Matthew 5:9 “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God.”

Once we were at war with God. We were his enemies. We had no interest in making peace with him. We were content to live and fight on the other side.

Then God himself came and made peace. He reconciled us to himself. He repaired the relationship. He sacrificed his own Son to do so. That is the best thing that has ever happened to you and me.

Spiritually, it makes sense that people who have experienced such peace would look at the relationships they have with the people around them, or the relationships of other people in general, and want to make peace. They see the value. They have experienced the relief. They know the blessing.

And this shows that they are becoming like their Father, from whom they learned this concern. The Lord once described King David as “a man after my own heart.” Jesus’ declaration of blessing here is similar. I know of no higher compliment than to be called “sons of God.”

Matthew 5:8 “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.”

The pure in heart haven’t achieved absolute holiness in their lives. They haven’t stopped sinning altogether. The Bible is clear that that doesn’t happen this side of heaven.

Their sins have been washed away in the cleansing waters of their baptisms, however, waters powered by Jesus’ death and resurrection to pay for their sins. The pure in heart have been converted, they have come to faith, and in that faith there is a new innocence, a new simplicity, a new honesty that acknowledges our sin and keeps going back to God for forgiveness.

These people, Jesus says, are blessed to see God. You realize that this blessing is something of an acquired taste. “Well whoopty-doo,” far too many people would say. “It’s not like that’s what I’ve been dying to see.”

Many years ago my family found a box with letters my grandmother had received from a man she almost married years before she married my grandfather. It was World War I, and the man was fighting somewhere in France. The letters were filled with the longing of two hearts desperate to see each other but forced to be apart. Do you feel the same longing to see this man, or my grandmother for that matter? Of course not. You’re not in love with them.

Only those with hearts purified by God’s grace consider it a blessing to see God, because only they want to see God. You can’t believe that you were a sinner, destined for hell and an eternity of misery away from God, with no way of changing your situation; and that then purely out of his grace God sacrificed the only Son he had to save you from your sins, make you his own child by faith, and give you heaven as a free gift; you can’t come to believe that and not at the same time come to love the One who showed you such love. As the sainted Dr. Becker used to say, “To know him is to love him” is more true of our Savior than anyone who ever lived.

And those who love Jesus know that it is a blessing when he promises, “They will see God.”

Matthew 5:7 “Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.”

The blessed have compassion, empathy. They have known spiritual pain and poverty. They have received God’s blessed solutions. And so, their hearts are full of mercy for others.

It is such a feature of being blessed that Jesus will see it as the primary way to describe them on Judgment Day: “Come, you who are blessed by my Father,” he will say, “take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world.” Why? “For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison, and you came to visit me.”

Being so merciful can be expensive. It can mean sacrifice. It means parting with your time, your energy, and your money.

But it is connected to a blessing. “They will be shown mercy.” God still sees your misery. It pains him. When Jesus saw Mary and Martha’s grief after their brother Lazarus died, it even moved him to tears and he intervened with a miracle.

God’s mercy doesn’t always lead to a miracle. But the Father above who loves you still intends to relieve your pain before it becomes too much. He may change your circumstances here. He may change your address to a heavenly one, where “there is no more death or mourning or crying or pain.” Either way, your misery prompts his mercy and ends in his blessing.

Matthew 5:5-6 “Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.”

The blessed are kind and gentle people. They lack the kind of aggressiveness and self-promotion so many successful people seem to have. “Well, this can’t be right,” we might think. “Meek people are going to inherit the earth? Doesn’t everything in our experience say just the opposite?”

It’s true that the meek and gentle may have less than the rough and aggressive. They may be more likely to get run over or taken advantage of.

But step back a moment, and look at some of the world’s ambitious power-brokers and gazillionaires. I won’t name names, but how much do they really enjoy their gigantic piece of the pie? How much of their lives aren’t consumed by scandals, lawsuits, squabbles, personal attacks, public shame, and a thirst for more that never seems truly content? You read the covers of the tabloids in the checkout line.

The meek may have only their daily bread, just enough to live on. But they live in the contentment that God has provided all they need, and the confidence that God will continue to provide. They have inherited the earth, because they can enjoy what they have right now. Contentment is blessing.

Even in their contentment, those God blesses may hunger and thirst: “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.” These people want to do what is right. They try to live a righteous life. They want it more than anything.

