Sayings of Jesus: Beautiful Attitudes (Part I)

I normally view cutesy-pie Christian catchphrases with disdain, but for the title of this week’s blog I’m going to make an exception. I don’t know who first coined it. It may have been Billy Graham; but if nothing else, he popularised it. In any event, I think it’s a cool description of what we call ‘The Beatitudes’ at the start of the Sermon on the Mount (about which I have written a couple of times already).   

First off, a disclaimer: this article is a tad longer than my usual word count.

The Beatitudes are a series of eight sayings of Jesus that begin the discourse we call the Sermon on the Mount that runs from Matthew 5 through 7. These sayings (in chapter 5, verses 3 through 12) are the qualities and characteristics of kingdom people. They’re foundational to the kind of ‘fruit’ that Jesus desires when he says, “By their fruit you will know them” (Matthew 7:16).

Another way of looking at these qualities and characteristics of kingdom people (we’ll look at what those are in a moment) is to reverse them. In other words, wherever we see the very opposite of those attitudes and behaviours, we are witnessing people who are not reflecting and representing the kingdom of God. Scripture encourages us to focus on what people do, rather than what they say, as the ‘litmus test’ of the authenticity of their Christianity. I don’t usually like to make political comments, especially when speaking of other people’s countries, but when we do reverse the Beatitudes, I can’t help thinking they correspond all too closely to attitudes we see coming from the Trump administration. Whatever ‘Christian’ spin-off benefits that Trump-affirming evangelicals think they are getting by supporting him (and I will grant that I can see some), it feels like they are (metaphorically) doing a deal with the devil to get them, so I hope it’s worth it. If Jesus was right that bad trees don’t produce good fruit (Matthew 7:16–20), then maybe the ‘good fruit’ that evangelicals think they’re seeing really isn’t so good after all.

(This is not to affirm the Democrats’ agenda—much of which can, unfortunately, be blamed for Trump’s apparent popularity, as the perceived less-worse alternative.)  

Returning to the Beatitudes, these eight sayings (some say nine, separating verses 11–12 from 10, but we’ll follow the majority view) conclude with three metaphorical images—of salt, light, and a city set on a hill—that picture what God’s people will be in this world, individually and collectively, when those qualities and characteristics are to the fore.

Let’s look at the introduction, verses 1–2.

“Now when Jesus saw the crowds, he went up on a mountainside and sat down. His disciples came to him, and he began to teach them.”

If we ignore chapter breaks, which were only added in medieval times, we can see the nature of ‘the crowds’ at the end of Matthew 4: “Large crowds from Galilee, the Decapolis, Jerusalem, Judea and the region across the Jordan.” Hence, when we read ‘his disciples’ in v.2, this will be referring to a much wider group than the twelve—so better, ‘his followers’. Being seated was the standard posture of Jewish rabbis for formal teaching. ‘Mountainside’ is too strong an English word, since it makes us think of ranges like the Alps or the Himalayas. As is evident from the landscape of the region, the sense is of a hillside, where a sloping elevation would assist Jesus being seen and heard.

Now let’s look at the Beatitude verses themselves.

“Blessed are the poor in spirit,

    for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are those who mourn,

    for they will be comforted.

Blessed are the meek,

    for they will inherit the earth.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness,

    for they will be filled.

Blessed are the merciful,

    for they will be shown mercy.

Blessed are the pure in heart,

    for they will see God.

Blessed are the peacemakers,

    for they will be called children of God.

Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness,

    for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

Each is introduced by the word ‘blessed’, which is a way of saying that ‘God’s favour is on you.’ Does God have ‘favourites’? Some would say no, insofar as it implies that some are more loved by God than others. I think that’s missing the point, though: the verses ‘say what they say’, so either we deny what they say or we conclude that something more nuanced must be intended. Which I think is that God’s favour is upon those who are living out these kingdom values; especially when it’s at personal cost. So it's not so much that God is ‘favouring’ some people over others in a ‘rewarding them’ sense, but that there is a cause-and-effect relationship between these things in the divine economy.    

Blessed are the poor in spirit

The meaning of the NT word for ‘poor’ ranges from materially poor, to lowly, to destitute, to humble (humbled by your circumstances), to without hope (hopelessness). The meaning of ‘spirit’ is even broader. Depending on the context, the Greek word pneuma can reference the Holy Spirit, the life-giving essence of a person (“giving up the ghost” is a euphemism for dying—‘ghost’ is an olde English word for ‘spirit’), the wind or breath of God, or even, an evil spirit! When Jesus says, “The wind blows where it pleases” in John 3:8, the word is pneuma. So, too, when he says, “The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak” in Mark 14:38. The context dictates which meaning and hence its translation. In this context, it’s about the life-essence of a person: the things that characterise a kingdom person in ‘who they are’.

This first characteristic is not only ‘beautiful’ but shocking (as indeed, they all are in their own ways). Shocking in that it reflects the very opposite of what one might expect as characteristic of human nature. So much is said these days (often rightly so) about the importance of a positive self-image and healthy self-esteem, each individual’s intrinsic worth as a person, being all that we can be, and so on. In this context, though, Jesus seems to have in mind ‘the humble-minded’ (as J. B. Phillips renders it). Perhaps this Beatitude is best understood when contrasted with its antitheses: ‘the arrogant in spirit’, ‘the self-sufficient in spirit’, or the ‘rich in spirit’—the contented, with no sense of spiritual need or spiritual hunger (on which see below).          

