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Speaker: Jerry Cisar
“The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting, it has been found difficult and left untried.” —G.K. Chesterton
The Sermon on the Mount gets to the heart of what has been found difficult and left, largely, untried. David Augsburger asks four crucial questions that help us identify if we are truly disciples of Jesus. The first two require little of us.
· Do you believe the story of Jesus?
· Do you believe in Jesus?
The next two get to the heart of what it means to truly be a disciple:
· Do you believe Jesus?
· Do you believe what Jesus believed?
The teaching of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount presses hard on these last two questions. It is radical — to read it any other way is not to read it at all. We cannot get out from under its demands by asserting that it either is meant for another age (past or future) (per Matt. 7:26-27).
R. Paul Stevens: “The ethics of Jesus demand a complete transformation. While perfection is never complete in this life, we must at least start being perfect because we are the children of God (5:48).”