Before getting stuck into
the meat of what Kingdom living is all about Jesus does something profoundly
loving: he affirms the very people he calls into this new lifestyle. The
demands of that life will be great. Maintaining those choices will not be easy.
And so before going into the detail Jesus tells his hearers that the Kingdom is
for people just like them. If they are broken, if they are small, if they are
downtrodden, if they hurt, if they have less – then they will receive the
Kingdom and all its promises; and how blessed, how happy, their situation is
because of this!
The by-product of this
blessedness, of this Kingdom ownership, is that they will shine before the
world thus drawing others to share in what they have. For they are the salt and
the light of the world. And the amazing thing about being salt or light is that
you don’t have to do anything to have an effect. If you’re a light bulb with
power running into you, there’s nothing you have to do to shine in darkness.
You just shine. It’s a state of being, not doing.
It is only after this
profoundly affirming truth that Jesus goes on to his ethical teaching. The
doing comes after the being. And the ‘being’ is about ‘being-in-the-Kingdom’; a
state that is theirs – and ours – by an invitation based on love and grace.
Is that a fair sketch of
the whole Sermon?
