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How to Be Miserable, Part Two

Sermon by Rev. Doug Pratt — February 24, 2008
 

Now when he saw the crowds, he went up on a mountainside and sat down. His disciples came to him, ²and he began to teach them, saying:
           ³“Blessed are the poor in spirit,
                      for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
           ⁴Blessed are those who mourn,
                      for they will be comforted.
           ⁵Blessed are the meek,
                      for they will inherit the earth.
           ⁶Blessed are those who hunger and thirst
                      for righteousness, for they will be filled.
           ⁷Blessed are the merciful,
                      for they will be shown mercy.
           ⁸Blessed are the pure in heart,
                      for they will see God.
           ⁹Blessed are the peacemakers,
                      for they will be called sons of God.”

Matthew 5:1-9

This is the second message in a 2-part series entitled “How to Be Miserable.” Now I acknowledge the title sounds just a bit weird. After all, who wants to hear about that? One member even wisecracked to me last Sunday after church that he’d been concerned about our sanctuary and parking lot getting too crowded, but if I kept preaching on gloomy topics like this the problem would be solved!

The first two words of the title are, I think, sure-fire winners. Our world is fascinated with “How to …” advice. Whole shelves at Borders and Barnes & Noble are occupied by “How to” books. We have cable channels that offer shows by celebrity chefs on how to cook a gourmet meal, shows by gardening experts on how to grow gardenias and roses, shows by home repair experts on how to rewire a house or fix a toilet, and shows on the Golf Channel about how to fix your slice or get out of a deep bunker. You can take “How to” classes at the Art League on oil painting, and at the community college on stock market investing. We love it when experts show us how to do it ourselves. And, generally speaking, the types of things we want to do for ourselves are good things, things that help us and enrich our lives. I doubt that anybody would buy a book, watch a show, or enroll in a course on “How to Be Miserable”!

But the reason we’re discussing this, as those who heard Part 1 of this series already know, is precisely so we can learn to avoid the things that make us miserable and, instead, direct our course consistently in the opposite direction. God actually wants us to be happy and joyful and experience life in all its fullness and abundance. The Bible repeatedly makes it clear that God loves us tremendously and desires good for us. But when we study the negative choices and actions that lead us to be miserable, we become more prepared and on guard to avoid those.

I was speaking a moment ago about “self-help” and “how to” books. One of the “kings” of this type of literature is Stephen Covey. He’s written a number of books about how to organize our lives and be successful in all we do. And his books are based on solid moral principles and biblical teachings. The book that really launched Covey’s career was the 1989 bestseller The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. It sold over 12 million copies and spawned a dozen other books by the author and made him a star on the speaking circuit across the land. I’m sure many of you have read the book or perhaps seen Covey on television or heard him at a conference.

Long before Stephen Covey hit the big time, another man went on a self-organized speaking tour, all over the area we now call the Holy Land. And what He told people—contained in this, the all-time bestseller—can be summarized as The 7 Habits of Genuinely Happy People. That’s what the “Beatitudes,” these principles found at the beginning of the “Sermon on the Mount” in Matthew 5, really are. They tell us how we can be “blessed” or “happy” or “joyful”—not just momentarily, but in a lasting and enduring way.

Because our purpose is to lay out a clear contrast between the positive teachings on how to be happy and the opposite choices that lead us to be miserable, it’s helpful to set them in parallel columns. As a quick review, here’s what we addressed previously:

HOW TO BE HAPPY	HOW TO BE MISERABLE
1. “Blessed are the poor in spirit.”	Deny your spiritual needs.
2. “Blessed are those who mourn.”	Ignore your negative emotions, or dwell on them.
3. “Blessed are the meek.”	Be proud and self-centered.

We now move on to the final four pairs of principles.

Happiness Habit #4
“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.”
In this Habit of Happiness, Jesus is telling us that if we want to experience inner joy, if we want to live at peace with ourselves, if we want to be able to sleep well at night and feel okay about ourselves, we will keep a short account with God. And we will avail ourselves regularly of the opportunity to acknowledge our sins and failings and receive the Lord’s cleansing forgiveness. This is the only kind of “righteousness” that is truly achievable by imperfect people like us.

