For Sunday, January 8, 2023:
Matthew 5:1-2 NLT: “One day as he saw the crowds gathering, Jesus went up on the mountainside and sat down. His disciples gathered around him, and he began to teach them.”
Jesus caught on! He was trending! People would follow him from place to place, and gather each morning to listen to his teaching. If this happened today, we’d say he received thousands of ‘likes’ on Facebook and was trending on Twitter. Jesus would be an ‘influencer!’
Jesus went up a mountainside, presumably so his voice could boom across the valley. The crowd then assembled on the opposite side of the valley, up the side of the neighboring mountain, forming an impromptu amphitheater. This was to be an important, detailed presentation. Theologians have named it, “The Sermon on the Mount.”
2,000 years ago, people were quite concerned with themselves, their power, their success, their place in society’s pecking order. It was quite a narcissistic society with everybody looking out for #1. Jesus is about to change all that! His heavenly concepts of loving the Lord and loving your neighbor somehow got lost in religion’s rules and rituals. Jesus is giving us a better way to live together, by caring for one another.
The best news is that God had eyewitnesses document the event, so even today we all could live our lives like Jesus taught!
Pastor Norton Lawellin
Jesus in the City Fellowship
