Marc Hunter - Class 1: The Tale of Two Mountains

Automatically transcribed. Accuracy is good but not perfect, and words are sometimes wrong. Trust the audio over the text.

1. 0:02

   Thank you Jason. So with that introduction. Will now call on a brother Mark to lead us in first class, on the tale of two mountains. Sort out the technology here.

2. 0:31

   Morning morning. So The Sermon on the Mount is Jesus. Most famous speech and we’re all intimately familiar with it and that can be one of the dangers to us is that we become over familiar to it and we build up these mental blocks. I swear we compartmentalize things and we begin to ignore the actual message in the sermon. So the challenge that I want to put to you today is to listen to The Sermon on the Mount as if you’re a first-century Jew steeped in the judaic tradition and the law of Moses and there is this radical Rabbi who has come and is presenting this message to you.

3. 1:20

   And and if you let Jesus do that. you’ll find that his words are inspiring and they’re challenging and they will also Crush you, if you let them So, what is he talking about in The Sermon, on the Mount, I proposed to you. That what Jesus is trying to do is to share with the Jewish people, what is righteousness? It’s a fundamental question of every religious system, every ethical system, every political system has to Define for themselves.

4. 1:54

   What is righteousness? And the big conflicts between civilizations in many ways revolves around, And this fresh, we’re suffering a conflict around this right now. Right. In the school system in the political system, they are changing the definition of righteousness and we are feeling that pressure. So what Jesus is doing is he’s challenging their definition of registering up here, a first-century Jew and you want to think of the most concise way to define righteousness, what would it be? Carlton think I asked you how well you follow? Okay.

5. 2:35

   And if you had to say to someone here is the most concise summary that I can give you some of the fundamentals would go the Ten Commandments. Thank you. I was hoping somebody get that answer. So the Ten Commandments 04 3500 years. This code of righteousness has been Endlessly effective. And if we think of even our legal system today, a lot of it is actually still based on this code from so long ago.

6. 3:05

   But if we consider for a second how these Commandments arrived and we’ll look at Exodus chapter 19 and this is from verse 12, you shall set limits for the people all around saying. Take care not to go up into the mountains or touch the edge of it. Whoever touches, the mountain, shall be put to death on the morning of the third day.

7. 3:31

   There were Thunders and Lightnings and a thick Cloud on the mountain and a very loud trumpet blast. So that all the people in the camp trembled, then Moses brought the people out of the camp to meet God and they took their stand at the foot of the mountain. This is the context of the arrival of the Ten Commandments.

8. 3:54

   What do we see in Matthew chapter 5 verse 1? And when he saw the multitudes he went up on the mountain. And he sat down. And all his disciples came to him. Oh, here we go. Different version. so, In the very setting in which Jesus is going to present his approach to defining righteousness.

9. 4:26

   We have a stark contrast to the Mosaic summary, and he’s going to give us a list, right? Moses came down from the mountain with the list and now we’re going to consider a list So, how does Jesus start blessed? What’s the first word out of Jesus mouth? When he’s providing an image of what righteousness?

10. 4:53

    Looks like is blast. and I just want to pause at the very first word and don’t worry, we’ll move a little quicker through the chapter than one word at a time but Do we approach our faith in the same way when we are going to summarize and describe to someone the essence of what our faith does for us the essence of what our life consists of view, we lead with the concept of blessing. And I proposed you that very often, we don’t very often. We sort of carry that heavy load and that we have an example, we can take from Jesus here in terms of how we present our message.

11. 5:40

    Now, there are people who leave our community because they grow up Among Us and they experience our community for years and they never internalized in their heart. The idea that we are Are blessed to be here. They leave. Because they feel some kind of Burden, they feel some kind of weight. It feels something like our face should be about Liberation.

12. 6:09

    Our faith is about Freedom. Our faith is about Hope about being God’s chosen people and yet, so many people can listen to our presentations for years. They can come to our cos he’s in our Bible class and they walk away in. This is, this is, this is to For me. Whenever that happens, we need to really look back at ourselves and say, where did we go wrong? Where were we out of balance?

