In this week’s sermon, Pastor Jacob Michalski focuses on The Beatitudes and what it means to “live the good life.” He explains that the word “blessed” in the Beatitudes equates to “happy” or having “the good life,” and then contrasts Jesus’s unexpected view of who has the good life with common perspectives. While people typically think of the good life in terms of comfort, security, and material success, Jesus declares that the good life belongs to those who are poor in spirit, mourning, meek, hungering for righteousness, merciful, pure in heart, peacemaking, and even persecuted. Pastor Jacob emphasizes that this seemingly paradoxical teaching reflects Jesus’s eternal perspective rather than a temporal one, and points out that the Beatitudes aren’t a checklist but rather an assessment tool to see if one’s heart aligns with God’s perspective on the world. He concludes by encouraging us to reflect on these teachings and compare our own definition of the good life with Jesus’s vision.
Reflection Questions
- What stuck out in today’s message? What did you find challenging and encouraging? Did you learn anything new?
- How would you define the good life? What are the characteristics of the good life?
- Read Matthew 5:1–12. Circle or highlight all the times you see the word “blessed” in the passage. What words or phrases do you have a difficult time connecting to blessing?
- Write a sentence rephrasing each Beatitude in your own words.
- Why does Jesus start the Sermon on the Mount this way? What is he saying about the Kingdom of Heaven by starting with this?
- How does Jesus’s definition of the good life in these verses differ from your definition/the one we often pursue?
- Many of these blessings feel paradoxical or contradictory. Why do you think Jesus says that things like mourning, meekness, and persecution lead to ‘the good life’?
- What do you learn about yourself and/or the Beatitudes from going through the attached reflection guide?
- What is one step you can take this week in light of what you learned?
