058. Chapter 37 - The Deity of Christ in the Sermon on the Mount
Chapter 37 - The Deity of Christ in the Sermon on the Mount Attempted Isolation of the Sermon As the atheistic modernist, who attempts to construct a system of morals and a way of life apart from God, finds himself borrowing from the Sermon on the Mount, so the theistic modernist, who claims to believe in God, but rejects, in whole or in part, the claims of Jesus, joins his liberal comrade in making the Sermon on the Mount the chief source for his “social gospel.” The borrowing from the sermon by the one is surreptitious; the endorsement of the sermon by the other is open and effusive. The right-wing modernist who attempts to honor God and dishonor Christ decries the preaching of doctrine: “What the world needs is the Sermon on the Mount. Why preach about the resurrection, quarrel over the virgin birth, or proclaim the atoning death of Christ for the sins of the world? Why not preach a social gospel for all people, whatever their faith — a gospel such as the Sermon on the Mount proclaims?”
Such Isolation a Violation of the New Testament
Several considerations are paramount in analyzing this position: (1) Is the Sermon on the Mount a complete or final declaration of the Christian faith? (2) Can the sermon be dissected and the “social message” stand without its foundation on Christ? (3) Does this sermon itself not imply and declare the deity of Jesus? If the Sermon on the Mount can be taken as a full and final revelation of the Christian gospel, it is strange, as Denney says, that Christ did not go back to heaven after delivering it and the parable of the prodigal son and a few other such sermons. The very fact that Jesus continued to teach and centered the attention of His apostles, and through them of the whole world, upon the crucifixion and resurrection, shows that the attempt to reduce Christianity to a system of morals outlined by a great Teacher violates the whole life of Christ and the program of Christianity as a way of life Redemption is offered through a definite plan of salvation based upon the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus, and upon the manner of life and the teaching of Jesus. Thus the gospel comes to its climax in the Book of Acts after the accounts of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus have been given by the four Evangelists. Further application and illumination of Jesus’ life and program are given in the rest of the New Testament.
Reasons for the Skeptics’ Emphasis The reason is quite apparent why modernists sing a constant refrain: “The Sermon on the Mount is all the world needs. Let us maintain the Sermon on the Mount and discard the ‘dogma’ of Christ’s deity.” They have abandoned Christianity, but still insist on wearing the name of Christ. They desire to separate enough moral teaching from the rest of the New Testament to furnish them some sort of elevated propaganda without reference to the personal claims and program of Jesus. They would “create a new religion for this new age,” but find themselves forced to go to the New Testament for their material. They attempt to choose material for a system of philosophy without reference to the divine Person of the Son of God. The Advice of Talleyrand
They remind one of the French philosopher who decided to create a new religion for France in the wild excesses of the French Revolution which severed most of the nation from Christianity. He approached the great French statesman, Talleyrand, for advice as to how to proceed in creating a new religion. Talleyrand replied sarcastically that it should be a very simple task for the philosopher to create a substitute for Christianity: all he needed to do would be to have himself crucified and then raised from the dead!
Revealed Religion In other worlds, Christianity is a supernatural religion — revealed from heaven, based on a divine Person, established by miraculous evidence, offering a definite, divine program, culminating in eternal glory. The attempt to extract from the New Testament a code of morals and isolate this system as “the new religion” for “a new age” is utter folly. The philosophical sects of ancient Greece, such as the Stoics and Epicureans, attempted to expound a way of life: the one, a way of pessimism and self-restraint; the other, a way of blind optimism and self-indulgence. Both alike utterly failed.
Man’s Need
Any modern attempt to proclaim a system of morals apart from the perfect example and the divine Person of the Son of God must likewise fail. Men need example as well as precept. They need to be shown as well as told. They need the thrilling encouragement of the Pioneer who leads the way. Jesus showed the ages how to live and how to die, and came forth Victor over death to give man everlasting hope. Even Stoicism became cold and self-centered, for it had no personal example to follow; no great Person to demand allegiance and self-sacrifice. The similar attempts of modern skeptics only emphasize man’s perpetual folly.
