Intervention on the Mount

Provides specific examples of behaviors and their destructive impact on the addicted person and others.

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The Mayo Clinic website has a good article on how an intervention can help a loved one start their recovery from addiction. Here is a summary of the main points:

The person struggling with an addiction often refuses to see it and acknowledge it. An intervention:

• Provides specific examples of behaviors and their destructive impact on the addicted person and others

• Offers a recovery plan with clear steps, goals and guidelines

• Insists that help be accepted and spells out what you will do if the loved one refuses

Your loved one’s problem involves intense emotions. The intervention can cause conflict, anger and resentment. To run a successful intervention:

• Anticipate your loved one’s objections. Have calm, rational responses prepared for each reason the person may give to avoid treatment or responsibility for behavior.

• Avoid confrontation. Show love, respect, support and concern — not anger. Be honest, but avoid accusing statements.

• Stay on track and remain calm in the face of your loved one’s accusations, hurt or anger, which is often meant to deflect or derail the conversation.

• Insist on a decision. Don’t give your loved one the possibility to think about whether to accept help. Doing so just allows your loved one to continue denying a problem.

Not all interventions are successful. The addicted person may erupt in anger or insist that he or she doesn’t need help or may be resentful and accuse you of betrayal or being a hypocrite.

Emotionally prepare yourself for rejection while remaining hopeful for positive change. If your loved one doesn’t accept treatment, be prepared to follow through with the consequences you presented.

How frustrating it must be for Christ to confront his people with life-and-death issues and have it turned it into a flowery chat on a hillside. We do the same thing with John 15. Jesus is to be arrested in a few hours and has these last few minutes to prepare his disciples for the terror to come. His warning is severe: You are about to be torn apart. If you don’t remain in me, you will fail. More than that: if you don't remain in me, God will let you fail.

But we turn it into a uplifting parable of the Christian receiving life through the vine, complete with small-group discussion questions:

• In what ways have you experienced God’s pruning? How did it make you feel?

• How does memorizing Scripture help strengthen your faith?

• Jesus says apart from him we can do nothing. How would you answer someone who tells you his or her list of accomplishments?

• What is one specific thing that God is speaking to you through this study? How will that shape your life in the coming week?

• What does the “fruit” in v 2 represent? (answer: The nine fruits mentioned in Galatians 5:22-23.)

Nonsense. Jesus is facing death and the scattering of his disciples, and we think about having a deeper relationship with Christ. Jesus is preparing his disciples for disaster and we read it for spiritual elevation. Yes, we all have to start somewhere, but Jesus is not talking about memorizing Scripture or how you feel or making sure to point to God every time we accomplish something, and the fruit he requires is not love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. John 15 occurs on the eve of the most important event in human history. There will be death and panic and wrenching agony. God will leave the Temple. To ask how this will shape our lives in the coming week is to so disconnect our lives from Scripture that there is virtually no point to being a Christian.

And so here, in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus wants the people of God to understand that they are miserably below the standard he requires, but instead we see it as a list of compliments. Oh yes, I am meek! Yes, I do think I am poor in spirit. Yes, we are the salt of the earth. Nonsense! Jesus did not come to congratulate the Israelites on the great job they were doing! He came to tell the people of God this was their last chance! The ax was already at the root. If you didn’t do it now, they would be cut down and thrown into the fire.

Jesus did not say “you are the salt of the earth” because they were. He said it because that’s what God had made them, but they lost their flavor and now are useless. Jesus did not say “blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake” because they were being persecuted. He said it because a few of them were about to be persecuted—and many more of them were about to be the persecutors. He assured those who suffered for his sake that their persecutions were not to be a reason for uncertainty but in fact were evidence they were on the right path, and that if they stayed on that path they would gain the kingdom. The rest would not.

This is serious, serious stuff and we make it a gentle Sunday School story. Jesus sat down to teach the people what God requires and we imagine him against a backdrop of a deep blue sky with some white happy clouds, a bright sun, and children playing he-loves-me-he-loves-me-not with the daisies. No. Jesus sat down to calmly, firmly, list their problems and his grievances, and insist that it be fixed, and right now, because a storm is coming and they need to be ready.

