An overview of the Sermon on the Mount and the focus on whole person behavior and a change of heart.

Introduction to Sermon on the Mount

Jesus emphasizes the importance of a real relationship with God and a change in heart.

Jesus Teaches Wholehearted Devotion

Exploring the significance of righteousness exceeding that of the Pharisees and the scribes.

The Core Verse of the Sermon on the Mount

Reflecting on the evidence of accepting Jesus as our Savior and living out the principles of the kingdom.

The Reality of a Change in Our Hearts

Drawing parallels between Psalm 1 and the Beatitudes, emphasizing human flourishing.

The Word Picture for Flourishing

Emphasizing the importance of being real with God and keeping a personal relationship with Him.

Living Out Devotion to God

Discussing the significance of genuine prayer and the personal relationship with God.

Prayer and Personal Relationship with God

Exploring the concept of forgiveness and finding freedom in letting go of past hurts.

Forgiveness and Letting Go

Emphasizing the importance of doing good, helping others, and living out the kingdom of God.

The Core Aspects of Doing Good

Exploring our actual relationship with the Lord in prayer and the importance of intimacy with the Lord Jesus.

Prayer and Intimacy with the Lord

The importance of discipline and fasting in our Christian lives, emphasizing the need for authenticity in our relationship with the Lord.

Discipline in Christian Lives

Encouragement to work on personal growth and development in order to flourish as followers of Jesus.

Flourishing in the Kingdom of Heaven

Reflection on the significance of communion and the sacrifice of Jesus, inviting participation and observation.

Communion and Remembrance

Guidance and encouragement for taking part in communion as a symbol of remembrance and commitment to Christ.

Taking Communion

Blessing and prayers for the congregation, followed by an invitation to fellowship and a closing prayer.

Blessing and Fellowship

- The speaker discusses the Sermon on the Mount from Matthew's Gospel.
- The focus is on whole person behavior that aligns with God's nature and requires a change of heart.
- The core message is to keep it real and have a wholehearted devotion to God.
- The speaker references Psalm 1 and compares it to the concept of human flourishing.
- The message emphasizes the importance of living in alignment with Jesus's core values for human flourishing.

- The speaker discusses the tendency for people to seek human flourishing through various means, rather than turning to the word of God for guidance.
- The focus is on the importance of genuine, private acts of kindness and prayer, rather than seeking recognition or praise from others.
- The message emphasizes the need for authenticity in our actions and devotion to God, without seeking to impress or gain recognition from others.

- The speaker emphasizes the importance of genuine prayer and relationship with God
- He discusses the Lord's Prayer and the significance of each line
- He emphasizes the need for forgiveness and the freedom it brings
- The speaker also talks about fasting and the importance of doing it sincerely, without seeking recognition from others

- The passage teaches about doing good things, giving, and helping others as part of living out the kingdom of God
- It emphasizes the importance of having a personal relationship with the Lord through prayer
- The passage also discusses the need for discipline in Christian lives, specifically fasting
- It encourages keeping a real and genuine relationship with the Lord, and the importance of character and discipline
- The passage ends with a communion ceremony, with an invitation to partake for those who have accepted Jesus and a call to consider following him for those who have not decided yet.

- The speaker talks about the significance of drinking the blood of Christ and the sacrifice he made
- A prayer is said for offering and stewarding resources for the kingdom of God
- The service ends with a blessing and an invitation to a picnic in the park for fellowship
- A song is sung about coming to the fountain for mercy and the Holy Spirit

The speaker discusses the Sermon on the Mount from Matthew's Gospel, emphasizing whole person behavior that aligns with God's nature and requires a change of heart. The core message is to have a wholehearted devotion to God and live in alignment with Jesus's core values for human flourishing. The passage teaches about genuine acts of kindness, prayer, forgiveness, and the importance of a personal relationship with the Lord. It also discusses the need for discipline, fasting, and living out the kingdom of God. The service ends with a communion ceremony, prayer for stewarding resources for the kingdom of God, and an invitation to fellowship at a picnic in the park.

so we have been working through the Sermon on the Mount, which is found in Matthew's Gospel Chapter 5, 6, and 7.

And the, I need to be at the slide previous to that.

If we can go to that 1 first, Balaji, the 1 before that.

I can deal with it if it's not popping up there.

So last week we talked about the the big idea was about whole person behavior.

So whole person behavior that accords with God's nature, will, and coming kingdom, and it requires a change of heart.

Now those are a lot of words, and Steve unpacked that for us really well and helped us to get our heads around it and what that really meant.

This week I am going to have a much simpler phrase for us to try to remember, and it is, keep it real.

So, but There's a larger version of that, which is Jesus teaches a wholehearted devotion to God for us to imitate.