But they have come to realize that we lack a righteousness of our own. So God gives them a better righteousness. He declares them not guilty for Jesus’ sake. He gives them credit for Jesus’ righteous life. He fills them with a righteousness more perfect and more powerful than anything they could have attempted on their own. The more they hunger and thirst for righteousness, the more God fills them. The more God fills them with righteousness, they more they hunger and thirst for it. Ever hungry, ever filled—It is a blessing to be both.

Matthew 5:4 “Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.”

Life is tough for the blessed. They often lack earthly reasons for joy, the things that make you happy. They lose their loved ones to death, their livelihood to unemployment, their families to unfaithfulness and divorce, their property and homes to natural disasters, their children to bad influences, their dignity to bad choices.

And it all grieves them. It makes them want to cry. They aren’t unique in what they suffer. These are all burdens common to man.

What makes the blessed different is that they understand the root cause behind their suffering. It’s sin. And it makes them mourn. They mourn not just the effects of sin, the misery it causes, though they mourn that, too. They are truly sorry that they have offended God and harmed their neighbors. Their tears are a mixture of pain and repentance.

“They shall be comforted.” Do you remember poor Lazarus from the parable of the rich man and poor Lazarus? When the two men receive their eternal rewards, and the rich man complains, Abraham explains, “Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted…” (Luke 16:25). In Revelation, John describes the people who have left behind the troubles of this world this way: “God will wipe away every tear from their eyes” (Rev. 7:17).

But not all the comforts have to wait. God loves you today. His forgiveness is a like a warm, soft blanket of his grace laid over your life with all its bumps and bruises, shortcomings and failures. He seeks you, accepts you, embraces you, and claims you as his own even now. This is what it looks like to be blessed. On the outside our lives give us plenty of reasons to cry. On the inside we are cradled in God’s grace.

Matthew 5:3 “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

“To be blessed,” Jesus says, “is to be poor.”

Jesus does not bless the poor in cash or wealth, though that often goes together with what he means. He blesses the poor in spirit. You won’t catch them bragging about their prayer life, how many people they have converted, how much they have given up to serve God, or how much they have grown and matured in their walk of faith. Whether they can quote Isaiah 64:6, or even know the passage exists, they agree with the prophet: “All our righteous acts are like filthy rags.” Not much of value there.

Imagine a homeless, jobless person millions of dollars in debt. If he dumpster-dived for aluminum cans and had 10 lifetimes to do it, maybe he could scrape enough together to change his situation. But he doesn’t even collect recyclables. All he has gathered together are scraps of cloth, and grimy, smelly ones at that–soiled by ripe, wet garbage, further spoiled by dust and dirt. Would he present those to his creditors at the bank, or send them in to satisfy the Visa bill? Would he show off his pile of rotting rags to impress you with his wealth? Would you?

Now, convert his soiled and spoiled collection to a life of thoughts, attitudes, and activities soiled and spoiled by selfish motivations, false pride, deceitful cover-ups, and self-indulgent lusts, and you have a picture of the poor in spirit Jesus calls blessed here.

How can Jesus call such people blessed? It’s not because their hearts and lives are such a mess. In that they are just like everybody else. No, it is because they are in touch with reality. They don’t mistake their filthy rags for gold bullion. They have come to grips with their true situation and stopped pretending it is better than it is. Once they admit their spiritual poverty, they stop trying to impress God with their garbage. They come to him with their hands empty. Before God, they know that they are only there to receive.

And God does not disappoint. “Theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” With Jesus they go from penniless beggars to shareholders in Paradise. They own their own piece of heaven, literally. God does not hold their spiritual poverty against them and wait for them to pay. He forgives it, and he pays for it with the blood of Jesus, and he replaces it with his own eternal home of endless pleasures. All of a sudden it is as if these spiritually bankrupt street people have won the billion-dollar Power-ball!

This is what it looks like to be blessed. Such people lack any great spiritual valuables of their own, but God has given them the deed to heavenly real estate. Maybe it’s just a promise now, God’s word on the matter. But he never, ever reneges on a promise, and possession is as certain for the poor in spirit on earth as it is for the saints in glory in heaven.