Blessed are those who mourn

Here’s another somewhat shocking one. This time, Jesus doesn’t say ‘in spirit’. The sense seems to be of literal mourning—in sadness, grief, and loss—though that does not preclude spiritual causes of that mourning. Another word would be ‘lament’. I say ‘shocking’ insofar as many older Brits (OK—I mean me) grew up in a regime of stiff upper lip, taking it in your stride, retaining a dignified composure, and ‘boys don’t cry’. Failing to mourn is failing to shed tears about the things God metaphorically sheds tears about.

Blessed are the meek   

Many today might read ‘meek’ as a synonym for ‘weak’. Some might say ‘loser’. Jesus is clearly refuting that. The NASB renders ‘meek’ as ‘gentle’, which I think captures it well.

The destiny of the gentle, here, is to ‘inherit the earth’. You would think it would be the destiny of the violent and the aggressive to inherit the earth—the powerful, and the ‘winners’. And that’s what’s happened throughout history: they do, but at a cost. “For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul?” Mark 8:36. Jesus said, “My kingdom is not of this world” John 18:36. A different ‘world’ (a different ‘earth’) is in view—‘treasures in heaven’ as the expression has it later (Matthew 6:19–20).  

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness

You may have heard this interpreted as fasting. But I would say that it’s metaphorical: a deep-seated desire akin to feelings of hunger and thirst to see ‘righteousness’ (‘doing what’s right’) governing our values and behaviour as communities and as wider society. Righteousness is not just some ethereal ‘status’ bestowed by Christ onto ‘saved’ individuals; righteousness is relational, and it’s a ‘doing’ word (just as ‘faith’ is a ‘doing’ word). It does begin from being made ‘right with God’ through Christ, but it then extends to all of our relationships being made right and then keeping them right. Righteousness in practice is ‘doing the right thing’ (doing what Jesus would do) in every decision and action in life.             

Blessed are the merciful

We can’t speak of this one without reference to its second part: “for they will be shown mercy.” James, the brother of Jesus, reflects this when he warns (in a little play-on-words) that “Judgment without mercy will be shown to anyone who has not been merciful.” James pre-empts those who may be thinking that judicial judgment is an exception to this mercy-showing by adding, “Mercy triumphs over judgment.” James 2:13. In Luke 6 (which has a shorter, but comparable version of the Sermon on the Mount that’s sometimes called the Sermon on the Plain), Jesus says, “Do to others as you would have them do to you.” Compare too, the Parable of the Unmerciful Servant in Matthew 18:21-35.

Note that showing mercy is not in conflict with judicial consequences when they are rendered fairly and compassionately; it’s not an either-or choice. Yet mercy tempers retributive judgment.    

Blessed are the pure in heart

Given the backdrop of the warning in Jeremiah 17:9 that—common to human nature—“The heart is deceitful above all things …” we might reflect that knowing the extent to which we are ‘pure in heart’ in our attitudes is not so easy. It requires self-reflection with the help of the Holy Spirit, one of whose roles is to guide us into the truth about ourselves (John 16:13). The outcome of purity in heart, however, is ‘seeing God.’ Again, this is metaphorical, insofar as God is invisible. I think it’s seeing who God is and what he’s like in his nature, plans, and purposes—seeing him ‘well’. It’s grasping who God is—more and more, better and better—through ongoing Holy Spirit-inspired ‘eureka moments’.   

Blessed are the peacemakers

For those of a certain age, it’s impossible to hear this phrase without being reminded of its famous mishearing in the Monty Python movie, Life of Brian: “Blessed are the cheesemakers”—leading to the equally famous response, “What’s so special about cheesemakers?”

But heard correctly (!), what is it about? The OT Hebrew word that usually gets translated by the English word ‘peace’ is shalom (corresponding to the NT Greek word eirēnē, from which derives the word for ‘peacemakers’), and it means far more than the absence of conflict, or a personal sense of inner tranquillity. Shalom is when everything in human life is as it should be. Our calling as ‘peacemakers’ does include helping resolve conflicts and bringing someone’s inner world into peace with their outer world, but it means far more: desiring to bring shalom into every area of their life. This takes us beyond simply ‘spiritual peace’ into a far more holistic well-being and wholeness. Compassion ministries are rooted in wanting to see more of God’s desired shalom made mainfest.     

Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness

We’ve already touched on what’s meant by ‘righteousness’. Here, I think we might reasonably include all of the preceding Beatitudes within that definition of ‘doing the right thing’. Each provides an example of doing the right thing—some, reflecting aspects we might otherwise miss.

Why does Jesus promise “theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew’s more-Jewish term for ‘the kingdom of God’)? Because the kingdom is founded on ‘Beatitude-like’ kinds of righteousness. Jesus knows that when we pursue those, it can be personally costly (which is probably why verses 11 and 12 add more about it).      

In “Part II” next week, we will look at those three metaphorical images—of salt, light, and a city set on a hill—that reflect God’s people in this world, individually and collectively, when the Beatitudes are to the fore.