I, John, saw another angel come up from the East,
holding the seal of the living God.
He cried out in a loud voice to the four angels
who were given power to damage the land and the sea,
“Do not damage the land or the sea or the trees
until we put the seal on the foreheads of the servants of
our God.”
I heard the number of those who had been marked with the
seal,
one hundred and forty-four thousand marked
from every tribe of the children of Israel.
After this
I had a vision of a great multitude,
which no one could count,
from every nation, race, people, and tongue.
They stood before the throne and before the Lamb,
wearing white robes and holding palm branches in their
hands.
They cried out in a loud voice:
“Salvation
comes from our God, who is seated on the throne,
and from the Lamb.”
All the
angels stood around the throne
and around the elders and the four living creatures.
They prostrated themselves before the throne,
worshiped God, and exclaimed:
“Amen.
Blessing and glory, wisdom and thanksgiving,
honor, power, and might
be to our God forever and ever. Amen.”
Then one
of the elders spoke up and said to me,
“Who are these wearing white robes, and where did they come
from?”
I said to him, “My lord, you are the one who knows.”
He said to me,
“These are the ones who have survived the time of great
distress;
they have washed their robes
and made them white in the Blood of the Lamb.”
R. (see 6) Lord, this is the
people that longs to see your face. The Lord’s are the earth and its fullness;
the world and those who dwell in it.
For he founded it upon the seas
and established it upon the rivers. R. Lord, this is the
people that longs to see your face. Who can ascend the mountain of the LORD?
or who may stand in his holy place?
One whose hands are sinless, whose heart is clean,
who desires not what is vain. R. Lord, this is the
people that longs to see your face. He shall receive a blessing from the LORD,
a reward from God his savior.
Such is the race that seeks him,
that seeks the face of the God of Jacob. R. Lord, this is the
people that longs to see your face.
Beloved:
See what love the Father has bestowed on us
that we may be called the children of God.
Yet so we are.
The reason the world does not know us
is that it did not know him.
Beloved, we are God’s children now;
what we shall be has not yet been revealed.
We do know that when it is revealed we shall be like him,
for we shall see him as he is.
Everyone who has this hope based on him makes himself pure,
as he is pure.
When Jesus saw the crowds, he went
up the mountain,
and after he had sat down, his disciples came to him.
He began to teach them, saying:
“Blessed are the poor in spirit,
for theirs is the Kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are they who mourn,
for they will be comforted.
Blessed are the meek,
for they will inherit the land.
Blessed are they who hunger and thirst for righteousness,
for they will be satisfied.
Blessed are the merciful,
for they will be shown mercy.
Blessed are the clean of heart,
for they will see God.
Blessed are the peacemakers,
for they will be called children of God.
Blessed are they who are persecuted for the sake of
righteousness,
for theirs is the Kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are you when they insult you and persecute you
and utter every kind of evil against you falsely because of
me.
Rejoice and be glad,
for your reward will be great in heaven.”
I have read many reflections on the beatitudes, have heard
several homilies that were very good, and have read some
excellent excerpts, but I won't talk about those beatitudes
today. I will make one comment to sum them all up (for
now) and that
is: "Blest are we for making God number one in our lives."
You know, like before money, before fame, before popularity,
before politics, television, new houses, cars, toys for
kids, before anything else that might interfere with Him
being first and foremost in our lives. That's the only way
that we will come to know happiness and holiness. Our call
to God's Kingdom is a call to holiness, and that is a life
time pursuit. Could it be that holiness is giving of
oneself completely and totally to God for whatever purpose
God wants to use us for? In our efforts to pursue holiness
we can appreciate the truth that the beatitudes challenge us
to go deeper beneath the surface of our being to make that
happen.
Perhaps we might say that they are about how we can put
God's love into action, about doing those things that will
make it possible for us to have an eternal presence with
God, about living out God's love for us. It takes a very
different kind of courage to respond to those words spoken
by Jesus on that mountainside. And you should know that
there is great risk, there is always a great risk in living
out God's love, because there is always those people and
those temptations that will try to persuade us not to. When
you think about it, how many have been persecuted for
holiness' sake in some way or another? Living this journey
of life as God's plan for us to follow in the footsteps of
Jesus is not so easy as it might sound. For to do so we
must put ourselves aside for the sake of those in poverty,
sickness, the outcasts, the homeless, those who are weak and
hungry for a better outcome in their lives.