Hagner’s explanation of the beatitudes as “a bold, even daring, affirmation of the supreme happiness of the recipients of the kingdom” is ridiculous. He wants to be modern and “with it”, so he pulls this puffery from his filing cabinet of memorable sayings. Worthless, mindless nonsense.

The people are not blessed. The boot of Rome is on their neck and it’s about to get a lot worse. There is no “supreme happiness” in their future:

Matt 10.21 Brother will betray brother, and a father his child, and children will have their parents put to death.

Matt 10.34 I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.

Matt 11.24 On the day of judgment it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom than for you.

Matt 23.37 How often I desired to gather you as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!

Matt 23.38 Your house is left to you, desolate.

Matt 24.2 Not one stone will be left here upon another.

Matt 24.21 There will be suffering, such as has not been from the beginning of the world.

Matt 25.30 Throw this worthless slave into the outer darkness.

Matt 25.46 These will go away into eternal punishment.

How do we reconcile Hagner’s “bold, even daring affirmation of supreme happiness” with Jesus’ dark warnings of unimaginable, unprecedented suffering? How do we reconcile Hagner’s statement that these are the recipients of the kingdom with Jesus’ promise that God will leave their Temple and then tear it down stone by stone. We don’t. He’s wrong; Jesus is right.

The Sermon on the Mount is not a green oasis in the midst of dark desolation. It is not the good old days before Jesus was rejected and things took a turn for the worse. It is not a flowery, happy time with Jesus and his followers before he got down to the serious work. The teaching of Jesus (and John) is consistent: repent! The Sermon on the Mount is one teaching in a long list of sober, last-chance warnings of approaching judgment. They—the people of God—have piled their garbage too high. God can no longer tolerate the stench. First Assyria, then Babylon, and now Rome. They are given a final 40 years to come back to God; then comes the desolation. It will be one thousand eight hundred and eighty one years before they will be able to use the name “Israel” again.

It is not “a bold, even daring, affirmation of the supreme happiness of the recipients of the kingdom.”

This is the Sermon on the Mount:

The people that God wants for his kingdom are poor in spirit, meek, merciful, and pure in heart. They mourn over their pitiful state; they hunger and thirst for righteousness. They make peace. They step into the persecution—at the hands of their own people—and stay the course even though they are regarded as traitors.

Almost no one does it. It is seen in only a few and unexpected exceptions: in a man living in the wilderness, in a widow with just two pennies, in the faith of a leper and a paralytic and two blind men, in a tax collector’s repentance, and in the dogs: a Roman centurion, a Canaanite woman, a Samaritan woman, a woman with an alabaster jar. It is not seen in the most expected: the religious leaders, the teachers of Scripture, the High Priest, Jesus’ family. It will be seen in a man who at this point is an enemy. It is not seen in the Twelve.

If God would have spared Sodom for ten righteous, would he not have given his own holy city the same chance?

God appointed Israel as the salt of the earth but they cared nothing about that and instead made themselves commonplace. God appointed Israel as the light of the world—his light of the world—but they hid that light and had sunk to such a low state that they themselves were in the dark.

Jesus warned them that the coming kingdom was not their safe haven. The Law was still their judge: not even one iota of the word of God would be relaxed. Anyone who broke God’s commandments or taught others to break it would be judged, and unless the people turned away from the path of their religious leaders they would suffer along with them.

They use the law to cover their sin by observing the letter while at the same time desecrating its truth. They think murder is murder only if there is a body. They think adultery is adultery only if there is sex. They use divorce to trade up and manipulate oaths to ensnare the naïve.

Can they truly think God is pleased when they twist his word to justify their sin? God does what is best for people—even his enemies, but his people create laws that allow them to profit off one another and hurt the ones who depend upon them most. God yearns for his people to be like him. He asks them to look around and see if they are any better than even the tax collectors. How can he be pleased with that? How could they be more blind?

God requires his people to act like him. He wants people who thirst for his righteousness and are willing to suffer any loss or indignity in order to do what he wants.

Instead of his people giving freely, they give in order to get. Instead of praying for God’s kingdom they pray for their own enrichment. Instead of mourning they make a show of feigned misery. Instead of building for God they build for themselves. They love what he hates. They do not trust God but instead—to his pain—look to the world for their welfare. They are blind to their own overwhelming sin and pick at the smallest sins of their neighbors. They—the people of God—to their shame, have no understanding of sacred things.

