Yesterday in The New York Times, there was an article about a picture taken by the James Webb Space Telescope, which launched two and a half years ago and currently orbits around the sun about a million miles from Earth. The picture is of a vast stretch of galaxies, and right near the bottom is a perfectly framed question mark formed by a pair of giant dust clouds.

Now, this was quite an energizing providence to me for today’s message. Not because I’m going to talk about astronomy, but because the last paragraph of the article filled me with a sense of sadness, urgency, and wonder that I get to talk to you about the Creator of this universe and his purposes for this church and Dana Olson’s family.

The author of the article, Dennis Overbye, closes like this:

We’ve barely begun to know anything — that’s why we build telescopes. Once the Webb has completed its rounds of investigations two decades from now, we might know a bit more about how this bowl of stars works. But we still won’t know why we are here. That question mark, our profound cosmic ignorance, is one of the great gifts of science.

So, the great gift of science is to underline the “profound . . . ignorance” that we do not know why we exist.

If that were the gift of science (and I don’t believe it is), it would be not a gift, but a curse. To wake up every morning and have to say, “I have no idea why I exist” — that is not a gift. It is a curse. And millions of people are taught to live under this curse.

But we — we who have been born again “through the living and abiding word of God” (1 Peter 1:23) — we know why we exist. We exist to know and enjoy and reflect the glory of our Creator and Redeemer, especially the glory of his sovereign, sustaining grace.

What Is Sovereign, Sustaining Grace?

What is God’s sovereign, sustaining grace? Where does God make plain that this is our portion? That’s my focus in this message. Let me give you a rhyming definition to illustrate what I mean from experience, and then I’ll show its meaning from the word.

Not grace to bar what is not bliss,     Nor flight from all distress, but this:The grace that orders our trouble and pain,     And then, in the darkness, is there to sustain.

I stress this because to celebrate a grace that bars what is not bliss, and gives flight from all distress, and does not order our pain — that grace would be biblically false and experientially unrealistic.

Our experiences and the Bible teach us that grace does not prevent pain, but orders, and arranges, and measures out our pain, and then in the darkness is there to sustain. Grace will one day banish all pain. But not yet.

Scarred by Grace

For example, years ago Bob Ricker was the president of the Baptist General Conference. He spoke at his daughter’s wedding. He pointed to some small scars on her neck and called them memorials of God’s grace — his sovereign, sustaining grace.

She had been in a car accident. Her injury prevented her from breathing right there at the scene of the accident. In the car behind her was a doctor who happened to have an air tube in his pocket. By the time he got to her, she was already turning blue. He forced the tube into her throat and saved her life. At her wedding a few years later, Bob told her: those scars you have to live with — they are memorials of sustaining grace.

Now, Bob Ricker is not naive. He knows that if God can ordain that in the car behind there be a doctor, and that this doctor have a breathing apparatus in his pocket, and that he have the presence of mind to use it savingly, then this God is fully able to prevent the accident in the first place. This is the God of whom Paul said in Ephesians 1:11, “[He] works all things according to the counsel of his will.” Bob even stressed, “‘All things’ means all things” — including, I assume, the paths of cars and airplanes and arrows and bullets and chromosomes and cancer cells. That was the inspiration for my little rhyming definition of sovereign, sustaining grace.

Not grace to bar what is not bliss,     Nor flight from all distress, but this:The grace that orders our trouble and pain,     And then, in the darkness, is there to sustain.

The God Above the Farmer

Here’s another story of grace, which I confirmed with Noël in the car yesterday driving over from Minneapolis. Noël, Abraham, Barnabas, and Talitha were traveling to Georgia, and the car broke down on a lonely stretch about an hour south of Indianapolis. The radiator was shot.

“Grace does not prevent pain, but orders, and arranges, and measures out our pain.”

A farmer in his mid-sixties pulled over and offered help. Noël said that she supposed they needed a motel and hoped that Monday morning there would be a garage open to work on the car. The farmer said, “Would you like to stay with me and my wife?” Noël hesitated. He said, “The Lord said that when we serve others, it’s like serving him.” He called his wife to get the okay and added, “You could go to church with us in the morning, if you can take a Baptist church.”

