Not long ago a friend commented to me that the Beatitudes were great prose, but not a realistic expectation for our way of life. I immediately remembered something I heard Stephen Covey say. (Covey is the author of The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.) While Covey was discussing Habit Number Four, have a Win/Win attitude, a businessman said to him that such an attitude was totally unrealistic in business. Covey responded by asking the man a question: “How long do you think you would stay in business if you were a winner but your customers felt like losers? Or, in the alternative, if your customers were winners but you were the loser in the business deal?”
I responded in a similar manner to my friend. I asked, “What kind of life would you have if it were dominated by the opposite of the Beatitudes? What follows a person with a haughty attitude? What happens when people are demanding, divisive, or critical?” Seeking to live out The Beatitudes is setting a very high expectation for life, but it is so much better than the alternatives.
In the concluding verse Jesus reveals how I can make living a life of the Beatitudes a realistic expectation for my life. When Jesus says that my righteousness must exceed that of the religious leaders, He is not saying that I have to do more than they do. He is saying I am called to a different kind of righteousness. This is the righteousness that comes through faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. In this righteousness the life of Jesus becomes visible in my life as I live in a way that expresses the merciful, forgiving, reconciling will of God.
What does today’s reading reveal to you about God?
What does it reveal to you about yourself?
Think about what God wants you to do or remember about this passage.
Does God want you to change anything in your life?
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