In spite of all this, there is a way out. Yes, it is a desperate situation, but it is not hopeless. If they ask, they will receive. If they search, they will find. If they knock, God will open.

But, it will not be easy. It is a breaking off of everything they have come to depend on. They must pull out of the needle, but once they no longer have their drug they will suffer horribly, They don’t know how to survive without it. A dependency of 20, 30, 40 years is not broken in a day. Or a month. Or a year.

The way back is made even more difficult because the path to God does not just run to God: it runs against his people. This is not an escape from Egypt: you are declaring yourself a traitor. You must not only fight your own addiction: you have to fight theirs too.

But, this is your only chance. If you stay with them, you will perish with them. There is only one truth. The storm will come. You can die with him now or die with them later, but life as usual is not an option.

Matthew 5.42

Give to everyone who begs from you, and do not refuse anyone who wants to borrow from you.

This is the verse that most clearly shows our addiction. When we look at the symptoms of addiction—anger, denial, bargaining—this is what brings those out most loudly and hottest.

We want to think that Jesus saying to “give to everyone” means that the people of God should act towards others as God has acted towards them. But that is pretty basic stuff. Saying that the people of God should be grateful for what God has done for them is not a surprising or new truth. Of course we should. Who would disagree with that?

But Jesus is not saying we need to be grateful. If he intended to say that, he would have said that. He said, clearly, to give to everyone and not refuse anyone. This is a very different thing, and it is something a lot of people disagree with. Most actually.

He says it because the people of God love the world, and because the people prefer the world to God. He’s talking to people whose values are so defined by the world that the things of God seem strange. Silly. Surprising. Shocking even.

He’s talking to people who must protect their lifestyle and will do anything to keep it. He’s talking to people who have a faint glimmer of the truth but work to suppress it. He’s talking to people who live in denial. He’s talking to addicts.

The problem is not that they’re poor but that you’re rich. Questioning whether they deserve it, whether they will squander it, whether you are confirming them in their lifestyle... all of these are first a problem with you. Yes, Jesus is concerned about their welfare, but he’s also concerned about you: about your clenched fist. You have every logical reason for why you’re allowed to keep it, why you don’t have to give to everyone and anyone, even why it’s not just absurd, but wrong to do it. But Jesus is talking to “you” and about “you”. “They” are just scenery. “They” are not the problem. “They” are not his target. He’s talking to you.

Jesus says “you” because the problem is there: in you. This is not a Sunday morning sermon. It’s an intervention. And the charge is this: You have a big problem!

The poor are blessed because they have no yet developed that paralyzing dependency. The poor are blessed because when God needs someone to move, they can do it more quickly and without all the drama. The poor are blessed because God has at least some chance of getting them to respond when he says something. The poor are blessed because they still have some sense of hearing left. The poor are blessed because they are less needy.

It is as difficult for God to use the rich as it is to mash a camel through the eye of a needle. They fight and kick and holler all the way from the world into the kingdom and God, quite frankly, doesn’t need the hassle. If he can do it without all the fuss, why not?

When Jesus says “give to everyone” he touches our wealth nerve and it gets an immediate and strong reaction, The more wealth, the stronger the reaction. We react because we must. We refuse because we must. We simply cannot live without it. It goes against everything in our nature.

Jesus pierces through to the nerve and we recoil in anger and denial. Is he exaggerating? No. It’s pointed and painful, but it’s not an exaggeration, because it’s what God must have of his people if he is going to accomplish what he wants. He can’t use addicts. He just can’t. They can’t be trusted. Children will rob their parents and parents will rob their children. They must have it and will do anything to get it.

Jesus exposes our addiction, to show that we have a problem, to show that our problem is so deeply rooted that we turn from the word of God rather than turn from our drug. Denial is the primary symptom of addiction: I am not an addict. Yes I use, but I am not addicted: I can stop anytime I want. Maybe I use occasionally or socially, or to relax, but so what? People who have no vices are boring. And who are you to accuse me?! You’re telling me you’re perfect? Jesus says not to judge. You violate Scripture to preach to me?

Anger. Denial. Bargaining.

Yep, you’re an addict.

