Bonhoeffer's Discipleship Lesson 6 The Beatitudes & The Visible Community

Good evening, this is M.t. Clark, and welcome to Bonhoeffer's Discipleship. And tonight we'll be doing Lesson 6, which is going to be based on Matthew 5:1-13 or 14. I will— we'll see. Basically, it's going to be on the Beatitudes and the visible community. This is taken directly from Chapter 6 6 and 7 of Bonhoeffer's Discipleship or the Cost of Discipleship. I'm normally joined with Peter McCabbage, my good friend, but he has seminary work to do tonight, and he put his priorities on the things that matter—his study. He is a student of the word of God, and he's a deacon, and fully support him pursuing his ordination, I believe, is what the point of seminary is. So just as a reminder, I I am M.t. Clark. I have a master's in Christian counseling. I also am a Community Freedom Ministry Associate for Freedom in Christ Ministries and an online discipleship course leader, and I teach Freedom in Christ course, which is a discipleship course, and I'm a big fan of discipleship. As it's transformed my life, and a huge fan of Dietrich Bonhoeffer. And thus we're doing this informal walkthrough, uh, Bonhoeffer's, uh, Cost of Discipleship, to encourage other Christians to pursue their freedom in Christ and to live a life of a Christian discipleship, to get on that path of Christian discipleship and see where the Lord leads you to follow Jesus Christ. Um, well, I don't have to introduce Peter because he's not here tonight, and, um, so it's just me and my PowerPoint presentation where we're going to walk through, uh, Dietrich Bonhoeffer's Discipleship book. So let's just start sharing that right away here. Let's see, there we go. And we'll go to presentation view. And here we go. So away we go. Um, Bonhoeffer's Discipleship, Lesson 6: The Beatitudes and the Visible Community. It's brought to you by me, M.t. Clark, and mt4christ.org, my blog, and the MT for Christ 247 podcast. And if you're watching this and not listening to it, it's also the MT for Christ 247 YouTube channel where you can view this presentation. A reminder of our study: it's on discipleship, not the disciple. Bonhoeffer's words, not the man. If you wanted to learn more about Dietrich Bonhoeffer, I highly recommend Eric Metaxas's works. Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, and Spy is his biography, and his latest book, Letter to the American Church, in which Metaxas draws parallels between what happened in Bonhoeffer's time and what is happening to the American culture in terms of a compromise of our faith, and, you know, moral depravity and all that stuff. So I recommend those, but as a Freedom in Christ instructor, I also recommend highly The Bondage Breaker by Dr. Neil T. Anderson, and basically I recommend that. I've taught that, and if you'd like to hear those teachings, we have them on the M.t. Clark 24/7 podcast and the YouTube channel. It's just an audio teaching, though. For Freedom in Christ, The Bondage Breaker, and Victory Over the Darkness. We invite you to check those out, and as a reminder, there's— it's one word— Dietrich Bonhoeffer's Cost of Discipleship and his book Discipleship are one and the same. However, there's different translations out there of the original, of Bonhoeffer's language. He. He spoke in German, and it's been translated into English, and I was a little shocked to discover that there was such a variation between versions. Last week, I preferred the Cost of Discipleship version, which was printed— the version I had, the paper copy, was 1959 and reissued in 1995, but I think it was actually issued in 1940 '89, I want to say. But this week I am going with the updated version from Dietrich Bonhoeffer's Works, Volume 4, Discipleship, which was published in 1989 and reissued in 2001, is the copyright information I have. So we'll be in this one, not that one this week. And there's— well, I guess you'll have to read both to figure out the difference. Anyway, Um, it is on Matthew 5:1-12, but we're gonna dip into beyond that, um, the Sermon on the Mount, uh, the Beatitudes. And it begins in Matthew 5:1-2, says, and seeing the multitudes, he went up on a mountain, and when he was seated, his disciples came to him. Then he opened his mouth and taught them, saying— and Bonhoeffer says in regards to that, Jesus on the mountain the crowd, the disciples. And the crowd sees there is Jesus with his disciples who have joined him. The disciples, not so long before, uh, they themselves were part of the crowd. They were just like all the others. Then Jesus's call came, so they went, left everything behind and followed him. Since then, they have belonged to Jesus completely. Now they go with him, live with him, follow him wherever he leads them. Something has happened to them which has not happened to the others in the crowd. This is an extremely unsettling and offensive fact which is visually, visibly evident to the crowd. And I shared this classic painting that's supposed to be Sermon on the Mount, or at least a Google search would reveal this painting. And I like the way that it just focuses on Jesus and his disciples., and I can't really name the disciples in the painting, but I'm guessing this one here with the black halo, I'm guessing that's Judas. Anyway, we move along to what the disciples see. This is the people. Now they're looking at the crowd. This is the people from whom they have come, the lost sheep of the house of Israel. It is the chosen community of God. It is the people as church. When the disciples were called by Jesus from out of the people, They did the most obvious and natural thing lost sheep of the house of Israel could do. They followed the voice of the Good Shepherd because they knew his voice. They belong to this people indeed, especially because of the path on which they were led. They will live among this people. They will go into it and preach Jesus's call and the splendor of discipleship. But how will it all end? And then Jesus sees, uh, Jesus— what does Jesus say? Jesus sees his disciples are over there. They have visibly left the people to join him. He has called each individual one. They have given up everything in response to his call. Now they are living in renunciation and want. They are the poorest of the poor, the most tempted of the tempted, the hungriest of the hungry. They have only him. Yes, and with him they have nothing in the world, nothing at all, but everything, everything with God. So far he has found only a small community, but it is a great community he is looking for when he looks at the people. Disciples and the people belong together. The disciples will be his messengers. They will find listeners and believe. Believers here and there. Nevertheless, there will be enmity between the disciples and the people until the end, and everyone's rage at God and God's word will