Mining Gold from the Sermon on the Mount 2
Matthew 6:9-13
After Jeeus cautions His close followers to avoid two pitfalls in prayer in this passage, He continues with an example of a concise model prayer. The Lord's Prayer…
Mining Gold from the Sermon on the Mount 1
Matthew 6:5-8
Springboarding from the recent study of the Beatitudes, our pre-Easter pursuit of Christ's ministry focus continues in Matthew's gospel. The Sermon on the Mount is one of Jesus'…
Walking with Jesus through Difficulty and Loss 9
Matthew 5:1-12
The final Beatitude is an expansion of Beatitude 8 on the topic of persecution. Jesus warns His disciples, and those in attendance at the Sermon on the Mount,…
Walking with Jesus through Difficulty and Loss 8
Matthew 5:1-10
The third horizontal Beatitude addresses the difficult topic of mistreatment of Christians for simply practicing their faith. Jesus conditions His teaching about persecution with, "because of righteousness", so…
Walking with Jesus through Difficulty and Loss 7
Matthew 5:1-9
In Beatitude seven, Jesus emphasizes the necessity of believers being peacemakers. Christians are not to simply be peaceful or peaceable, but to expand beyond those inner workings of…
Walking with Jesus through Difficulty and Loss 6
Matthew 5:1-8
The second horizontal Beatitude is a challenge from Jesus to His followers to be "pure in heart". David engaged purity several times in the Psalms, comparing it to…
Walking with Jesus through Difficulty and Loss 5
Matthew 5:1-7
As noted while unpacking the first four Beatitudes, they are vertical in nature by defining a right and acceptable relationship with Goe. Beatitude five begins the horizontal instruction…
Walking with Jesus through Difficulty and Loss 4
Matthew 5:1-6: The fourth Beatitude is again vertical in nature, revealing God's acceptance of the indivdual and their acceptance of the Lord by trusting in the goodness of…
Walking with Jesus through Difficulty and Loss 3
Matthew 5:1-4
In the third Beatitude, Jesus addresses the topic of meekness. Our Lord promised, "Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth". Our Amerian society favors assertive,…
Walking with Jesus through Difficulty and Loss 2
Matthew 5:1-4
After establishing the context of the Beatitudes and unpacking what Jesus meant by denoting, "the poor in spirit" last week, we continued with the 2nd Baatitude. Christ identifies…