This series of lenten reflections concludes with Part V
We have come to the last, but not final, part of Lenten reflections on the Sermon on the Mount. It is last but not final because God’s Spirit speaks anew with every reading, deepening our understanding and challenging our assumptions. Godly love means more than we can imagine. Godly justice lies yet beyond the fitful progress we have made. The Spirit is always spurring us on in a more godly direction just outside our comfort zones.
Jesus reminded the crowd of the well-known Golden Rule to “…in everything do to others as you would have them do to you, for this is the law and the prophets.” There is another version that we are not to do to others as we do not want them to do to us. The two cannot be divided; they are one. As Jesus said it there is a positive injunction to act for the good of the other. The negative version cautions us not to presume what is good for the other but to learn from them what good is most needed. Consider the adage that we need to walk a mile in the other’s shoes before making decisions about what to say or how to act. It requires knowing something of their story, learned from them and reliable, verifiable sources.
There are some who claim the name of Christian but cannot produce much evidence of it. Not everyone who says “Lord, Lord” is to be trusted. “Beware of false prophets,” Jesus warned us. You can know them by their fruits. Know how to discern good from bad fruit. Or think of it another way, there are so-called prophets, preachers, and other public figures who disguise themselves as interested in the good of others, but inside they are ravenous wolves intent on serving their own selfish desires. Sadly, we can be easily fooled, but God is not. False prophets and their like will find the gates of eternal life closed to them no matter how loudly they claim the name of Jesus.
Jesus’ words are the words of God, not delivered through a messenger but from God’s Word made flesh in Jesus, God incarnate. All other words from whatever authority are subordinate to these. They do not promise a life of ease free from trouble. They do promise the way to live through the changes and chances of this world in the sure and certain hope of life eternal. They are the way for us to help make God’s kingdom become more real and present, at least in part. They are the way to less violence, more peace, greater harmony, and better opportunity for every person in every condition of life to live more fully into all they are capable of being.
The storms will come, some of them violent and destructive. They can be more than we can bear by ourselves. But believing and trusting in God’s power of love and living into the Way of the Cross outlined in these words will be like a house anchored solidly on rock. The storms will come, but they will not destroy the house. To hear these words and not live into them is like building a house on sand. It will be destroyed by the storms of life.
When Jesus had finished teaching, the crowds were astounded at what he had said with such authority. They are the words that guided the earliest Christians who were known simply as The Way. In our own day, we call it The Way of Love and The Way of the Cross. These Lenten reflections have attempted to describe something of what The Way is, to answer questions about what living in The Way involves. It is, to paraphrase scripture, to let your light so shine that others may see your way of life and give glory to the God and Father of all.