Chart A
A Message in the Shadow of Growing Hatred
Luke 6:20-49.
I. The Setting to a Tough Sell
I love reading the stories of Jesus’ healings because they are done with such purity. He does not charge money, nor seek publicity, but heals because people need it. There is a beautiful example of such a miracle in Luke 6:6-10. It took place on a Sabbath and as Jesus entered the place of worship he noticed a sad sight. A man was there with a shriveled hand. This was in an agricultural economy and so if a man did not have two good hands he would not be able to work, not be able to feed his family, nor gain the respect of his wife, his children and most of all himself. Jesus healed the man. He gave the man back his ability to work and therefore his dignity.
God has called us to ministry. He has called us to do the very same things: to truly help people and “help them help themselves”. Many of us have tried teaching or ministry and Luke 6 has some insight for us. Our ministry might not go as we would expect. Luke records that something happened after the man’s hand was completely restored: But they were furious and began to discuss with one another what they might do to Jesus (6:11). The plots against His life began to take place.
Earlier in Luke there was violent reaction to the content of Jesus’ sermon (4:28-29). After that sermon they tried to kill Him. They tried to throw Him off of a cliff on which the city was built. What Jesus said in that sermon was that God was open to all people (even those who were not Jews), and it hit a nerve. Today, as most of us are not of Jewish extraction, we are so thankful that God is open to all people. How could such a statement be controversial? Was not God the creator of all the earth in Genesis 1 and 2? Does not the Old Testament teach that He is the Lord Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth? Did not Isaiah say the messiah would be a light for the Gentiles, that he may bring my salvation to the ends of the earth?
Those who have been in ministry know that sometimes the most difficult people to work with are “church people” and the most jealous or narrow-minded leaders to work with are “church leaders”. It was the church people of Jesus’ day that did not like hearing that God would save anyone who had faith, even those outside of their religious group (4:24-27) and it was the church leaders of Jesus’ day that did not appreciate the man with the shriveled hand being healed. Jesus healed it on a Sabbath, and so they thought Jesus broke a rule. They did not care about the maimed man only about a rule. Should we stay out of ministry? Will our efforts be unappreciated? The answers from the Gospel of Luke are “no” and “yes” in that order. We are called to go into ministry, but we are to realize it will be filled at times with opposition from the very people we would least expect it to come from.
In these chapters Jesus is modeling something for us. Some people in the religious community had begun to oppose Him, despite the amazing display of power to heal (4:23, 33-36, 38-41, 5:7, 12-15, 17-26 and 6:6-10) and release people from the sorrow of illness, demon-possession and despite His remarkable ability to deal positively with people. Their irritation with Jesus centered on petty religious concerns. Their opposition was said to be about His understanding of God’s Word even though His views accurately reflected the Old Testament’s spirit. These were the serious religious people of Jesus’ day and yet ironically their viewpoint and behavior was actually in opposition to what God’s Word taught.
When opposition comes from the very people who supposedly respect the Bible the most, it would discourage many. Jesus anticipated that discouragement and met it head-on. Jesus wanted to teach us how to deal with such opposition. He would not merely tell us what to do, but experience the very things we experience today and show us through His actions how to deal with it.
How the Shadow was dealt with
Effective ministry will draw praise and popularity (4:15, 22, 37, 40, 42, 5:15, 18, 26, and 6:17-19). It will also draw opposition. Human beings are hard to work with and there are as many idiots in the religious crowds as there are in the non-religious groups. And there is a generous sprinkling of jealousy, guarding of our turf, selfishness and lack of trust in God in every one of us. Part of our hearts will praise God and other parts will recoil in anger from what God will do. It is the same with dealing with people.
Jesus calls us to minister to such a corrupt species (both lay people and clergy) and in these chapters Luke (4-7) will show us He concentrated on two things: teaching the truth by doing the truth and then teaching us how to become like Him.
Following the horrible response in 6:11, Jesus appointed “apostles” (6:13-16). He appointed staff members. These twelve men must have been excited and pleased about being the “selected ones”. What they did not know is that they were selected under a growing and dangerous opposition. Jesus’ success and the way He went about it had sown the seeds of His own death. If they want to kill your boss, they will eventually turn on you.
What the disciples were to later realize and then reflect on was how Jesus reacted to the threat of 6:11. They too would experience such opposition immediately after His departure into heaven. The stories in the Book of Acts bountifully reveal this. They did well, and they knew how to do well because their Master had modeled it for them. They had been instructed on how to handle opposition.
Luke says Jesus modeled for them a fourfold pattern. First, He prayed all night (6:12). One of those days Jesus went out to a mountainside to pray, and spent the night praying to God. It is hard to pray when we have been treated in this way, but it is the first thing Luke records for us. Second, after this night in prayer, He made plans to expand His ministry by picking twelve key men whom He designated as “apostles” (6:13-16). They were to be the “sent ones” (what the word apostle literally means) as Jesus had plans of expanding His efforts. Luke will give examples of this expansion later in chapters 9 and 10. Instead of retreating and becoming worried, Jesus chose to enlarge the ministry. He did not tuck into the fetal position or labor under despair. He aggressively made plans to cultivate a new body of leaders. Perhaps, the direction to appoint apostles (and which ones to appoint) and the freedom from the sourness, fear or bitterness that opposition can create came from the night of prayer.
Second, as noted above, He looked into the future and began the task of enlarging the ministry and replacing Himself 6:13-16).
Third, He began doing again what He had done before that caused Him so much trouble: the healings (6:6-10) and His teaching (4:21-27, 5:20-21). He welcomed the crowds and began curing their illnesses and instructing their souls once more. He went down with them and stood on a level place. A large crowd of his disciples was there and a great number of people from all over Judea, from Jerusalem, and from the coast of Tyre and Sidon, who had come to hear him and to be healed of their diseases. Those troubled by evil spirits were cured, and the people all tried to touch him, because power was coming from him and healing them all. When I meet opposition and am not appreciated, it is so easy for me to say: “Fine, then I am not going to get involved again”. Jesus goes back to healing and teaching because that was still what people needed. This choice to return to the actions that cause opposition might also have been motivated by the whole night in prayer (6:12).
Fourth, He taught the crowds but Luke lets us know that the content of the teaching (6:20-49) was especially designed for these new “sent ones”. The crowds were there, but He set His eyes on the Apostles (6:20). Looking at the disciples, he said…. As hinted at before, Jesus did not pull in but expanded His efforts. This shows courage but insight as well. He knew these sent ones were the future; His time was short. He would accomplish much but it would have died with His generation if He had not called the twelve and begun the passing of the mantle of leadership (as with Elijah to Elisha). Jesus had already taught them by His courageous actions of praying, expanding though under threat and healing and teaching again though it had brought partial rejection. Now He taught with words how the next generation was to understand and act. He was speaking to you and I. Someday, you and I will also have to do the same things: model through our behavior and teach with words the next generation.
Two Major Themes
So what do you say to the new generation of Christian leaders who will face opposition for doing unselfish and effective ministry? The answer is found in Luke’s famous “Sermon on the Plain” and could be seen as “staff training”. What He taught them was remarkable. Content wise, it addresses two questions: what is the nature of true happiness and how does one deal graciously with enemies. The first is found in 6:20-26 and the second in 6:27-49.
These agendas were taught by a teacher who definitely had little cause to be happy: He was almost killed in 4:29 after His first sermon, and new threats hung over His future (and they would eventually succeed). He had real and immediate enemies or opposition (6:11). It is in these circumstances that Jesus taught His disciples the nature of true blessedness (or happiness) and how to handle one’s enemies with love. His disciples were to learn that day that to be a leader in the Kingdom of God would entail commitment to these two agendas. It was to be seen as foundational material for being in a leadership capacity in the Kingdom of God. What is more, this teaching, could keep His disciples (and us) from being destroyed by the discouragement that comes from opposition.
Teaching subjects the audience does not want to hear.
His audience needed these truths, but they did not know that. Can you imagine teaching new recruits to the ministry on these two subjects: what you fear most is the key to being blessed and you are to love the idiots who hate you? These are not the “feel good” messages so often heard in church and certainly not what we would expect to hear if one was trying to encourage people to consider ministry.
First, Jesus was saying that true blessedness consisted of what most of us try to avoid and judgment came upon those who experienced what most of us eagerly seek. We try to avoid being poor and seek to be rich, comfortable and well liked. Jesus taught that the things we avoid and fear could hold the key to our happiness (or we could use the more profound word: “blessedness”). No one wants to hear that blessedness comes from poverty or social rejection.