fall on his disciples, and they will be rejected with him. The cross comes into view. Christ, the disciples, the people— one can already see the whole history of the suffering of Jesus and his community. The, uh, the 1959 version said they can see the passion of Christ come into sight. Um, so yeah, you can see the whole history. It's all right there— the disciples, the crowd, and Jesus. And where will it all end? Well, I think we know. Uh, let's move ahead. Uh, who are the Beatitudes for anyway? Who are the blessed? Uh, therefore blessed Jesus is speaking to the disciples. He is speaking to those who are already under the power of his call. That call has made them poor, tempted, and hungry. He calls them blessed not because of their want or renunciation. Neither want nor renunciation are in themselves any reason to be called blessed. The only adequate reason is the call and the promise for whose sake those following him live in want and renunciation. Renunciation. The observation that some of the Beatitudes speak of want and others of the disciples' intentional renunciation or special virtues has no special meaning. Objective want and personal renunciation have their joint basis in Christ's call and promise. Neither of them has any value or claim in itself. Jesus calls his disciples blessed. Yeah, our ascetic practices of you know, a vow of poverty or renouncing everything of the world, you know, basically those are good works. And are they good works or bad works? Self-righteous works or the works of the kingdom of God? It depends on Jesus's call. If Christ calls you to do it, I'd say they're righteous works. If you're just doing it to impress people or to make yourself someone special, yeah, maybe they're not so good after all. So yeah, it's all about the call of Christ. It's not being in want and having personal renunciation that makes us righteous or makes us blessed, as the word says. Christ's call Jesus calls his disciples blessed, as Bonhoeffer writes. And what about the rest? The people hear it and are dismayed at witnessing what happens. That which belongs to the whole people of Israel according to God's promise is now being awarded to the small community of disciples chosen by Jesus. Theirs is the kingdom of heaven. But the disciples and the people are one in that they are all the community called by God. Every one of them is called. Jesus' blessing should lead to decisions and salvation for all of them. All are called to be what they truly are. The disciples are blessed because of Jesus' call that they followed. The entire people of God is blessed because of the promise which pertains to them. But will God's people, in faith in Jesus Christ and his word, now in fact seize the promise Or will they, in unfaith or disbelief, depart from Christ and his community? That remains to be seen even to this day. So the people of God are the nation of Israel, but Bonhoeffer correctly points out that it's through faith, and so the promise is theirs. Will you take the promise? Will you redeem? Will you be redeemed? Will you redeem the promise by putting your faith in Christ and following him? You know, some people think they're the nation of Israel's blessed, period, the end of story. The Bible indicates otherwise. It's through faith in Christ alone that we're saved, not because of where you were born or what nation you grew up in. It's not a cultural identity. Or even a religious practice. It's faith in Christ alone that will do it. Let's see, we move along to Matthew 5:3, the first of the Beatitudes. And as I noticed Bonhoeffer's commentary on it, these first few, these first few Beatitudes seem to split— his commentary seems to touch on, well, the disciples, the world, and then sort of a general promise or to us or to anyone who would want to receive the promises of the Beatitudes. So I sort of divided these first two with the text alone in these three headings. The first Beatitude is blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. The disciples, The disciples— I should just not read the heading and just read Bonhoeffer's text. The disciples are needy in every way. They are simply poor. They have no security, no property to call their own, no piece of earth they could call their home, no earthly community to which they might fully belong. But they also have neither spiritual power of their own nor experience or knowledge they can refer to and which could comfort them. For his sake, they have lost all that. When they followed him, they lost themselves and everything else which could have made them rich. Now they are so poor, so inexperienced, so foolish that they cannot hope for anything except him who called them. Jesus also knows those others, the representatives and preachers of the national religion. Those Pharisees, those powerful, respected people who stand firmly on the earth and inseparably rooted in the national way of life, the spirit of the times, and the popular piety. But Jesus does not speak to them. He speaks only to his disciples when he says, blessed, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. The kingdom of heaven will come to those who live thoroughly in renunciation and want for Jesus's sake. That's the disciples back then, and that's for us too. In the depths of their poverty, they inherit the kingdom of heaven. They have the treasure well hidden. They have it at the cross. The kingdom of heaven has promised them invisible majesty, and it is already given them in the complete poverty of the cross. And through the cross, you know, we get the kingdom of heaven. Um,— and yeah, anyway, we'll move along. The next beatitude is Matthew 5:4, which says, Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. Every additional beatitude deepens the breach between the disciples and the people. The disciples' call becomes more and more visible. That is why the disciples are rejected as strangers in the world, bothersome guests, disturbers of the peace. The world celebrates and the disciples stand apart. The world shrieks, "Enjoy life!" and the disciples grieve. They see that the ship on which there are festive cheers and celebrating is already sinking. While the world imagines progress, strength, and a grand future, the disciples know about the end, judgment, and the arrival of the Kingdom of Heaven, for which the world is not at all ready. Those who mourn are those who are prepared to renounce and live without everything the world calls happiness and peace. They are those who cannot be brought into accord with the world, who cannot conform to the world. They mourn over the world, its guilt, its fate, and its, uh, and its happiness. Um, yeah. Um, You know, this really hits close to home because, I mean, you know, the world's narrative is that, you know, sort of evolutionary, we want to be moving towards good things and up, you know, up and onward, enjoy