Posted by
ValiantForTruth on Sunday, May 18, 2008 11:01:02 PM
Studies in the Sermon on the Mount with help from Martyn Lloyd-Jones
For whom is the Sermon on the Mount intended? To whom does it apply? What is really the purpose of this Sermon; what is its relevance?
We must ask these questions because there are conflicting opinions.
Is the Sermon for the Christian? To answer we ask is there any teaching to be found in the Sermon on the Mount that is not also found in the various NT Epistles. If we make a list of the teachings in the Sermon on the Mount and then read the Epistles, we will find that Christ’s doctrine is expounded by the Apostles. Now all the Epistles are meant for Christians today; so if the teaching is the same as that of the Sermon on the Mount, clearly its teaching also is meant for Christians today.
The purpose here is not to expose the error that teaches otherwise. Dr. Lloyd-Jones does a good job of that in his introduction to the Sermon.
According to Lloyd-Jones the Sermon on the Mount is a perfect elaboration of what Jesus called His new commandment. So the Christian is a student of Christ’s words in this Sermon so that we might learn what it is to love one another as Christ loved us.
We agree that the kingdom of God in one sense has not yet been established on the earth. It is a kingdom that is to come, but it is also a kingdom that has come. ‘The kingdom of God is among you’, and ‘within you’; the kingdom of God is in every one born of the Spirit. It means ‘the reign of Christ’. He reigns in the Church when she orders her faith and practice according to His word. The kingdom has come in Christ; the kingdom is coming as the gospel is applied to believers in every nation and every generation; the kingdom will come in its fullness at the end of the age.
Whenever Christ is enthroned as King, the kingdom of God is come. While we cannot say that He is ruling over all in the world at the present time, He is certainly ruling in that way in the hearts and lives of all His people. The Sermon on the Mount is meant for all Christian people because it is a perfect picture of the life of the kingdom of God.
The Gospel of Matthew begins with this Sermon. Matthew was writing especially for the Jews and his emphasize was upon the kingdom of heaven. The Jews had a false, materialistic conception of the kingdom. They thought the Messiah was one who was coming to give them political freedom. They were looking forward to someone who would deliver them from the bondage and yoke of the Roman Empire. They always thought of the kingdom in an external sense, a mechanical, military, materialistic sense.
So Matthew puts the truth concerning the kingdom in the very forefront of his Gospel, for the great purpose of this Sermon is to give an exposition of the kingdom as something which is essentially spiritual.
The kingdom is primarily something ‘within you’. It is that which governs and controls the heart and mind and outlook. It affects the way we think and live. Far from being something which leads to great military power, it is to be ‘poor in spirit’. In other words, we are not told in the Sermon on the Mount, ‘Live like this and you will become Christian’; rather we are told, ‘Because you are Christian live like this.’ This is how Christians ought to live; this is how Christians are meant to live.