The Ethics of the Sermon on the Mount

pp. 99-105

The Kingdom of God is already in our midst but not fully revealed. Jesus pronounces the poor, those who

mourn, the meek, and the hungry and thirsty as the first beneficiaries of the kingdom of heaven.

He pronounces them as blessed – we share in their reward when we do our part to help these people in need.

The kingdom of God is about God’s intense desire to be part of our lives and our history.

We are called to be perfect as the Father is perfect Use of the word Abba (father/daddy)

throughout the sermon. We are also referred to as the “children” of our Father in heaven.

Being children of God has its obligations: loving our neighbour and even our enemy, to be generous, to be forgiving etc.

It is an ethics that makes us righteous

Righteousness – being upright blameless or morally right; to act with justice. We are made righteous through the loving action of God.

The Holy Spirit is what makes us right in the eyes of the Father.

We are also right before God as he sees his Son in us.

Grace

Our justification comes from the grace of God. Grace is favour, the free and undeserved help that God gives us to respond to his call and to become children of God.

Grace is also the supernatural gift we receive from living out the sacraments that were instituted by Christ. It is essential for everlasting life in Christ.

It is an eschatological ethics

Eschatology – pertaining to the end time or the fullness of time.

The Kingdom of God is a different kind of time than we normally experience.

We have been given a glimpse of God’s goodness and love; the Holy Spirit continues to work through us and we reproduce God’s love in fragments.

Eschatological ethics strive for the infinite good.

It is a response to an experience of being loved by God.

These glimpses of infinitely goodness that we receive are important and real.

To be right with God is to be right with each other. Our relationship with God is measured

by our relationship with the poor.

“Whatsoever you do the least of my brothers and sisters…”

It is a gospel ethics

Jesus is teaching us an ethics based on the New Covenant, according to St. Thomas Aquinas.

It goes beyond Mosaic law and is related to love – It is not punitive like the like divine legislation. Instead it is an invitation to come to Jesus.

Since we know God through the person of Jesus we have the knowledge to know who is making this invitation.

The New Testament Revelation of God God is revealed as love.

God is revealed as the Trinity – 3 persons in 1 God

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nhs4zTzCCfc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cgOt3Iuh8YE

Jesus is the perfect incarnation of God’s love.

The love God has for the world is why Jesus comes to Earth to redeem us and conquer sin.

“For God so loved the world, that he gave His only begotten Son, so that everyone who believes in Him may not perish but have eternal life.” John 3:16

The sermon itself is an expression of the kingdom of God.

Our first response is to receive it with gratitude and to be converted by it.

We become inspired by the love we receive from others and in turn are called respond with love.

Jesus is both the self-gift of God’s love and the full response to the gift of God in his mission of liberating people from sin.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cdQktpR7r20