What is the Sermon on the Mount?

In the closing of the last chapter we saw our Lord Jesus Christ surrounded by a great multitude of people, which followed Him and who were attracted by the King's presence, before whom the various diseases had to flee. If we turn to the eighth chapter we find the continuation of these scenes we had in the last half of the fourth chapter. Between these two chapters are three very important ones, which are as such found only in this Gospel. The contents of the fifth, sixth and seventh chapters are in the form of a continued discourse of our Lord, commonly called "the sermon on the mount," an expression which the reader knows is nowhere found in the Gospels. If we look through Mark, Luke and John we do not find any such report there of a lengthy discourse; indeed, except a number of fragments in the Gospel of Luke, we find nothing whatever in them about these sayings. When we turn to the Gospel of Luke, we find that the portions of this discourse reported there are in an entirely different setting. We point to that which is generally called "the Lord's prayer." In Luke we read (chapter 11) that as He was praying in a certain place, when He ceased, one of His disciples said unto Him, Lord, teach us to pray, even as John also taught his disciples. And he said unto them, When ye pray, say, Our Father, etc. Now in Matthew there is no such incident, but the disciples hear it in a continual flow of speech. We also call attention to the fact that the call of Matthew is reported in the ninth chapter, the call of the twelve disciples in the tenth, here his discourse is placed before these historical events. The Holy Spirit, to carry through the wonderful scope of the first Gospel, has put the words of our Lord together into one continued address to His disciples, in the very midst of the most positive evidences that the King has come and Jehovah is in the midst of His people. When the King is manifest He utters His proclamation. Such is the discourse before us here in Matthew, the proclamation of the Lord Jesus Christ as King. And if the King proclaims, makes known His proclamation, it must be concerning the Kingdom which He came to bring, preached and offered to the people. Let this, then, be the starting-point of our analysis of this discourse. The so-called sermon on the mount is a proclamation concerning the Kingdom, the magna charta of the Kingdom of heavens.

As to the sermon, it is instruction in the righteousness proper to all that enter the Kingdom of the heavens. Those born of the Spirit alone can meet the state of soul blessed in the Lord's eyes. It is not a requirement as on Sinai, but Christ's description of such as suit the Kingdom. Not a word of grace to sinners is uttered. It is not the gospel of God's grace to the lost, but His words for His disciples; and personal obedience is the rock at its close. To misrepresent this is mere error; and it is evangelical men who find most difficulty. Others no doubt are wholly wrong; but we must not confound it with redemption or saving grace.

The multitudes were present, but the discourse was addressed to His disciples. This, chapter 5:4 clearly shews. If Luke 7:1 be compared, the facts appear pretty clearly. There it is said, "Now, when he had ended all his sayings in the audience of the people." The moral bearing of the fact is more important. The sermon on the mount characterizes the Lord's teaching in Israel, as introducing His doctrines. At the close of His ministry He has to denounce their rejection of it. Hence, here, as has been remarked, He begins with blessings, and in chapter 23 closes with woes. It will be observed that in the close of the preceding chapter, the power displayed in His ministry, and its effect in attracting the people from all quarters, had been stated. He preached the good news of the kingdom. In the sermon on the mount, He lays down its principles, describes the character of those who would enjoy its privileges, and gives positive directions for the government of their conduct. Meanwhile He was in the way with Israel, judgment awaiting them, if they did not agree quickly on the way. Hence, also, moral principles and precepts, not redemption, are the subject of the discourse. If this be understood, it is easy to perceive why the direct application of the discourse is to those who had received His word, and were entering into the kingdom, though as laying down the principles of the kingdom announced to all, all — at least those who had ears to hear — among the multitude were concerned in its contents. It may be remarked that in Luke the disciples are more formally distinguished — " Blessed are ye poor, for yours," etc., and hence woes are added. Just as in Matthew 3:7 the Pharisees and Sadducees are denounced, in Luke 3:7 the whole multitude. While this address was continued to Israel by Him who had the ministry of the circumcision for the truth of God — in a word, until Jesus was rejected — men were under trial, and, though God knew all things, were not treated as finally rejected; but the death of Christ, and we may add, the resisting of the testimony of the Holy Ghost, has closed the history of that trial, and the fig-tree is judged for ever to be fruitless and unprofitable. It did not then become so, but was proved to be so; and in Israel this was proved of every child of Adam, so that a new creation, connected with the Second Adam, risen and glorified, was needed. Hence we know fully the Son of Man came to seek and to save that which was lost.