13. 6:39

    And how we presented our message, we are more than conquerors through him, who loved us. We can do all things in Christ, who strengthens us? This is a privilege to be here. It’s a blessing, it’s an opportunity. That doesn’t mean it’s easy, right? And we’ll get to that in the in the Beatitudes. And then Jesus says, blessed are the poor now again, Jesus, they’re going to continually surprised us through this through this topic because if I said to you, I’m so blessed. Because I’m poor, you would say you’re crazy, right? We would not associate those two concepts together. When we were introducing, the idea of blessedness to someone poverty would not be where we would start. In fact, in most cases, we would assume the exact opposite right in society.

14. 7:37

    At large, the very definition of blessing has become something akin to Will and so The Challenge and Paul addresses is later on. I have learned in whatever state I am to be content. In the first phrase, Jesus is challenging us to disconnect the idea and the concept of blessing from some kind of situation. You may experience in your life right now whether it’s a health situation, whether it’s an economic situation, whether it’s a social situation, what we’re going to see throughout these Beatitudes is that you can be Blessed independent of the circumstances that you’re in.

15. 8:19

    It’s a radical concept that everything in the world around us, and in our heart Rebels against that notion, we are kind of insist that the way we feel, is a consequence of the circumstances that were in. And Jesus is telling you right from the start, that’s not the case. You have a choice. And then he says, in spirit blessed are the poor in spirit. Now, you may say, it’s unfair of me to focus on poverty because these clearly spiritualizing here but in the Luke account, he just says, blessed are the poor and he leaves it at that. And what we see here is a common thing that Jesus does which is he takes the physical and he spiritualizes it right. There is a poverty that we can experience but there’s also a poverty of spirit and will see this all throughout Jesus teaching.

16. 9:11

    In Luke 4:18, the spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to Proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to Proclaim Liberty to the captives. You go, okay? Liberty to the captives. When did Jesus ever go into the prison and set people free? He clearly. Never did that.

17. 9:33

    Recovery of sight to the blind to set at Liberty, those who are oppressed to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor. We see in Galatians 3. 23 before Faith came. We were held captive under the law imprisoned until the coming. Faith would be revealed. Jesus said for judgment, I came into this world that those who do not see, may see and that those who see may become blind. So we’re going to see the constant Spirit spiritualization, we’re going to see it. In the case of morning, we’re going to see it in hungering and thirsting.

18. 10:13

    Eating and other cases through the Beatitudes so let me come back to the notion of the Beatitudes we said were blessed. We’re starting on the premise of being blessed all throughout how is a list of blessings, a definition of righteousness. I guess that’s kind of odd. Okay, the attributes that Jesus talks about here, they’re not even Commandments.

19. 10:43

    Just blessed are the poor in spirit. He doesn’t say you should be poor in spirit. You must be poor in spirit. He just makes an observation. You’re poor in spirit, you will be blessed. So just keep in mind, what a difference in approach we have from from Jesus. Here we have a different teacher, different mountain and a different list.

20. 11:05

    So now let’s dive into them in more detail. Blessed are the poor in spirit, what does it mean to be poor in spirit? And in the nasb ministers, Bible says those who are not spiritually. Arrogant. Okay, now, why would Jesus Lead With blessed are the poor in spirit? Why of all the things you could lead with?

21. 11:27

    Why is that his first beatitude, you think? What about who he’s talking to? Okay. And why would poor in spirit be an appropriate? Yes absolutely okay. So there’s actually two layers here. Right? What we’re going to see through each of those Beatitudes is that every one of them is going to poke at the scribes and the Pharisees and their whole approach to religion and their whole approach to Righteousness. So when you say well, you know what’s really great is that people who are poor in spirit the scribes and the Pharisees are going to feel left out of that category, right? Because that’s not generally how they approach religion. Now, in terms of for us, how does being poor in spirit be serve as a good foundation for us? Why like, for sure, but what is it about being crushed in spirit?

22. 12:42

    That’s right. You are open to answers to questions. You haven’t figured it all out yet, right? What, when you’re poor, you don’t have enough when you’re broken. You need to be made whole, you’re looking for something. And one of the biggest problems we have as humans is that We know the answer to things and the moment, you know, the answer the moment you’ve solved the question, the moment you figured it out, you have stopped. That’s it.

