MANIFESTO Interpretations, pt. 2

For those still on the MANIFESTO Challenge (Reading all or part of Matthew 5-7 all summer long), I want to continue my discussion on interpreting this text correctly.

OK, now that nobody is reading this blog any further, I'm going to get slightly technical.

The puritans had a great approach to the sermon.
They said that the law (in this case, the "new" law of the sermon) sends us to Jesus to be justified, and Jesus sends us back to the law (the sermon) to be sanctified.

In other words, when we study the sermon and its demands we MUST conclude that we are unable to keep or fulfill it perfectly.
(I will continue to struggle with anger, lust, selfishness, worry, etc, my whole life.)
Thus, it drives me to Jesus who did fulfill the law/sermon perfectly.
Jesus invites us to put our life in his.
In his life we are therefore justified.

Then, our lives secure in Jesus, we find we are drawn back to the law/sermon.
But, and this is vital, NOT as our path to justification.
This isn't how we earn our justification/salvation.
Jesus earn our salvation, and offers us life as a gift.

So now we go to the sermon as our guide for living the sanctified life.
It is instructive for living the christian life.
But Jesus is still the door to enter to life.
Make sense?
Cool.

This approach makes me LOVE the sermon!
It pushes me to Jesus who pulls me back to the sermon.

SECOND POINT FOR TODAY:
What do I think is actually happening in the sermon?

My best understanding is this...
When Jesus went up the mountain with all these followers they actually took an extended time to talk about all this stuff.
The sermon, as it comes to us, is kind of like the cliff notes version.
Matthew wrote for us the main points of the discussion.
The discussion itself took the better part of the whole day.
The main points that we have were the points so clearly stated and explained by Jesus that they were literally seared into the mind of Matthew.

He nailed the beginning (5:1-12), gave each main point of middle (5:13-7:22), then wrapped it up with Jesus' conclusion (7:23-27). The middle part does have a logical flow, which I'll get into later.

Here's why I think this is the correct interpretation:

• It makes sense of the setting and flow of the text.
• It explains why the "sermon" only takes about 10 minutes to read.
• It honors the words we do have as the authoritative words of Jesus.
• It is open enough to engage us with the topics/questions raised.
• It gives us the "final answer" on many fundamental questions.

Well that's enough biblical interpretation for one blog.
Thanks for reading this far, if in fact anyone did!