life, live your life to the fullest. But without a relationship with God, without peace with the Lord, there's nothing to celebrate. Basically, you are on the Titanic. It is a sinking ship, this world, and there is only one life preserver, and that is Jesus Christ. And the disciples know that. They know about judgment, and they know about the arrival of the Kingdom of Heaven. And without Christ, there is nothing to celebrate. We can try to help people, but without salvation, we are just treating symptoms to somebody who is a hopeless case. Those who mourn are those who are prepared to renounce and live without everything the world calls happiness and peace because they know the value of the gospel of Jesus Christ, and they know that those riches or those benefits of the world are temporary. So when they see the world lost in the flesh, lost in the self, trying to find their happiness in the things of this world, It just makes us grieve, and we desperately want all people to be saved. But without Christ, all that stuff is nothing, and you won't be blessed. So we're mourned, you know, that's what we're mourning is the things of this world. We lost them all, you know, they— we see the truth that, you know, those things don't satisfy, and, and it hurts. But we, we mourn for them and for the things lost and for the, the people who don't see it. We move along. Disciples' mourning ministry, bearing suffering. Everyone want to be a Christian? Your ministry will be bearing suffering. Yeah, yeah, we don't usually lead with that on Sunday morning. Anyway, Bonhoeffer says no one understands people better than Jesus's community. No one loves people more than Jesus's disciples. That is why they stand apart, why they mourn. It is meaningful and lovely that Luther translates the Greek word for what is blessed with to bear suffering. I won't even attempt to say the German word. The important part is the bearing. The community of disciples does not shake off suffering as if they had nothing to do with it. Instead, they bear it. In doing so, they give witness to their connection with the people around them. We know your pain. We feel it. At the same time, this indicates that they do not arbitrarily seek suffering either, that they do not withdraw into willful contempt for the world. Instead, they bear what is laid upon them and what happens to them in discipleship for the sake of Jesus Christ. Finally, disciples will not be weakened by suffering, worn down and embittered until they are broken. Instead, they bear suffering by the power of him who supports them, Jesus Christ. The disciples bear the suffering laid on them only by the power of him who bears all suffering on the cross. As bearers of suffering, they stand in communion with the crucified. They stand as strangers in the power of him who was so alien to the world that it crucified him. This is their comfort, or rather, he is their comfort, their comforter. This alien community is comforted by the cross. It is comforted in that it is thrust out to the place where the Comforter of Israel is waiting. Thus it finds its true home with the crucified Lord here and in eternity. When we're disciples, we take comfort from the cross. How counterintuitive is that? We're going to take comfort in someone else's death and torture? No, but we know— of course not— but we know what it means. We know that that is the way that the suffering in the world is borne, you know, is bared out on the cross. It's the answer to all the world's suffering, and we can be comforted knowing that it was for a reason, and we can bear the suffering that we face because of the— the reason that Christ died, and we play a part in it to share that hope. And we find our comfort in the presence of Jesus, who is in communion with us when we believe in him. Matthew 5:5, we move along to, Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. No rights they might claim protect this community of strangers in the world. Nor do they claim any such rights, for they are the meek who renounce all rights of their own for the sake of Jesus Christ. When they are berated, they are quiet. When violence is done to them, they endure it. When they are cast out, they yield. They do not sue for their rights. They do not make a scene when injustice is done them. They do not want rights of their own. They want to leave all justice to God. What is right for their Lord should be right for them. Only that in every word, in every gesture, it is revealed that they do not belong on this earth. The earth belongs to these who are without rights and power. Yeah, I would just like to comment on that. Um, there's such a, such a— in today's culture, there's such a push for, you know, give me my rights. I have the right to do this. I have the right to do that. I want justice and I want it now. The way of the cross is a little different. Christ didn't defend himself, and he trusted God to do what was right. And in there it says not to sue. I know when I've faced injustice, I've considered suing someone. So there's a lot to learn about being meek. Let's see, we'll carry on with the section under the world. Let them have heaven, the world says sympathetically. That is where they belong. But Jesus says they will inherit the earth. So, you know, send us to heaven. Christ says we get the earth. Those who now possess the earth will, with violence and injustice, will lose it. And those who renounced it here, who are meek unto the cross, will rule over the new earth. We should not think of here of God's punishing justice in this world. Rather, when the realm of heaven will descend, then the form of the earth will be renewed, and it will be the earth of the community of Jesus. God does not abandon the earth. God created it. God sent God's Son to earth. God built a community on earth. Thus, the beginning is already made in this world's time. A sign is given, the sign of the cross. Already here, the powerless are given a piece of the earth. They have the church, their community, their property, their brothers and sisters in the midst of persecution, even unto the cross. But Galvagatha too is a piece of the earth. From Golgotha, where the meekest died, the earth will be made new. When the realm of God comes, then the meek will inherit the earth. And, and that's, uh, points to the end times, uh, you know, it basically points to Revelation with the millennial kingdom, uh, passages where, you know, Christ comes back and the only people left standing will be his disciples, and we will rule the earth. And thus the meek, the lowly, those who have faith and follow Christ and don't try to stand for their rights and try to rule the earth through violence and injustice, those people The disciples of Christ will one day inherit the earth, and it will be a new heaven and a new earth. So let's move along. Matthew 5:6 says, Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled. Disciples live renouncing their own righteousness. They give no credit— they get no credit themselves for what they do and sacrifice. The only righteousness they can have is in hungering thirsting for it. They will have neither their own righteousness nor God's righteousness on earth at all times. They look forward to God's future righteousness, but they cannot bring it about themselves. Whoa. Those who follow Jesus will be hungry and thirsty along the way. They are filled with longing for forgiveness of all sins and for complete renewal. They long for the renewal of the earth and for God's perfect justice. So yeah, but the curse, the curse upon the world still conceals God's justice. The sin of the world still falls on it. The one they are following must die accursed on the cross. His last cry is his desperate longing for justice: My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? But a disciple is not above the master. They follow him. They are blessed in doing so, for they have been promised that they will be filled. They shall receive righteousness not only by hearing, but righteousness will physically feed their body's hunger. They will eat the bread of the future life at the future heavenly supper with the Lord. They are blessed because of this future bread, since they already have it in the present. He who is the bread of life is among them, even in all hunger. This is the blessedness of sinners. And yeah, we hunger and thirst for righteousness, and then the ultimate righteousness is Christ. We get our righteousness through Christ, and so we long for his return where righteousness will rule the earth again. Again, looking at the end times, and, you know, we don't make ourselves righteous and God's righteousness is given to us. It's imputed to us. Christ's righteousness is imputed to us when we put our faith in him. We don't have to do anything to be righteous. We have to believe on the righteous one, and we receive it. Let's see, we'll move along to 5:7. Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy. Now, Bonhoeffer said earlier in his commentary that as we move through the Beatitudes, there's a further and further separation between the disciples and the crowd, the world. And as you notice, we sort of went down. As I read this commentary, I realized there's not a whole lot that applies to the world when we get further along, especially with something like mercy. Blessed are the merciful, so they shall obtain mercy. Bonhoeffer writes, these people without possessions, these strangers, these powerless, these sinners, these followers of Jesus live with him now also in the renunciation of their own dignity, for they are merciful. As if their own need and lack were not enough, they share in other people's need, debasement, and guilt. They have an irresistible love for the lowly, the sick, and for those who are in misery, for those who are demeaned and abused, for those who suffer injustice and are rejected, for everyone in pain and anxiety. They seek out all those who have fallen into sin and guilt. No need is too great, no sin is too regretful for mercy to reach. The merciful give their honor to those who have fallen into shame and take that shame unto themselves. They may be found in the company of tax collectors and sinners and willingly bear the shame of their fellowship. Yeah, and we're not too, you know, give mercy You know, uh, the disciples give away anyone's greatest possession, their own dignity and honor, and show mercy. They know only one dignity and honor, the mercy of their Lord, which is their only source of life. He was not ashamed of his disciples. He became a brother to his— to the people. He bore their shame all the way to death on the cross. This is the mercy of Jesus from which those who follow him wish to live, the mercy of the crucified one. This mercy lets them all forget their own honor and dignity and seek only the company of sinners. If shame now falls on them, they still are blessed, for they shall receive mercy someday. God will bend down low to them and take on their sin and shame. God will give them God's own honor and take away their dishonor. It will be God's honor to bear the shame of sinners and to clothe them with God's honor. Blessed are the merciful, for they have the merciful one as their Lord. And, you know, the passages on mercy reminds me of the forgiveness that we're to give to other people when we receive our forgiveness. You know, because we've received mercy, we give mercy. You know, we obtain it, we obtain it, then what do we do with it? We give it to others basically by forgiving them, for they know not what they do, and we try to lead them to obtain their own mercy through putting their faith in Christ. And so that mercy is great. Let's see, Matthew 5:8. And at this point, basically, I gave up on the divisions. It was all pretty short and, uh, succinct. But Matthew 5:8 says, Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Who is pure in heart? Only those who have completely given their hearts to Jesus so that he alone rules in them. Only those who do not stain their hearts with their own evil, but also not their own good. A pure heart is the simple heart of a child who does not know about good and evil, the heart of Adam before the fall, the heart in which the will of Jesus rules instead of one's own conscience. Those who renounce their own good and evil, their own heart, who are contrite and depend solely on Jesus, have purity of heart through the word of Jesus. Purity of heart here stands in contrast to the all external purity, which includes even purity of a well-meaning state of mind. A pure heart is pure of good and evil. It belongs entirely and undivided to Christ. It looks only to him who goes on ahead. Those alone will see God who in this life have looked only to Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Their hearts are free of defiling images. They are not pulled back and forth by the various wishes and intentions of their Their hearts are fully absorbed in seeing God. They will see God whose hearts mirror the image of Jesus Christ. And that's it. You know, when we follow the Lord, we're not terribly concerned about our own good or our own evil. We're concerned with doing the Lord's will. We're concerned with conforming to the image of Christ. And When we do that, it gives us a heart that's pure. In my walk, all the repentance I've done was all successful, which is through the power of God, the communion that I have with Christ. But it was all a response to be obedient to God's word, to have a pure heart, through Jesus's word. Through, you know, Jesus is the word of God after all. Um, and, uh, so I wanted to obey it and I wanted to come in line with it. And when I agreed to do that out of my heart instead of that of my self-will, um, righteousness and purity, uh, came. And, uh, it keeps coming, uh, to increasing and increasing, uh, measures, more and more. Uh, anyway, we move on to Matthew 5:9. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the sons of God. Jesus's followers are called to peace. When Jesus called them, they found their peace. Jesus is their peace. Now they are not only to have peace, but they are to make peace. Uh, to do this, they renounce violence and strife. Those things never help the cause of Christ. Um, Christ's kingdom is a realm of peace, and those in Christ's community greet each other with a greeting of peace. Grace to you. Peace to you. Jesus— peace and peace be with you. Jesus' disciples maintain peace by choosing to suffer instead of causing others to suffer. They preserve community when others destroy it. They renounce self-assertion and are silent in the face of hatred and injustice. That is how they overcome evil with good. —that is how they are makers of divine peace in a world of hatred and war. But their peace will never be greater than when they encounter evil people in peace and are willing to suffer for them, or from them actually. Peacemakers will bear the cross with their Lord, for peace was made at the cross. Because they are drawn into Christ's work of peace and called to the work of the Son of God, they themselves are called children of God. And we move along, uh, to Matthew 10:5-10. Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Uh, this does not refer to God's righteousness but to suffering for the sake of a righteous cause, suffering because of the righteous judgment and action of Jesus' disciples. In judgment and action, those who follow Jesus will be different from the world and renouncing property, happiness, rights, righteousness, honor, and violence. They will be offensive to the world. And if, you know, I just want to take a break there. If you don't believe that, just go protest for a right-to-life demonstration and see how offensive you are to the world. That is why the disciples— I carry on, sorry. That is why the disciples will be persecuted for righteousness. Justice's sake. Not recognition, but rejection will be the reward from the world for their word and deed. It is important that Jesus calls his disciples blessed not only when they directly confess his name, but also when they suffer for a just cause. They are given the same promise as the poor. For those who are persecuted, they are equally to— equal to the poor, you know. And I shared a picture of a burning church because that's the world. The world will hate Christ and his followers. And when you stand for righteousness, like traditional marriage, like I said, the right to life, people are going to revile against you and call you hateful. So thus, blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Amen. Here at the end of the Beatitudes, the question arises as to where in this world such a faith community could actually find a place. It has become clear that there is only one place for them, namely the place where the poorest, the most tempted, the meekest of all may be found. At the cross on Golgotha. The faith community of the blessed is the community of the crucified. With him they lost everything, and with him they found everything. Now the world comes down from the cross. Blessed, blessed. Now Jesus is speaking only to those who can understand it, to the disciples. That is why he uses a direct form of address when he goes to the last beatitude, which is in Matthew 5:11-12, it says, Blessed are you when they revile and persecute you and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for my sake. Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you. For my sake, for Christ's sake, the disciples are reviled. But it actually hurts Jesus. Everything falls on him, for they are reviled on his account. He bears the guilt. The reviling word, the deadly persecution, and the evil slander sealed the blessedness of the disciples in their communion with Jesus. Things cannot go any other way than that the world unleashes its fury in word violence and defamation at those meek strangers. The voice of these poor and meek is too threatening, too loud. Their suffering is too patient and quiet. In their poverty and suffering, this group of just Jesus's followers gives too strong a witness to the injustice of the world. That is fatal. While Jesus calls blessed, blessed, the world shrieks, away, away with them! Yes, away. But where will they go? Into the kingdom of heaven, as Christ promises here. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven. The poor will stand there in the joyous assembly. God's hand will wipe away the tears of estrangement from the eyes of the weeping. God feeds the hungry with the Lord's own supper. Wounded and martyred bodies shall be transformed, and instead of the clothing of sin and penitence, they will wear the white robe of eternal righteousness. From the eternal joy, there comes a call to the community of disciples here under the cross, the call of Jesus: Blessed, blessed. And we move along. That was the end of the Beatitudes, and we're moving into chapter 7, uh, the visible community. But as you can see, this is really like Bible study with Bonhoeffer because he moves in right into the next scriptures. Basically, um, this, the whole second half. Well, I should look ahead before I speak ahead, but basically it leads us through the scriptures. Bonhoeffer teaches straight out of the word of God to instruct us in how a disciple is supposed to live and what the cost of discipleship is. And of course, it's from Matthew 5:13 and 16 that we move along to. Where he says— Jesus Christ says, you are the salt of the earth, but if the salt loses its flavor, how shall it be seasoned? It is then good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by men. You are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden, nor do they light a lamp and put it under a basket but on a lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house. 'Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.' And here I share a picture of a salt shaker spilt, which says, 'Salt of the earth impacting others with the gospel.' We move along to the scriptures. Matthew 5:13, 'You are the salt of the earth.' Bonhoeffer comments, Those being spoken to are those called in the Beatitudes into the grace of following the Crucified One. Up until now, we must have had the impression that the blessed ones were too good for this world and only fit to live in heaven. Now they are described using the image of the most indispensable commodity on earth. They are the salt of the earth. They are the noblest asset, the highest value. The word the world possesses. Without them, the earth can no longer survive. The earth is preserved by salt. The world lives because of these poor, ignoble, and weak people