23. 13:11

    There’s no more spiritual growth. What would you grow into? You’ve already figured it out. So Jesus is saying, blessed are the poor in spirit because you know what, only the poor in spirit are probably going to get past the first beatitude Everyone else has figured it all out there somewhere else doing their thing.

24. 13:29

    But the people who are hungry and are going, I need something. I’m still missing something. They’re going to listen to the rest of this sermon. When slide behind blessed. Are those who mourn for they shall be comforted. So this again is there’s a Is Jesus just saying, you know, anybody who’s lost a relative recently is blessed.

25. 13:57

    We are talking about this, they brought it up the readings last night, right? That just morning is not in and of itself. Some kind of holy attribute, right? Everybody Mourns. So in what way is Jesus saying that those who mourn are blessed? And I proposed to you and I think I’ve got a slide for this. Yeah, Nehemiah chapter 1, he says this is me my As per. They said to me the remnant, there in the province, you survive, the Captivity are in great distress. And reproach in the wall of Jerusalem is broken down and it’s gates are burned with fire.

26. 14:32

    And when I heard these words, I sat down and wept and mourned for days, and I was fasting and praying before the god of Heaven, you might had a good job and he was set, he was not poor, he didn’t have any immediate problems. but when he became aware of the suffering and the poor condition of other people, he mourned Right, his morning was a consequence of loving other people and this is one of the big paradoxes in life is that the more you love other people, the more you will suffer and suffering is unpleasant and painful by definition.

27. 15:21

    So a lot of people manage that suffering by caring less, right? You can just say, you know what you do your thing, I don’t care and you will feel the weight go off of your shoulders. But when you come to the Ecclesia in, you’re just eating up inside. When you hear your neighbor and how hopeless is life is when you encounter the people at work and and the consequences of sin that are destroying their lives and it just weighs on you. Right?

28. 15:52

    Why would it when you? Because you love them and if you’re happy to see them, go off the rails and, and and into trouble This blessing isn’t for you, we mourn in proportion to how much we love. And therefore we are blessed. If we mourn How is this poking at the scribes and the Pharisees? That’s not something They Mourn about, right, right? They’re not particularly concerned about in a morning. Sense, they may be concerned with what other people do, but but it’s not very much from from a sense of. Oh, I’m so, you know, carrying and I’m concerned about this person’s fate.

29. 16:40

    And we see this also Matthew 23 Jesus said this Jerusalem Jerusalem who kills the prophets and Stones, those who are sent to her, how often I wanted to gather your children together, the way a hen gathers, her chicks under her wings and you were unwilling. The thing that I find fascinating about this is that Jesus is morning for Jerusalem and in the process, he describes what kind of people are in Jerusalem, the The people who kill the prophets and stone, those who are sent to them. Now that’s love right?

30. 17:16

    If you can mourn for people who are that Wicked, that’s love and that’s something we should aspire to. Blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the earth. Now I meant I’ve titled this the unexpected Sermon on the Mount. Blessed are the meek. Okay, your first century Jew for they shall inherit the earth, like you’re under Roman occupation. Like, how is meekness ever going to put you in a position of power?

31. 17:50

    And this is the same problem we have today, right? Like meekness does not put people in positions of power. They do not inherit the the Earth, the people trying to inherit the Earth right now are exactly the opposite of meekness. And and again how does this poke at the scribes and the Pharisees?

32. 18:09

    Meekness was in. They were trying to inherit, right? Like in the crucifixion of Jesus. What we’ve got to kill this man because he is going to threaten our position, right? Our inheritance as meager isn’t was under the Roman occupation that little bit, they were willing to kill innocent people in order to preserve that the opposite of meekness Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness for they shall be satisfied. And the verse I love in relation to this here is second, Timothy 4:8 henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness which the Lord the righteous judge will award to me on that day.

33. 18:54

    And not only to me but also to all who have loved his appearing and I sense in here a hunger and a thirst. Just right. So when you feel that the trials and you see the catastrophes on Earth, what is your reaction to that? You get angry at God, you go, have your, how could this happen?

34. 19:15

    Or does it fill you with the longing for things to be better? So that when Jesus arrives you’re like, finally, like this is the moment that I’ve been waiting and living for at this moment, everything is going to be okay.

