Greetings FCCB’ers!

Wow, it feels like Spring outside- I will take it! I hope you’ve been having a nice week in the Lord. Just a reminder – we’ll be continuing

our “Character of God” at 9:00 am this Sunday. Rebecca Morgan did a great job last Sunday as she shared about the “beauty of God.”

This Sunday we’ll have three discussion groups to will follow up on that dialogue.

Gerri White and myself will lead a discussion group in the Coggin Room, Rebecca Morgan will lead a discussion group in Rm. 24 and  Taylor Robinson will lead one in the Library.

We hope you can join in on one of those fruitful discussions on the beauty of God and His majesty above all things. We truly do know and serve an awesome God!

Speaking of continuing things, this Sunday I will be doing Week 2 on the Sermon on the Mount. As I shared this past Sunday, I have been deeply impacted on a personal level by reading back over Jesus “sermon”. My prayer is that 2017 would be a year when we seek out His perspective in all of our situations, so that we may have the mind of Christ.

The sermon begins with the Beatitudes as Jesus lists off the “blessed”. So many of the characteristics are surprising because they come from the Lord. No mortal human being would have ever been able to make them up…no way, no how.

We pick up this week on verse 7 in which Jesus says,

 “blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.”

Mercy is interesting word and hard to define. Two definitions I like from Webster’s are:

“compassion or forbearance especially to an offender” or

“compassionate treatment of those who are in distress.”

The Lord has shown unbelievable mercy towards us in both of those areas of our lives. All our sin is offensive to a Holy God- He gave us mercy and grace. And we are desperate without Him – He gives compassion in our distress. Due to the mercy shown us, God honors us when we pour out our lives to others with mercy, for the merciful will be shown mercy. FCCB is a merciful church and I thank God for that. Please be thinking of ways that we can continue to grow in the mercy of our Lord  and in extending that mercy to others. Maybe write down a couple of ways you want to grow in showing mercy to others in 2017. He will give you the grace to do so. Amen!

Verse 8 states,

“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.”

Of course we cannot purify our own hearts. Yet, as the Lord purifies our heart day by day, we see more of His work everywhere. When our lives get crowded out by sin and addictions that entangle us, it makes it so much harder to see Him and His work. We can be blinded by our sin. The Lord doesn’t want us to live that way. So Lord, we pray for your purity of heart in our lives in 2017 in a fresh way!

Verse 9 talks about peacemakers.

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

Now the types of peacemakers Jesus is describing are not people who just avoid conflict and turn a blind eye to things just to “keep the peace.” Rather, it is people who work towards reconciliation even in very complex and challenging situations. These are people who are committed to relationships no matter what the cost, even navigating through hard moments. Blessed are the peacemakers who seek reconciliation because the Lord has reconciled us to Himself by His death on the cross! May we lay our lives and desires down for the sake of healthy growing relationships with others in Christ! What are ways you want to grow as ‘peacemaker’ in 2017?

Verses 10-12 deal with persecution. No one enjoys being persecuted and in our flesh we would prefer to avoid it at all costs. And so I have good news my friends: Jesus does not call us to seek out persecution. Therefore, you don’t have to go run to a street corner today and yell at people so persecution will come your way. Rather, He points to the fact that if you will follow Him, you will be persecuted. It’s gonna happen. This is hard to acknowledge and accept. Lord, can’t there be another way?!! Ultimately, it is the way of the cross. We receive His redeeming work in the midst of our persecutions for He uses all things, even persecution, for His glory. So we can agree with Jesus as he states,

“Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdome of heaven.” v. 10.

We can rejoice when people speak ill of us because we are following Christ. Because our hope is not in this life, it is in Him. He is our hope and so we can agree with confidence as we persevere that “great is your reward in heaven.” Our hope is in Him for all eternity and so while we labor in this life with false words, heartache and mockery from time to time, we rejoice that is all for Him. These things are so hard, so we desperately need His perspective in these things. He will show us!

Verse 13 goes on to state that

“you are the salt of the earth.”

What a powerful image Jesus gives to His followers. Out of all people on earth, the followers of Christ are the ones who are ‘salt.’ What does this mean? Well, we know many qualities of salt like preservation or adding flavor. So followers of Jesus help preserve many good things and add so much flavor to people’s lives by bearing witness to Him!

“Taste and see that the Lord is good…..”Psalm 34:8.

We don’t want to miss out on the impact we have by being salt, so lets keep growing in this reality!

In conclusion verses 14-16 speaks about being the “light of the world.” Verse 14 states,

“You are the light of the world, a city on a hill cannot be hidden.”

The city of Boston was founded to be a “city on a hill” for the glory of the Lord to be made known. Throughout history God’s people have grabbed hold of these verses and sought the Lord as He demonstrated His light to a dark and hurting world. May this be said of our generation! Jesus concludes by stating,

“neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house.”

I love this imagery. It would be a foolish thing to cover up a lamp. Yet, I feel this temptation in my own life from time to time, out of fear of being “different” when talking to people or not wanting to people to feel uncomfortable in talking about God. But, God does the work. We just need to thank Him for opportunities to radiate His light to others. What a privilege. Over the next couple of days, please think about your spheres of influence. Your workplace, your neighborhood, your unique skill set, your family, etc. are natural places where you can let your light shine!   We want to have more opportunities to celebrate ‘lampstands’ in people’s lives and to pray for these. This summer we prayed in the service for teachers to be ‘salt and light’ in their workplaces for the Gospel. Then a few months ago we prayed for business people. This Sunday we want to pray over medical professionals. So if you are a doctor or a nurse or involved in another role in the medical field we would like to pray for you and your valuable ‘lampstand’ in the lives of others!

Hope to see you and all of you this Sunday as we continue to be a part of the Lord’s amazing work in this church and in this town!

Blessings,

Pastor Andrew