Second, Jesus followed with how to forgive your enemies and the depth of how He defined forgiveness was daunting. Jesus demonstrated for us how to attempt to move our disciples to a deeper and higher understanding of reality. What He desired for His disciples was both hard to do (6:27-46) and potentially painful (6:20-26), but was essential (6:47-49).
How to approach such teaching
So how does one go about teaching on subjects that are unpopular? The first thing Jesus does in addressing these tough issues is to catch His audience off guard. Jesus’ opening agenda (6:20-26) could be seen to cut in several directions. Those who had suffered were apt to find Jesus’ opening statements to be words of comfort, especially in 6:20-23, and thus could have appreciated how it illuminated their experience and gave hope. Blessed are the poor for yours is the Kingdom of God, could be wonderful to hear if you were poor. It would be a word of hope. Others, and no doubt many of the people present that day, and certainly this was true of the disciples, were not in the midst of some extreme hardship or pain. Perhaps, the message was speaking into their future. Finally, some were not poor or hungry, but rather rich and well respected and these words must have seemed uncomfortable.
Also, these truths are put in catchy, almost poetical form and so may not have sunk in at first. They would have given immediate comfort to some, but to others the phrases were so familiar that they created a temporary comfort similar to when we hear music we know well. The phrases were so familiar the uniqueness of how they were used might not have been consciously understood. It was only as one pondered what these words meant that they were understood. Perhaps, later when they were suffering a new openness to truth was possible. For a few, these words would immediately be seen as the very pinnacle of God’s Wisdom.
In the second agenda on forgiveness, the task was to get people started on a difficult path. When we are truly hurt we do not appreciate someone telling us to let him or her “get away with it”. If enemies did not presently beset us then the words were so beautiful that they did not offend. To those who were under the shattering oppression of an “enemy” in the form of a horrid boss, relative or co-worker His words would be exceedingly challenging. However, we all know through our own past experiences that difficult tasks always seem impossible until they are tried. The directions for a difficult task are seldom appreciated before it is attempted and completed.
To teach that one should love one’s enemies is not what we want to hear. Many of us have been horribly hurt and live in great dread or bitterness because of what has done to us. However, those who have tried to do what is taught in Luke 6:27-49 see and understand the beauty of this teaching. These verses demonstrate Jesus’ way of teaching: creativity, repetition, variety and finally shock.
Final difficulty
There is another disturbing aspect to these two tough agendas. As He ends both sections Jesus added a disturbing quality. They were taught in such a manner as to make it clear that they were not “good suggestions” but mandatory. One was not just “happier” if one obeyed the teachings about sorrow, but cursed and damned if one did not (6:24-26). Also, the carefully chosen metaphors used in the second agenda of 6:27-49 make it frighteningly clear that disobedience to the teaching about forgiveness of one’s enemies disqualified one from being a disciple and set up their doom (6:39-40, 43-44, 46 and 49).
II. Theme Number One: Definition of Blessedness 6:20-26
Content and Form: An enchanting Reversal.
The sermon opened, as mentioned above, with the proclamation to these new, potential leaders, on how to understand what made someone happy or blessed. Jesus attempted to persuade His audience to see life differently. His first attempt at persuasion, was to hold out a “carrot on a stick” to attract them. He promised a state of blessedness. He wanted His leaders to be able to know when they were on such a path. Certain conditions would define when they were in the right direction (6:20-23).
Blessed are you who are poor for yours is the kingdom of God.
Blessed are you who hunger now, for you will be satisfied.
Blessed are you who weep now for you will laugh.
Blessed are you when men hate you, when they exclude you and insult you and reject your name as evil, because of the Son of Man, for that is how their fathers treated the false prophets.
His second attempt to persuade was by means of a threat. Thus He defined the opposite of what created blessedness. They were to see what would lead them into a state of woe or judgment. After He had promised blessings He gave threats. Therefore, verses 20-23 contained a fourfold description of promised blessedness whereas 24-26, also in a fourfold manner, declared what constitutes being in a state of woe or a threatened state of judgment.
But woe to you who are rich, for you have already received your comfort.
Woe to you who are well fed now, for you will go hungry.
Woe to you who laugh now, for you will mourn and weep.
Woe to you when all men speak well of you, for that is how their fathers treated the false prophets.
Perhaps, you are like me when I first seriously read these statements. I found them very disturbing. I did not want to suffer, and so I was open to forego blessedness, but I did not like being damned because I would not allow the states that would produce blessedness. These statements frightened me, but something inside me knew they were true, but I feared what it would be like if I got inline with them.
We notice that each of the four statements about blessedness or the four statements about woe was crafted with two sub-parts. First, Blessedness or woe was defined, and then in each case a motive clause was given as to why the statement was true. The motive clause was given to pull them into the state described. You were blessed if you wept now because the future would be different and conversely you were in trouble if you laughed now for the future held sorrow. This pattern was in all eight statements.
The state of blessedness was defined by being in one of four conditions: to be in poverty, hunger, sorrow, or in a state of social rejection. All of these methods or states of obtaining blessedness are surprising, and in part because they describe various types of pain. In other words, “suffering equals blessedness”. To gain happiness or be in a state of blessedness is to be in a state of what we would consider unhappiness: poverty, hunger, crying, and experiencing social rejection.
In contrast, to become condemned or in a state of Woe was to be rich, well fed, happy and socially accepted. These were clear positive states or states of prosperity. In other words, “prosperity equals condemnation”. The motive clauses we find associated with the states of woe are: they have received their final comfort, would go hungry, would mourn and would not be associated with Israel’s great prophets but with the false prophets.
Can you imagine going to your High School or College Re-union and boasting about financial ruin, your miserable hunger, your nights of endless weeping and the disrespect all held you in?
Clearly, these are alarming verses. Is Jesus a negative person, has His own experience made Him bitter? Or was Jesus saying this is the way to true joy and to be a disciple of Jesus demanded a reversal in one’s way of thinking? This was His first message to His newly appointed leaders: evaluate your blessedness in an entirely different way than you normally do. Jesus was challenging them to see life differently and perhaps warning them of what would come in their future. It would lead to blessedness, but would first entail a state of sorrow or pain.
A Creative Switch of Familiar Words
The words that opened these phrases were familiar words found often in the Psalter: “Blessed are….” All of us want to be blessed. He creatively taped into an aspiration common to all cultures and used words specifically native to His culture that invoked that aspiration. This phrase is found 18 times in the Book of Psalms. The Psalms, of course, are poetry. They have a cadence and a beauty to them. All eight of these statements are beautifully crafted and easy to remember. The two sets have a parallel pattern in that in each set of four the last is always the longest. The poetry, the cadence have the capacity to drive them deep into our memory.
However, as beautiful and familiar as these formulations are, Jesus used them in a unexpected manner. He spoke of what made a man blessed, but then surprised His listeners with something they would not have considered a blessing. Once Jesus had their attention, He attempted to move them to a higher plain. He broached the truth that rough times, sorrow, hunger for what you do not have, rejection, and poverty could be the means of bringing us into the very realm we sought. Was He the deepest kind of optimist?
Employ Familiar Words in a Context One does not Expect
The Psalms teach us that to live correctly (trust in God 6x; help the poor 1x; fear and obey His law 5x; have a good thing done to us either by being forgiven 3x; being His chosen people 3x or be able to walk in His presence 1x) is a state of blessedness. If one continues reading in Luke (or in any of the other Gospels) Jesus brought up all of these truths in His teaching: trust in God, help the poor, obey the Torah, forgive others, be the elect and be one with Him. However, He did not use the “Blessed are…” phrase in those teaching sessions. He did not teach those truths here where one would expect Him to.
Instead, He was creative by employing the phrase “Blessed are…” in a different manner: blessedness would come from experiences that one would normally view as a curse. He understood what was humanly normal and scripturally normal, but wanted them to see that in His Kingdom even what would normally be viewed as a sorrow could be the beginning of being blessed.
Strange Combinations but not Strange Truths
Jesus was not disagreeing with the truths taught in the Psalter. Instead, He was restating another truth taught in the Old Testament: that if God was in the equation, “what was meant for evil could be turned into the service of good”. Joseph’s experience is an example of this, and he verbalized it in Genesis 50:19-21. Normally, it is bad to be sold into slavery by your own family, but the dynamic, sovereign action of God turned what was an evil deed by Joseph’s brothers into extensive good for Joseph, his family and many foreigners (Genesis12:3). King David first wept or was in difficult times for nearly a decade running from the corrupt Saul, but he wound up the greatest King Israel ever had. His difficulty helped him end His reign as King well whereas King Saul and David’s son Solomon, who did not experience such pain, did not end well.