You have a problem. Jesus went up that mountain and sat down, calmly, to confront you about it. He said “give to everyone” to show you how addicted you are. He said “do not refuse anyone” to make you angry. You reply that it’s hyperbole because it’s impossible. But if it’s hyperbole, then what words do you allow Jesus to use if he actually wants to tell you to sell everything? We need look only at the rich young man in Luke 18 to see how we squirm and twist within our addiction. Jesus tells us to give to everyone and we dismiss that as silliness. Jesus tell us to not worry about what we will eat or wear, and we turn that into an admonition to not worry. Jesus says “You cannot be my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions” and we say “but I’m already a disciple.” And so Jesus says, “Okay, I’ll give you a real-life example of what I mean: that it’s not just advice; it’s a demand: I turn away people who don’t do it”. And we say, “Well, sure he had a problem! So Jesus confronted him on it. But Jesus has not confronted me, so I don’t.” He said if you love the world you cannot love God and we react in pain, “I don’t love the world!”

Okay, let’s step back and allow Christ to say something. These are the words of Christ, recorded in the word of God, to the people of God. To you. Read them slowly, word by word. They are to you, for you, about you. Not someone else. Not someone with a problem. You. And remember, Jesus never told you to be more generous, or more loving, or kinder. He didn't come to tell you to be nice. He told you to be like God. There is no room for bargaining. There are a lot of good people in the world. He wants people who know what he is like. He wants people he can trust to not embarrass him. He wants you to be that person. But,

— You · cannot · be · my · disciple · if · you · do · not · give · up · all · your · possessions.

— One · thing · you · lack. Sell · your · possessions · and · give · alms · and · follow · me. 

— Where · your · treasure · is · there · will · your · heart · be · also.

— You · cannot · serve · God · and · mammon.

— Those · who · love · their · life · will · lose · it.

— Those · who · hate · their · life · in · this · world · will · keep · it.

Jesus said that unless a grain of wheat (you) dies, it (you) remains a single grain; but if it (you) dies, it (you) bears much fruit. Jesus’ death does not mean you don’t have to do it. You have to die before you can live. If you stay in the earth you just stay in the earth.

Your addiction puts you into an irrational and stubborn denial. There are no words Jesus can use to convince you he means what he says. He says it over and over, in different ways. He gives us examples from his own life, from the lives of his disciples, and from the rejection of the rich young man. He never tells us to be more generous, yet that’s what we read, every time. We leave him no way to use words or real-life examples to tell us what he wants. If he uses soft language we say, oh, how nice! If he uses harsh language we know he could not possibly be talking to us. If he makes a demand we soften it to a suggestion.

Can you imagine how frustrating it is for him to say it again and again, for thousands of years, and have almost no one pay attention?!

Why do you call me Lord and not do what I say?!

At the end, when we come before him and everything is laid bare, he will look at us and say, “Really? You thought the word of God was an exaggeration? You thought my demands were unreasonable?” And our stupid shame then, knowing that he gave us this opportunity to experience God, and we didn’t just say no, but called it silly, our shame then will make anything else he says after that justified. Because he gave us the privilege of being like him, and our addiction said no: don’t do that. And we listened to our addiction instead of our Savior.

If you weren’t addicted you’d embrace the teaching instead of reacting against it. People who have no problem have no problem. But people who do have a problem get angry. They hide. They make excuses.

Why does Jesus say “everyone” and “anyone”? Does he really mean absolutely everyone and anyone? That’s your addiction talking. The answer is that whatever God does, we must do as well. God is free. He has no addictions and so he acts out of pure love and goodness and integrity, with no struggle over what he wants for himself.

If you can’t bring yourself to agree with “everyone” and “anyone”, then compromise: give to half. Now God gets something, they get something, and you start the withdrawal. A win-win-win situation. If you can’t do that, give just 25%: half of a half. How could anyone but a hard addict argue with that?

You won’t do it. You’ll give a sliver but not a slice. Your addiction is total. You will give enough to get out of the room. Whatever they give is only a tactic. If you give a little hopefully they’ll let you alone so you can keep the rest. With any luck, they’ll think they've gotten through and not bother you again, then you can keep it all.