Luke 13:6-9 “Then he told this parable: ‘A man had a fig tree, planted in his vineyard, and he went to look for fruit on it, but did not find any. So he said to the man who took care of the vineyard, ‘For three years now I’ve been coming to look for fruit on this fig tree and haven’t found any. Cut it down! Why should it use up the soil?’ ‘Sir,’ the man replied, ‘leave it alone for one more year, and I’ll dig around it and fertilize it. If it bears fruit next year, fine! If not, then cut it down.’”

The man in the parable was looking for fruit on his tree. That is a picture of the Lord coming to us and looking for fruits in our lives– the product of repentance and faith. Where there is true repentance and faith, a life of love naturally follows. That is the true measure of repentance–the love that flows from faith. It’s how we respond to God’s grace to us.

But it is easy for us to confuse fruits of repentance with something else. When you see a decorated Christmas tree, you are not confused about the source of the ornaments hanging on the tree. I have seen little children try to eat a Christmas ornament before, but we understand that those ornaments are not the fruit of a pine tree.  They may make the tree look better, especially Charlie Brown’s little tree in the Peanuts Christmas Special. The proper fruit of a pine tree, however, is a pinecone, not a shiny ball.

Somehow Christians find it hard to see that the fruit of repentance must be…the fruit of repentance! Repentance involves three parts: First, we feel sorrow for our sins and confess them to God. Second, we trust in God’s grace and receive his forgiveness (that’s the part many people forget). Third, we produce the fruits: a life of love. Any change of behavior or loving actions that don’t follow sorrow for sin and faith in the gospel aren’t the real thing. They are like hanging ornaments on the tree. You can change people’s behavior by making them feel guilty, appealing to their pride, or promising them all kinds of treats. Psychologists understand the principles of behavioral modification. But none of these are the product of true repentance, because they don’t come from our response to God’s grace.

In order to produce real thing, God himself works hard at inspiring our response. “‘Sir,’ the man replied, ‘leave it alone for one more year, and I’ll dig around it and fertilize it. If it bears fruit next year, fine! If not, then cut it down.’” There are three things we can note about the Lord’s efforts here. First, he is patient. The man in the parable had been coming around to this tree for three years. He didn’t chop it down right away. In the same way, the Lord keeps extending our lives. He gives us and others time.  He genuinely loves us and wants to see his work come to fruition in us.

Second, he is persistent. He keeps coming back. Jesus gives the impression that the man in the parable kept coming to the tree and looking again and again. It was more than an annual visit. So our Lord pursues us. As poet Frances Thompson once described him, our Lord is “the hound of heaven.” As a hound chases a rabbit, relentless, steady, the Lord keeps after us though we try to run from him or hide in our sin.

Third, he is proactive. “Sir, leave it alone for one more year and I’ll dig around it and fertilize it.” The gardener didn’t mess around with the externals. He addressed the roots. Our Lord does the same. He acts first. He gives freely to nurture life in us. He meets us in his word with the message of the cross. He meets us in his supper, where Jesus’ own body and blood nourish our souls with forgiveness. As a God of grace, our Lord does not wait for us to respond to him. He takes the initiative. He produces the repentance he seeks in us, and fruits of love grow from the faith he has cultivated in our souls.

There is a reason the Lord is digging around in your life, making you uncomfortable, yet always leaving you with reminders of his forgiving grace. He is looking for something. Let the gospel do its work, and give him the fruit he seeks.

Luke 13:1-3 “Now there were some present at that time who told Jesus about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mixed with their sacrifices. Jesus answered, ‘Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered this way? I tell you, no! but unless you repent, you too will all perish.’”

It’s not hard to see how someone could come to such a conclusion, is it– that these men were somehow worse, guilty of greater sins, because of what happened to them? You might think that God would protect them while doing something so pious as offering him sacrifices. Instead they were killed in the act of sacrifice.  Wouldn’t that be a sign from God that he was angry with them and rejected their sacrifice? Wouldn’t that be an indicator that these men were somehow lacking in their repentance?

People tend to draw conclusions like that based upon what God allows to happen. We still do it today. When hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans, some suggested God was targeting the city because of the wild behavior associated with the French Quarter or Mardi Gras. I once overheard a guest at a wedding express his surprise that God didn’t strike him dead when he entered the church. His reason? It had been so long since he last attended worship. When nothing happened, he concluded that God must be okay with his life after all.