In the going up the mountain, as we have in the beginning of Matt. 5, we have a parallel with Moses when he went up mount Sinai to receive the law from God to pass on to the children of Israel, both the tables of testimony and the ceremonial ordinances connected with them. So here we see our Lord sitting at the top of the mountain with His disciples gathered around Him, enunciating the principles of the kingdom of heaven. We have here what we may call the statute book of the kingdom. It is the King stating the principles of His kingdom which, as we have said, would be established if they would receive it by receiving Him. As we know, this co-called sermon on the mount runs on to the end of Matt. 7, and in the compass of these verses we hear our Lord saying, "Ye have heard that it was said" (Matt. 5:21), "but I say unto you." Fourteen times we hear the Lord saying, "I say." Who but One Who was God dare speak in this way? In the authority of His Own Person, yet in His position as the Messiah, He opens out these new principles.

Then when great multitudes followed Him from all parts of the land, it became necessary that the true character of the kingdom He was prepared to set up, should come out. And the Lord unfolds the principles of it to His disciples in what we know as the Sermon on the Mount. (Matt. 5 - 7)

In the so-called sermon on the mount (Matthew 5:1-7:28) the Lord proclaims the principles of the kingdom of heaven.

In Matthew we find all these events and actions of our Lord in a different setting. In vain do we look in our Gospel for the Sermon on the Mount. It is not reported and only given in full in the Gospel of Matthew. The Sermon on the Mount is the proclamation of the King concerning His Kingdom. Mark, describing Him as the ministering One, had to omit the utterances of the King. If we look for a place in Mark where the Sermon on the Mount belongs chronologically, it is at this point. For the peculiar arrangement of the events in the Gospel of Matthew see "Exposition of Matthew." He ordained the twelve to be with Him and endowed with supernatural power to be sent forth by Him. In Luke we read He prayed all night. The calling of the Twelve was for the extension of His loving ministry. Notice also the giving of names. "Boanerges" for the sons of Zebedee is only found here.

The sermon on the Mount is in no way a spiritualising of the law. There are but two commandments one could say that allusion is made to; and even this is not true, for the Lord gives a teaching which does not agree with that which was current among the ancients, if He does not even contradict it; and never would He have spoken thus of the law of God. He says that every word of the law and of the prophets shall come to pass; He Himself came not to make void, but to fulfil. Moreover to "fulfil" has not at all the sense of obeying, but just simply what is said of giving the fulness. Disobedience of the law when it was in force was not the means of entering into the kingdom. The Lord, like the gospel, confirms fully the law as come from God. When it subsisted, to be obedient to it was the path of God; but here, while saying so, the Lord puts His teaching in contrast with the discourses of the times of the law. The narrow gate and the strait way characterised the walk of the disciples: their fruits would shew the true nature of those who sought to make them go out of it.

The sermon is not the rich grace preached to sinners any more than redemption, but the path traced for the faithful who would have part in the kingdom which was going to be established. It will be remarked that the name of Father is very distinctly employed in this discourse of the Saviour. As it is said in John 17, "I have declared unto them thy name"; the Son being there, the name of the Father was revealed. Such is the measure of conduct ordained for the disciples with respect to others - "perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect." From this name flow the principles of their walk in this world. It is true that they were here, and He in heaven; and they addressed Him accordingly; but the Father was revealed. It is for the coming of the Father's kingdom that they were to pray.

The text universally alleged to put us under the law is, "I am not come to destroy the law and the prophets, I am not come to destroy but to fulfil." Now what Christ's fulfilling the law has to do with putting me under it I never could understand. I should have thought that it would have rather been the contrary, and, if fulfilled, there was an end of the matter. Thus He fulfilled the sacrifices, and the rather as He speaks of the prophets, which gives to the word "fulfil," used as it is as to both, a force quite different from that sought to be made of it. It is a mere fancy, let me add here, that a Christian cannot use every word of Scripture for profit, law and all, without (that is) putting him under law. All that happened to Israel is written for our instruction, on whom the ends of the world are come, but that does not put us in the place they were in. All that reveals God to me, His mind, His will, His ways, is profitable to me, is light, without putting me in the place of those of whom I read.