So, they stayed with the farmer — who was also an aviation mechanic that diagnosed the problem, drove to town Monday morning, bought a new radiator, came back, put it in at no expense, and sent the family on their way. In the meantime, Barnabas had pulled his fishing rod out of the car and caught a nineteen-inch catfish — the icing on the cake. Spectacular, sovereign, sustaining grace.

The God who can cause a farmer to stop to help Noël, and who sees to it that he is a Christian (even a Baptist!), and that he and his wife have room for the family to stay, and that he is a mechanic, and that he finds a radiator first thing Monday morning, and that he is willing to take the time, and that he has a pond with catfish — this God is perfectly able to keep a radiator from bursting open in the middle of Indiana. But in this fallen world of futility, that is not usually the way sustaining grace works. It does not always spare us frustrations and disappointments and losses.

Not grace to bar what is not bliss,     Nor flight from all distress, but this:The grace that orders our trouble and pain,     And then, in the darkness, is there to sustain.

Responding Like Paul

A young man in our church who was dealing with a physical condition that did not get better in spite of prayer said to me, “It would be easier if Jesus hadn’t healed, but instead had given grace to endure the absence of healing.” One of the things I said to him was this: “That’s exactly what Jesus did do — and for that very reason — in 2 Corinthians 12:9–10.”

God’s grace ordained that Paul have a thorn in the flesh for the sake of his humility, and then he does not remove it in answer to prayer. Instead, God says, “My [sovereign, sustaining] grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”

To which Paul responds, “Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”

Not grace to bar what is not bliss,     Nor flight from all distress, but this:The grace that orders our trouble and pain,     And then, in the darkness, is there to sustain.

Grace Abounds Even in Babylon

Our text in Jeremiah 32 is about this kind of sovereign, sustaining grace and holds the key to why Faith Baptist Fellowship exists after 44 years, and to why Dana and Christa and the girls served so faithfully.

Jerusalem and God’s chosen people are in darkness and distress, and it is God himself who has ordered it so. Look at verse 36: “Now therefore thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, concerning this city of which you say, ‘It is given into the hand of the king of Babylon by sword, by famine, and by pestilence.’” That’s what those outside of Israel are saying, and it is true. Grace has not spared them this calamity. Nor will the grace of God spare you your appointed calamity. He will spare you many sorrows, but not all.

But what they say about God’s chosen ones is not the last word. God has the last word. And it is a word of sovereign, sustaining grace. Verse 37: “Behold, I will gather them from all the countries to which I drove them in my anger and my wrath and in great indignation. I will bring them back to this place, and I will make them dwell in safety.”

So, God declares that he has ordered the trouble and pain: I have driven them to these foreign lands. And he declares that he himself will deliver them and bring them back to himself and to their land. In other words, sovereign grace will eventually triumph over the calamity.

What Makes Us Saints So Sure?

How can we be sure of this triumph of grace in our lives, our churches, our souls? It is one question to ask, Why has Faith Baptist Fellowship endured for 44 years? But an even more urgent question is, How can we be sure that grace will triumph for this church and in our own lives in the future? How can you be sure that grace will sustain you to the end in the faith and holiness that brings you safe to heaven?

That’s what the rest of this text is about. The answer is sustaining grace for God’s chosen people is sovereign grace. That is, sustaining grace is omnipotent grace. It is grace that overcomes all obstacles and preserves the faith and holiness that bring us home to heaven. This is our only sure confidence for the future. You and I, in ourselves, are utterly fickle and unreliable. If we were left to our own powers to persevere, we would make shipwreck of our faith. It is sure. This is why the saints have prayed and sung for centuries,

Oh, to grace how great a debtorDaily I’m constrained to be!Let thy goodness, like a fetter,Bind my wandering heart to thee.Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,Prone to leave the God I love;Here’s my heart; Oh, take and seal it;Seal it for thy courts above.

Is that the way saints should pray? Is that the way to pray for your future and for Dana’s future and for this church’s future? Is that a biblical way to pray?