The obvious sin that follows this kind of thinking is loveless, self-righteous judging of others. People become cold and hard toward their unfortunate neighbors. They find an excuse to refuse help or sympathy just when they are needed most.

A less obvious problem with this thinking is the way it undercuts our confidence in God’s grace. If he grants prosperity only to those who do right, and he brings hardship on those who do wrong, what are we to conclude when diagnosed with cancer? What must we assume if we suffer a long string of failures? What if we are the victims of a tornado, flood, or car accident? Does that make us worse than everybody else? Is the Lord targeting us for special judgment? Have we somehow failed in our repentance? Has our faith been a sham? Are we headed for damnation?

Jesus answers our questions whether we should see tragedies as a measures of repentance or faith. “I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish.” These are not a measure of repentance. They deliver a message of repentance.

Do you ever read the obituaries in the newspaper? I have never read an unkind obituary. None of them say that Mr. Jones was a criminal, a cheat, a blight upon humanity and we’re glad he’s gone–good riddance! They speak in warm and loving terms. He meant so much to his family. He contributed so much to the community. He will be sorely missed.

Still, every obituary gives a silent testimony that this person, too, was a sinner. If the wages of sin is death, then every death is preaching of sin. It preaches not only about the person in the casket. The sermon is directed at me. I am mortal, too. I can’t hear about the death of my neighbor without being reminded of my own sin and impending death. That makes every death–whether from untimely tragedy, or at a ripe old age–a call for me to repent while there is time. The same holds true for every pain or heartache we experience through life. They are all a consequence of sin. “Unless you repent, you too will all perish.”

Jesus does not issue his warning to be vindictive. He loves us and wants to help. The Great Physician is offering his diagnosis of our souls’ sickness. Doctors don’t deliver their diagnosis to see us suffer. They want to share the solution. So does our Lord. His medicine works. He suffers the symptoms and the consequences of our sin in our place. He cleanses us with his blood and forgives us. His treatment not only delays death and extends our lives. It cures death and gives eternal life.

Tragedies don’t make an accusation. They offer an invitation. Jesus invites us to repent and escape from death to life.

Matthew 14:19-20 “And he directed the people to sit down on the grass. Taking the five loaves and the two fish and looking up to heaven, he gave thanks and broke the loaves. Then he gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the people. They all ate and were satisfied, and the disciples picked up twelve basketfuls of broken pieces that were left over.”

This is a well-known miracle from Jesus’ life. Outside the events of Holy Week, it is the only story from his life that is included in all four gospels. None of them tell us how Jesus did the miracle, the process for multiplying the loaves and fish. Did the loaves grow back new parts in the disciples’ hands even as they tore pieces off and gave them to others? Did the basket from which this food came suddenly begin to produce new loaves and more fish as the first ones were taken out and given away? We don’t have the details.

But take note of these two facts: First, everyone ate and was satisfied. Everyone got more than a taste. They got all they wanted. They all ate until they didn’t want anymore. When God does his work, he doesn’t settle for some second rate, half-baked, incomplete conclusion to the project. When he atones for the sins of the world, Jesus suffers on the cross until he can say, “It is finished.” Here, he made sure everyone got enough.

Actually, there was more than enough. The second thing to note is that the disciples picked up 12 baskets of leftovers, one for each of them. That was far more than they started with. In the end the Lord took what they gave, did his work, and then returned more to his people than they had given him.

The Lord satisfied the needs of his people. The Lord far exceeded the needs of his people. Are the lessons for you and me hard to see? If it seems to us that we live in a time when God is no longer providing for us in such miraculous ways, in one sense we might be right. We have no promise that God is going to make the food grow in our cupboards. But do we have any need for such a thing? Don’t we live in a time in which God has blessed us with incredible plenty? How likely are most of us to run into such a situation where we are part of a crowd of thousands scrambling for something to eat?

I remember reading a story of a lady from Uganda, standing up in the middle of a worship service and asking the congregation to join her in thanking God for giving her shoes! She was overcome with appreciation. I can’t remember anyone from my church ever asking me to include a prayer of thanksgiving in the service because the Lord had finally given them shoes.

Maybe we don’t think of food that is more than enough, and our clothes that are more than enough, and our shelter that is more than enough, as a miracle like the feeding of the 5000. But the same power of the same God makes it so. He doesn’t promise us a miracle, but every day we see the fulfillment of this promise: “My God will meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus.”