they come to those who somehow expect it for themselves. The blessings of God, just like those we have read about this morning in the Gospel, don't come to the so-called “winners” of the world.

In the beatitudes, Jesus turns our understanding of blessings upside down, for his blessings do not come to those who are trying to get a blessing, but to those who understand that the kingdom of God is an entirely different enterprise and realm from what we experience now. A lot different!

Someone once said, "I've been poor and I've been rich, and, believe me, rich is better." But being “rich” is not the same as being “blessed”. Listen to what Jesus says, about who is really blessed…

- Blessed are the poor in spirit…

- Blessed are the meek…

- Blessed are the merciful…

- Blessed are those who mourn…

- Blessed are the pure in heart…

- Blessed are the peacemakers…

- Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness…

- Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness sake…

Not much here to support the Prosperity Theology Crowd nor for the send-me-a-$100 dollars-and-be-blessed-televangelists either, is there!

Our ideas of being blessed are really twisted... even for Christians. A modern view of the Beatitudes might sound something like this…

- Blessed are the rich… they can buy what they want.

- Blessed are the strong… they can take what they want.

- Blessed are the winners… they can have what they want.

- Blessed are the talented… the can be what they want.

- Blessed are the self-confident… they can do what they want.

This view is completely contrary to the ideas of what Jesus is saying in the Beatitudes, in the Gospels, and even in his example to us. In these few simple lines, Jesus turns our concept of “blessings” completely upside down; for in these few lines, Jesus gives us the ideals and guiding principles for the Kingdom of God and for those who would be citizens of that Kingdom.

But who in this modern, hedonistic, narcissistic world really wants the “Blessing of God” if it means being poor in spirit, being meek, being humble, and even perhaps being persecuted and rejected? Who wants to follow a religion that has as its core idea that life is more that wealth and prosperity and success… and that rejects the notion of “winners and losers” as the measure of God’s true favor and blessing?

My friends, we must remember that these Beatitudes - these wonderful statements concerning who is blessed or who will be blessed, are not prescriptions, but rather are descriptions of true Christian Character and Kingdom Living – right here and now. Remember the theme we have here at All Saints for this year…. “Make a Little Heaven in 2011”! In order to do that, we have to adopt these concepts and ideas, not as a prescription for being blessed and for getting ourselves into Heaven, but rather, see them as descriptions of how we should live now, and make a little heaven right here and now.

If the Beatitudes are the description, then what is the prescription? What does God really want us to be and do? We see the answer in the first lesson that we read today from the Prophet Micah

Micah says, “….and what does the LORD require of you… but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?”

"Do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with God." That's it. Nice and simple. That is the prescription for a Godly life and a Blessed life in this world, that then in turns, seeks to create – by its humble attitude and simple example – a little piece of Heaven right here and now all around us. That’s a “prescription” that even Walgreens can’t fill, but with God as our help, we can!

But the problem in implementing this, is that we often don’t really want to embrace what God wants, but rather, what we want. We too often prefer the modern Beatitudes that I mentioned earlier… of…

- Blessed are the rich

- Blessed are the strong

- Blessed are the winners…

- Blessed are the talented…

- Blessed are the self-confident…

In short, we want to be happy, and we often exchange God’s eternal blessings for a temporary emotional high of happiness. To prove my point, see how you would finish this sentence: "I will be happy when...."

There must be a million possible endings for that sentence...

- I will be happy when I grow up and move away from home.

- I will be happy when summer comes and I don't have to go to school.

- I will be happy when I fall in love and get married.

- I will be happy when I can buy a new car.

- I will be happy when I get promoted.

- I will be happy when I retire.

- I will be happy when my aches and pains go away.

- I will be happy when I win the lottery.

- I will be happy when… WHATEVER!!!

So… just WHEN WILL you be happy? What will it take? And, what are the chances that it's ever going to happen? How long will it be? One year? Five years? Fifty years? And once you’ve achieved this state of happiness because what you waited for finally came, what will be the next thing you will have to have in order to STAY happy?

We all want to be blessed, but if our understanding of being blessed is this sad and twisted idea that being happy equates to being blessed, because we got something we have been waiting for or even praying for, then we rob ourselves of the true blessings from God that bring more than just a passing emotional happiness… they bring joy – real Joy – joy unspeakable and full of glory; and they bring Peace – real Peace – a Peace that passes all understanding.

This real peace and this real joy, comes when we heed the words of Micah, and we demonstrate the ideas of what Jesus is saying. In short, if we seek God’s blessings… we will miss out.

But if we do justice, and love kindness, and walk humbly with God… and we seek not blessings but rather seek God’s Kingdom and his Righteousness, then we will know and live a blessed and peaceful and joyful life.

Sounds upside-down, but, isn’t Christianity at its very core – completely upside-down? Paul even points this out in what we read today in the Second Lesson….

- God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise;

- God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong.

- God chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things - and the things that are not - to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him.

My friends, as Paul said, “the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved, it is the power of God!” . The Cross makes absolutely no sense at all in a logical world, but it is the power of God. Completely upside-down! And the Beatitudes only accentuate this; because they are a description of those whom God truly favors, truly blesses – a description of what God does and will do for those who turn to him and seek him.

Yes, next Sunday, there will be winners and losers in the Super Bowl, and there will be some who will proclaim that the winners were blessed! But the truly “blessed” are not the winners we see around us… they are those who have unlocked the secret of a joyful and peaceful life by following the prescription of doing justice and loving mercy and walking humbly with God… of seeking first God’s Kingdom and God’s righteousness.

And being “Blessed” in this way may never get our names in the papers or on TV, we may not be any “richer” than we are right now, may we not be any more successful or smarter or prosperous than we are right now… but by following this prescription, we will be blessed and will be a blessing to others as we work for peace, work for justice, comfort the mourning, lift up the poor in spirit, and hold out a hand of tolerance, acceptance and love to those around us. That my friends, is what the beatitudes really are all about. That my friends is what Christianity is really all about!

May God grant us the grace and the will to be this people – this blessed, joyful, peaceful people - who make a difference in the world around us in Jesus’ Name.

In the Name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.