35. 19:34

    Now, if we’re scribes and Pharisees now, they weren’t necessarily think of Jesus in the terms of judgment. But if we’ve absorbed their view of religion, How might we feel about Jesus appearing? Hey, this could be some anxiety in there, right? So, this is where we have to consider that we’re used to talking about the scribes and the Pharisees over there, and we’re here on that other side.

36. 20:04

    And looking at them. There’s a little bit of scribe and Pharisee, and every single one of us, right? And so when we think of Jesus arriving at this very moment, do you love his appearing or it is that stress? You out a little bit, right? Are you really hungry and thirsting for righteousness? Because that’s what Jesus is going to bring. He’s To bring righteousness.

37. 20:25

    Is that a world? You want to live in? And how do you feel in terms of your relationship with Jesus? Okay. Would you feel blessed if you walk through right now and if you don’t, we have work to do.

38. 20:43

    Blessed, are the merciful for they shall receive Mercy. Now here’s some the real jab at the scribes and Pharisees, right? And Fundamental problem with Mercy is it it seems in direct opposition to law. Like if, if you have a rule and people break it and then there are no consequences to them breaking it, what’s the point of having a rule at all right? The whole Foundation of of rules and Commandments in order and structure depends on not having Mercy. You can’t just be willy-nilly.

39. 21:26

    Merciful it undermines the whole Foundation. And so, we have to ask ourselves. How do we see our discipleship? Are we in? Are we the custodians of the rules? Are the ones who make sure that’s for you shall go and no further. Blessed, are the merciful I’ve noticed something interesting about my personal levels of mercy. So I charted them out here on a computer guy. So I started them out on a chart. And on this scale we have the amount of Mercy that I’m inclined to exhibit and on this axis I have the amount of time. And it’s the amount of time since I have made a very public mistake.

40. 22:16

    I’ve failed in a way that is unavoidable and that everybody knows that. I yeah, I should have done that lost my temper. You know there’s any number of ways to fail publicly and what I find is in that first hour after I have failed publicly, I am so full of Mercy. Like, if I, like, if I spill at the dish in the kitchen and then my kid comes along and knocks over a bowl of cereal.

41. 22:46

    I’m like, It’s okay. It’s like that. Those things happen, right? Let me help you clean it up right at first. Our it’s great, you know, my 6 hours 12 hours, by the next morning and number eight, you know, like yeah, I can remember that yesterday. I spilled my milk, but if you’re a little more careful, when you came around the corner then you know, maybe we won’t have these accidents by a week later. Two weeks, one month, it’s more like, what are you doing? You know?

42. 23:13

    Yes, it was an accident, but if you’re more careful, These things won’t happen. So there’s now there’s power in here and this is why I want to I mentioned crushing and it was mentioned earlier. There’s a side effect to acknowledging being crushed the longer. You can stay crushed and more. Merciful, you will be.

43. 23:40

    And when that crushed feeling when you leave it behind, when you kind of forget about it when you fade it that’s where your sense of order and structure and well we just can’t let anything happen here. Like, you know, there are certain standards that must be upheld. And again, will come. I know there’s Nuance here, we’ll come back to that. c.s. Lewis says a quote, he says, everyone says, forgiveness is a lovely idea until they have something to forgive Now, the other point I want to make here is blessed. Are the merciful pole?

44. 24:19

    Not just blessed is the person who, once upon a time in one event, despite some mercy, it’s blessed are people who have an abundance of Mercy. Now, how do you put yourself in a situation where you have continual opportunity to show? Mercy, what does your environment have to consist of?

45. 24:45

    People people what people would be the most helpful and growing your sense of mercifulness. Sinners people who are making mistakes. Now making mistakes in general, that’s helpful. But if you really want to sort of take your mercy up a notch, what should these people be doing things again? They should be really offending you. In a completely unjustifiable and unfair way. Right.

46. 25:18

    We’re on no basis whatsoever. They’re holding a grudge, they’re holding a resentment, they’re expecting you to they’re saying things to behind your back that like this is where you need to be if you want to be in this category, right? It’s a necessary precondition. You simply cannot be a merciful person around perfect people so we should be thankful that we are in the families and equations that we are.