But at its core, what that is really about, and you will see how Jesus unpacks this, is he wants a real relationship with us and in the Sermon on the Mount in a certain sense it is all about that You could say that the core verse of the Sermon on the Mount is found in the fifth chapter, the 1 before, and verse 20 where it says that unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the Pharisees and the scribes you will not enter the kingdom of heaven." And that sounds like, oh, it's picking on the Pharisees and the scribes.

What it's really telling us, what Jesus is really telling us is, this is not just religion.

This is about a relationship and a way of life.

For many of us, we have learned the John's Gospel, chapter 3, verse 16, sort of part of the whole gospel, we have learned that, for God so loved the world that he gave his 1 and only son, that whoever believes in him will not perish but will have eternal life.

What's interesting and kind of intriguing is that Jesus didn't put John 3.16 in the Sermon on the Mount.

And so you scratch your head, you say, wait a second, if the Sermon on the Mount is like Jesus' manifesto, it's his declaration of what the kingdom is all about, then how come John 3.16 isn't in the Sermon on the Mount?

So ponder that with me and as we go through this, I think what we will find is that the reality of a change in our heart and us Accepting Jesus as our Lord and Savior is that there will be a change in us and we will live out These principles it will be shown so that you will see the evidence of us having accepted Jesus as our Savior in the practical living out of a life that is now in alignment with Jesus's core values.

So in fact, we will be living out the principles of the kingdom.

So as I studied this and some of the others that have been speaking, They use different sources, and I just want to give credit to a few that I used in the preparation of this.

So studies in the Sermon on the Mount by Martin Lloyd-Jones.

1 of the Sermon on the Mount and Human Flourishing by Jonathan Pennington, and that's 1 that all of the speakers have been sort of looking at or studying as they've been preparing their messages.

Communicators Commentary, which helps me to stay kind of anchored and make sure I actually bring it down to a message that I think we can get and we can understand.

And then my good buddy Mark Twain, I have to quote him a time or 2 as well.

So he's a theologian even maybe more so than all the rest of them.

Notice the second 1 is the Sermon on the Mount and Human Flourishing.

So we have been looking at that word, but I want to take us this morning for just a minute back to Psalm 1.

I learned this Psalm when I was a young man.

And I could rattle it off, in fact, we would have contests to see how quickly we could say Psalm 1.

Could in fact you say it in 1 breath and that would actually, you would have to just go.

walks not and counts it in the God who stands in the way of sinners, sits in the seat of the scornful, and his delays in the law of the Lord, and his law he meditates day and night.

And you'd have to try to get that all out.

What's fun to think about here is that for those listening to the Sermon on the Mount, their reference or their, what they had heard read to them many times was part of it would have been the Psalms and they would have been very familiar with Psalm 1.

So in Psalm 1, the first Psalm, you get the blessed phrase that you get in the Beatitudes that we studied a number of weeks ago.

So in Psalm 1 there's just, that's Psalm 11, And it's blessed is the 1 who does not walk in the or step or walk in step with the wicked or stand in the way that Sinners take or sit in the company of mockers So that was the 1 they knew and then verse 2 is the contrast But whose delight is in the law of the Lord and who meditates on his law day and night.

So flip over to the the the servant on the mount that Jesus gave to us and he's now like click and expand instead of 1 blessed he does 9 blessed and he explains a lot more about what this is really all about.

But when we were actually discussing this series as the leadership team here, We wrestled a little bit with the word flourish, because flourish isn't a word that we kind of use a lot.

But I would suggest that Psalm 1 verse 3 is the word picture for flourishing.

That person is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither.

You envision a tree planted close to a river where it constantly gets the water that it needs and you picture that tree growing strong and tall and being able to withstand whatever storms come, whatever happens in that tree's life.

Now when you think about it, There are thousands and thousands of books written, seminars developed, courses taken.

In fact, you could even argue that most of the human disciplines, the different areas of study are all about human flourishing.

Whether it is science, whether it is the arts, whether it is psychology, think about the different major kind of disciplines that you can study at university.

And you'll find that directly or indirectly, the vast majority of them are having to do with human flourishing.

There's an interesting contrast to the animal kingdom and to those of us that are humans.

When you think about the fundamental drive of the animal kingdom is to survive and to reproduce.

But when it comes to the human condition, you and I are made in the image of God.

We are given an order in which we actually wrestle with and work towards human flourishing.

However, for the majority of our poor race, we have the word of God, we have a hundred verse document that gives us the recipe for human flourishing, and we leave it on our shelves, or we put it somewhere out of the way, or we ignore it totally, and instead we click on Kindle or on Amazon or on something and we buy book after book after book seminar after seminar and they've all got different titles and they all got different amazing phenomenal speakers and all this kind of stuff and they do this and what are they trying to teach you?

Human flourishing, which is right there in the Sermon on the Mount.

So that's too long an introduction but I just had to get that off my chest.

