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Thus the Sermon ends on the same note of radical choice of which we have
been aware throughout. Jesus does not set before his followers a
string of easy ethical rules, so much as a set of values and ideals
which is entirely distinctive from the way of the world. He
summons us to renounce the prevailing secular culture in favour of the
Christian counter-culture. Repeatedly during our study we have
heard his call to his people to be different from everybody else.
The first time this became clear was in his commission to us to be both
'the salt of the earth' and 'the light of the world'. For these
metaphors set the Christian and non-Christian communities over against
each other as recognizably, indeed fundamentally, distinct. The
world is like rotting food, full of bacteria which cause its
disintegration; Jesus' followers are to be its salt, arresting its
decay. The world is a dark and dismal place, lacking sunshine,
living in shadow; Jesus' followers are to be its light, dispelling
its darkness and its gloom.
From then on the opposing standards are graphically described,
and the way of Jesus commended. Our righteousness is to be deeper
because it reaches even our hearts, and our love broader because it
embraces even our enemies. In piety we are to avoid the
ostentation of hypocrites and in prayer the verbosity of pagans.
Instead of our giving, praying and fasting are to be real, with no
compromise of our Christian integrity. For our treasure we are to
choose what endures through eternity, not what disintegrates on earth,
and for our master God, not money or possessions. As for our
ambition (what preoccupies our mind) this must not be our own material
security, but the spread of God's rule and righteousness in the world.
Instead of conforming to this world - whether in the form of
religious Pharisees or of irreligious pagans - we are called by Jesus to
imitate our heavenly Father. He is a peacemaker. And he
loves even the ungrateful and the selfish. So we must copy him,
not men. Only then shall we show that we are truly his sons and
daughters (5:9, 44-48). Here then is the alternative, either to
follow the crowd or to follow our Father in heaven, either to be a reed
swayed by the winds of public opinion or to be ruled by God's word, the
revelation of his character and will. And the overriding purpose
of the Sermon on the Mount is to present us with this alternative.
That is why the Sermon's conclusion is so appropriate, as Jesus
sketches the two ways (narrow and broad) and the two buildings (on rock
and sand). It would be impossible to exaggerate the importance of
the choice between them, since one way leads to life while the other
ends in destruction, and one building is secure while the other is
overwhelmed with disaster. Far more momentous than the choice even
of life-work or of a life-partner is the choice about life itself.
Which road are we going to travel? On which foundation are we
going to build?
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