whom the world rejects. It destroys its own life by driving out the disciples, and oh wonder, the earth may continue to live because of these outcasts. This divine salt— Bonhoeffer attributes that the Homer Divine Salt proves itself by its ineffective— is its effectiveness, my bad. It penetrates the entire earth. It is the earth's substance. Thus the disciples are focused not only on heaven but are reminded of their mission on earth. As those bound to Jesus alone are they sent to the earth, whose salt They are. Yeah, so it's not just yours is the kingdom of heaven, wait for it to come. You're the salt of the earth. And we are called into his work with all that we are. As Bonhoeffer goes on to say, when Jesus calls his disciples the salt instead of himself, this transfers his efficacy on the earth to them. He brings them into his work. He remains in, in the people of Israel, but he consigns the whole world to the disciples. Only when salt remains salty is the cleansing, flavoring power of salt preserved, and the earth preserved by salt. Salt must remain salty for its own sake as well as for the sake of the earth. The community of disciples must remain what Christ's call has made them. That will be their true efficacy on earth and their preserving strength. Salt does not decay. It is therefore a lasting power for cleansing. That is why salt is used in the Old Testament for offerings. The fact that salt will not decay guarantees that the community will last. You are the salt, not you should be the salt. The the disciples are given no choice whether they want to be salt or not. No appeal is made to them to become salt of the earth. Rather, they just are salt whether they want to be or not. But the power of the call which has reached them, you know, that's by the power of the call which has reached them. You are the salt, not you have salt or you have the salt. It would diminish the meaning to equate the disciples' message with salt, as the Reformers did. No, the disciples themselves are the salt, not just the word that they share. What is meant is their whole existence, their presence, to the extent that it is newly grounded in Christ's call to discipleship, that existence of which the Beatitudes speak. All those who follow Jesus' call to discipleship are made by that call to be the the salt of the earth in their whole existence. So it's not just sharing the gospel, um, that makes us the salt of the earth. It's the way we live. It's everything about us. We're supposed to represent the kingdom of God in everything we do, and that's what makes us salt. That guy's different. Um, he's a holy roller. He's a Bible thumper. You know, he's, he's one of those Christians. He's, in fact, uh, One of my friends, we were in a Christian fellowship group, and me and one of my friends were in a group, this woman, and we were both, you know, trying to live a discipled life. And we discovered later that the other members of the group called us ultra-Christians. So if you're an ultra-Christian, you're being salt of the earth. People are recognizing, wow, this guy really believes it and he really lives it. And that's it. We want to be authentic in our faith as disciples of Christ. We are the salt of the earth. Matthew 5:13 continues and says, but if the salt loses its flavor, how shall it be seasoned? And it is then good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled under the foot by men. So have you lost your flavor? Bonhoeffer writes, the other possibility, of course, is that salt loses its taste, that it stops being salt. It ceases to be effective. Then it really is no longer good for anything except to be thrown away. That is the special distinction of salt. Everything has to be salted, but salt that has lost its taste can never be again be salty. Everything, even the most spoiled stuff, can be saved by salt. Only salt which has lost its saltiness is hopelessly spoiled. That is the other reality of salt. That is the threatening judgment which hangs over the disciples' community. The earth is supposed to be saved by the community, but the community that has stopped being what it is will be hopelessly lost. That's pretty threatening, you know. You know, if you lose your saltiness, you're going to be thrown out. And you're supposed to be saved by, you know, the earth is supposed to be saved by us. But if we stop being what we're supposed to be, maybe we weren't what we thought we were and we'll be hopelessly lost, says Bonhoeffer. He continues to say, the call of Jesus Christ means being salt of the earth or being destroyed. Yikes. It means following Christ or the call itself will destroy the one called. There is no second opportunity to be saved. There cannot be such a salvation. That's pretty flat out wow, Bonhoeffer, because it's not a gospel of works, but if we're not who we are, we're not the church. If we're not the salt of the earth, we're not answering the call. We're not answering the call to discipleship. We're not a disciple. Um, by your fruits people will know you. So we'll move ahead with that. Um, but yeah, you can take it up with Bonhoeffer. Don't take it up with me. Um, I just happen to agree anyway. Um, but it goes on to say, uh, Jesus goes on to say, you are the light. Jesus is called Jesus' call promises the community of disciples not only the invisible efficacy of salt, but the visible shine of light. You are the light again, not you should be the light. The call itself has made disciples, them, light. It cannot be any other way. They are a light which is seen. It is very different than the call would be not No, it is, if it were different, then the call would not be revealed in them. What an impossible, senseless goal it would be for Jesus' disciples, for these disciples, to want to become the light of the world. They have already been made into the light by the call in discipleship. Again, not you have the light, but you are it. The light is not something given to you, as for example your preaching, but you yourselves are it. He who speaks directly of himself by saying, I am the light, says directly to his disciples, that's Jesus, you are the light in whom, in your whole lives, as long as you remain faithful to the call. Because you are the light, you can stay hidden no longer. Even if you wanted to. Uh, the— it's the city on the hill, the community of disciples. Light shines in this, and the city on the hill cannot be hidden. It simply cannot. It is a— it is visible far into the countryside, no matter whether it is a— it is a strong city, a guarded fortress, or a crumbling ruin. This city on the hill, what Israelites would not would not be— what Israelite would not be reminded of Jerusalem, the city built on high, is the community of disciples. That's the city on the hill. With all this, the followers of Jesus are no longer faced with a decision. The only decision