out with the old, in with the new

I'm reading a book called Pure Heart: Restoration of the Heart Through the Beatitudes. The forming concept of the book is intriguing: that the Beatitudes offer healing and guidance in a couple of critical areas. First and foremost, our identity as children of God. Secondly, as children of imperfect parents. I'd always understood the spiritual aspect (as much as I could grasp such a far-reaching concept), but never the richness of the natural piece of this.

As I have delved into this very personal teaching by Tom and Donna Cole, who both have come out of the homosexual lifestyle, I did a little study on this passage in Matthew 5. Lo and behold, Matthew Henry's Commentary sheds some very interesting light on this second principle. He points out that the Old Testament concludes with a curse in Malachi 4:6:

He will convince parents to look after their children and children to look up to their parents. If they refuse, I'll come and put the land under a curse." (The Message)

(I see it rather as a threat of a curse.) Then Henry goes on to point out that the Gospel of Jesus Christ begins with a blessing (or maybe a promise of blessing?) in the Beatitudes: blessed are the poor in spirit (Matt. 5:3). So connect these dots: the Old Testament ends with a strong injunction to get the family relationships right, or there will be a high cost. The New Testament begins with the encouragement to get these relationships right, and some instructions on how to do it.

How's that? The Beatitudes teach how to have right family relationships? Consider the posture and expectations of these principles that Jesus is teaching. He says, "Blessed are:"

  1. the poor in spirit: if you're spiritually impoverished (not just highly leveraged), you're in a place of desperation. I know I can't fix this myself. I need God's help. This is the critical first step in the 12 Steps of recovery.
  2. those who mourn: the Coles assert that the mourning person here is grieving such a massive loss that they are devastated, and that nothing fits this description better than a child who wasn't loved and nurtured adequately by their mom. The mother wound will keep us off balance our whole life if we don't discern it properly, and then get healing.
  3. the meek: here the concept is one of a child who experienced the blessing and covering of a loving father who was appropriate in his discipline and guidance. The Greek word πραΰ́ς (transliterated praus, translated meek) is used only three times in the New Testament. First in this passage, next in Matt. 21:5 (and here referencing the Zechariah 9:9 prophecy of the Messiah riding a humble donkey's colt), and finally in 1 Peter 3:4 where Peter celebrates the woman whose adornment is internal rather than external, "the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God's sight is very precious." [my italics to connect with the Greek word]. The child who has this will inherit the earth. Those who don't, and had a father who either was absent or violent will need healing to deal with their father wound.
And the list/Beatitudes go on. There is more to learn about my wounding, and lots of healing to seek.

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