47. 25:43

    Right? Because they fill our days with these opportunities. For Mercy, fascinating thing. I was watching a an online, a preacher online and he was getting big into, you know, what Jesus did for us. And then he got into the atonement, and he was like, you know what, Jesus did for us is there’s all this, you know, God is righteous. And you’re evil.

48. 26:12

    So the only way we can solve evil, Is by killing an innocent man. And I’m like, I did you not read the rest of scripture like they, they they don’t believe in Mercy. They don’t see any Escape force in other than somebody must pay and, and I don’t know, I don’t know. I can’t understand how they see God as just when he’s, you know, killing an innocent man in that.

49. 26:45

    Substitutionary way it’s a little bit of an aside but it just shocked me. Let’s move on to the next. One blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God as an attention getter again because nobody can see God, right? So it listeners are going to be going, well, okay, how does that work?

50. 27:06

    But we know Psalm 24, who may Ascend the hill of the Lord, who may stand in his holy place, he who has Clean Hands and a pure heart who has not lifted up his soul to falsehood and is not sworn deceitfully. He shall receive. Blessing from the Lord. And this is another exercise that I like, do for homework. But all these Beatitudes have all kinds of cross references, to the Old Testament, to blessing blessing, blessing all through the Old Testament.

51. 27:34

    Now, I struggle with this one because when your heart is your heart, and there it is and it’s full of all those things that you put in it over the years and all those things, you can cock at yourself. How does one go about? Being pure in heart. What can I do tomorrow?

52. 27:58

    And the day after, like I can’t just be pure in heart, like it’s there, right? I like there’s no physical thing I can do to get this thing away from me.

53. 28:19

    oh, yes. Okay, so your heart has what it has and it’s not good, right? So, if you have a big jug of polluted water, okay? It sits there. And and and that’s, that’s what you’re working with. But the least you can do is put in some pure distilled water into it, right? And every little, little bit of that that you can do, what it does is it dilutes the other stuff and while Never ever reach.

54. 28:52

    Absolute distilled water Purity. It is a continual process of making sure that the things that are going into your heart are contributing to purification and not to corruption. Now, scribes and Pharisees listening to. This blessed are the pure in heart in their world view. How is this? How are they going to react to this? What’s up, what’s up?

55. 29:22

    The Pharisees General view of the purity of your heart. You can make it here by Paul in the wall so you can make it pure by following the law hasn’t. That’s an interesting, that’s an interesting question. her either are there already pure I proposed to you, sorry this issue here he comes.

56. 29:53

    Yeah so that you know you shouldn’t eat and you shouldn’t but you know what I mean. Yeah. So there’s all these rules but that’s kind of a ritual Purity that fundamental question of whether your actions are motivated by the sincerest of motives. Right. How much does a Pharisee care about that? Are the answers?

57. 30:16

    They generally don’t write like if you did the thing. Then, whether your heart was pure when you did, it is somewhat irrelevant, right? Who knows, how would you measure that, right? Well, like I would, I wouldn’t know, right? Like if you’re measuring Purity by number of hours of attendance way I can do that, right?

58. 30:35

    I can make a chart and I can say you’re at this level of this person’s at this level but what if somebody was more pure and hard, like I don’t know. Like I you can’t tell and therefore it becomes outside of the scope of what they were you. About generally speaking and to that point, they defined Purity they changed the meaning of the word to be well.

59. 30:59

    How many hours were you there or you know, how religious do you appear? And so something we have to worry about blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called the sons of God. This is another one of those ones that peace with who. Right? We don’t want to make peace with the world but peace.

60. 31:21

    Amongst ourselves, we want to be peacemakers. Jesus said you’re not think that I came to bring peace on the earth. I did not come to bring peace but a sword. We have a movement sweeping our society that says the definition of righteousness is that I should never say anything but you might find upsetting, right?

61. 31:41

    And therefore they would say we are peacemakers You know, don’t say things against what we believe that’s not what Jesus is talking about here, right? If possible. So far, as it depends on, you be at peace with all people. It’s not always going to depend on us. If by simply advocating biblical principles, we will encounter conflict. Now, what is the situation in a community? When you increase legalism and the spirit of the scribes and the Pharisees, what effect does that have on peace? Almost always a negative effect, right? When when people come in with a legalistic point of view and I’m going to talk about people and and you might be thinking about this person that person when I say people. I mean you, right?