Man needs more than precept and example. He needs more than to be shown how to live even though the precepts be infallible and all-inclusive and the example absolutely perfect; the result is but to leave man humbled, heart-broken, and hopeless because of his continual failure to walk the way of life which has been revealed to him. Man needs a divine Redeemer. There must be actual redemption from sin made possible for man. The death of Christ is God’s answer to man’s supreme need. The Sermon on the Mount does not proclaim the death of Christ, but it is the natural and essential preliminary to that declaration. The sermon can only be comprehended in the light of further declaration which Jesus added to it. The implications of the sermon lead on straight to the cross.
Divine Authority of the Sermon The deity of Christ is the living current which flows through the entire Bible. Read where you will and you cannot proceed far without encountering this current. The effort even to isolate this single sermon fails, for the Sermon on the Mount is founded on the rock of Jesus’ divine person. It can only be comprehended fully when illustrated by His perfect example. His declarations proceeded so directly from His own person and authority that it was this, rather than the amazing content of the sermon, which startled His hearers. Read carefully through the sermon and see how often He expressly presents Himself as the foundation of life, here and hereafter. When this is not openly stated, it is continually implied.
Uniqueness of the Sermon The content of the sermon is also of such unique and supreme character as immediately to place its Author above the sinful world to which it was delivered. Literary critics frequently remark that Shakespeare would be one of the most famous of writers by reason of his poems even if he had never written a single play. If we knew nothing about Jesus at all, with the exception of this single sermon, it would immediately place Him apart from all the rest of mankind, the insoluble mystery of the ages. Shakespeare, along with all the famous literary men of the world, borrows his moral insight into human conduct from the teaching of Jesus. This sermon is the unapproachable climax of all efforts to state in a single discourse the elemental duties of man toward God and his fellow man.
Inspiration of the Old Testament The Old Testament, by reason of the continual claims of its writers to speak for God, and because of the sublime content of its messages and the miracles which sealed them, proves itself to be uniquely inspired among a world of human productions of the time. The Sermon on the Mount surmounts the Old Testament both by reason of the actual distinctions drawn and principles enunciated, as well as by express claim of Jesus to authority to set it aside even as He proclaimed Himself “the fulfillment of the law” — the actual achievement of the goal for which the law was given.
Contrast of This Sermon and the Old Testament A single line of test will suffice for and the Old Testament measuring the Sermon on the Mount with the Old Testament. This sermon and the entire New Testament concentrate upon the thoughts and intents of the heart. The Old Testament system was one of innumerable regulations and ceremonies which were the prolific ground for the growth of formalism. The prophets cried out in protest against the empty form which carries out the letter, but has no life. In a series of beautiful sayings with which Jesus opened the sermon, He pictured the glory of the ideal life. He spoke with the authority of heaven in declaring the blessings of God upon those who walk in the way of life. His incisive analysis of the perfection man should seek is matched by the absolute assurance of what God will do in return. Man’s thought is turned to search and purge his own heart, seeking the realization of his spiritual need, sorrow over the triumph of evil, humility, eager desire for righteous living, love in his heart toward his fellows, purity of thought and purpose, desire to promote peace and loving-kindness among men, and determination to maintain absolute loyalty to Christ in spite of persecution and suffering. The Authority of Christ