What is different between Jesus and the Psalter’s use of the phrase is not theological in nature. The difference is in pedagogical method. What was different was how to use familiar phrases in a creative manner. In the Psalms, it is what we choose to do or God has chosen to do that sets up a state of blessing. In the Sermon on the Plain, the phrase was used to re-orient one’s conception of reality, because of the Sovereignty of God. In God’s hands, what was evil could become good. The athlete that is willing to but in the painful training is often the one who has the joy of success when the game is played or meet is run. Jesus is saying His disciples have a guarantee that blessing will follow sorrow.
As mentioned above this concept did not originate with the teachings of Jesus, it was in the Old Testament as well. Therefore, in Joseph’s life or in David’s what changed everything was the action of a sovereign God who could be trusted, and Jesus wanted His disciples to understand that the same God would be actively turning all the things they feared into blessings.
This creative switch of how familiar words were used was also present in the phrase, “woe to you”. That phrase was drawn from the prophets and when spoken by them set into motion a dreaded judgment. It was the dynamic nature of the prophet’s words (because they were God’s words) that caused the early prophets to be both admired, hated, or feared. Since God’s words had power (God created the world with them) if a prophet pronounced a word of woe (and it truly was from God) then that speech became the catalyst of the feared judgment. The words were not the cause in some magical sense, but were causative because they were God’s words.
It was not unusual that these woe oracles could be pronounced against the believing community (i.e. Israel or the Church). What was unusual were the motives listed by Jesus in 6:24-26. The apostles were familiar with the pronouncements of woe for issues like idolatry or abuse of the poor, but not because one was rich or well liked. Such motives as cause for judgment were unnerving. Usually such states were not motives for judgment but were signs of God’s blessing. However, as in Solomon or Saul’s case their wealth or lack of suffering helped bring about their undoing. Every great person in the Old Testament that did well experienced what is taught in 6:20-23.
The Anomaly is not Explained: Finally, there is another pedagogical method employed with these alarming phrases. They are not explained. They leave one “hanging in the air”, so to speak. A good way to get people to consider truths they would rather ignore is to startle them with the unusual use of familiar words but not fully explain what you mean. They would not forget what Jesus said because of the familiar, yet alarming way in which these poetic statements were crafted. They were left wondering.
III. Dealing with One’s enemies: Luke 6:27-49.
A. Approaching Difficult Subjects: forgiving one’s enemies:
Most people do not want to forgive their enemies and therefore most people don’t. Jesus was quite aware of the difficult task before Him. What He will do is clearly an exercise in persuasion. His work can become a model for our own efforts to approach difficult agendas. His primary method was to promise and threaten. He tried to motivate by promises, holding out many and various types of rewards (or carrots on a stick in front of the proverbial donkey) and by threatening with various types of coming judgment (the stick is waved in the face of the donkey).
His craft had other aspects. All through 6:27-49 Jesus would first teach directly then move to a more subtle approach or an indirect approach. He would hit hard and then back off and seem to go in another direction, but He would double back to the same disturbing agenda. In addition, both the subtle and overt approaches are laced with metaphors (multiple and varied types were used). The mental pictures the metaphors created would add punch to His attempts to sway them His way. He knew the importance of His subject so He used repetition through out, pounding away at the stubbornness of His audience. The repetitions are amazingly creative.
In addition, He showed His audience that compliance was beneficial and not optional. Therefore, He battled against superficial thinking. He would carefully and thoroughly define what it meant to forgive, how to do it and how extensively it was to be done. One saw how deeply He expected the forgiveness to go and how to specifically accomplish it. One could not complain that they did not know how to start or how much was expected. He pounded away against the entrenched attitudes that could destroy His listener. He truly cared that they became free.
The effort and work creative teaching demands are partial proof of the communicator’s intense love of their audience. The love is manifested by the intensity, variety and creativeness of the methods used. Boring teachers are often teachers that do not really care nor want to expend that much effort. Since He thought forgiving enemies was so important we will go through His argument.
B. The Basic Agenda: 6:27-36
Opening Commands: 27-28
Jesus stated what He wanted of His leaders in 27-28. He opens this second division by giving a fourfold command:
But I tell you who hear me:
Love your enemies,
Do good to those who hate you
Bless those who curse you,
Pray for those who mistreat you.
Repetition is clearly present, but it contains disturbing variety: to love an enemy also means: to do good, to bless, and to pray for one’s enemies. In similar fashion the word enemies has variety: an enemy was also referred to as those who hate, curse and mistreat you. The repetition is a Hebrew technique (well known from the Old Testament) for stating what is important. Repetition is the equivalent of an exclamation point. To the writers of the Old Testament what was important was repeated.
The repetition served in another fashion; it expanded the possible application in the mind of a listener or reader. We may not immediately think we have “enemies” but we may know certain people hate us, speak ill of us (curse us?) or have mistreated us. In similar fashion, the word “love” can be too common a word to truly grab us, but words like “do good” or “bless” or to actually “pray for” an individual that has demeaned or harmed us might take-hold. We might say we love someone but to actually pray or bless them could trigger a more profound understanding.
How One Blesses an Enemy: 6:29-31
Following the fourfold command to love your enemies in 27-28, the emphasis turns towards “how” to deal with mistreatment from those who are enemies (6:29-31). His audience was given concrete instructions on how to treat enemies. They were to treat them well. In essence, they were to be thoughtfully aware of injustice but to deliberately respond with an “others-centered” agenda. How they were to respond was to rise above the knee-jerk retribution so common in human interaction. Their response was to move to a higher agenda, a higher thoughtful approach. It was to consider not what is best for oneself or what one was “due” but rather to consider what we would consider best for ourselves as the measuring stick for our enemy or oppressor. He used two types of teaching methods to accomplish this: condition/result (29) and straight-forward commands (30-31).
Condition/Result Formulations.
Jesus was using a familiar literary form that His hearers had seen multiple times in the Old Testament. It was a major way to teach law and basically imbibed of an “if – then” formulation: “If” X then Y, or given this condition, “then” this result should be present. So Jesus says: If someone strikes you on one cheek, (then) turn to him the other also. If someone takes your cloak, (then) do not stop him from taking your tunic. “If” we are assaulted, which could be physically or more likely verbally, “then” we are to allow them to take another shot. “If” someone defrauds us financially, “then” we are not to resist if they seek to take more. Revenge or counter attack is not to be our response. It is a thoughtful lying down of our rights. Oswald Chambers says it well: “The only right a Christian has is the right not to insist upon his or her rights.”
Straight Forward Commands
Jesus then changes somewhat the mode of His instruction and goes back to the command formulation by stating three demands: give, do not demand it back and do to others what you would like. The first two belong together: give to those who ask from us, and do not demand back from them what was taken. In the context, if an enemy asks for help, help them and do not demand back what the enemy has taken from us. This is followed by a final command to do to others what we would desire to have done to us. Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back. Do to others as you would have them do to you. (6:30-31)
It is this last command: “Do to others as you would have them do to you” that could give insight to the above instructions. How would we like to be treated if we were the oppressor? So, if what our enemy asked for what would hurt them, should we give it? If they stole from us, would we want the person to demand it back? What would be good for the oppressor? For instance if someone at work who had miss treated us asked for help on a project then we were to help them despite how they have treated us. If they took credit for something we did at work then we were not to demand they return to us the credit for the successful idea or accomplishment. Certainly Jesus is not teaching us to be consumed with the bitter demands for justice. We are to still see our enemies as our brothers or perhaps how a parent would see a child.
Motivation to Forgive: 6:32-36
Rhetorical Questions
Then Jesus gave them reasons “why” they should forgive through a series of rhetorical questions that asked the listener to ponder the path to true virtue (6:32-34). This is a subtle form of argumentation. The motivation was founded on conclusions that Jesus asked His listeners to build by the questions He asked them. The listeners designed in their own minds the motivations. By asking the rhetorical questions He was forcing them to think things through on their own and come to conclusions that these questions led the listener to. If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even “sinners” love those who love them.
And if you do good to those who are good to you, what credit is that to you? Even “sinners” do that.
And if you lend to those from whom you expect repayment, what credit is that to you? Even “sinners” lend to “sinners”, expecting to be repaid in full (6:32-34).
The argument was simple, even sinners help those who help them but great people help those who do not help them. This is playing off of the idea of a higher agenda of getting your eyes off of our own rights but focusing on the needs of others, even our enemies (in 6:29-31). Here the higher agenda is to move beyond helping those who help us but helping others because helping is good in itself.
