Transforming Love

July 21, 2019 Background Scripture: Matthew 5:38 – 48 Lesson Passage: Matthew 5:38 – 48 This is Part 4 in this series of lessons that examine portions of the Sermon on the Mount. Love has the capacity to change people. That’s the focus of today’s lesson. Love can change the person who shows love as well as the person who receives love. That’s the power of the message in today’s lesson. Jesus taught submission as a response to aggressive evil. Rather than an eye for an eye, Jesus taught his followers to accept non-retaliation as a new way of responding. Rather than escalating violence, Jesus taught how to deescalate tension by refusing to retaliate. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. embraced this approach when he became the iconic leader of the Civil Rights movement. He was not the first to apply Jesus’ principles of non-violent confrontation with evil in recent times. Dr. King had studied the non-violent protest philosophy of Mahatma Ghandi in India and observed its results. Jesus demonstrated his teaching through his own examples. After Jesus’ ascension, his disciples demonstrated his teachings through their examples. There have been others over the centuries to use these principles but these principles have not become common practice among people around the world—not even Christians. Yet, the principles work just as Jesus knew they would. The principles of non-violence work by transforming the hearts of people. Transformation takes time and it cannot be observed externally. What is observed is the change of behavior over time due to the inward change of heart. At the time of the Civil Rights movement, none of the minorities who were being affected had the authority to make decisions to remove the unjust laws and ordinances from the books of municipalities and states throughout this country. That required the transformation of hearts of the decision makers. This is where the teachings of Jesus came in. Dr. King had to cast a vision that led tens of thousands of people to live out the principles Jesus taught in the Sermon on the Mount. The people submitted, God responded, and hearts were transformed. Jesus summarized his teaching on this subject by comparing the character of his followers to the character of God. A person’s response should be governed by their character rather than the character of the ones they are responding to. God is holy and benevolent to good and evil people. That’s because God’s actions emanate from His character rather than as a response to the character of others. This is how the followers of Jesus are called to respond to others. Love people because of who we are and not because of who, or how, they are. It is natural for us to respond to people based on how they act towards us. Even evil people will do the same. It is a completely different matter to respond to people solely out of the goodness of one’s heart. To do that is to act in a manner that reflects the love of God in us. As we unleash the love of God into our surroundings, we will see the transforming power of that love in others as well as in ourselves. Robert C. Hudson June 19, 2019

Fulfilling the Law

July 7, 2019 Background Scripture: Matthew 5:13 – 20 Lesson Passage: Matthew 5:13 – 20 Today’s lesson is a continuation of our review of the Sermon on the Mount. In today’s excerpt, Jesus addressed the role of believers in the world and how it affects their standing in the kingdom of heaven. Jesus gave two simple yet powerful analogies for the believer’s role in the world. First, Jesus compared the believer to salt. Salt can do two important things when it comes to food. Salt is used as a seasoning to enhance the flavor of food. This works fine as long as the salt remains salty. If leaching takes place and the crystals that remain are no longer salty to the taste, then the salt is considered worthless as a seasoning. Likewise, as long as salt remains salty, it can be used to help preserve or cure meat so that it has a longer shelf life. Jesus told his listeners that they were the salt of the earth. During the time when few options existed for preserving food, Jesus’ listeners understood how important salt was. Secondly, Jesus compared the believer to light. Light is placed where it can be seen and where it can illuminate everything around it. A weary traveler who happened upon a hilltop city at night would have seen it as a welcomed sight. It can be seen for miles if it is situated on a hill. No matter how far away the city might have been, the sight of the city at night would give the traveler extra energy to at least continue moving until they arrived at the city. It would be a beacon of hope. Likewise, the homeowner would light their oil lamps at night to illuminate the room. It would be pointless to light a lamp and then put it out of sight where its light could not illuminate the space around it. The illuminated city could very well be incidental to a traveler; whereas, the lamp is lit on purpose. In both cases the light serves a definite purpose. Jesus told his listeners that they were the light of the world. To the weary traveler in this world, the believer’s light might be incidental but it could serve as a beacon of hope. Sometimes believers find themselves in dark places or situations. Could it be that God places us in dark places so that we would illuminate the space around us? Again, those who were listening to Jesus understood how important it was to be what God expected them to be. In both examples, Jesus let his listeners know that they were to have an impact on the world around them. They were not going to be saved to become closet Christians or believers. The world would need them whether the world appreciated them or not. We learn in the prophecy written by the apostle John that God is not going to destroy the world until He has removed every believer from it first. The world is being preserved from destruction as long as believers are in the world. The only answer to man’s eternal damnation is the gospel of Jesus Christ. This light, or knowledge of the gospel, can be found in believers. We are the light of the world. We must illuminate the space around us with the gospel of Jesus Christ as a message of hope for the lost. Finally, Jesus made it clear that his mission in the world, contrary to the opinion of Israel’s religious leaders, was the fulfillment of the Law. During his earthly ministry, Jesus was often accused by the Jewish religious leaders of being a Law breaker. But unlike those leaders, Jesus’ righteousness was not an outward display but actions driven by inward purity and holiness. Jesus calls his believers to be even as he was. Robert C. Hudson June 19, 2019