Trust the Promises
Transcript
Shelby Abbott [00:00:00]: Welcome to the Connecting Podcast with Paul Tripp. My name is Shelby Abbott and this podcast exists to connect the transforming power of Jesus to everyday life, right here, right now. So why are we walking through The Beatitudes? Why are we walking through The Sermon on the Mount?
Paul Tripp [00:00:19]: Well, life right here, right now is hard and we live in a fallen world. It does not operate the way God originally intended. That hardship will enter your door. We live in a culture that does not esteem Christianity anymore and we will be misunderstood and mistreated. So how do you live there without being fearful, anxious, bitter, angry, paralyzed? How do you live this vibrant, hopeful, encouraged Christian life, a life of faithfulness to God?
Shelby [00:01:00]: Yes, a question every Christian should be asked.
Paul [00:01:02]: Yes, and there's no better place to go to answer that than The Sermon on the Mount. That's Jesus looking at His disciples. They, too, were living in a fallen world. They were under a foreign occupation. They were under a religious system that had gotten incredibly legalistic.
Paul [00:01:23]: Life was hard for them. Most of them would have been poor. Jesus calls His disciples away and says, "You want to live as My disciple in this world? This is how."
Shelby [00:01:38]: Yes, so today we're going to talk about trusting in the promises that are given, in particular, in The Beatitudes. So I'm going to read Matthew 5:2-12, but I'm going to be intentional about highlighting the promises that Jesus says here. So starting at verse two...
2And He opened his mouth and taught them, saying:
3“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
4“Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.
5“Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.
6“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.
7“Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.
8“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.
9“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.
10“Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
11“Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on My account. 12Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
Shelby [00:02:59]: A lot of promises in there, a lot of things to trust in, despite the difficulties.
Paul [00:03:06]: This is the life of a Christian's dreams. Kingdom of heaven, comforted, inherit the earth, satisfied, receive mercy, see God, called a son of God, inherit the kingdom of God and...
Shelby [00:03:24]: Reward is great.
Paul [00:03:25]: Rewarded.
Shelby [00:03:26]: Yes, when you highlight them and you go through them that way, it's like, "Oh, oh, oh!" It makes you joyful.
Paul [00:03:34]: Now, why do The Beatitudes include a promise? This is the way I read Scripture. I'm always asking why. Why does everyone need a promise? If these are blessings, just being that way, being that kind of person is a blessing. Why do I need the promise?
Shelby [00:04:06]: I think, in general, God understands that humans respond to being motivated by incentives.
Paul [00:04:13]: Yes, and there it is. I think it's such a beautiful thing. I mean, it's a level of grace that's almost hard to describe because God, who gives us the ability to do these things, then blesses us for doing them.
Shelby [00:04:40]: Yes, so crazy if you think about it that way.
Paul [00:04:43]: I mean, it's just amazing. We couldn't possibly do it without Him, and then He congratulates us for doing them and pours His blessing on us.
Shelby [00:04:49]: Right, yes, it's beautiful when you look at it.
Paul [00:04:51]: But I think the thing you said about human motivation is really important. God created us; every part of human functioning came out of His wise design, and so He understands how we operate. And part of our operation is the presence, reality, and importance of human motivation.
Paul [00:05:31]: When I was growing up, my mom and dad didn't teach about Santa Claus and sort of taught us that this is a great time for us to show love for one another at Christmas and give gifts.
Paul [00:05:49]: But one of the things my dad did is he would put up for all four of us (there are four children) a chart with chores. And for every chore, he put a little monetary amount to it. 25 cents, a dime, you know, a dollar. And he said at the end of... it would be like at Thanksgiving, he would do that. He said, "At the end of this, when we all go shopping together as a family, I will double it."
Shelby [00:06:30]: Great motivation.
Paul [00:06:30]: That man understood human motivation.
Shelby [00:06:32]: Yes, great incentives.