The Old Testament talked about another kind of “righteousness” that came from perfectly obeying God’s laws and commandments—and people tried very hard to reach that lofty goal. But we found, universally, that we couldn’t make it. The “Gospel” or “Good News” Jesus brought to us is that there is another way to be right with God than living a perfect life. It’s the way of receiving God’s mercy and grace and forgiveness. But the Lord never forces forgiveness on us. We need to ask for it and receive it.

The opposite of this habit of happiness is Misery Method #4: Stifle your conscience. God created us with a warning bell: the conscience. So if we want to be uncomfortable inside, if we want to be loaded down with guilt and shame, if we want to feel defensive and awkward in a church service and riddled with anxiety and fear, then we will stifle that inner whisper of our conscience and try to ignore its reminders. There are people everywhere around us who are afraid to take a good, honest look at themselves inside—because they know they won’t like what they see there. And for whatever reason—pride, stubbornness, or unbelief—they choose to not take advantage of the forgiveness of sin the Lord offers. Instead, they keep shoving that guilt deeper and deeper inside.

But what happens when we let our “account” with God get very long, when we allow our unacknowledged, unconfessed and unforgiven guilt to pile up? It’s the spiritual equivalent of the debt crisis that is afflicting so many American households. Easy credit has been shoved into the hands of millions of consumers by banks and finance companies, without teaching them how to handle the plastic. Bills come in, and many people pay only the minimum required payment monthly. So what happens to that debt, at an 18% or 24% or 27% annual rate? It compounds dramatically! It can quickly grow beyond an amount the debtor can ever hope to repay. That, I believe, is what inner feelings of guilt do, if we don’t “pay them off” by receiving Christ’s gracious forgiveness.

In the 1960’s psychiatrist Karl Menninger was getting nowhere treating some seriously depressed and suicidal patients who were hospitalized. He decided to experiment with a new course—one that didn’t fit the Freudian orthodoxy. He began probing his patients’ consciences to find if they had some buried guilt that was impacting their mental health. Nearly every one of them finally admitted to having buried inside things for which they felt guilty and ashamed. When Menninger took them through a process of facing their failures and actions, admitting their responsibility, dropping their defenses of blaming others, confessing their sins and asking for forgiveness, it made a profound difference for the patients. Most of them recovered rapidly and returned to active lives. Karl Menninger wrote a landmark book—Whatever Became of Sin? —that impacted counseling methods.

Have you been paying off your account with the Lord regularly? It’s a wonderful daily discipline, to quiet ourselves, listen to the soft voice of our conscience about whether there are any things we feel uncomfortable or guilty about in the past day, and then acknowledging and asking for God’s forgiveness of those. When we “hunger and thirst for righteousness,” in this the only way we can ever achieve it, we receive His cleansing and renewing in our souls.

Happiness Habit #5
“Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.”
The word “mercy” means something that is not earned or deserved. It is an act of kindness or love that a person can’t pay for. There are opportunities all around us to add to our joy and happiness by freely and unselfishly doing something for someone else. We show mercy when we sacrifice our time to volunteer, when we do something unexpected for a spouse or family member as an act of love, when we pray for others who are going through a hard time.

The opposite of the joy of giving mercy to others is found in Misery Method #5: Give others only what they deserve. If you want to be a miserable person, never do anything without strings attached. Always keep score in all your relationships. Calculate what you can get out of anything. Hold on tightly to what you have and never let go willingly of your money or your time.

But to experience the joy and blessedness Jesus invites us to experience, we have to let go of our grip. We have to be willing to sacrifice, to put somebody else’s needs above our own. What we give, as God’s Word and centuries of Christian experience have confirmed, always comes back to us eventually. So let’s give without expecting an immediate return, out of love, the way Christ has loved, us, and let’s trust that as we are merciful to others God’s mercy will overflow into our own lives.

Happiness Habit #6
“Blessed are the pure in heart.”
Purity is not a word we hear a lot about today. It almost seems like an archaic, out-of-date concept. We are bombarded constantly by the opposite approach, our Misery Method #6: Fill your mind with garbage. The explosion of information and entertainment and stimuli today is both a benefit and a curse. Our minds are constantly receiving images and data, to the point of overload.