You will give as much as the other addicts and call it good enough. You will tell others of the joy of giving, but deep down you know that’s a deception, because you stop once it gets uncomfortable, and you know that Christ’s giving was never comfortable. But, if you talk about the joy of giving you’ll make people think you actually do it, so smiling and acting happy keeps them away.

Here’s the truth: there’s little joy in true giving. It hurts. It causes fear. And once you find out what they really did with it, you get angry, because it was wasteful and selfish. But God gives to his enemies. Do you really think God’s enemies use his gifts the way he wants? Giving is not intended to give you joy. It is intended to free you from your addiction so you can be used. You must learn to live without it because God uses the strong and the free, not the needy.

It will be difficult. More than difficult: frightening, painful. The addiction has you and will not give you up without a fight. But so long as you are dependent upon it, you will never be free for God.

You can do it. You can actually find joy. Not joy in giving, but joy in having less and pressing on to having even less, because once you’re free, there is an exhilaration to pressing closer to Christ. God does not take away the pleasure of your drug without giving you the pleasure of being free of it.

The truth is, you can come to the point where you, like Paul, look back on it and call it garbage. God has said “You shall not return that way again!” and so with your exodus he gives you the desire and strength to stay away. Truly, he does, because once you are free, everything is different and going back seems like a dirtiness.

But here’s a secret. You’ll always be an addict. The dependency is always there, waiting for you to take a small taste. If you lose your focus or tell yourself you've done enough, you’ll take that taste. God gives you the gift of being free, but you will forever be hooked. If you fall back into it, you'll have to extract yourself again.

On the one hand, this is not for everyone and was not intended to be. Jesus wanted one Moses, not a million. But he also wanted a Caleb and a Joshua and an Aaron and all the other people who were given their area and level of responsibility.

But, even though he wanted only one Moses, he tolerated no one saying there was nothing so special about Moses that he should be give the leadership. Every one of those people who crossed the Red Sea were in Egypt. They bent their backs to slavery and did nothing (that we know of) to get out. The boy David fond himself in the camp of the army of Israel and was astonished that no one defended the honor of God, so he did it himself. Daniel and the three young men refused to obey the kings command and preferred death.

The opportunity was there for any of them to take hold of, if they had the understanding of who they were and who God was. Nehemiah understood that the Israelites were in Babylon because they had offended him, and prayer for the people. If any of the people in Egypt, who understood clearly they were sons of Jacob and of Isaac and of Abraham, had used that knowledge to plead with God based upon that truth, it might have been a very different story.

But now they were out of Egypt, because of Moses. None of were people God wanted for the task; none of them helped. But now that they are free, they complain. Now they want the leadership. So God destroys them.

The demand of Christ is not that everyone sells everything to follow him, but that there is no progress in the work of God without people who do it, and those who don't do it have the responsibility to be sheep. After you are delivered and the Egyptians are at the bottom of the Sea it is too late to say, "thanks, I'll take if from here". No, you won't! You will do what you're told, just as the people who got you your freedom did as they were told.

Jesus puts the highest standard in front of everyone so they all know what is required and so they all know they're know doing it. Not doing it is one thing; saying it doesn't have to be done is cowardly and stupid. Not doing it is one thing; saying that Christ did it and now we don't have to is spiritual fantasy for people who live in neverland.

The standard is high, but it is there. A few will do it. The rest have the obligation to admit they haven't done it, never will, and don't want to.

If you had the opportunity to trade places with Paul and be the author of half of the New Testament, would you? Would you live his life to have the eternal gratitude of the God of the universe?

If you had the opportunity to trade places with John the Baptist, be the cousin of Jesus, be the person Jesus said was the greatest person ever born, would you? Would you argue with bees for their honey, have locusts for breakfast and lunch and dinner, wear nothing but rags, be mocked by the Jews, and be imprisoned and beheaded?

I think no one would want that. Even knowing the outcome--of being so highly honored by God and Christ and his Church--I don't think we would do it.

Peter? Sure. Why not? John? Sure. Luke? Absolutely. Philip? Mary the mother of Jesus? Mary? Martha? Mary Magdalene? Sure.

But Paul, no. Absolutely. John the Baptist, no. Their lives were just too horribly difficult.

Some people must do the impossible thing. Some people must do the difficult thing. But no one is allowed to present themselves as the standard: "this is a far as you need to go.