62. 32:35

    And I mean me and I mean every one of us has this battle inside us between this rules-based observable rigid system and what we know we should be but we are not yet and so When we have issues of conflict in our relationships, families and Ecclesia has we have to ask ourselves? Is there some degree of legalism involved here?

63. 33:04

    And is this what Jesus is getting at here? Blessed, are the persecuted in, there’s a whole number of verses here and we know from Hebrews chapter 11, where it talks about all the people who suffered so much. Again, the Pharisees not super excited about being persecuted, right? They much prefer to be on the other side of that equation, right?

64. 33:29

    And, and ferreting out the people who have stepped over a line and making sure that they’re in line. The other thing here is that There’s a question of status of who is at the top and who’s at the bottom and the persecuted people by definition, or at the bottom of the hierarchy socially in every respect. And and part of what Jesus is saying, here is that, if you’re at the bottom of a hierarchy and we talk about being merciful and people are mistreating you in some way. This is actually a privileged position. This is one of those moments where you You can actually be christ-like right?

65. 34:12

    Price was persecuted. He was murdered. He was tortured. You want to be christ-like. Except the situations where people will persecute you without bitterness and without Revenge.

66. 34:29

    So context, we were looking, we started with the Ten Commandments. Now if you had to summarize from The Ten Commandments, the recurring theme within the Ten Commandments What would you say? Thou shalt not, Thou shalt not. And interestingly enough, eight times in the Ten Commandments we have the phrase, Thou shalt not, and eight times.

67. 34:59

    Jesus comes forward here in The Sermon on the Mount with a beatitude. And what we have to think about here is what is our fundamental philosophy of religion? What is our fundamental view of righteousness? And how we Define it is it defined by a long list of bow shalt Nots or is it defined by a principle of blessing?

68. 35:28

    We see our faith is one of the Privileges or one of prohibitions. Do we see it as a blessing or as a burden? The Beatitudes are not something that Jesus commands. It’s just something he observes. It’s an aspirational message. He just letting you know, this is information. You want to be a part of this community. You want to be a part of the Blessed Community. These are the character attributes, all of them are unmeasurable very frustrating.

69. 35:56

    How am I doing? Morning today. How am I doing in hungering and thirsting them that there’s no, there’s nothing tangible for me to hold onto and, and we’re going to get into a lot of tangible things in the next sections. But I want you to try to remember, through this whole series. This is where Jesus starts, this is as Foundation blessing and Broad spiritual principles. Then we get salt and light.

70. 36:25

    And now, we shift from purely, sort of spiritual into actual activities. And there’s a lot of debate when you read the literature on what Jesus means by Salt and Light. But I think that Jesus says, you are the salt of the earth and if the salt doesn’t bring that salty quality, then it becomes.

71. 36:51

    Absolutely you Alice, you are the light of the world and where in scripture have I have I heard this notion of being a blessing in the whole world. And for me, I go back to Genesis 12:3. I will make you a great nation and I will bless you. I will make your name great.

72. 37:11

    And you shall be a blessing. You shall be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse him who curses you and in you all the families of Of the Earth shall be blessed. And what I Think Jesus is telling us with the salt and the light is that okay?

73. 37:31

    We’ve spent some time in meditation and contemplation and we consider these principles and if you don’t live in a way that these are noticeable, then it’s absolutely pointless. You might, as well Chuck this all about. What’s the point of having salt in a recipe if it does not affect the taste? What’s the point of you being a disciple of Christ and going out into the world?

74. 37:57

    If nobody can tell that you’re there. Right. If you can work next to someone 8 hours a day, you know, five days a week month after month. And they have no idea that you have a light. Then the whole thing was pointless, right? It doesn’t matter how many hours of Bible study, and how many Bible classes and how many Bible School, none of that matters.

75. 38:22

    If you go out and spend a bunch of time with with people and they can’t tell and they call it just Canadians guy. Canadians are so polite, right? You just, you’re just another Canadian. This is the first major risk that we encounter here, right? Principles are great. They Manifest in your daily relationships.

76. 38:46

    Do the people in your life. Feel it that you are a disciple of Christ in your family, right? This is the the big challenge because our faith make any difference.