possible for them has already been made. Now they have to be what they are, or they are not following Jesus. "The followers are the visible community of faith. Their discipleship is a visible act which separates them from the world, or it is not discipleship. And discipleship is as visible as light in the night, as a mountain is in the flatland." Yeah, people need to see it. You know, we are to be a visible community. That means in the public square and everywhere society goes, we are to represent the kingdom and represent Jesus Christ. You know, the visible community— we must be seen. To flee into invisibility is to deny the call. Any community of Jesus which wants to be invisible is no longer a community that follows him. No one, after lighting a lamp, puts it under the bushel basket but on the lampstand. There is that other possibility that the light will be shaded intentionally, that it is extinguished under the basket, the call— that the call is denied. Hide it under a bushel? No. The bushel basket under which the visible community hides its light can be fear of human beings just as much as it can be intentional conformity with the world or some arbitrary purposes, whether it be missionary purposes or whether it arises from misguided love for people. You know, you don't want to offend anybody with your faith, so you don't say anything. And then Bonhoeffer continues, but it may also be, and that is even more dangerous, a so-called Reformation theology which even dares to call itself the theology of the cross, and whose signature is that it prefers a humble invisibility in the form of total conformity to the world over Pharisaic visibility. In that case, the identifying mark of the community ceases to be an extraordinary visibility. Instead, it is identified by its fitness to function within the justitia civilis. Here, this criterion for Christianity is considered to be that the light should not shine. Exactly. You know, I know Eric Metaxas speaks on this in his book To the American Church, the letter to the American church, but I'm not quoting him because I don't remember exactly what he said. But basically it's this: what we have now are churches that don't seek to offend anybody and quote unquote rest on, I just want deliver the gospel of Jesus Christ. So they don't speak on anything. They just want to be friendly and conform to the world, sort of be like the world, and hope that people through, you know, lifestyle ministry or whatever will eventually see the light and just say, I want to be like this friendly Christian guy. And to do anything other than that, it would be like this legalistic Pharisee who's trying to judge people or offend someone. And Metaxas says it's a danger, you know, that it compromises the call to remain invisible. That, you know, some people say don't get into politics, you know, just to preach the gospel. I'm not political. And I used to be like that. I don't want to offend anyone. I'm a people pleaser. I want to be a peacemaker. But the thing is, the only peace comes from Christ, and that's going to offend people, no matter how nice you try. Believe me, and I try, I try, brother. But after a certain point, we have to be the light. And unfortunately, as the word of God tells us, that Men don't like the light because they like darkness. They don't like their own darkness. They don't like to be told about God's righteousness, God's plan for salvation, and that most of us, all of us, are called to repent of our sins. So, but, you know, we don't want to offend anybody. We maybe not want to shine that light. But as Bonhoeffer points out, it's really denying the call of discipleship. We'll move along. The theological phrase of the day is the one I stumbled over, is justitia civilis. Say it 3 times, justitia civilis. Okay, maybe it's better if you say it quick. Anyway, what does that mean? Well, justitia civilis, or external thing, things external, is defined by Christian theologians as the class of acts in which fallen a man retains his ability to perform both good and evil moral acts. This means that he can be kind and just and fulfill his social duties in a manner to secure the approval or praise of his fellow man— fellow men. It is not meant that the state of mind in which these acts are performed or the motives by which they are determined are such as to meet the approval or praise of God. But simply that these acts, as to the matter of them, are prescribed by the moral law. In other words, it's the ability for people who don't have a covenant relationship with the Lord to do good things. But those good things, even though they could even be spelled in the Bible, like, you know, do not steal, do not lie, do not murder, I did all these things, but it doesn't, you know, it doesn't really gain the approval of God. It doesn't gain the praise of God. God wrote that law on everyone's heart. And the fact that we can be good and still be evil, you know, we could do both good and evil, you know, is why we need a Savior. The only reason we're forgiven is because of our faith in Jesus Christ, not because of our good works. And basically Bonhoeffer points out that the Reformation theology pretends to prefer to Pharisaic ostentation a modest invisibility. We'd rather be invisible than look like Pharisees, which in practice means conformity to the world. Yikes. When that happens, the hallmark of the church becomes just the Thea Sybillis instead of extraordinary visibility. We just do good works and we don't look that different from the rest of the world. You know, we do the good, we do the bad, and take them both, and we're just like, you know, our lost neighbors. The very failure of the light to shine becomes the touchstone of Christianity, you know. So that's not like a good phrase. Anyway, we move along. Let's see. And with the injunction to let your light shine. But Jesus says, let your light shine before the Gentiles. In any case, it is the light of Jesus's call which is shining. But what sort of light is it in which those followers of Jesus, those disciples of the Beatitudes, are to shine? What sort of light should come from that place to which only disciples have a claim? What do the invisibility and hiddenness of Jesus's cross, under which the disciples stand, have in common with the light which is to shine? Shouldn't it follow from the hiddenness of the cross that the disciples should likewise be hidden and not stand in the light? It is an evil sophistry which uses the cross of Jesus to derive from it the Church's call to conformation to the world. You know, don't conform to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of the mind. Does not a simple listener recognize quite clearly that precisely at the cross something extraordinary has become visible? Or is it all— or is that all nothing but just a stia civilis? Is the cross confirmation to