Okay now when we go to our chapter today, or the verses we're going to talk about, it is simple and yet it is crazy deep.

So first of all, in Matthew 6 and verse 1, I'll read verses 1 to 4 here.

Don't do your good deeds publicly to be admired by others, for you will lose the reward from your Father in heaven.

When you give to someone in need, don't do as the hypocrites do, blowing trumpets in the synagogues and streets to call attention to their acts of charity.

I tell you the truth, they have received all the reward they will ever get.

But when you give to someone in need, don't let your left hand know what your right hand is doing.

Give your gifts in private and your father who sees everything will will reward you.

Basically God sees everything a matter of the principle here of saying be careful, watch out, because there is a tendency even when we do good things that we're doing them for a personal motive.

We picture it back in the day, and you know, he talks about those that were blowing trumpets in the synagogues and calling attention to their acts of charity and so on.

What about at the back of the flyer for the your local hospital in terms of the giving that you know for that hospital?

They have categories and they know what to do to make you look to be in the biggest possible category.

So they even do the dollar range so that if you give $100, you'll be in the range of $100 to $999.

And if you give $1,000, you'll be in the range of $1,000 to $9,999.

They doctor this, they make this, and they, your name, it feels so good when it's there.

We like to be on, there's a hilarious case in the West Island, I won't name the church, but there was a church trying to raise money for, to renovate and they couldn't get the money to actually renovate.

So what they decided to do was they offered that you could get your family name on a window, on a something, And they laid this all out in a plan and the place was funded within weeks.

You and I have this nature, this tendency to want to have that.

And Jesus challenges us here in terms of our good deeds, the things that we do.

And he says, in my kingdom, I'm looking for reality.

I'm looking for something that you're doing between you and me and not the show stuff.

way he says it that I struggle with is he says, you'll lose your reward from your father in heaven.

By the way, in this passage that we're dealing with today, the phrase your father in heaven and your father is used like over half the times that it's used during the Sermon on the Mount.

It's very much father is emphasized in this particular passage.

When you give to somebody in need, he wants us to be generous.

That's part of the characteristics of the kingdom.

But to do it without even your left hand knowing what your right hand is doing.

I find it hilarious, but Jesus has a way of nailing something in a few words that you and I can then take and ponder.

Think about, for instance, Steve referred to this a few weeks ago, But remember when, like you think about today, the challenges that we have with pornography.

In all different types and types and whatever in our world where everything is available at the click of a button and where lives are being destroyed and marriages are being damaged terribly and young people are getting destroyed by this stuff emotionally, Jesus says it in 1 phrase.

I say to you that everyone that looks at a woman lessfully has already committed adultery in his heart.

Jesus says 1 phrase long before there was internet, long before there was like anything that we currently have in our world, but Jesus nails it.

So here he says, when you give to somebody in need, don't you let your left hand know what your right hand is doing.

It's something that we do in response as part of the characteristics of the kingdom that we have become part of, 1 of the family values.

Give your gifts in private and your father who sees in private will reward you, who sees everything.

Core through this whole message is the fact that God sees everything.

Mark Twain, 1 of my favorite philosophers, says, you cannot pray a lie.

What's really funny is we do it all the time.

There, there I get to still in my life, even though I'm, you know, kind of a middle aged guy, I get to hang out with a lot of young adults.

Well, there was a discussion that happened this week.

Now, 2 of these young adults have the inferior smartphone, that they in abbreviated way call an iPhone.

So 2 of them have 1 of these inferior smartphones and they have for the sake of sort of security and caring for each other, they have hooked them up in a way where they each know where each other is.

And so they can always be aware of where the other 1 is.

1 of them happened to be overnight at somewhere where they were a little bit ashamed of being there overnight.

So the next day they're talking and the 1 is telling the other 1 where they were totally lying and at the same time knowing that they both have this feature on their phones so they actually know where they are.

And they're telling me about this, at least the 1 is, okay, and finding this like, what?

I'm listening to it, and of course I'm preparing my message for Sunday, and I'm saying like, yes, that is so us.

Like, God knows what you're thinking right now.

He knows when you turn off search history.

And Yet we still try to lie to God We still try to impress him.

So reality 1 of the things the Lord is talking to us about here today is these values of living out this devotion to God in our lives is be real with God, keep it real.

Do good things, help others, be kind, do those things, but it's between you and God.

When you pray, don't be like the hypocrites who love to pray publicly on street corners and in synagogues where everyone can see them.

I tell you the truth, that's all the reward they will ever get.

Shut the door behind you and pray to your father in private.

Then your father who sees everything will reward you." Can it be that even when we pray, we're trying to impress?

Those of us that love and follow Jesus, We know this subtle, crazy, like it's sin.

I've mentioned it before from this pulpit, like you get pictures back after a family gathering.

