Catherine Marshall in the book “Stories for the Heart,” provided a great illustration entitled “A Picture of Peace.” She tells the story of a king who once offered a prize to the artist who could paint the best picture of peace. Many artists tried, and the king looked at all

Jesus said that if we are to be blessed, we need to be “pure in heart” (Mt. 5:8). As we saw in my previous blog on this topic, the Greek word for “pure” refers to the removal of something unclean or useless from our lives that will result in having

Not too long ago, I was introduced to a song entitled “Without His Cross.” The lyrics tell the whole story of how the events of “Good Friday” impact our lives, even today. Here is the essence of those lyrics:  “Without His tears, there is no comfort; without His death, there

In the first century, the “heart” was considered to be the center of one’s personality. Consider the following: when obviously referring to the “mind,” the Apostle Paul spoke of “…foolish hearts becoming darkened” (Rom. 1:21); when referring to the “will,” Paul spoke of certain people having “…stubborn and unrepentant hearts”

In the first century, the common response to being wronged was retaliation, “An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth!” But for those who enter the Kingdom where Jesus is King, He expects the response of His followers to be quite different when they face injustice. And

How could anyone find joy in the midst of persecution? It seems like a cruel joke for Jesus to tell not only His disciples, but also the crowd gathered around Him, to rejoice while being persecuted. The answer comes when we consider the fact that persecution for any cause should

In last weeks’ blog we found that there are two Greek words that are important for us to consider if we are going to understand the biblical meaning of “righteousness.” The first word, which we looked at last week, is the verb dikaioo, which means “to be made righteous” or

Jesus admonished the multitudes to seek certain qualities that will, if they possess them, result in a blessed life. Last week, we began to examine His words, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied” (Mt. 5:6). I asked all of us to spend

Jesus wasn’t finished sharing with the crowd about the qualities of a blessed life on the hillside overlooking the sea of Galilee. It was likely on that same hillside some time later in His ministry that Jesus would feed over 5,000 people with just a basket of fish and bread.

Warning! This will be a “tad” longer than most, but I hope it will also be engaging and meaningful for you. So, let’s get down to unpacking the text at hand!!! As Jesus continued to teach the multitudes about the “blessed life,” he moved beyond having a “humble spirit” (Mt.