Hey everybody, we're gonna be doing the normal Bible thing here in just a minute, but first I want to talk about something that I understand is a little bit of a departure from what we normally do, but it'll only take a minute and it is something I'm really excited about. I've been working on a side project with a couple of friends for the last little while, and I'm pretty pumped because it's about to launch, and I'm hoping that maybe you all might want to get in on the ground floor. It's not a YouTube thing, it's not a Bible thing, it's not a podcast thing. It's actually an energy drink that I think is going to be awesome and it's gonna catch on. It's called Zap with two peas, and I actually worked out the formula for it myself. It's made up of 10% real fruit juice, like people actually went out into fields and picked actual fruit, so you know it's good for you, it's all natural. About 25% of the drink is made up of metallic tap water from my house. Additionally, I got a gigantic crate of expired maple syrup. That's about 20%. I threw in some mulch and then a substance we're calling horse pulp, for lack of a better word. And then the remaining 35% is just liquefied chlamydia. My friend who's kind of into medical things but is not technically a doctor, reviewed this and he said it will definitely give you energy, is likely to cause chlamydia in most people who consume it, and that the horse. I almost got through it. That's like the fourth time I've tried to do this. There, I mean, obviously there's there's no energy drink. I'm never going to invent an energy drink. But that's the worst sales pitch ever, right? And the reason we all know that it's the worst sales pitch ever is because when you're trying to sell something, you don't tell people about how horrible the thing that you're trying to sell is or about the horrible things that it's going to do to them. You tell them all the things that are great about your thing and you ignore all the things that are bad. And then once somebody's in and they've committed and they've kicked in money and they've told all their friends that they're doing this thing, so now their reputation is on the line, then you tell them about the horrible stuff. This is how cults work. It's the only reason they continue to exist, is this particular sales pitch. So you would figure that if Jesus wants people to sign up for his religion or his kingdom thing or whatever it is that he's doing here that we still don't really understand in Matthew chapter five, that he would put some lipstick on this thing, that he would tell people about all of the awesome stuff. Like you would think that he would lead with things like, you're gonna feel fulfillment in your heart, or things like, you are gonna feel such lightness and encouragement. Or that maybe he'd lead with something like, If you just believe in me enough, all of your financial needs are going to be met. And if you plant the seeds of blessing by donating to my thing, you are going to reap a bountiful harvest of financial blessing in your life. But instead, he's leading with all of this language, says stuff like mourning and poverty and being hungry for things. And then it talks about being persecuted. And that's the section that we call the Beatitudes. That sounds really pleasant, but there's tons of things with negative connotations in there. It seems like what Jesus is doing again is that he's describing an upside-down kingdom where the values are all backwards. But in terms of a sales pitch, this is a dumpster fire, and it just gets worse in verse 11. In this little addition to the beatitude meme, the beatitude structure, it goes like this: Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you. Simply put, I think you learn a lot about what's going on inside the head of an advertiser or a salesperson just by the fact that they are willing to advertise or sell. They probably think they have a product that's worthwhile, but they also think it's a product that needs to be sold. The very act of selling is a way of admitting that my product isn't so perfect that it's just going to go immediately, completely viral across all of planet Earth and take over every mind and every pair of eyeballs and every set of ears because of how perfectly awesome it is. Even the best stuff, implicitly the people behind it are acknowledging, look, it's going to take a little bit of effort to give this thing some legs, so let's put a little spit shine on it. I think we learn something about what's going on inside the mind of the person who puts all of the ugly stuff right up front. And I think what we learn is that one, this person believes that this thing is so true and so real that there's no reason at all to manipulate or twist things around to get people to sign up. The second thing it tells me is that maybe he's not first and foremost trying to get people to sign up. Now, the reason I think this is because I'm getting the impression that Jesus is talking about a world kingdom versus a kingdom kingdom, the truer, realer kingdom where he is king. And the world kingdom values would be more people equals more true, more power equals more true, more uh agreement and um solidarity in the opinion polls equals more true. But in kingdom values, true is true. It doesn't really matter what anybody says or does. Jesus is not teaching like the normal teachers of the law, he's teaching like somebody who has authority to just say this is how the things are. This is the reality of what the true values and the true currency of things are, not ought to be, are. So then I guess the invitation here would be if you sign up, this will hurt by world terms. And remember, he's talking to an original audience who completely gets the idea of persecution. They are crystal clear on this. It is hardwired into their cultural, ethnic, religious history. Everybody there knows what it is to be oppressed, to be occupied, to be abused, to be beaten up. There's still clear, vivid cultural memory of religious oppression from especially their Greek overlords. So they get it, and not only do they get it, they're sick of it. But then along comes Jesus and he's saying it's worth it. So Jesus is inviting people to eyes wide open faith. Advertisers are inviting you to eyes wide shut, faith. Hear what you want to hear. See the part of this advertisement that you want. Imagine that this will create the health benefits that you want it to create. Imagine that this program will make you feel the things that you really want to feel. I mean, good advertising makes you hope that it's real and it never allows something ugly to cross your mind. But again, Jesus is different in his messaging. He wants you to picture the terrible things that might go along with this right up front. Why? Because implicitly he's saying it's worth it, and also too, because it's true. If you're gonna go around saying stuff that is an overt rejection of the agreed upon values of planet Earth, it's gonna irritate people. Then in part it's gonna irritate people because of their insecurities, because maybe they're afraid that the person who does this is right, but also it's gonna irritate people because you're trading in different currencies. And how about a little bit of sympathy for the person who rejects Jesus' message here? I mean, these aren't all crazy people who would be irritated by those who would embrace Jesus' message. It's just a natural clash. It doesn't even need to be thought of as good guy, bad guy in order to understand the inevitable friction. You're talking about two different models of power, two different models of authority, two different models of value, two different models of currency, two different reasons for existing. And look, when people play the game with different sets of ground rules, it's frustrating. I played risk during finals week every single year of college. And the one year, I don't know, somebody decided they were gonna flip over the table. Not literally. They decided I'm gonna play to lose. Do you have any idea how difficult it is to manage a game of global domination when someone is trying to be dominated? You can't anticipate their moves, you don't know what they're doing. This is frustrating. And what are you gonna do? Be mad at somebody because they're not trying to win? You just guess you're wrecking everything. Try to win, care. Well, I think that same inevitable natural tension is going to happen here. And we'll break this more down tomorrow. The point is, Jesus doesn't lie to people. Jesus instead walks up in front of his disciples with a great big crowd right there, is like, hey, we got this backwards kingdom. This is what this whole thing is all about. You've been wondering because you've heard stories about stuff that I do. Well, it's all about this backward kingdom and the God who's behind it. And if you sign up for this kingdom, even though it's the truest, realist thing and all the values are stuff that deep down everybody really actually wants, it's still gonna super clang and clash with what's going on with everybody else. And guess what? They're not gonna like it, and you will probably suffer because of it. Dang, terrible sales pitch on the one hand. I mean, that's maybe even worse than my pitch for my energy drink, which what did I call it again? Uh zap with two Ps in case you're looking for it. But on the other hand, how refreshing to just get told the absolute truth up front. Turning over all the cards. Here's everything that's gonna go down, this is gonna get weird and it's worth it. And that would seem to be the message of Jesus and the Bible whenever he or it talks about persecution in general. We'll break down the specifics of that a little bit more tomorrow. But mostly, and I cannot stress this enough. I'm really sorry I used the expression horse pulp repeatedly in this episode. I'm mad. This is the 10 minute Bible hour podcast.