Perhaps we are too busy only, with obeying the Ten Commandments,
which God inferred (These you can at least obey!) that we
forget about where the real challenge lies for all
Christians, and that is indeed these words that Jesus spoke
on that mountain. That is not to say that the Ten
Commandments are not important, of course they are.
They were given to Moses for his people during a time when
they were worshiping false Gods. And when challenged
by the Pharisees about those commandments, Jesus went on to
say, "I am the fulfillment of the old law. I give you
two new commandments, to love God with your whole heart,
your whole soul, and mind, and to love your neighbor as
yourself. Everything of the old law is contained in
these two commandments." - words to that affect.
Yes, we live in a crappy world, a very
troubling country. There is much that is going wrong, much
that is being done that is not of God. We do our best to
remedy that situation, but could it be that we got this way
because too many of us did not listen and heed the things
that Jesus said that we should do, these words of the
beatitudes? If Jesus is calling us to follow Him, he is
certainly calling us to be doers of his word and not just
believers and hearers. If we want to put God first in our
lives as well as in our country and our world, we have to put
Him first in our hearts, in our families, and in our
relationships with others.
It's
not about us folks, it's about God and what His will is.
Yes, many of us are limited in someway, just about everyone
is. That is why we don't go it alone. We journey together,
our sinfulness and all, despite our sinfulness and all, to
the best that we are able. Effort is what counts to God.
Have we done the most with what he has given us? Our
talents, our treasures, our gifts, our skills, our wisdom,
our everything. And we have to do that in our own
brokenness, carrying our own crosses, our illnesses, our
pain, our suffering, beyond on our limits.
Jesus wasn't speaking to just those folks in front of him
below on that mountain that day. He was speaking to all of
humankind for all times. Until we release ourselves unto
his will, the world will never change for the better, our
country is not going to change for the better. Government
is not going to change anything for the better, not anytime
soon.
The
future of our children and grandchildren are definitely at
risk. Nothing is ever going to change unless I change,
unless you change. We can't sit on our proud achievements
of the past. I use to do this and I use to do that. I did
my share, let someone else do it. I gave my share years
ago. This isn't years ago people. This is now, and Jesus
is preaching from that mountainside now. Will we respond or
turn our ears and heart away? Time will certainly tell, now
won't it?
He spoke just three words
after His baptism in the Jordon River.
"Come Follow Me -
and your sins I will deliver."
But, not just only their sins -
those fishermen by the sea,
for our sins also he would die -
that we might share eternity.
Eternal life would be restored -
as Adam and Eve had disobeyed;
for eternal life was taken from us -
in the Garden of Eden that day.
He began to call on several others -
fishermen and men of other trades,
to walk with Him on a journey -
for they did not know the way.
After twelve was selected -
to be his close disciples and friends,
He set the course before them, -
they must follow till His very end.
The "Teacher" as they called Him -
laid before them His plan,
a journey not so pleasant -
as they would travel amid the land.
"Come follow Me" he said to many -
as the journey to Calvary began,
preaching to them in parables -
that they might better understand.
He cured many of their illnesses -
the blind, the deaf, and the lame,
and after they were restored to health -
they gave glory and praise to his name.
Those he called were all sinners -
the downtrodden and the lost,
to follow in his footsteps -
but to first pick up their cross.
He fed them when they were hungry -
often times there was nothing to eat;
He even took five loaves and two fish,
and replaced the hunger of each.
The crowds grew in numbers unfathomed -
just to hear his kind and gentle voice,
told them that their lot would not be easy -
that they would have to make a choice.
It was a difficult journey to travel -
he was challenged by hearts of hate,
laughed at, scorned, and rebuked -
this son of God who knew his fate.
As the final days of the journey unfolded -
many of those followers would stray,
He would be denied and left all alone,
and eventually he would be betrayed.
Laid upon his shoulders was a cross -
when he labored up Calvary's hill,
scourged, beaten, and bloody -
the soldiers tried to break his will.
His death was a result of his great love -
for sinners such as you and me,
and three words still echo in my heart -
He says them still yet this day,
"Come follow Me!"