Straight Forward Commands with a Promise
The rhetorical questions also functioned in another way. They were setting up premises (foundational facts) that were to be the basis of what followed next: a three fold series of commands. Based on this reasoning from the rhetorical questions that greatness was to be found in helping those who had not first helped us, Jesus gave straightforward commands on the three topics brought up by the three rhetorical questions (6:35 a). But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back
Jesus is relentless; the threefold command was followed by a two-fold motive clause: a promise of reward (35b) and assurance that such behavior was following the very character of God (6:35 c). Then your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, because He is kind to the ungrateful and wicked. If we could give to those who did not give to us, then we would achieve greatness. Such actions bring us into the very nature of the Most High. We have begun to act like Him, or in simple terms we are like the Lord of Heaven, or “godly”. True godliness was not to be found in religious behavior but by being like God in our actions towards those who had harmed us. Reading your Bible or going to church did not make you godly, loving your enemies did.
The section on motivation is finally finished with repetition. Again, it is put in a straight-forward command and followed by a classical motive clause: Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful. (6:35-36)
This motivation section (which followed the “how” of 29-31) asked the newly appointed leaders to “think” (32-34) “do” (35a) and “know why” 35b-36). It is clear that 27-36 is a unit speaking of how to handle enemies (note 6:35a repeats 27a) and why they should do so.
Forgiving enemies is a very emotionally charged subject but it was to be approached with strength, rational arguments and by engaging the listener to make the case for Him. Jesus approached the subject authoritatively with the straight-forward commands (29-31 and 35a). He asked His audience to reflect on truths they had formed from their own understanding and from their own wisdom and perception of what was good for others (31) and how high an agenda this was (32-34). They were to focus on the fact that God would reward, and we would truly then be His children. Reward was promised along with the promise of intimate association and identity with God (35c-36). Given the promised results of loving one’s enemy it was logical to love your enemies (if one believed the promises).
C. The Extended Argument: 6:37-49
Straight Forward Commands with Motive Clauses: 37-38
It appears that Luke saw the following verses as still in the service of convincing Jesus’ audience to love their enemies. A new tack was taken that moved back towards the issue of “how” to love your enemies. The next two verses broached the issue of judging others and could, like the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 7, apply to other situations than just our enemies. However, in Luke’s context, it would be more natural to apply the instructions about judging others to judging enemies.
Luke continues to show “how” to love and “why” we should love our enemies. His approach is to teach us how to deal our natural judgmental attitudes that we form towards those who have harmed us. Luke defines how to love one’s enemies as eliminating our drive to judge or condemn but rather to do the opposite of what we would naturally want to do.
Do not judge, and you will not be judged.
Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned.
Forgive, and you will be forgiven. (37)
Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. (38)
It is natural to judge those who harm us, but if we are following the pattern set down in verses 27-36 then we are to forego our rights and that would include our natural desire to condemn. The motive clauses for not judging your enemies are somewhat different than the motive clauses given previously (in 32-36). What was new was that the blessing was centered on receiving forgiveness for oneself. To the extent that we do not judge or condemn, it would come back to us (6:37-38). What we were to give, was to give someone a break from the relentless judgmental condemnations we so naturally are filled with. The promise is if we do not condemn then we will not be condemned (6:37) and thus how much “slack” we give will determine how much “slack” we receive.
There is a subtle challenge of our normal understanding of control being taught here. Giving up our control could lead to freedom and peace. Our judgmental attitude leaves us imprisoned by our own hatred. Jesus is showing His followers “how” to break down the prison doors. Fight the need to judge by “re-directing” one’s mind to our own need of forgiveness and to fight to forgive by “re-directing” our mind on how much forgiveness we will need. The reward is a great one. Freedom from our own desired penalties would be gained and the reception of an abundant and expansive flow of forgiveness of our own mistakes and sins would ensue.
We are given not only the “way to salvation”, but the key to freedom from the crushing hatred that can oppress our mood and disposition. Our enemy’s actions no longer control us, but it demands that we give up a false sense of control. We falsely believe we are still in control if we hold a grudge. We have “at least in our minds” not let them “get away with it”. Indeed, we falsely think, we remain in control. The challenge to forgive promises control but it is a risk. We could refuse to make our minds focus on our own need of forgiveness. We could also choose to, by our free will to follow His commands. The choice is ours.
Rhetorical Questions to Persuade plus Promises: 39-40
The next two verses (6:39-40) present negative and then positive motivation. The point of both verses appeal to our role as leaders. He also told them this parable: “Can a blind man lead a blind man? Will they not both fall into a pit? The first verse is a parabolic statement that wants the listener to forge two images in his or her mind. The first image was of two blind men. These rhetorical questions function to draw in the listener’s mind a vivid picture: one blind man following another into a pit. We can all picture the harm that would overtake the follower. By implication Jesus was speaking of the harm that could come to those we lead if we are blinded by hate (6:39). These two questions are a new type of motivation appealing to the good within us that cares about those we influence. This would be a potent motivation for good leaders, good parents or good teachers. Good leaders do not want to harm their followers or students or children. Not forgiving would blind us spiritually and then we would pass on that state to those who watched and emulated us. Our lack of forgiveness would be picked up and emulated by those who we influenced. We would damn our own children, students or parishioners.
This theme of the responsibility of leadership continues in verse 40 but in a different literary form: an aphorism. A student is not above his teacher, but everyone who is fully trained will be like his teacher. This short wisdom saying forms within our mind a mental picture of a student and his teacher. This verse does not threaten but rather functions as a promise that a fully trained student emerged when the student was like his teacher. In this present context, the good student is like his teacher by following all that they have seen the teacher do and teach on loving enemies (from the context of 6:27-39).
This could be taken in two ways. First, in parallel with verse 39, the teacher would be us. The fully formed student would be those we influence. Second, Christ would be the teacher and we would be the students. We know from the rest of Luke’s Gospel that Christ did and would forgive others (even those who tortured Him on the Cross in 23:34) and so we would prove our own discipleship by doing the same.
The leadership theme continues in 6:41-42. Again an appeal is made to our higher nature. We need to be clear headed and insightful so as to help others. This section leaps back to an earlier theme of getting rid of a judgmental attitude begun in 6:37-38. Again the listener would be involved in building the argument by the use of rhetorical questions in 41-42a. Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, “Brother”, let me take the speck out of your eye,” when you yourself fail to see the plank in your own eye? (6:41-42a)
The listener’s deductions formed by thinking out the answers that the rhetorical questions demand set up what follows. You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye. (6:42 b) Similar to 6:32-35 a command ensued followed by another motive clause promising spiritual perception enabling one to help and serve one’s enemy (who is called a brother) in 42 b. Again the form was “think” (41-42a), “do” (42b), and understand “why” we should obey (42c) similar to the form in 32-36.
Agricultural Metaphors: 43-44
A new theme dominates the next series of metaphors (6:43-44). The metaphors are drawn from the world of agriculture. The theme centers on the fact that a person’s character is revealed by their actions. No good tree bears bad fruit, nor does a bad tree bear good fruit. Each tree is recognized by its own fruit. People do not pick figs from thorn bushes, or grapes from briars (6:43-44). This was indeed another or different way to persuade His audience. He asked them to observe nature and in that light see the persuasiveness of His view of dealing with enemies. The presence of a loving attitude towards one’s enemies or the lack of one would indicate one’s true nature. Bad fruit, or no forgiveness, indicated a bad tree or a poor leader in the Kingdom of God. The forgiveness or love of one’s enemies became the telling factor as to what type of disciple (and then leader) one was (6:43-44).
Business and Discipleship Metaphors: 45-46
The next metaphor contains both a promise and threat that speaks of what a merchant can offer to sell is determined by what is in his store house. The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For out of the overflow of his heart his mouth speaks (6:45). What is stored up in the very center of our being or mind (their hearts) is what we truly have to offer. What we have inside of us becomes apparent to the world by what comes out of our mouth. By implication, if we have not forgiven our enemies or are consumed by hate it will emerge in our conversation. Who we are is revealed.
The final metaphor to caps His arguments about how our identity is revealed by how we treat our enemies. The metaphor imbibes on a common relationship in the ancient world: mentor or Rabbi and his students. He asks another rhetorical question in 6:46: Why do you call me, “Lord, Lord,” and do not do what I say? The question elicits the picture of a student evaluating his or her right to claim some one as their mentor. The picture encourages us to ponder whether we are truly under the lordship of our master if we refuse to do what He said. The new leaders in the upcoming Kingdom of God must be in concert with what their master told them to do or they proved by their actions that He was, in reality, not their master. If they did not love their enemies which meant rising to see them as brothers who should be treated well, given to and forgiven, Christ was not their master. If we could not rise to His higher agenda, then we could not be considered to be disciples.
