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Lesson OneThe Context of the Beatitudes3 Activities1 Assessment
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Lesson TwoMajor Approaches3 Activities1 Assessment
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Lesson ThreeReversals for the Unfortunate3 Activities1 Assessment
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Lesson FourRewards for the Virtuous3 Activities1 Assessment
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Lesson FiveLuke's Blessings and Woes3 Activities1 Assessment
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Course Wrap-UpCourse Completion1 Activity1 Assessment
Participants 179
Discussion Questions
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Why is it important to understand who Jesus’ teachings in the Sermon on the Mount were meant to apply to?
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70 Replies
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I feel that it is important to understand the target audience, because so many times scripture is taken out of context. Especially in our modern times, with the rise of what seems to be the false church and how it has connected itself to the government in the US.
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Clearly the sermon was for common people. Jesus first preached it to common people. It is important that we understand because there are still too many different interpretations of the beatitudes that one may fall into false teaching, but the bible reveals to us the true calling of God’s people.
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This is what we sign up for
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It’s important to understand who Jesus’ teachings in the Sermon on the Mount were meant to apply to so that none of us have any excuses as to think it wasn’t meant for me, you, or us followers of Jesus. It was and still is meant for us Christians.
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To question to whom Jesus is speaking in the Beatitudes is foolishness. Jesus came to bring the Kingdom of Heaven to us, symbolized in His departure so that the Comforter will come. As James 4:5 says the scriptures tell us that God is so jealous concerning us that He put His spirit in us because He wants us for himself. (ERV) Romans 8 will say that whoever does not have His Spirit is none of His. Jesus came to speak to “His.” Believers. Every color, creed, race, all who will believe in Him as He says in John 3 to “…whosoever believes shall not perish but have eternal life.” The dispensationalist have accurately discerned the Truth that all of Jesus’s teachings were originally for Israel, yet they must ascertain that YHWH, from the beginning (Revelations 13:8) had already decided to save the whole world, AND this covenant is wrapped in Abraham as Paul will reveal in Galatians 3 when he reveals that God said “seed” singular, speaking of Jesus Christ. His Abrahamic Covenant began with the Nation of Israel (seed as the sand- natural seed) and proceeded to the whole world (stars in the sky-spiritual seed). As a note, when the Israelites claimed Abraham as their father, Jesus denounced their claim with a scriptural condition, stating “If Abraham was your father you would know me, but since you don’t know me, Abraham is not your father. The devil is your father!” (John 8:44) Now John and all of Jesus disciples are Jewish so this is not a blanket statement to cast over the nation. This is Jesus defining the covenant of redemption for those who BELIEVE in HIm. He was referring to those Jews who did not believe in Him, and if He were here today, He would be referring to anyone who does not believe in Him as the scriptures teach. So the notion that the sermons on the mount is for the Jews is obliterated with that statement. Jesus exhorts that Abraham is the route by which He would come into the world (typology of the sacrifice of Isaac who is a type of Christ) and the place where Abraham saw God’s plan in Christ. Those Jews who reject Jesus are not of the covenant of redemption established between God and Abraham in Genesis 15. So, Jesus’s teachings are revelations of those who are Kingdom-minded. Not perfect. Abraham who lied, Isaac who told the same lie as his father Abraham, Joshua who made a covenant with the Gibeonites after God said to not do so, David who committed adultery, powerful Elijah who ran from Jezebel in fear for his life, Gideon who after waging a great war in God’s name incidentally created an ephod which will lead Israel into idol worship, Samson touching the dead, drinking wine, and eventually telling the secret of cutting his hair in his nazaritic covenant, all due to lust for Philistine woman. None of these were perfect yet they were all Kingdom chosen and Kingdom minded. God came to reveal His Kingdom to us on Earth and to give us the ability to live in that Kingdom now in the power of the Holy Spirit. Those who are so minded…will find themselves, however imperfectly…in the beatitudes.