We have been billing the Sermon on the Mount as the ultimate success seminar. A major reason for this designation is that the sermon tells us how to get along with God, and that is the ultimate basis for success. After all, if the God of the universe is blessing you, you will be a success, and if He is not, you are in trouble.
How do we get along with God? Jesus provides an answer in our next Beatitude: “Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.” (Matthew 5:7)
This verse does not tell us explicitly who will show the merciful mercy, but the clear implication is that it is God. True, when we are merciful, other human beings may be more likely to cut us some slack, but that is not the message here.
One reason I say this is that this is not always the case. No one was more merciful than Jesus, yet the world showed Him precious little mercy.
More to the point, the Beatitudes tend to be talking about God’s response to us. It is God who comforts the mourning, who rewards the persecuted, etc. Therefore, in this Beatitude Jesus is telling us that if we are merciful, God will show us mercy.
Therefore, Jesus is teaching us that we get along with God in regard to being recipients of His mercy by showing mercy to others.
This seemly innocent teaching in reality represents a frontal assault against the current evangelical worldview. The shapers for contemporary evangelical thinking assure us that our behavior does not affect God’s attitude toward us or treatment of us. That is all of grace.
However, this Beatitude seems to teach otherwise. And to make matters worse, this same message permeates this significant sermon. The next chapter records Jesus teaching that God only forgives those who forgive others (Matthew 6:14-15), and in the following chapter Jesus teaches that those who judge will be judged by the same standard (Matthew 7:1-2).
Therefore, Jesus consistently asserts that contemporary evangelical leaders are wrong, that God deals with us according to our behavior. If you are nasty, God will be nasty to you, and if you are nice, you can expect similar treatment from God. Want to get along with God? Be righteous and kind. Love your neighbor.
This, of course, does not exclude grace. We are saved by grace, i.e. God justifies us by grace. We can go to God for forgiveness of present sins. Beyond that, God bestows many undeserved blessings on us.
However, it is a mistake to use this great truth to paint God as a one-dimensional personality. We have a low opinion of one-noters. Why would we think that God is one of them?
Why would we? Maybe because we have come under the influence of Rogerian psychology with its teaching of unconditional acceptance, which has led us to believe that “I will get along with God just because I am me, and I am special.”
This orientation has misled us to believe that the blood of Christ makes our behavior inconsequential to God. That view suggests that God feels just fine with us when we hurt others, the implications being that we are the only person in the universe that matters to God.
This view, seeing ourselves as the only person that matters, constitutes great existentialism and Rogerian psychology, but makes for really bad theology. It also engenders bad behavior, as revealed in George Barna’s findings regarding evangelicals.
If we would start to believe that how we treat others will influence how God treats us, this could start an evangelical reformation.