Concluding Parable: 47-49
The sermon was concluded by the famous parable/metaphor of a house built on dangerous sand or built on a solid rock foundation (6:47-49). I will show you what he is like who comes to me and hears my words and puts them into practice. He is like a man building a house, which dug down deep and laid the foundation on rock. When a flood came, the torrent struck that house but could not shake it, because it was well built. But the one who hears my words and does not put them into practice is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation. The moment the torrent struck that house, it collapsed and its destruction was complete.
In Luke’s Sermon on the Plain only two major agendas have been brought up: how to be blessed (or to be judged) and how to deal with enemies. Does this concluding metaphor apply solely to the teaching on how to handle one’s enemies or to the teaching found in 6:20-26 as well. It is probably best, given the nature of Jewish teaching found in the Old Testament, to have it serve in a “double-duty” function. The construction parable could be seen as a strong conclusion to the theme of handling enemies as well as to the theme of what a state of blessing is.
As all of us know “crisis reveals character”. Also, we all know rough times will come. Jesus never promised us an easy life and His life certainly did not model for us a life of ease. What is important is not avoiding the crisis but holding up well while in the midst of it. Thus a sound spiritual foundation in the new leaders of the Kingdom of God was promised to those who obeyed Jesus’ words. That strong foundation would help them weather the storms of life.
Spiritual collapse was threatened when rough times came if Jesus words were not obeyed. Spiritual solidity was promised when times of trouble came if obedience to His words was present (6:47-49). Jesus’ final statements (6:46-49) are His final attempt at persuasion. They state that our very existence as a disciple or our very survival is dependent on obeying. Sadly, we have all known people refuse to see sorrow in a different way and when the rough times come they quit being a Christian and see God as having let them down. Their faith collapses. In similar fashion, we have all met people who regularly attend church but are bitter, miserable people.
In a positive light we have seen those true Christians who have had rough, very rough times in their lives but it has only made them stronger, sweeter and more powerful. We have also seen the joy of some older people who do not see themselves as victims though often mistreated. Far from being victims, they move and operate in a mode of freedom, joy and insightfulness. They have forgiven their enemies and have instead learned to bless them. They choose to be free and are free indeed. The truth has set them free. When attacked they prayed (6:12), called others to the task (6:13-16), continued helping others (6:17-19) and taught how to forgive and handle tough times to others (6:27-49).
IV. Methods Employed Through Out the Sermon on the Plain
Simple Summary of What Lies Behind His Teaching
Jesus taught on two difficult subjects in Luke 6 and if we summarized what He did there it would bring up how He taught through out the Gospels. Two things dominate Luke 6 but will dominate all of His teaching. First, we have seen Jesus lived His teaching. He was what He taught. He would forgive, and He would demonstrate in His own life the blessings of poverty, suffering pain, hunger and rejection. Second, it is apparent that He loved those He taught. If we are to teach like Jesus taught then we too need to decide to love our audience (and not our acceptance or popularity) enough to confront the truly necessary, but difficult issues. For example, it will take great courage to broach the issues of the role of sorrow and the necessity of forgiveness of one’s enemies. Jesus is a courageous teacher but also a talented one. All through the Gospels He took on the tough issues but did so with great skill. This skill that He had was also a manifestation of His love for His audience. Thus to teach like Jesus we would have to decide to live the message, and then have enough love for those we teach to bring up the issues they do not want to hear and to love them enough to do it skillfully.
While teaching at the University I was asked a question the week before the students registered for classes. I was asked about a certain teacher and my answer was to list five other teachers that were well known across the curriculum for being excellent teachers. I said, “Your peers talk about the teacher you asked about in the same they talk about these other five.” An hour later that student came up to me and said: “Do you know what all five of those teachers have in common? They like us and we know it.” If I could boil down good teaching to one point, it would be: “You need to like your students”.
Love and audience, and I have found that real love, at least in me, is seldom spontaneous. Love is a choice we make, and it can be the motivation and drive behind all we do. One of the ways we love our students or our audience is to love God. If we love God we will already be practicing what we teach because it pleases Him. Love of our audience is also a choice we make that manifests itself in acting out in our lives the message we teach. To some degree if our message is a part of us, we will do this unconsciously. We do what we teach because we have already decided to so such things because they are pleasing to God.
The decision to love also manifests itself in our willingness to bring up these difficult issues. We have all met children who are a miserable to be around because they are so out of control, rude and self-centered. Almost without exception they have never been disciplined and never been brought to face the tough issues on important disciplines. We also have met children who are lazy and often they have never been confronted with necessity to work when young children. It might have been too unpleasant for their parents to such things and it has left their children ill equipped to deal with life as an adult and ill equipped to work hard at their marriage or in the raising of their own children. Their parents seemed to be taken the easy way out and betrayed them. Their parents may have said they loved them but it was a selfish feeling, not real love. It is much like the teacher who is well liked because students had little difficulty in their class but also learned very little. So if we love our neighbor and love God we will be on our way to teaching like He did.
However, if we decide to love our audience, our students or our children all of know how hard it is to get people to listen and do the difficult issues. Here is also where love is essential. If we love our audiences we will need to approach them skillfully. We cannot force them to follow God’s will but we should do our utmost to persuade them to try. I remember being angry with a fellow worker that refused to comply with our agreed upon standards and went to the head of the organization and asked permission to hold up his check until he complied. More was involved that just the standards, this particular employee often challenged me and some of our tension was personal, not organizational. He looked at me right in the eye and said very slowly: “OK, I will do as you ask”, but continued to fix me with his gaze. I then realized I went to too far. I would have got my way, but for the wrong reasons. I then replied that I would not press the point, but would let it go. Then the boss said, “You made a good decision.” He then told me he liked my passion for excellence, but wanted that passion to be matched with skill. The words that followed have burned long in my memory. He told me he wanted me to be like him, but to get there 10 years before he did. I then reflected that he was as passionate as I was but had made some bad decisions in pursing some of his goals. As I reflected on his face that day perhaps he was remembering some of those mistakes. However, He knew he could not shove his insights gained from those mistakes down my throat, but that I needed to choose for myself to be patient. He carefully, gave me the freedom, but also by his gaze was trying to persuade me to step up into a higher use of my passion and my authority. He wanted me to have wisdom as well as passion. It took wisdom to know when a decision was not based on complete objectivity. He wanted me to learn control when one had authority, and not to lose one’s passion but to handle it with insight and skill. He knew I had to choose to that. He knew I had to choose to love even those who irritated me.
He handled me with great skill. As we teach we need to persuade, we cannot force others to come to the highest. We do not always have the best role models for how to persuade people, but I believe the Scriptures are a great gift. They are given to us to help us be like He was. It has been my experience that I to decide to believe that Jesus was God and as God knew how to teach. I have had to decide to believe He knew best how to persuade the creatures He created. We have to decide to use the gift. We will not be forced to, it must be our decision. Similarly, those we teach may not choose to take the more difficult path. However, if we use skill as my boss did that day, the chances of our success will be greatly increased.
I must admit that there is a difficulty with His methods of persuasion. His methods take energy, concentration and practice. They are not easy to use, but they can be learned. However, we need to know what He did and so would will follow is a list of how He attempted to teach and persuade His audience. Our courage to teach His truths needs to be matched with adeptness. Our love will drive the necessary effort we need to expend. The “check list” of techniques below is to serve to remind us not to leave out any of His methods from our repertoire.
The listl below will serve two functions. First it will review and high light the methods He employed in the Sermon on the Plain. Second, it will serve to further elucidate what He was teaching.
1. Familiar Language: As was stated above, Jesus used familiar language patterns drawn from the culture. “Blessed are…and Woe to you…” were statements familiar to His audience as they were forms drawn from the Psalms and Prophetic literature. We would need to use phrases common to our culture that our audience would readily recognize. Jesus’ audience was a highly religiously conservative one and so He used phrases familiar to them. The apostles did not use this language or phraseology in the epistles as most of their audiences were more secular and Greek. Each age and each culture has unique phrases. Whether we live in a city or in a rural area, it is our job to find and employ the phrases common to our audience. We can then first connect with them and next surprise them by how we employ those phrases to serve a higher and challenging agenda: such as seeing the role of pain from a higher and deeper point of view.
2. Use of Motive Clauses: Jesus used a motive clause in all eight of the statements in 6:20-26. “For yours is the kingdom of heaven” or “for you have already received your comfort” are examples of Jesus appealing to the minds of His audience. Jesus’ teaching is inundated with motive clauses. Besides the eight given here, there are 3 different motives given in 32-36 to justify the commands in 27-36 and four are given in 37-38. There are two subtle motivations given in 39-40 and a clearly stated motive in 42, a subtle one in 46 and a clear promise and threat in the concluding parable in 47-49. Jesus is appealing to rational thought and trying to persuade His audience to go against their natural inclinations.
