All That Jesus Taught : Bible Study Part 12 | Zac Poonen

We continue again on subject on ‘All that Jesus taught’. We are basing these series on Matthew 28:20 which say that Jesus told his disciples to go in to every nation and make disciples and teach them everything that he himself has commanded. This is what I have called the neglected half of the great commission. So I thought it would be good for us l though to go through all that Jesus commanded and taught so that we can fulfill the great commission, and satisfy His heart’s desire, and bring God’s people to the place where he wants them to be. So in our last study we were looking at Matthew 5:3, 4, and 5 where we saw 3 of the right attitudes that disciples should have. Remember he spoke to his disciples, first of all as we read in verse 1 and 2. We must also remember that these are not characteristics that people in the world appreciate. People in the world do not appreciate being constantly aware of their won need. In the world, they say, be full of self confidence, confidence in your own ability. Well that is okay as far as physical ability is concern, and intellectual ability is concern, and human smartness that’s required of salesman, and CEO’s, and things like that but when it comes to the spiritual realm it’s exactly the opposite. It’s the one who’s poor in spirit, who’s going to possess God’s kingdom. Who’s the one who mourns for his sin, who’s going to be strengthen spiritually and is the one who’s meek and does not fight for his rights who’s going to inherit the earth.

In other words God’s ways are not our ways. He’s way of thinking is completely opposite to this world’s way of thinking and all these right attitudes and be attitudes mention here are not the things that the world appreciates. In fact the quite opposite of it and that is why we read at the end of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said “This way that I have spoken of is a very narrow way (Matthew 7:14) and very few people find it so I don’t anticipate millions of people turning to this way”. Many of millions want to go to heaven and millions want the power of the Holy Spirit but very few want to have these attitudes that Jesus spoke of has the characteristics of people who are in God’s kingdom. Now we move on to verse 6 where Jesus said “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness for they shall be satisfied”. Now in the world, there are hungering and thirsting for all types of things. If you look at the things that people hunger and thirst for I think most people hunger and thirst for wealth, money, comfort, comfortable life maybe houses and lands and advancement in society, higher position in their jobs and they want to beautify their appearance and everything that will bring them honor and comfort and pleasure in this world even Christians.

Most Christians, even those who claim are Born Again. Many of them are pursuing all these things. But hungering and thirsting to live a Godly life, hungering and thirsting to overcome sin is such a rare quality that I believe what Jesus said. Very few find this way to life. I’m not surprised when I find very few interested in a message of being totally righteous. In fact I’m not surprised when people turn around and say “That’s impossible”. When people say “The Sermon on the Mount is an impossible standard, nobody can live up to it”. That’s exactly the answer I expect from a worldly Christian or a so called Born Again Christian who’s got a worldly attitude. I would even question whether such a person is really Born Again if he neglects Jesus’ said in the Sermon on the Mount. That’s why we see that when Jesus said “You got to teach all that I commanded” in Matthew 28:20. He first said you got to make them disciples. Every person who calls himself a convert who wants to go to heaven is not interested in obeying Jesus’ commanded, far from it. But a person who becomes a disciple would be interested to know what Jesus commanded.