Sermon On The Mount Series
[Sept 2009 – Feb 2010]
Following. Jesus. Blessed. These are familiar words—familiar to the point that many of us already think we know what they mean.
But is it possible that another look at Jesus and his teachings might change the way we think about these words? Would we come away with new questions? Like What does it look like, really, to follow Jesus? What does it mean, really, to be blessed?
If we dare look with fresh eyes and listen with a first-time hearer's ears, what we find is that Jesus' teachings about following him and about being blessed are provocative, counter-intuitive, difficult, and gutsy. Nowhere does Jesus talk more clearly about what it looks like to follow him than in the Sermon on the Mount. This familiar [perhaps too familiar] teaching is his proclamation of what a life looks like when somebody allows God's rule and reign to take over. It's about what happens when God shows up: The poor, the meek, and those who mourn—even these groups are called blessed. And enemies are loved, the poor are cared for, people mean what they say. This is the seemingly impossible, made to happen on earth.
Tools + Resources
Our Sermon on the Mount series runs from September 13, 2009 to February 14, 2010. During this time:
- Join us or listen online as we study these chapters in Matthew verse-by-verse
- Make use of our weekly SotM readers for discipleship and personal study—download this week's reader or view previous weeks.