One of the opening declarations of Jesus is that the Old Testament law finds its fulfillment in Him, even though it is so certainly the Word of God and so very precious that “not one jot or tittle” of it can possibly pass away until all for which it was given is fulfilled. “I came to fulfill” is the key to His attitude toward the Old Testament. To this end was the Old Testament law given: that it might prepare the chosen nation for the Christ and might lead them to accept as final and supreme His revelation from heaven. The absolute authority with which Jesus offers His teaching is proof of His deity. Moses received the law from God; the prophets prefaced their words with “Thus saith the Lord.” But Jesus declares: “Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time….But I say unto you.” Moses and the prophets were but human messengers delivering God’s message; Jesus is God in the flesh, speaking of His own divine authority. The Secret Sins of Man Unveiled The Old Testament contains the noblest system of morals man had known up to the time of Christ. But the Sermon on the Mount sets up standards of life which are so much higher and more difficult of attainment that the contemplation of it leaves man full of awe and shame. Jesus cut through the crust of conduct into the very essence of life: the thoughts, purposes, and motives of the heart. He laid bare to man the secret origin of his moral failures. He demanded that life be purified at its very source. When any man opens his heart to the Sermon on the Mount, he suddenly becomes conscious of the fact that he is a hypocrite. He is haunted by the acute realization of how vile and impure he has been in the secret recesses of his soul. He can no longer look with a sigh of relief at his hands, rejoicing that they have never been stained with the blood of his fellow men, for all of the thoughts and desires clothed in hatred and malice which have at times thronged his heart, rise up to condemn him. The nobler the man, the keener his self-realization and the more acute his embarrassment and self-abasement.
Man’s Conscience Stirred the by Sermon As a man realizes he is approaching Almighty God for the final judgment with the Sermon on the Mount in his hands, the dreadful specters of his sins haunt him. He is reminded of the situation of Richard III the night before the fatal battle in Bosworth Field when the ghosts of those he had murdered passed by his tent and accused him of his crimes until the wicked king, unable to bear the torture of his conscience, cried out, “My conscience hath a thousand several tongues, And every tongue brings in a several tale, And every tale condemns me for a villain.
Perjury, foul perjury, in the highest degree;
Murder, stern murder, in the dir’st degree;
All several sins, all us’d in each degree, Throng to the bar, crying all, Guilty! Guilty!” The person who can study the Sermon on the Mount without suffering distress of conscience had better look to his conscience. Someone has said, “The greatest of all sins is to be conscious of none.” Man is not qualified to judge as to the greatest of sins, but the emphasis of Jesus upon the sins of the self-righteous is in the superlative degree. This is the message of the parable of the Publican and the Pharisee. The luminous gleams of this principle are projected from every angle of the Sermon on the Mount, seeking to penetrate the vain and complacent meditation of men. The whole weight of the sermon is calculated to show to man his exceeding sinfulness. Could any greater contrast be conceived than the manner in which the sermon also reveals the sinlessness of Jesus? There is not in the entire sermon the slightest note of personal confession on the part of Jesus. Who but God could speak thus: with words of such absolute authority, such sublime insight into man’s failures and needs, and the consciousness of the perfection of heaven? The Claim to Perfection Implied The ideal which the sermon presents is so pure and complete that it brings to man at once the realization that he has not reached this ideal and that he cannot reach it. The net result is to cause man to cry out in shame and despair. Jesus continually pointed out during His sermon that the first great essential is for man to realize his sin and his hopeless condition without God’s mercy and grace. The Sermon on the Mount is the supreme effort to bring man into this mood. At the same time that the sermon unveils the sinfulness of man, it reveals the sinlessness of Jesus. Thus man is not left despairing and hopeless. The sermon reveals the highway to life. It offers God’s mercy and love in the person of Jesus Christ. It suggests that in the mystery and majesty of the person of One who united the perfection of man and of God, there is to be found the final salvation of man’s lost and ruined life. The serious contemplation of the heights and the depths of the Sermon on the Mount is enough to cause a man to join with Peter in the agonized cry of self-abnegation: “Depart from me, O Lord, for I am a sinful man.” This sermon by Jesus furnishes at once the indictment and the inspiration of the human race. It is as much the necessary prelude to the full gospel preached by Peter at Pentecost as the latter is the inevitable sequel to the Sermon on the Mount. The system of morals proclaimed in the Sermon on the Mount not only is delivered by the personal, infinite authority of Jesus, but it rests upon the perfect example which Jesus gave to the world. Here again is a divine uniqueness in the sermon. As He did not say, “I say to you by the authority of Moses and the prophets,” so He did not say, “Take my teaching, but not my life, as your guide.” The infallibility of His authority is matched by the absolute perfection of His life. There is not the slightest note of personal confession of sin or shortcoming in His sermon, even in the midst of the delivery of moral teachings so lofty that the best of men still struggle and strain even to comprehend, not to mention to attain them. The Actual Perfection of Jesus’ Life