338 But there is another consideration to be referred to here, the sermon on the Mount. This, blessed as is the instruction contained in it, was before the cross which judicially closed the relationship of the Jews with God, breaking down the middle wall of partition. We have no hint of redemption in it from beginning to end, nor of the relationship in which men should stand to God by it. It gives, and gives most blessedly, the characters which were fitted to enter the kingdom of heaven just going to be set up. Now that kingdom was not yet set up, but announced as immediately to be so. Nor do I for a moment imply that they were to give up the character necessary in order to enter as soon as they had got into it. It would be absurd. But what it does is to give the characters suited to the kingdom, not to shew the effect of its being set up by the rejection and cross of Jesus. It is not the law, nor is it the gospel. Christ could not preach His death and resurrection as an accomplished ground of salvation. It is to disciples, though in the audience of all, that no man might mistake the true character of the kingdom, nor of those who were to get into it. That and the revelation of the Father's name are the subjects of the discourse. The law and the prophets were until John; since that the kingdom of heaven was preached, and every man passed into it. The gospel of the death and resurrection of Christ could not be preached, though long before and now prophesied of. The preaching was that they might receive Him, not crucify Him.

50 One topic remains untouched, to which, as occupying the minds of many saints, and of great importance in their eyes, I would here advert. A few words suffice to establish the system, and sanction the widespread condemnation of those who do not hold it: but the explanation of the point will require a somewhat greater space. "Their laws were heavenly; for they were those of the sermon on the mount" (page 22, note). This meeting the popular and just feeling, that the principles of the sermon on the mount ought to govern us, settles the whole question in many a mind that the sermon on the mount was addressed to the church, and that it was for no one else. But hard words will not drive me from what I have been taught of God from the word. Now I fully admit that the directions in the sermon on the mount are a guide to us. On the other hand it surely is very objectionable to say "their laws were heavenly, for they were those of the sermon on the mount," if it be meant that this is the whole directory of the church, or that the church was put under laws. Both of these propositions are entirely false. But the question (though it may seem so to those unaware of the bearing of all this) is not whether the church can take these directions, and use them by the Spirit for her guidance. If they are addressed to others than the church, then a condition is found to have existed to which the testimony of Christ applies, but which is not the church. If it is solely and exclusively the church, then there is no example (here at least) of disciples other than the church; and we are to take the disciples as being, during the lifetime of Jesus, the church; and the proper and peculiar blessedness of that body, in the unity of the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven, becomes a mere casual difference.

51 I say then, that the disciples were not then the church, though they afterwards became the first nucleus of it, and that the sermon on the mount is not addressed to the church, nor could be (though the church now has it for its guide in its walk). If I say to one who has never been at court, You cannot join the king's court but in a court dress, it is clear that he will have to wear the court dress when there. For what I say means that that is the dress that suits the court; but the man as yet does not form part of the king's court. But, further, the kingdom of heaven is not the church; and while we enter into it in the way of being the church, others may enter into it in another way, as the Jews and others during the millennium; and this dress prescribed in the sermon on the mount may be as needed for those who are to enter in in that way, as for those who are, by this new form of the manifold wisdom of God, become the church of God in earth. Thus when it is said, "Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth," this may be true of those who shall inherit the earth in a millennial way, and I believe will be true and more literally and immediately true than it is of the church; and that to confine it to the church as exclusively true of it, is only ignorance. This shews the bearing of the question.

Then, as to the fact, I say that the disciples were not then the church, and could not be addressed as the church (Christ being not yet dead and risen again, and the Spirit not given). They were addressed in their then condition. And is there any great wonder in that? But farther, could one in the church, a Christian now, as it has been put by one opposed to my view, have sat on the mount with the disciples, and have listened with the disciples to this sermon as addressed to himself as well as to them? I answer at once, No. He would have said, How blessed to my soul are these instructions! what a guide to my feet in this dark world! how my soul delights in them, and in Him who gave them! But he would have felt that they were addressed to them, and not to him. He was in the kingdom, he had the secret of the Lord, and the Holy Ghost dwelling in him. And this one word, "Except your righteousness exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven," would at once make him feel, "This is for them, addressed exclusively to them." It is impossible that such language as Ye shall in "no case enter" can be addressed to those who are already within, who are in and of the kingdom. It gives the immediate consciousness that the address is to others, though it may at the same time give the consciousness that the principles addressed belong to those that are within. That they got new instructions, belonging to the remnant, is most true - such as would not have suited any others. That this remnant became the nucleus of the church and carried these instructions along with them into it, is equally true. But they were not then addressed as the church, nor even as being in the kingdom: nor could they be, for neither was set up. And this sermon is in prospect of the setting up of the kingdom, and shews the qualities and persons suited to it before it was so set up, and in no case even alludes to the church.