the world? To the shock of everyone else, is the cross not something which became outrighteously visible in complete darkness. Is it not visible enough that Christ is rejected and must suffer, that his life ends outside the city gates on the hill of shame? Is that invisibility? No, they tried to hide it. They tried to hide, you know, Christ's— Christ, you know, they tried to discredit him. They tried to kill him. They tried to end but, uh, the world saw it, and those who believed, um, went to their deaths proclaiming it. And, uh, it survived through all of history because it wasn't invisible. It was very visible. And when you see it, when you hear the gospel and the Holy Spirit reveals to you the truth that Jesus Christ is Lord, it becomes very clear., and you see it everywhere. Let's move along. And the light of good works— by their fruit you will know them, as I said before. The good work— Bonhoeffer sums up by saying the good works of the disciples should be seen in this light. Not you, but your good work should be seen, says Jesus. And you don't stand up and say, look at me. Just let your actions and words Follow the Lord of all creation, be the thing that people see, and then they can give the Father the glory. What are these good works which can be seen in this light? They can be no other works than those Jesus himself created in the disciples when he called them, when he made them the light of the world under his cross. Poverty, being strangers, meekness, peacemaking, and finally being persecuted and rejected And all of them, the one work bearing the cross of Jesus Christ— pick up your cross and follow me, says Christ— all of those things are done. Why? Because of Christ, not because of our own righteousness that we're trying to earn through asceticism. The cross is that strange light which shines there, by which alone all these good works of the disciples can be seen. Nowhere does it say that God becomes visible, but that the good works will be seen and that the people will praise God for these works. The cross becomes visible and the work— works of the cross become visible. The wanton renunciation of the blessed become visible. But human beings can never be praised for the cross or for such a faith community. Only God can be praised. If the good works were all sorts of human virtues, then the disciples, not the Father, would be praised for them. As it is, there is nothing to praise in the disciple who bears the cross, or in the faith community whose light so shines, which stands visibly on the mountain. Only the Father in heaven can be praised for their good works. Why am I here tonight doing this? Why am I speaking? Why am I reading Bonhoeffer's book online to— it's just for God's glory. It's to give him the praise, you know, for anything good that ever came out of me. You know, basically, I got to point to Jesus Christ, God the Father, and the Holy Spirit. It's for him. That is why they see the cross, and we'll finish up here. That is why they see the cross and the community of the cross and have faith in God, there then shines the light of the resurrection. You know, so yeah, when people see the cross, they see the community of the cross and have faith in God, that's when that resurrection power can be seen and light up the world. And it is my prayer— as I stop sharing the screen, as that was the last slide. It is my prayer that no matter where you are, whether you're listening to this or watching it on YouTube, that you answer the call that Christ has put on your life, that you seek the truth and you seek the Lord's will, and wherever it leads., and don't be caught in a church culture thinking that's the only thing that God has for you. Often he'll call you to do things that you never expected, but that could mean serving in your local church. So we don't rally against the church; we support it, and we just say, you know, live your faith every day. Don't just visit your faith once a day, one day a week at a local church. Choose to live a discipled life. Make the daily decision to know who you are in Christ and to live a life of Christian discipleship, because the things that you surrender to the Lord are given back to you more than you could ever imagine. And that's tonight's teaching. If you don't know what I'm talking about in terms of the Life of Christian Discipleship, that's okay. We encourage you to check out our teachings that we have on the podcast and our YouTube channel for Victory Over the Darkness, The Bondage Breaker, and Freedom in Christ to get some teaching from Dr. Neil Anderson in the Word of God that will lead you to find your freedom in Christ., to give you the assurance of salvation, to help you with your identity of who you are in Christ, and to give you tools, um, to overcome the things that, uh, that would trip you up. Um, so we invite you to check those out. And as always, we invite you to read the Bible. Um, we are transformed by the renewing of our mind through the word of God. As good as Bonhoeffer's book is, it doesn't compare to the word of God from which he teaches. So we encourage that. And if you didn't know, we have a Bible study on our podcast and our YouTube channel. It's a little program that we call Bible Study with the Cinkatis, as I'm joined by Arthur and Susanna Cinkati each week, and we discuss whatever topic Arthur comes up with, and we try to keep it in the context of what the word of God says and how it affects our lives and how we can apply the word of God to our lives. The application of knowledge is wisdom, and we seek to use the highest wisdom, that is the word of God. So from me, M.t. Clark, and mtforchrist.org, and the MT for Christ 24/7 podcast and YouTube channel, we wish everyone a good night. Next week we'll be doing another lesson. It'll be lesson 7, and I believe it's on the righteousness of God. The brother and woman, uh, basically from the cost of discipleship. Um, that, that might be incorrect, um, but it will be for sure correct next week, and I'm pretty sure that's right. Um, well, uh, with that said, let me pray us out. Lord God, Heavenly Father, thank you for another day in your kingdom. Lord, thank you for the call that you put on our lives to follow Jesus, um, in all that we do. Lord, we pray for the people listening or watching this program, uh, that they would be encouraged in their Christian faith or to seek out, um, uh, the truth and to make Jesus Christ their Lord and Savior. Um, Lord, we just know that, um, your way is the way of peace, your way is the way of life, and when we put our faith in you and follow you as Christ's disciples, did, we will be blessed just as they were. Uh, Lord, we thank you, we praise you, we love you, and we pray all these things in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen. All right, good night everyone. Thank you for tuning in, and God bless you all.