Paul [00:06:33]: And all of a sudden, we all got excited about chores and we were all calculating in our mind. And the beautiful thing, though, was when I went to shop, that was money I had earned, but I also felt rewarded because it was more than I had earned.
Paul [00:06:55]: You got to look at these rewards and say, "This is more than you could ever earn." I could never earn my way into the kingdom of heaven. I could never earn my way into lasting satisfaction. I could never earn my way into mercy.
Shelby [00:07:07]: Or seeing God.
Paul [00:07:09]: So, God is moving us toward Him by making these promises, but giving us vastly more than we could ever earn.
Shelby [00:07:22]: Absolutely incredible. Yes, it helps us to understand that God working through us is a reward in and of itself, too. It helps us to see the value of God being with us. It's not just the end prize, which He knows that we're, like I said, that we're motivated by, but it's that process of getting there as well, that there's joy and comfort and love in the process of getting to that end goal.
Paul [00:07:48]: That's right. We're in the process of completing a documentary on Paul Tripp Ministries because it's been 20 years and we wanted to do that, just celebrate God's goodness. Luella was interviewed because she's been an integral part of this from day one, and I thought she had the best summary of the whole twenty years.
Shelby [00:08:19]: Yes, what did she say?
Paul [00:08:20]: It was three words. She said, "Surprised by grace."
Shelby [00:08:27]: Beautiful.
Paul [00:08:28]: That this grace is just... it's surprising. Like, we're doing it again. We're going, "This is amazing." God enlivens me spiritually. I was a dead man walking. He gives me knowledge of what is right and wrong. He produces the desire in me to do what is right. He holds motivations in front of me in His promises, then He lavishes blessing on me at the end. I mean, it's just...
Shelby [00:08:56]: Grace on grace on grace.
Paul [00:08:57]: It's just... it is what John says in John 1. It's grace upon grace and upon grace, upon grace, upon grace, upon grace, and again I say unto you, upon grace.
Shelby [00:09:18]: And that promise of grace that will come and that is here right now is something that I think, not only helps us to appreciate the relationship we're in, it helps propel us toward being people who take joy in being obedient to God.
Shelby [00:09:41]: There's joy in obedience. It's not begrudging, like I have to do this kind of stuff in order to make God pleased or make Him happy. There's a joy in the fact that I am being obedient because it's bringing pleasure to God.
Paul [00:09:53]: Well, and you know, if you just wanted to look at The Beatitudes in a more legalistic way, you would say this is just a call to obey. Just obey. But that's not what it is. Following Jesus is the best blessed life ever. It just is.
Paul [00:10:22]: There's something else I want to mention about human motivation. We find it hard to be motivated by nebulous general motivations. Like if you say to your child, "Do your homework and maybe in the next couple weeks, we'll go get ice cream."
Shelby [00:10:46]: Not helpful.
Paul [00:10:47]: It's not going to do it and it's interesting to me that God understands me so completely that every beatitude has a particular promise of blessing. So beautiful. It's specific, so I can grab my...
Paul [00:11:11]: "Hold on, I want to receive mercy. I want a heart that's satisfied. Oh yes, I want that. I want to inherit the kingdom, the best kingdom ever, unlike any kingdom of this earth." And so, your heart runs after the specificity of the blessing you're being promised, not just, "Someday, somehow, yes, I'll be for you."
Shelby [00:11:31]: Some vague thing, yes, yes.
Paul [00:11:32]: Yes, it's not that at all, which means that God, in His condescending love, knowing how weak and distracted we can be, knowing how easily we give up, knowing how impatient we can be, never leaves us without reason to obey.
Paul [00:12:11]: He doesn't have to do this. He is the ruler of the universe. He could say, "Obey or else." But the Bible isn't an "obey or else". Is there judgment? Sure, there is, but God's principal way of motivating His children is not judgment.
Paul [00:12:38]: God's principal way of motivating his children is grace. It's a catalog of promises that are almost too extensive to recite because I am never, no matter what I'm doing, no matter what I'm facing, no matter how hard it is, or no matter how inconsequential it is, no matter what location I'm in, what situation I'm in, no matter who I'm with, I am always given reason to do what is right.
Shelby [00:13:13]: Yes, and I think it's important to understand, too, that the motivation that we have is fueled by knowing that the reward on the other side is worth the sacrifice. If somebody wants to work out and go through getting up early and lifting weights or running and going through the pain of that, they see the value on the other side and they think it's worth it, so they'll go through the pain of waking up early.
Shelby [00:13:40]: They'll go through the pain of running and go through the pain of lifting weights in order to get to that reward on the other side. And I think that once we see properly what Jesus is unpacking for us here, we see that reward on the other side and say the sacrifice was absolutely worth it.
Paul [00:13:57]: You know what I think our problem is? I think our problem is we don't comprehend and meditate on and embrace how the magnitude of God's love for us. This is love unlike any love we've ever experienced.
Paul [00:14:26]: This is love so deep, so beautiful, so comprehensive, so faithful, it just about stretches the bounds of human language as far as they can be stretched. Think about this. Think about this love. Everything He calls us to, He makes possible; then He lavishes reward on us. Where do you experience that?
Shelby [00:15:04]: Well, where else is that going to be? Even in the best of relationships, the best marriage you could ever have, the best parent-child relationship you could ever have pales in comparison to that. We don't have any categories for it, which is why this is so important to refresh ourselves with, to wash in this and see the beauty of it.
Paul [00:15:27]: So, where does this take us? It's not without your choice. You have to begin by saying, "I lack desire. I don't always want to be merciful. I don't always want to be a peacemaker. That often, I would rather have my own way. I'd rather have the buzz of sin for a moment. I'd rather win an argument with my wife than love her like Jesus loved the church. I'd rather win the argument over six inches of turf with my neighbor than to be an example of the love of Jesus."
Shelby [00:16:31]: Yes, I would rather win that argument online with someone and try to slam-dunk my opinion and be right, as opposed to loving and kind.
Paul [00:16:41]: I'd rather, rather, rather, rather, rather, rather, rather. You start there and say, "Lord, won't You meet me by Your grace? Won't You help me to remember You? Won't You help me to believe that my destiny is secure? Won't You help me to live with Your promises in view? Won't You correct my values, so that I would find joy in what gives You joy, so that I would know the bountiful, beautiful blessings of following You? Lord, help me. Lord, help me. Lord, help me." Those are prayers that your Lord will never turn His back on.
Shelby [00:17:45]: And even though that's scary because it brings us to the end of ourselves and I think a position of neediness that we see in scripture all over the place (Old Testament, Psalms, Proverbs, New Testament), neediness is a good thing in the eyes of God, but coming to the end of yourself and admitting your own neediness is just an incredibly difficult thing for a human being to do because we always are like, "What do I do? What am I supposed to do? How am I supposed to act? What am I supposed to say?" Those kinds of things. Well, when you're at the end of yourself, you got nothing but hope that God is going to show up.
Paul [00:18:21]: Maybe it's important to say if you're having regular times with the Lord and they don't include confession, you haven't really yet met with the Lord.
Shelby [00:18:36]: Yes, that's good.
Paul [00:18:37]: You got to come with that brokenness and you got to say, "Too high, too far. I need help," and God won't mock you. He won't be disgusted by you. He won't revisit His grace. He'll forgive and He'll empower and He'll transform and then, He'll give you the reward.
Shelby [00:19:07]: Incredible!
Paul [00:19:08]: It's helps so beautiful. May we find joy in The Beatitudes because our minds are stayed on Him and we trust Him; and we know that if our destiny is secure, today is secure, too, and our God gives lavish rewards.
Shelby [00:19:35]: Yes, let's trust in those promises. Amen.
Paul [00:19:38]: Amen.