Make your goodness like a fetter — a chain — that binds my wandering heart to you. Seal my heart with an unbreakable bond for the courts of heaven. In other words, keep me! Preserve me! Defeat every rising rebellion! Overcome every niggling doubt! Deliver from every destructive temptation! Nullify every fatal allurement! Expose every demonic deception! Tear down every arrogant argument! Shape me! Incline me! Hold me! Master me! Do whatever you must do to keep me trusting you and fearing you till Jesus comes or calls.

May we — should we — pray and sing like that?

Four Promises of Sovereign, Sustaining Grace

The answer from this text is yes. That kind of singing and praying is rooted in the new-covenant promise of sovereign, sustaining grace. Let’s read it. Keep in mind that this is one of several Old Testament promises of the new covenant that Jesus said he sealed with his own blood for all who are in him. It is not just for Jews, but for those who are true Jews by virtue of union with Jesus, the seed of Abraham (Galatians 3:7, 16). Jeremiah 32:38–41 says,

They shall be my people, and I will be their God. I will give them one heart and one way, that they may fear me forever, for their own good and the good of their children after them. I will make with them an everlasting covenant, that I will not turn away from doing good to them. And I will put the fear of me in their hearts, that they may not turn from me. I will rejoice in doing them good, and I will plant them in this land in faithfulness, with all my heart and all my soul.

Notice four promises of sovereign, sustaining grace.

1. God will be our God.

God promises to be our God. Verse 38: “They shall be my people, and I will be their God.” All the promises to his people are summed up in this: “I will be your God.” That is, “I will use all that I am as God — all my wisdom, all my power, and all my love — to see to it that you remain my people. All that I am as God, I exert for your good.”

2. God will change our hearts.

God promises to change our hearts and cause us to love and fear him. Verses 39–40: “I will give them one heart and one way, that they may fear me forever. . . . I will put the fear of me in their hearts.” In other words, God will not simply stand by to see if we, by our own powers, will fear him. He will sovereignly, supremely, mercifully give us the heart that we need to have, and give us the faith and the fear of God that will lead us home to heaven. This is sovereign, sustaining grace. (See also Deuteronomy 30:6 and Ezekiel 11:19–20; 36:27.)

3. God will not let us turn away.

God promises that he will not turn away from us and that we will not turn away from him. Verse 40: “I will make with them an everlasting covenant, that I will not turn away from doing good to them. And I will put the fear of me in their hearts, that they may not turn from me.” In other words, his heart-work is so powerful that he guarantees we will not turn from him. This is what’s new about the new covenant: God promises to fulfill by his power the conditions that we have to meet. We must fear him and love him and trust him. And he says, “I will see to that. I will ‘put the fear of me in their hearts’ — not to see what they will do with it, but in such a way that ‘they may not turn from me.’” This is sovereign, sustaining grace.

4. God will do this with infinite intensity.

Finally, God promises to do this with the greatest intensity imaginable. He expresses this in two ways, once at the beginning and once at the end of verse 41: “I will rejoice in doing them good, and I will plant them in this land in faithfulness, with all my heart and all my soul.” First, he says that he will exert this sovereign, sustaining grace with joy: “I will rejoice in doing them good.” Then he says (at the end of verse 41) that he will exert this sovereign, sustaining grace “with all [his] heart and all [his] soul.”

How Great Is God’s Desire to Do You Good?

He rejoices to sustain you, and he rejoices with all his heart and with all his soul. Now, I ask you, not with any sermonic exaggeration, or with any rhetorical flourish, or with any sense of overstatement at all — I ask you, I challenge you, can you conceive of an intensity of desire that is greater than a desire empowered by “all [God’s] heart and all [God’s] soul”?

Suppose you took all the desire for food and sex and money and fame and power and meaning and friends and security in the hearts and souls of all the human beings on the earth — say, about eight billion people — and you put all that desire, multiplied by all those eight billion hearts and souls, into a container. How would it compare to the desire of God to do you good implied in the words “with all [his] heart and all [his] soul”? It would compare like a thimble to the Pacific Ocean, because the heart and soul of God are infinite, and the hearts and souls of man are finite. There is no intensity greater than the intensity of “all [God’s] heart and all [God’s] soul.”

“Grace will one day banish all pain. But not yet.”

And that is the intensity of the joy he has in sustaining you with sovereign grace: “I will rejoice in doing them good . . . with all my heart and all my soul.” