Action Holy Jesus Disciple

iWill

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. (Matthew 5:6)

Today we live in a society that’s all about gratifying the individual.  It’s an “all about me” world.  The world is teaching us to look out for number one and these days number one is not God.  Number one has become me.  One look at the company Apple and we can see how much we have bought into this little idea.  Have you heard of the iPhone, iTouch, and iPad.  These are just a few of the products Apple has to offer.  I’m not saying the products in and of themselves are bad.  (In fact, we own a couple.)  I just want us to look at the name.  Every name starts with “I”.

It’s important that we understand the attitude of this world and that we learn to overcome it.  In fact, Jesus gave the Sermon on the Mount to help us see what our lives should like.  There is nothing in there that talks about what this world can do for me.  A lot of it does have to do with me, but it begins with me changing.  It begins with me embracing the Truth of God and allowing it to shape me.  It begins with me saying, “Okay, even if I want to shake the other person and help them understand that they can’t do certain things…  I can’t!  I can only work on me!”

God wants to change me!  He wants me to learn how to live to His standard.  Jesus sat down face to face with His disciples.  The stuff that He shared in the Sermon on the Mount was very important.  We need to take a look at it piece by piece and embrace it for our lives.  Let’s see what there is for us and determine to have an “iWill” attitude.  An attitude that says, “I will follow you Lord wherever you lead, I will give you my best, I will forgive, I will not judge others, I will love my enemies, and I will bear good fruit with my life.”  Let’s take a look at these things and seek to serve the Lord with all our hearts.  May we not walk away from the Truth until we find ourselves truly transformed and ready to be obedient to all that we find.

Let’s take a deeper look at the background of this sermon.  We will never fully appreciate it without the background.

1.  Who was Jesus giving the sermon to?

  • Matthew 5:1 and Luke 6:17 & 20 share that Jesus was with His disciples.  There were a crowd of people who had been following Him, but in Luke 6:20 we see that Jesus narrows in on His disciples.  He makes it very clear that this message He is about to give is for them.  His words were specific and He was preparing them.  The disciples consisted of more than just the 12.  There were also the 72 who would be commissioned in Luke 10.

It’s important for us to understand this because the message was very specific to this group of followers.  It was for the disciples who were committed to following Christ.  They had signed up for this life that Jesus offered.  They had given up their boats, their former lives, their families, their way of living, etc.  They essentially had nothing but Jesus.  They now needed to learn how to follow Him and make the most of this life they would live for Him.

2.  How did Jesus give the sermon?

  • “He went down with them and stood on a level place…” ~Luke 6:17
  • “Now when he saw the crowds, he went up on a mountainside and sat down…” ~Matthew 5:1

I’m going to keep this simple for the sake of time, but I urge you to look into it more if you have the time.  My main point that I want to get across is that Jesus got on level ground with the people.  He sat down in one passage and the other passage says He chose a level place.  Jesus never acted like He was better than anyone, even though clearly He was.  He sat eye to eye with the disciples to get His message across.  He knew how to be relational.

I think sometimes we miss this boat.  We forget to get eye to eye with each other.  Jesus was full of compassion and loved people where they were at.  I certainly feel His love and compassion through the action of sitting eye to eye with the disciples.  He wanted to make sure He had their attention.  May we learn from this and do our best to become more relational with each other.  May we start to do things more eye to eye and in a loving manner like Jesus did!

3.  Jesus handled distractions well.

  • In Matthew 5:1, we see that Jesus simply goes to the mountainside to get away from the crowds.  He wanted to be in a place where He could give a clear message that would be heard by His disciples.
  • In Luke 6:19, we see that the crowd was trying to touch Him because they knew healing came from Him.  He was not distracted by this.  Luke simply states, “Looking at his disciples, he said…”  Jesus did not allow distractions to keep Him from getting the Truth across.

We often become very distracted in our “I” centered universe.  It becomes difficult to hear God, the pain of others, or even be guided by the Holy Spirit.  We get too busy thinking we have to do what’s best for “me”.  Let’s take time to get away from the distractions, whatever that may be for us as individuals.  Let’s take time to learn what really matters and focus in on it.  May this journey through the Sermon on the Mount encourage you in a life of richness.  May you see what a life focused on Christ can look like!  I’m looking forward to this next part of the journey with you!

Challenge: Read Matthew 5 and Luke 6:1-36

Memory Verse: Colossians 3:1-2 or 3:1-4, Let me know how your coming along on these memory verses and how God is using them in your life.

Dear Father God, I pray that we will learn together what it means to apply everything that we see in the Sermon on the Mount.  I know these words are vital for our way of life today.  We can’t live without You guiding us, not truly live that is.  You are the only One who really knows how to give true life.  I pray that we will learn to be obedient to what we find in Your Word.  May our lives become a little less “I” centered and a lot more Christ centered.

I surrender all at the foot of the cross,


4 replies
  1. chosenwoman
    chosenwoman says:

    Excellent message. I do agree the world does think about “ME” we have become our worse enemy…We want what we want when we want it. We don’t have patience we won’t wait. But with God we better learn how to have patience and wait because we can’t rush Him for He works on His timing not ours.

    Reply
    • godisalwaysfaithful
      godisalwaysfaithful says:

      It’s such a blessing to have you stopping by and sharing your thoughts. I appreciate you adding your wisdom to the posts. You are absolutely right that “ME” can be the worse enemy that we deal with. It’s why we need to arm ourselves with God’s Word daily. Thank you for reminding me that God is always on time. His timing is perfect!

      In His Grip of Grace,
      Sarah

      Reply
  2. AnnaMarie
    AnnaMarie says:

    I enjoyed this devotional. I realized, so many times when I get distracted during my alone time with God, its distractions of things that I need to accomplish for myself. This encourages me to keep God a #1 priority in my life. He has control,and that when I hand over my life to Him, He will bring order..He will direct me..He will set everything in place. I just need to stop trying to run the show 🙂

    Reply
    • godisalwaysfaithful
      godisalwaysfaithful says:

      Hi Anna,

      It’s amazing how many distractions come our way when we want to take our time with God. I know exactly what you mean. Praise God that you continue to seek God and give Him #1 priority in your life. You are absolutely right… HE ALONE WILL bring order, HE WILL direct you, and HE WILL set everything in place. This always precedes with an iWill attitude of “Yes, God I will give you the steering will, I will let you be in control, I will let you lead me, I will let you bring order to my life, I will let you direct me, and I’ll let you make sense of things for me.” Things run so much more smoothly when we stop trying to be the center of our own universe, as you said, “when we stop running the show”. May we step back and see how well the show can run when God is running it! Enjoy the show from God’s point of view!

      Have a blessed week!
      Sarah

      Reply

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