We have so much freedom and so many options. And we have so many choices to make about what we will allow into our brains, what we will think about and dwell upon. We know that all actions begin as thoughts. When we let corrupted, selfish, greedy or lustful images and thoughts into our minds, of course they affect us. What we think about affects what we do. Some of you had the privilege of hearing Rebecca Hagelin at our January Bonita Christian Forum. Her book, Home Invasion, has been a powerful tool for parents and grandparents in understanding the corrupted world in which our kids are growing up. But it’s not just elementary-age and teenage kids who are being impacted. All of us fight the battle of the mind every day.

Keeping our thoughts pure requires that we filter out whatever we can—by choosing to not watch those shows and movies, not visit those websites, and not read those magazines and books. And sometimes, when we can’t stop the garbage from coming in, we have to process it and cleanse it and ask for God’s help to remove it.

Happiness Habit #7
“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God.”
We are “peacemakers” if we care enough about our relationships to work through our problems, conflicts and disagreements to reach a place of peace and reconciliation. Being a peacemaker is never easy. And many choose what feels at the time like the simpler path: Misery Method #7, which allows us to leave all differences unresolved. When we avoid conflicts and problems at all cost, or when we let differences fester, or when we hold a grudge or seek revenge, we are following this path. It often feels most natural, while the opposite—peacemaking—can be hard work.

We live in a world of conflict. The Middle East is wracked with civil wars between Sunnis and Shiites (and al Qaeda) in Iraq, between the elected government and the radical Taliban in Afghanistan, between Israelis and Palestinians in the Holy Land. The Western world must be on constant guard against terrorism. Conflict reigns between Democrats and Republicans in Congress. Lawsuits clog our court system, along with divorce cases and custody battles. Peace seems as hard to find as ever. Into this strife-torn world Jesus sends us to do our best to try to bring peace and reconciliation.

While none of us has a magic wand to produce peace around the globe, we can begin where we are with our own relationships. There may be someone here this morning who is alienated from a family member, and the Lord is going to put it on your heart to try to make things right and re-open communication. There may be someone here this morning who is convicted that they need to address a problem in their marriage, or try to bring together people who have been at odds in their community. Making peace often requires compromise, bending, humility and/or a willingness to meet another person in the middle. Sometimes it requires us to forgive.

It was one of those old western movies—the kind they “ain’t makin’ any more.” It was on one of the classic film channels, and I wish I could remember the name of it. But the climactic scene has stuck with me. Two cattlemen have been fighting over their herds and their grazing lands, and they unexpectedly meet in the town saloon. Harsh words are exchanged, and they challenge each other to step outside for a showdown.

Standing in the middle of the street, 20 paces apart, fingers itching to reach for their holsters, one of them suddenly calls out to the other, “What are we doing? In five minutes one of us will be dead, and the other will be in jail for murder. Why are we throwing our lives away for a bunch of cows?” And then he dropped his guns to the dirt. His opponent quickly drew and aimed, and then he hesitated. This was his chance to blow away his rival. But his conscience got the best of him. He, too, dropped his pistols, and then slowly walked towards the other with his right hand outstretched. The whole town breathed a sigh of relief. It’s a picture of what Jesus is calling us to do. In a world of conflict and rivalry, retribution and revenge, He asks us to drop our guns and take a step towards the other.

Conclusion
And so we have completed our brief study of the “Beatitudes”—the steps to true happiness—along with our analysis of the opposite path towards being miserable. Which step do you need to take today? Do you need to ask God this morning to forgive you and cancel your debt and relieve your guilty conscience about something? Do you need to notice someone in need and give to them in mercy? Do you need to filter out some of the garbage entering your mind and concentrate on positive thoughts? Do you need to work at patching up a broken relationship or help others to reconcile?

None of these steps is easy. Nothing worthwhile in life ever is. They may even feel at first unnatural. But Jesus has shown us the best way, the right way to find real lasting joy. Will you follow His bidding, and trust that His ways are best?