77. 39:04

    So Jesus sets this stage and I believe he’s deliberately contrasting, his message with the law of Moses with the Ten Commandments specifically. And maybe I’ll get you to act. I know, I’ve been letting you off easy, not making you turn off a lot of past, turn up a lot of passages, but if you look up, Hebrews chapter 12. We’ll look at some verses in Hebrews, chapter 12. And we’ll think about two mountains here and we’ll start at Verse 18.

78. 39:51

    Are you have not come to what may be touched again touch there’s we’re talking about what’s measurable, right? Being pure in heart, that’s not a measurable thing. So you have known come to what may be touched a blazing fire and darkness and Gloom and a tempest and the sound of a trumpet and the voice, whose words made the hearers beg that, no further message should be spoken to them.

79. 40:19

    Is this how we show forth our religion and our faith to people around us for they could not endure. The order that was given if even a beast touches the mountain. It shall be stoned. Indeed. So terrifying was the sight. That Moses said, I tremble with fear. Is that how we approach? Our belief as a big scary mountain is clouds as Lightning earthquakes and fear than Hebrews 12:22?

80. 40:51

    But we have come to Mount, Zion the city of the Living. God, the heavenly Jerusalem to innumerable, angels and festal Gathering into the Assembly of the firstborn, who are enrolled in heaven and to God, the judge of all and to the spirits A righteous men made perfect and to Jesus the mediator of a New Covenant, and to the sprinkled blood, that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel. So in Matthew Chapter 5, Jesus is calling us to his mountain and we have to choose in our daily life. And in the way we live our religion, whether we are standing at the Mosaic mountain, or are we standing at the mountain?

81. 41:35

    That Jesus is calling us to Two. she slides behind and then if we go back to Matthew, chapter 5, Jesus surprises us again. All this time, the people who are in, this is a fancy word for this antinomy ins and, you know, mediums are against legalism. So they’re the other side of legalism.

82. 42:07

    They’ve been cheering this whole time, right? Jesus is sort of opposing the the law, he’s opposing this legalistic view of religion and then he says in verse 17, Hold on, do not think that I came to abolish the law or the prophets. Okay, in this, this is part of the reason. I Think Jesus is structured on the some self, he’s challenging the law and the prophets, but he’s not, right?

83. 42:38

    And we’re going to have to wrestle with this to the rest of this series. Do not think I came to abolish the law and the prophets, I did not come to abolish but to fulfill. So sometimes when we say, oh, we’re not going to be legalists. That the comfortable space, we move into. As we see them, the rules, don’t matter, Right. I’m approaching god with a fear because there are no rules and I can do whatever I want and that’s why I have such peace in my heart.

84. 43:08

    When I approached Jesus and Jesus is going on, no, you know, that is not the message that would be a misunderstanding of the message that I’m putting to you today. And then so at this point and my mind’s eye, I see the Pharisees on the sidelines going. Yeah, you know, this. you tell them, you know, they thought they were going to, you know, go with it that fuzzy, easy approach to religion and then Jesus gets to verse 20, where he says, unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the scribes and the Pharisees you will, by no means enter the kingdom of heaven, And I want you to put yourself again in the shoes of a first-century Jewish Baker. And what he imagines in the pharisaic whole life, they and their world affairs cycle.

85. 44:14

    Like, this is the good life, right? This is the Pinnacle of righteousness. These are the people who know all the books, they’ve memorized huge tract. They spend day after day, studying and debating. They have every physical and obvious manifestation of righteousness, right? They correct me. I go to them for teaching. These are the university professors of our religious system. And this man is telling me that unless I, as a humble Baker exceed, the righteousness of those people, I cannot be in the Kingdom of Heaven.

86. 44:57

    It’s absolutely mind-boggling. How can that be true? How does this not immediately put the Kingdom of Heaven Out Of Reach for every ordinary person. The scribes and Pharisees work, all their lives to attain that level and that level isn’t good enough. And where does that leave you? And that’s the topic that we’ll look at next class, but I want to leave you with a reminder of where Jesus started.

87. 45:31

    We’re going to get into the law and examine some of the elements of the law. Remember that, Jesus started with the principle that you are to be a blessing.

88. 45:46

    Thank you. Thank you brother, Mark. And we are just going to