You like the pictures in which you look good.

You don't like the pictures in which you don't look good.

When it comes to prayer, even in our prayer life, we can be, are we worshiping God or are we trying to make sure that it sounds good in how we pray or that we make sure people know that we're praying or that we're ever this it's crazy but the Lord knows and he's looking for reality in our hearts Sin follows us all the way so he encourages us here Just pray by yourself You don't need any show.

It doesn't need people who need to know that you're praying.

Just pray talk to God This is a personal relationship between you and him.

He then goes on to talk to us about prayer, about like showing us, giving us an example.

And I love verse 7, When you pray, don't babble on and on as the Gentiles do.

They think their prayers are being answered merely because they repeat the words again and again.

Your father knows exactly what you need even before you ask him.

1 of the fundamental things in terms of us flourishing in our lives is to know that God knows us, to know that he cares for us, to know that he has our best interests at heart.

When we grasp that, I shared with you, I think the last time I spoke here, right at the end of my, after I took 3 months off, and people wanted to know, what did God say to you?

He actually likes to spend time with me when I spend time with him the Lord looks forward to that time.

Zephaniah 3 says that he rejoices over me with singing.

When he starts thinking about me, he starts singing.

My brother and sister in Christ, do you, does that ring well with you?

Do you sense that as you think about your relationship with the Lord when he thinks about you today.

He knows you by name and it makes him sing.

He wants a real, real relationship with you.

And then he gives us what in English, at least in this version of English, is a 62 word prayer.

It's not very long and only 7 of those words are about our needs.

Like, what's that, maybe 12% or something?

What percentage of your prayer life is telling God what you need, what you want him to do?

Our Father in heaven, may your name be kept holy.

Any of you that have studied psychology at all, you know exactly what that is doing.

When you are taking your mind off of yourself and you are putting it on God, it is very freeing for you.

It is, it's actually, it's delivering you in and of itself, but it is the desire of our hearts as those that know and follow Jesus.

This is, I wanna get into a lot in the kingdom now or I'll be here for another hour.

But just to say that as you and I live out what Jesus is teaching us here, we are bringing God's kingdom.

It is in fact coming as we live this out.

So as you pray, may your kingdom come soon, in fact in living this out, you are seeing that kingdom come.

There is absolutely, it is absolutely true, we look forward to the day when Jesus will reign in righteousness over this earth And when his kingdom will be established, that will never end.

That is an awesome day to look forward to.

But meanwhile, you and I, in living this out, can be part of that kingdom coming.

May your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

We say it and then we say, but Lord we actually want my will to be done.

To actually have that ahead of anything that we're asking him.

There's a certain young lady sitting in our audience today, I won't pick any interventionally names, but who called us 1 day to tell us that she was moving.

And then when we asked, when is this move happening, she said in 6 years.

And that is, maybe it was 5, I can't remember, it was like years.

Most of our stress comes from the way ahead.

The stuff that's, Jesus says, this is what's, okay, ask this.

Now he gets on to the forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.

And I love this, and for the sake of time, I'm gonna talk about it right here rather than waiting.

I was gonna have it as a separate slide, but we'll skip that 1.

Imagine a sermon on forgiveness, and I'm preaching the sermon.

I walk up at 11.20, and I stand here and I say to everyone, folks, just bow your heads and pray with me.

Father, please forgive me the same way that I forgive others.

I can do that with 80% or with 90% or 99%, but you don't know the 1 situation in my life.

You don't know what that person did to me.

And I don't minimize for a second things that Could have happened in your life in the past.

There are some horrific things that have happened to people in the past and the concept Of forgiveness is very hard But the biblical model that you and I have Of the 1 who is preaching this sermon Is the lord jesus hanging on calvary's cross He was there He was taking your sins and my sins on himself.

He was bearing the judgment, he was bearing the punishment for sins that he had never committed.

And as he hung there on Calvary's cross, taking the punishment that you and I deserved, he said, Father, forgive them, for they don't know what they're doing.

It is not for you and I to say, but Dave, what happened to me didn't happen to you, so you don't understand.

I don't compare myself to you and to what it is that you hurt from or that that you have to let go of but Jesus is the example and Jesus is the 1 we look to and Let me just suggest that there is tremendous flourishing ahead of you if you can come to the point where you can pray, Father forgive me in the same way that I forgive others.

In the letting go, in the committing that to him who judges righteously, you find that there is tremendous freedom and that there is relief and that there is a way for you to flourish in your life.

And don't let us yield to temptation but rescue us from the evil 1.

We know that there are temptations every day and that we need that prayer that the Lord teaches us here.

Well now We are going to go on to the last part of this, which is, when you fast, don't make it obvious as the hypocrites do, for they try to look miserable and disheveled so people admire them for their fasting.

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Flourishing in the Kingdom of Heaven