Sermon on the Mount

"Consider your own calling, brothers and sisters. Not many of you were wise by human standards, not many were powerful, not many were noble of birth. Rather, God chose the foolish of the world to shame the wise, and God chose the weak of the world to shame the strong, and God chose the lowly and despised of the world, those who count for nothing, to reduce to nothing those who are something, so that no human being might boast before God. . . . So, as it is written, 'Whoever boasts, should boast in the Lord.' " - [1 Corinthians 1: 26-31].

In Matthew 5, Jesus went up to the mountain and began to teach His disciples. One of the most famous components of His Sermon on the Mount were what is called "The Beatitudes."

The Beatitudes (literally, the Blessings) are a series of contrasting conditions of the human spirit:
Those who are poor in spirit will [inherit] the Kingdom of Heaven;
Those who mourn will be comforted;
Those who are meek will inherit the land;
Those who hunger and thirst for righteousness will be satisfied;
Those who are merciful will be shown mercy;
Those who are clean of heart will see God;
Those who are peacemakers will be called children of God.

I never knew about the Beatitudes when I was growing up. Yes, we went to church, until I was about age 14. I don't know what my parents learned there, sitting in the pew each Sunday.

But I didn't get any teaching of the Beatitudes -- from church or from my parents.

And yet, I lived the Beatitudes.

I was the peacemaker in the family. My mother and father did not get long. My brother was cruel to me. My mother sided with my brother over me. My father favored me over my mother, so my mother resented me. And him. . . My father complained about my brother to our mother.

I learned, early on, to stay out of the way. I was meek. I hid in my room a lot.

But, on a sunny days, my mother would say, "Go outside!! It is too nice to be inside, in your room."

Outside, my brother rounded up the neighborhood kids to bully me. They called us rich. Well, their families did not have a lot, and we had more. But that was not my FAULT, and it was not something I was in any way responsible for. I wasn't going to boast about it. It had nothing to do with ME. I certainly did not lord it over them. I just wanted to be liked-- or not liked -- by who I was.

The neighborhood kids would taunt me about my good grades. I could not help it that I had been given "smarts", or the diligence to work hard in school. But, I would not boast about my intelligence, it was how I was born.

I was the merciful one. When my brother hit me, I would go sit under the pine tree in a neighbor's yard. I would not strike back. My mother seemed weary all the time. I weeded her garden. I did the mending.

I was, by definition, weak. I was the baby and the only daughter. I was the smallest one in the household. And yet, my family seemed to take me as a "rebuke". Maybe because I was humble, not thinking I was so great for all the material things they had, which they believed would burnish their reputation.

Paul said, in 1 Corinthians, that "God chose the lowly and despised of the world, those who count for nothing, to reduce to nothing those who are something."  Certainly, my family thought they were "Something"-- way better than others, superior in every way. They spoke as the Pharisee did in Luke 18:11, "God, I thank you that I am not like other people -- robbers, evildoers, adulterers."

When I mentioned to my parents that we had enough to give some to charity, I was met with scorn and derision. I was despised for this. Not knowing what I was really saying, I was regarded as someone who counted for nothing, "reducing to nothing, those who are Something."

I was a "foolish" child, intelligent but not educated in the ways of the world. Like an "idiot savant", if my parents would excoriate the black man, I would proclaim that the black man could not alter the color of his skin. Or that, I as a female, could not help that my strong brain was born into a female body. My parents were horrified. It was as if I had spoken blasphemy.

Yet-- instead, God had chosen ME, the weak, the foolish, the lowly and despised, to shame the powerful, the strong, the so-called "wise"of the world.

Innocently, I did not know why what I was saying was so "wrong". It seemed that my family hated me. All I knew is that I did not belong. It was as if I had been born into the wrong family. Little did I know that I was there to shame them, to reduce them --who believed they were Something-- to Nothing.

It has taken me years to figure out that I was the righteous one ("right with God"). My family had mirrored the upside-down, radical world of the Kingdom of Heaven, where the powerful are stripped bare and reduced to Nothing; and the meek shall inherit the earth.

I was called ugly almost daily; and a Failure. Just as Matthew 5 says, "They utter[ed] every kind of evil against [me] falsely because of [Jesus]. "

But I am blessed. I am exhorted to, "Rejoice and be glad, for [the reward] will be great." I am promised that I will be satisfied, I will be shown mercy, I will be called child of God. I will see God.

[Related Postings: "Unlikely Blessings, 2/1/11;  "The Beatitudes", 11/13/15]

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