The mind can lead us out of emotional ruts or emotional captivity. What the will decides will eventually (not immediately) bring the emotions into line. We are asked by Jesus to think and ponder with Him the reasonableness of His challenges to rise to new perspectives. Once our minds are engaged and the proper decisions are made then our emotions will follow. The head leads the body and the “will” leads the “emotions”.
This appeal to the mind indicates that Jesus respects His audience. He is not trying to emotionally control them but effectively persuade them. He is very similar to the great prophets of old who were persuaders. The prophets were not men who had any secular authority in the community to enforce their point of view. Though Jesus was God, He was not the head of a large institution. He had no troops, no government backing, or power over His audience. He limited Himself to persuasion. No matter what authority we think we hold in this life we will discover that we cannot make people forgive or view pain in a positive light. We will have to persuade them.
3. The Use of Anomaly or a Glitch: The use of a surprising or disturbing statement is common both in the Old Testament and in Jesus’ teaching. The four ways to be blessed are not how we would normally view a state of blessedness. Their contrast in the pronouncements of woe is just as alarming. The statements were not fully explained. There are some hints given in the statements as to why they were given, especially in the reference to time: “will be satisfied”, or “you will go hungry”. However, a full explanation of why He reversed our normal expectations and especially what that could mean was lacking. This is done by Jesus deliberately. He seems to be willing to leave His audience hanging with no satisfactory or at least convincing explanation. This method takes great skill and a bit of nerve to employ.
These four alarming statements in 6:20-23 that were repeated in 6:24-26 were not explained and Jesus as a teacher was aware of what He did. Luke’s tactic here was also to leave them unexplained temporarily.
In Luke 6:20-26 the four alarming statements were expounded upon by the four stories that follow in chapter 7. Each story would elucidate one of the four statements. Blessed are the hungry is elucidated by 7:1-10. The hungry one is a foreign, pagan military officer who is so hungry for the welfare of his slave that he braves the rejection of a foreign religious leader (Jesus the Rabbi). He aggressively seeks first to get Jesus to come and then will aggressively try to protect Jesus’ reputation. His hunger is satisfied as his servant was healed (7:10). The centurion not only received the healing of his servant but the knowledge of what faith truly was (7:9). Jesus gave him more than what he knew he needed. His hunger was for the welfare of another, and so this foreigner had entered into a state of blessedness.
The widow at Nain weeps because of the death of her only son, but through her pain she is placed in a position to experience a precursor to the resurrection of Jesus (and eventually of herself). The resuscitation of her son turns her weeping into joy (7:15). She gains more than the return of her son but a powerful deep understanding of what resurrection means. Her situation and subsequent miracle moves her from being the object of pity to the bringer of insight for the entire crowd. They sense through her situation, the presence of a prophet in their midst (7:16-17). She was truly blessed. She shows us that weeping even over the horror of losing a child can be turned. She becomes the model of hope for countless generations that death is not the final statement.
In the next two stories the same explanatory function prevails: John the Baptist is ostracized by the government but would be termed by Jesus as the “greatest man born among women” (7:28a). Few of us ever hope to be as great as John but in our own experience of being hated, excluded, rejected or insulted (6:23) because of Christ we too can become great, even greater than John: yet the one who is least in the kingdom of God is grater than he” (7:28b). John’s example shows us that our rejection could signify for us that our marginalization could become greatness.
Those who are poor are blessed and literally that is often true. Poverty of some type can become the means used of God to bring us under His reign and thus into true riches and true blessedness. The illustration in Luke 7 takes the meaning of being poor in a wider sense than the realm of monetary matters. The prostitute who cries at His feet during the dinner is looked down upon by the religious leaders and is poor in self-esteem. She humbly bares her poverty and is lovingly brought into the reign of God. Her response of extensive and demonstrated repentance is not only accepted by Jesus but praised (7:43-47). She is not only pronounced forgiven, but told that she has faith and sent away in peace (or shalom) in 7:50. She is at peace with God because her poverty drove her to seek forgiveness and thus entrance (by faith) into the reign (the Kingdom) of God.
All four vignettes in Luke 7 illustrate or elucidate what the surprising statements in 6:20-26 mean. It was only later in the weeks and months to come that the disciples were to slowly see what He meant by what He did in their midst. The realization of what He was teaching only became clearer though the experiences of life. They understood theology not from a class room lecture but through what they experienced in daily life.
What Luke will present multiple times in Jesus’ teaching method is the use of such disturbing statements as a deliberate pedagogical technique. This technique seems to follow a pattern. The statements are expounded later to the disciples, after the teaching session, through the experiences that follow the large teaching blocks that contain such “glitches” or “surprising elements”. The stories or narratives expound what the disciples are to learn from the anomalies. In other words, Jesus would teach then end (metaphorically) the church service and dismiss the audience without explanation. It would be later in the week (or later in the month or year) that the disciples were to be educated as to what the anomalies or glitches meant. This would mean our children, our students, our ministry staff, or our parishioners would only understand what we so surprisingly said to them weeks, months or years later.
Luke has used this pattern before the Sermon on the Plain. In the first sermon Luke records of Jesus’ teaching, he did not explicitly state what Jesus meant when He quoted Isaiah 61:1-2 in Luke 4:18-19. What Luke did, was to use every vignette or story that followed the sermon in chapter 4:16-30 to elucidate the anomaly, and thus each story demonstrated what Jesus meant by the quotation of Isaiah 61. Who are to be the recipients of the Lord’s favor (4:19) was answered by who Jesus extended mercy to: Gentiles, the ill, tax-gathers, etc. in 4:31-6:11.
The narratives that followed in 8:19-53 (especially 8:22-53) expounded the surprising “soil parable” of 8:3-8. In the extended teaching of 10:2-16 there was a glitch in the use of a phrase in 10:9 and 10:11 that was made clear by the two stories of 10:25-42. There was a glitch or seemingly contradictory statement in 21:18 that was expounded by the narratives that follow going from 22:1-24:49.
Jesus seemed to know He was disturbing His audience and then seemed to couch the disturbing element in a memorable form that haunted the back roads of their memories. Later, they would see in the actual experiences of working with Jesus what He meant when He used such statements. Realization was delayed and that was intentionally done. Truth learned over time, and learned by later reflection from the actual circumstances of life drove home and drove deep the truth Jesus intended to teach.
It takes skill to teach in this way. We have to acquire the ability to carefully craft such alarming statements. Those statements cannot be created unless we truly understand and know what we want to say. We also have to know and believe that what we say will be acted out in our own subsequent ministry or example. We have to believe that God will cause such elucidation in our audience’s lives because it is His truth and He will bring it about. It also takes courage to believe that delayed understanding is a deeper understanding. It takes courage to believe that we do not immediately need to have the audience give us feedback that they understand (we preachers and teachers are sometimes addicted to seeing the light go on in people’s eyes).
4. The Use of Metaphor: The use of metaphors that have double meanings or expandable meanings is also another method employed. Being poor meant more than just financial poverty as 7:36-50 expanded being poor to being poor in self-esteem. Being hungry was expanded in 7:1-10 to being hungry for more than food to include hunger for the welfare of others. The metaphors of the speck and the plank in one’s eye were not speaking of a literal “eye”, but eye used as a metaphorical example of perception in 6:41-42. It is obvious that the metaphor of fruit trees in 6:43-44 was to be taken beyond the literal usage as verse 45 immediately directed the application of the literal agricultural and mercantile reference to the issues of the heart.
Jesus’ choice of metaphors is both universal in some cases and culturally specific in others. His choice of using agriculture would not be as effective today in highly urbanized societies. His choice of the story of the blind man would work today. We are to select metaphors that serve well the truth we wish to teach to our particular audience. Not to adjust our metaphors would be criminal.
The use of metaphor was dominant in all of Jesus’ teaching. In the Sermon on the Plain Jesus used them extensively. Some are somewhat hidden in that He used words almost in a code-like manner: i.e. “poor” and “hungry” which went beyond what the literal word meant. Similar is the reference to the “prophets” which might be best understood in our day as equivalent to rock stars or athletic heroes. The prophets were seen as spiritual heroes and were highly regarded spiritually. Prophets were in a sense a code word for “spiritual great ones” or “central definers of the culture”. The words “striking one’s cheek” and “taking one’s cloak” were metaphorical references to infringements made on either their dignity in the former case or their personal possessions in the latter.
