Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
“Blessed are those who are persecuted” sounds as silly as “blessed are those who mourn.” Persecution and blessing do not go together. What does Jesus mean?
I am going to assume that verse 10 and verse 11 of Matthew 5 are close enough in meaning to deal with both verses in this one reflection. Verse 11 seems to expand on verse 10. The only difference being that Jesus for the first time speaks directly to the disciples who have gathered before him. “Blessed are you” rather than the more generic “Blessed are those.”
The general idea is simple enough. A life conforming to Christ-likeness will not be easy. It has always been this way, “for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.” And of course it is the way of Jesus - “the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed…(Luke 9:22).
There is a qualifying statement to the persecution in both verses.
Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness sake.
Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute...on my account.
Jesus is not describing those who are picking a fight. He is not describing the quarrelsome or the instigator. He has already described the characteristics he is forming in us as meekness, mercy, and peacemaking.
Those who are persecuted because they are jerks aren’t really persecuted, they’re just reaping what they sow.
The persecution Jesus describes comes from pursuing righteousness. Dale Bruner nicely uses the next section of the Sermon on the Mount to describe what Jesus is getting at:
Disciples will be called fanatics; in seeking reconciliation they will be called cowards; in decisions for sexual purity they will be called puritanical; in fidelity to marriage they will be called prudish; in rejecting oaths they will be called sectarian; in responding nonviolently they will be called weaklings; and in loving enemies they will be called unpatriotic.
In other words, obedience will be labeled as fanatical, foolish, even hateful. I remember after reading the Sermon on the Mount with a small group of men over several weeks, one of the men responded by saying, “This all sounds nice and all, but I work in the real world and I am sorry but this would never work.”
Pause there for a moment. I think we all understand what my friend was saying - and those of you who have worked more “normal” jobs than I have probably understand what he is saying better than I do. But, think of what this implies. It implies that Jesus, who “is before all things, and in whom all things hold together” (Col. 1:16), doesn’t know what the real world is like.
Does the “real world” work though? Isn’t the so-called “real world” evidence enough that the way of Jesus should be given a hearing.
G.K. Chesteron once said that “the first time you read it (The Sermon on the Mount) you feel it is impossible (much like my friend’s response); the second time you read it you feel nothing else is possible...on the first reading you feel it turns everything upside down, but the second time you read it you discover it turns everything right side up.”*
The way of Jesus - which is enabled by the grace of Jesus and the power of the Spirit at work in us - is what it means to be truly human. Jesus is the one human being in all of history who lived perfectly what it means to love God and love neighbor to the glory of God. As we are conformed into his likeness we are becoming more fully ourselves, more fully human. This will inevitably grate against the dehumanizing ways of the world. This is the primary way that most of us will experience persecution in America. We live in step with the beat of a different drummer and it will be misunderstood, laughed at, vilified, scorned, and ridiculed by those playing a different tune.
The Church, of course, around the world is persecuted in much more drastic ways. The church in America often sees persecution where there is none out of some false sense of victimization. But, it seems like Jesus is not stating what is possible - as in, you might be persecuted when you pursue righteousness - but what is inevitable. Followers of Jesus will be meek and mourners, merciful and peacemakers, pure in heart and hungry for righteousness, poor in spirit and persecuted.
The way of Jesus is the way of self-denial.
The way of the world is to be true to yourself.
The way of Jesus is recognition that everything, each breath, is a gift.
The way of the world is to assume we have certain entitlements.
The way of Jesus is the way of grace.
The way of the world is the way of merit.
The way of Jesus is the obedience of faith.
The way of the world is “you do you.”
The way of Jesus is the way of weakness.
The way of the world is the way of power.
The way of Jesus is the way of personal engagement with people who have names and lives and dreams and hurts.
The way of the world is the way of impersonal manipulation and false connection (hmm...like a blog.)
The way of Jesus is the way of justice.
The way of the world is the way of oppression.
The way of Jesus is the way of mercy.
The way of the world is the way of cold justice.
The way of Jesus is the way of nuance.
The way of the world is the way of self-righteous certainty.
The way of Jesus is the way of the cross.
The way of the world is the weapon of the cross.
Where these ways collide is where persecution happens. It comes from the right and from the left, from the religious and the secular, from inside the church and outside the church. I’m sure, at times, it comes from me and maybe you.
Holding all of the ways of Jesus at the same time is impossible (these beatitudes are like the fruit of the spirit not the fruit of our natural selves) which is why they begin with being poor in spirit - we recognize our need and ask for help.
My guess is persecution, for most of us, will feel akin to loneliness. Like Elijah we will often wonder am I the only one who has not bowed the knee. And of course we are simultaneously not alone, there is always a remnant, and we have often bowed the knee, which is why grace is so amazing. But, the loneliness is real. The talking heads on both poles speak a language that seems so foreign. Words that used to mean one thing now mean something else or nothing at all. We are strangers in a strange land.
Several years ago we had a house concert in our living room and a couple of musicians that worked for YWAM in Modesto, CA came and played some music and told their story. One of the songs by Chris Whitler has stuck with me for years. The opening verses go like this:
What did you expect?
The saints have always been a little sad
With threadbare souls and a hunger in their heart
What did you expect?
Haven’t you heard the prophets weep
And cry through brokenness because they see the way we miss
This Joy, Joy, the aching world, holds at bay,
Like a child scared of her doctor, and the freedom that he offers.
And Peace, Peace,
Surrounds us now, but no one sees,
So close it's kind of funny, how we still choose our running.
And it feels like it has never been any other way.
Yea, it feels like it has never been any other way.
At the time I was wrestling mightily with being a faithful pastor to a strained church in a challenging community. And the opening line, “What did you expect? The saints have always been a little sad,” came at me like they were sung by Jesus himself. What did you expect?
It is important to remember that the blessing and the kingdom are as real as the persecution and the loneliness. The same Jesus whispering, “What did you expect?” is also whispering the words of Peter in John 6, “Where else are you going to go? Only I have the words of life.”
Jesus can say those who are persecuted for righteousness are blessed because those who are persecuted for righteousness are close to him. For those who have tasted and seen, there is nowhere else you would want to be no matter how hard it gets.
I remember a seasoned pastor speaking to a small group of younger pastors (I was young then). I forget now who said it or what the setting we were in was but I remember his words. He looked at us and said, “You can’t quit because it is hard, so how are you going to keep going?” What I remember about that question is the certainty of the first half of the sentence, “You can’t quit because it’s hard.” And I knew exactly what he meant. Once you have experienced the good news of the real Jesus it is impossible to turn away. Not for some theological perseverance of the saints' reason (although I believe that is true too as Jesus holds us fast) but because you don’t want to. Where else would we go?
Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
*Quoted by E. Stanley Jones in a quote in Darrell Johnson’s The Glory of Preaching (pg. 165).
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