What is the significance of this but that Jesus claims divine perfection? He had met the devil in the wilderness before He delivered the Sermon on the Mount. “We have not a high priest that cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but one that hath been in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin” (Hebrews 4:15). “For such a high priest became us, holy, guileless, undefiled, separated from sinners, and made higher than the heavens; who needeth not daily, like those high priests, to offer up sacrifices, first for his own sins, and then for the sins of the people; for this he did once for all, when he offered up himself” (Hebrews 7:26, Hebrews 7:27). As Jesus offered Himself on the cross as the perfect propitiation for the sins of the world, so He offers Himself in the Sermon on the Mount as the perfect Example of the teaching He is giving. It is implied in every line and syllable that He is keeping perfectly the moral and religious teaching He enjoins upon the world. Particularly applicable here is the remark which Godet offers upon the challenge Jesus issued to His enemies to point out a single sin in His life (John 8:46): “Had He been merely a super-eminently holy man with a conscience as tender as such a degree of sanctity implies, He would not have suffered the smallest sin, whether in His life or heart, to pass unperceived; and what hypocrisy it would, in this case, have been to put to others a question whose favorable solution would have rested only on their ignorance of facts which He Himself knew to be real!”
Jesus Presented Himself as the Embodiment of the Divine Program
Added to the infallible authority and the sinless life of Jesus underlying the sermon, there is the absolute identification of Jesus with the program which He presents. After stating the characteristics of the ideal disciple in the Beatitudes, He boldly sums them all up in a proposition of personal devotion of men to Him: “Blessed are ye when men shall reproach you, and persecute you, and say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake. Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets that were before you” (Matthew 5:11, Matthew 5:12). The prophets were persecuted by men for their devotion to God; Christians are to endure persecution because of their devotion to Jesus. The identification of Himself with God is decisively stated in this parallel as it is specifically declared in the closing words of the sermon: “he that doeth the will of my Father who is in heaven.”
Judge of the World The calmness with which Jesus proclaims His authority over the Old Testament, His own moral perfection, and the identification of all that is noble with personal devotion to Himself, are climaxed by His declaration that He is to be the judge of the world. He boldly traces the course of all human history, pointing out the swirling crowds pushing on their way through the wide gate to destruction and the few who enter by the narrow gate to life. He predicts the future attitude of the world toward His followers and the persecutions they will endure. He dares to open the gates of heaven and promise eternal reward. He is to be the Judge of the world in that final day: “Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven: but he that doeth the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say unto me in that day, Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy by thy name, and by thy name do many mighty works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity” (Matthew 7:21-23). The dramatic ending of this sermon is the vivid picture of a great house falling with a mighty crash amid the howling elements and the raging, relentless floods. It predicts the fate of the foolish man who “heareth these words of mine, and doeth them not.” The Sermon as Conclusive Evidence
Jesus repeatedly declared during His ministry that His deity would be clearly established by His resurrection. He indicated that His crucifixion would so establish His divine character and mission as to draw all men to Him. By the resurrection or even by the crucifixion (and they cannot be separated) one may prove the deity of Jesus regardless of the rest of His life. And the Sermon on the Mount — that which the modernists themselves would proclaim as the indivisible minimum of their social gospel — when carefully examined, shows forth Jesus as the Son of God, the Savior of the world and the Judge of the universe.