There were the more obvious metaphors of “pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap”, the blind man leading the blind into the ditch, and the plank and speck in one’s eyes, fruit from trees, and building foundations. All of them functioned to form mental pictures in their minds. Effective use of metaphors created mental pictures that stayed in the listener’s minds and helped them visualize the truth. They would often remember such mental pictures long after they forgot propositional statements of theology. In addition, every time someone saw a blind man or looked at a fruit tree, it could have sparked their memory of Jesus’ teaching.
5. Intentional Delay: Immediate understanding was often deliberately delayed. The listener was forced to ponder and to wait for the explanation. The delay was not merely from the beginning of a teaching session to its end, but the delay often went beyond the communicative event. Making the disciples wait for explanations was frequent as mentioned in # 4) but His predictions about the future took a similar form whether He was predicting His death or speaking of when He would come again. Jesus thought that not immediately understanding what He has taught in a given teaching setting was acceptable pedagogy. He had deliberately and intentionally used this delayed approach. What helped maintain the truth in the listener’s mind was either the jarring words or the jarring experiences they had. The jarring words or word pictures helped keep the truth in the memory until experience helped the listener realize what it meant.
Jesus said if you did not love your enemies or see sorrow as a blessing your spiritual lives would fail during times of stress. Many in the audience no doubt heard Jesus’ metaphor but did not truly realize how true it was until they met stress in their lives. It was after their faith survived in the crisis or later failed after the storm of life overwhelmed them that true understanding could emerge.
6. Repetition: The use of repetition is found frequently in Jesus’ teaching. In the Old Testament this is a device used to emphasize a point. It fulfills the role of an exclamation point in English literature. In Hebrew literature, what is vital is repeated. In Luke 6, the repetition of the four agendas in the “blessed are you” were repeated in a negative form using the Woe Oracle form. In 27-28 there is a four-fold command that is a creative repetition, in 29-30 there is a threefold exhortation that is summarized (and thus repeated) in 31. Another threefold repetition is found in the three rhetorical questions with the three comments (one following each rhetorical question) in 32-34. Verse 35 repeats all three statements brought up by the rhetorical questions in a command form. The commands are next justified twice by repeating the motive clause for the commands in a different manner: 35c is basically repeated in 36b. There is a fourfold series of commands (in 37-38) and though they are not exactly coequal to one another they are a repetition of the same attitude. In 43-44, the fruit tree metaphor contains repetition of a different sort: it moves from a general concept repeated twice followed by two specific examples of fruit trees illustrating the general principle. In verse 45, another form of repetition is found in the mercantile metaphor applied (positively and negatively) of that truth. Finally, this form of repetition is found in the parable of the house built on sand or built on a rock. The repetition is again done through contrast: first as promise (47-48) and then as threat (49).
Repetition in Scripture often has another function. There can be a development of thought that arises from the repetition. Statements that are parallel enrich the first statement or clarify it. The phrase “enemies” in 27a is parallel to “those who hate you”, “who curse you, and “who mistreat you”. This repetition expanded the possibilities for the audience to relate to specific people or situations in their own lives or experience. The same expanding pattern was found for “Love your enemies” in “do good”, “bless” and “pray for”. Here the repetition helped define in a more extensive fashion how and in what manner one would practically love their enemies. “Doing good” moved the concept of love out of mere feeling to actions. In similar fashion “blessing” is verbal whereas praying for another moves us into loving someone in private and from the depth of our inward and private life.
This development aspect to parallel statements or repetition is found in the three statements in 29-30 (“turn the other cheek”, “do not stop him from taking your tunic”, “and do not demand it back”). These statements were then summarized (or expanded into a philosophical statement) in the following verse: “Do to others as you would have them do to you”. Here the specific examples were given first and then followed by an overarching principle. Similarly, the threefold repetition of 32-34 was repeated in command form in 35 (“love”, “do good”, “lend”) and was then developed further in the final parallel statement found in 36. Verse 36 is also a summarization of what it means to love, do good and lend. Such a person is “being merciful”. Similarly, the threefold “do not judge”, “do not condemn” and “forgive” of 37 is parallel to “give”. By placing the three statements about handling others’ faults in a non-judgmental attitude was seen as giving a “gift”. It was an act of will that was done to someone who had not earned such a response. It is simply given. It was a gift. To be a “gift-giver” is to no longer be a victim of your enemies.
Jesus was using repetition, but in such a way as to demand that one thought further or beyond the original statement. The repetition also seemed to keep the listener off balance. He may be able to dodge the phrase “love your enemies”, but when it was repeated in concrete ways of “doing good”, actually “blessing when cursed” or “praying” when mistreated it finds different ways to stick and pin the listener down to concrete action. Our repetition must keep our audience off guard and help dig behind their defense mechanisms. We too must help our audiences see how to apply what we are speaking about by repetitive, concrete applications that are also part of a larger theme or truth.
7. Aggressive Humility: Jesus saw spirituality from an aggressive point of view. Jesus was not advocating a passive nature. One was not to be a victim to mistreatment or oppression from an enemy but was to meet it in an aggressive fashion. His disciples were to love, do good, bless, and pray for those who oppressed them. The commands moved the individual from a helpless victim to the realm of positive, deliberate action. Passivity was ruled out. The same is true with the triad of “love”, “do good” and “lend” of 32-35 and the triad of “do not judge”, “do not condemn” and “forgive” of verse 37. In fact, the aggressive stance is underlined in this particular section by the parallel of “give”. Jesus called upon His listeners to act, to take charge, and to define relationships on their world view and thus aggressively counteract the oppressors’ world view. They were to be the benefactors, the givers in a world of self-serving oppression. In their humility they became the masters.
In similar fashion the choice of the words “your cloak”, “your tunic”, and “what belongs to you” acknowledged that injustice has taken place. The choice of these words verbalized the clear truth that Jesus recognized what an enemy took was an act of theft. One was aggressively merciful not because one had low self-esteem or was unclear on what was right, or what was theirs. Jesus said they had been abused or cheated out of their reputation or property but He counseled forgiveness in the face of acknowledged unjust facts.
One was not to pull back but aggressively meet oppression from people who hated them or had harmed them. Perhaps, the aggressive nature of Jesus’ response was encouraged by the extensive motive clauses that promised great reward. They were to expect great reward (35b), be seen as imitating God as His sons (35c, 36), escaping judgment, avoiding condemnation, and receiving forgiveness (37) and receiving such in abundance (38). They would be given insightfulness to help others in their faults (42), prove their discipleship (45, 46), and establish a spiritual foundation to their lives that would withstand the storms of life that would come (47-49). It was a non-violent, but aggressive reaction to abuse. It was non-retaliatory, but not because of low self-esteem or ignorance. Jesus was fully cognizant that wrong had taken place. In Luke 23:34, when Jesus says, Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing, He is fully aware of the evil of their action. They were killing God. Luke shows us Jesus was very aware that His trial was unjust. We forgive, but not because we are brain dead.
There was some passivity in “do not stop him” in its parallel construction with the more aggressive verb “turn to him the other cheek” of verse 29. The same is true for “do not demand it back” of verse 30. Though all of these actions were put in the more aggressive summary in verse 31, it appears to be showing the reader that once purposeful aggression from one’s enemies has begun one should not try to undo their actions. There is a release from insisting on one’s own rights. Wanting to “set things right now” was to be forsaken and aggressively forsaken. Not insisting on one’s rights in a determined and purposeful act of will turned the victim into the aggressor and therefore conferred psychological freedom to the mistreated.
8. Case…Consequence: The “case…consequence” or “if…then…” form was used in 29-31, 32-34 (in part in 20-26) and is used extensively elsewhere in Jesus’ teaching. This form is found in the legal genres’ of the Old Testament (see Exodus 22 for several examples). In the six cases listed in 29-34 the driving element was instruction. It partook of the following form: “case or situation” and “response or consequence”. In other words, “given this case, what should be my response?
The function of this form is paradigmatic. The condition or case was seen as a “sample” of a type of situation and therefore a sample of an appropriate response. The example given is to be followed in particular, but the particular is to function as an example for wider application. Though multiple cases are given of specific types of reversal (20-26) or multiple cases or situations where forgiveness needed to take place, each stood for more than itself. So if one took one’s coat that was to be seen as a “sample” of something being taken from us of a material nature. Being “hit on the cheek” was no doubt literal but much more as metaphor or sample or paradigm of being insulted.
This is similar to Old Testament Law where the case always referred to more than the specific agenda mentioned. Each specific case or specific consequence was to be a paradigm (or master example) for many similar cases. The case, if you will, was to be seen metaphorically. It was a specific example of a larger principle or attitude towards life. Thus in Exodus 22:1 when one was to pay back 4 to 1 in stealing and selling a sheep and 5 to 1 in stealing and selling an ox. This was understood as more than the literal application. There is obviously a difference in penalty between stealing an ox and stealing a sheep. An ox was like a tractor in those days and to steal and sell one took away a man’s ability to plow his fields. This was more serious than stealing one’s ability to have milk, wool and food. Thus when David stole Uriah wife, he took part of Uriah’s family and thus the judgment pronounced in II Samuel 12 followed the four fold issue of Exodus 22:1. Four of David’s family members were exacted in judgment: the baby born out of wedlock, Amnon, Tamar and Absalom. Using modern legal terms, the case became a precedent to be followed in similar situations or cases. This is very similar to how specific legal cases operate in many modern courts today.
9. Diverting One’ Focus: Jesus asked much of His audience. He challenged them to go against their natural (though inferior) ways of handling sorrow and enemies. He knew this and so used a technique I discovered one day coming home from school. I complained to my friend of having a headache. He stopped, looked at me and then punched me in the stomach. When I recovered my breath, I asked him why he did that. His response was, “Well, does your headache still bother you?” It didn’t. Granted, I had a weird friend, but he diverted my attention from one issue to another.
Jesus knew that to directly tell someone not to worry (Matthew 6:25) was not enough. Jesus showed us that the key to proper control of one’s emotions was to re-focus or divert one’s energies. Enemies hate, curse, mistreat, strike, and take whereas the one listening to Jesus diverted his mind to love, doing good, blessing, praying, offering and giving. One did not just passively “take it”, one went to work.
One’s agenda or approach to life was not to be dictated by the oppressive behavior of others, but by deliberate choice one took the higher road (32-34) and moved up into the realms of the divine (35-36). One was not to judge others but divert their attention to their own faults (42). One diverted one’s mind from the present and looked to the future (20-26). We divert our attention by faith that God does exist and can use sorrow to His and our advantage (as in Luke 7 God used the sickness of a servant, the death of a child, the brutality against a servant of God and the humiliation sins brings to a prostitute). By faith the centurion looked to someone else’s needs (both His servant and Jesus’ reputation) and by faith the prostitute braved her fears and sought out Jesus.
10. Rhetorical Questions: The use of rhetorical questions demanded that the listener use their minds. The audience was encouraged, and it was even demanded of them, to think. A rhetorical question is, of course, not to be answered but is designed to induce the listener to think. A rhetorical question specifically focuses the person’s mind in a certain direction. Jesus believed that using one’s mind and further pondering would lead the individual to see the correctness of His position. Typical of all biblical teaching is the encouragement to think. Rhetorical questions, the use of open-ended metaphors, or puzzling parables, etc. are just some of the techniques used to help people think. Those who would discourage thinking in their approach to teaching would be out of line with biblical thought.
Luke recorded Jesus using 83 rhetorical questions in his Gospel. Even when He told a story His characters used them (5 times). In fact, the first words Jesus spoke recorded in the Gospel of Luke at age 12 were in the form of a rhetorical question. Luke recorded 65 rhetorical questions in his presentation of Jesus’ teaching and 13 times Jesus used them in responding to people in various dialogues.
In Luke 6, Jesus often worked off the rhetorical questions to advance His argument. For example, in the Rhetorical Question: “If you love those who love you what credit is that to you?” is followed by “Even sinners love those who love them”. He expected His audience to do deductive reasoning based on the premises they themselves had created by their own thinking demanded by the question (32-24). One had to think out what the rhetorical question was asking them to ponder and then come to a decision. Based on the decision that they had come to, He asked them to go further. “Is it virtuous to love those who love you?” The answer, Jesus wanted them to come to was: “not really”. Once they had settled that in their minds, then He worked off of that truth and shamed them with making that type of virtue as co-equal to what sinners do. The shame was to lead them to rise higher than the actions of sinners.
On other occasions, Jesus’ use of rhetorical questions was to let the rhetorical questions stand on their own as in verse 39: “Can a blind man lead a blind man? Will they not both fall into a pit?” He did not comment further but respected His audience enough to make the proper deductions from the metaphor. It appeared that He believed they had understood what He wanted them to see and moved on.
In a very real sense Jesus is showing respect for His audience’s ability to think and comprehend. As teachers or preachers we often tell people what to think. We never ask them to think the issue out for themselves. The Rhetorical Questions guide their thinking in certain channels, but demands them to do some of the work themselves. My experience is that most people going to church are used to being “told what to think”. Those who rebel against the “sermonizing” of preachers or parents (and they are many) are in some senses rebelling against the demeaning attitude of such an approach.
It is true that lazy listeners resent having to think, but then again listening does not help anyone if action does not follow. Perhaps if one refuses to expend the effort to think, then they would refuse to expend the difficult effort to change their lives.
There is one more aspect to this that comes up in the “third sermon” of Luke’s Gospel (8:3-18). If we refuse to struggle then maybe we do not really want to learn or our spiritual eyes are closed by our previous sins (the darkness hates the light). So Jesus quotes Isaiah 6:9 in this sermon after the parable of the sower: though seeing, they may not see; though hearing, they may not understand. So how does one regain spiritual insight? How does one become good soil as in the parable of the sower? The answer is in stories following the sermon. One has to read the stories and figure out the answer.
Luke follows the teaching session with five short stories or episodes in Luke 8. The first one establishes a principle that hearing good words is not the path to closeness to God. Hearing and acting on what one hears is the right path. My mother and brothers are those who hear God’s word and put it into practice (8:21). The implication is that blindness might have come from the refusal to obey what we already knew.
The following four vignettes or stories all record disturbing events that come upon the disciples (almost drowning), the demoniac (being tortured by the demons), the woman who was healed (physical suffering) and the parents whose daughter was ill (she died before being raised from the dead). In all of these cases their lives were turned up-side down by a near death experience on the lake (22-25), by demon-possession (26-39), illness (41-46) and the death of a child 40, 49-56). In short, the soil of their lives was turned upside down, in other words, they were plowed! They had the rocks, weeds or compacted soil of their lives loosened. It was in the condition of that over turning of their lives (plowing over-turns soil) that they were given a chance to act. The disciples failed to trust, so were rebuked (8:25), the demoniac was willing to hear a “no” so became the source of blessing to his whole community (8:38-39), the ill woman touched the edge of His garment and found healing and faith (8:44, 46) and father was challenged to believe when he heard the news of his child’s death and still invited Jesus to his home and received his child back (8:50, 55-56). Three of the four had fulfilled the story of who is close to God or who are God’s mother and brother (8:19-21). Only the disciples were losers, but then again, clergy are so hard to teach.
11. The Use of Promise/Threat: Jesus used both promises and threats to persuade His audience to act upon His statements. Jesus was clearly a persuader. He knew He could not make humans with free will obey in any significant manner if He forced them so He appealed to them to make a decision. He did so passionately and challenged them to change. The form of placing a threat next to a promise is an ancient one used extensively in the prophetic literature of the Old Testament.
Jesus wanted to drastically change their views of what is a state of blessedness in this life in 6:20-26 and how one was to treat and deal with enemies (6:27-49). In His attempt to motivate proper behavior, He both threatened (the four Woes) and promised (the four Blessings).
In dealing with enemies, He threatened them with classification with sinners in 32-34 if they did not change but promised they would be like sons of the Most High if they followed His Word (35-36). He promised they would escape judgment, condemnation and receive forgiveness in 37 and both promised and threatened with the statement in 38 that how they gave would determine what they would themselves receive. He subtly threatened with the metaphor of the blind man leading the blind in verse 39. They could be the cause of others’ destruction by their blindness in 39. They would harm those who they led if they did not do what was asked of them in 37-38 and with the implication that if they did not treat their enemies well they would not be like their teacher. They were threatened with being a hypocrite if they did not attend to their own faults instead of those of others and promised they would be given insight to help others if they examined their own lives first (41-42). A subtle promise and threat lurked behind the metaphor of the fruit trees and the store owner who brought out his treasures. They were threatened with exposure, by the fruits or wares they bore or brought forth, if the fruit of forgiveness was not present in handling their enemies. In a more obvious promise and threat Jesus concluded His teaching with the building construction metaphor. They were promised spiritual solidity if they obeyed His Words and threatened explicitly with spiritual collapse if they did not.
12. Short Memorable Statements: Finally, He used short memorable and catchy statements or aphorisms: “Do to others as you would have them do to you” or “Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful”. These short pithy statements had a way of fixing themselves in the disciples’ memory. They were short and clever, but loaded with philosophical or theological meaning. These need to be created afresh today. Oswald’s Chamber’s, “baffled to fight better” as a title for his commentary on Job is superb. This is a 20th century statement, and so new ones need to be made that are profound and accurately reflect the contents we wish to communicate in our century and in our culture..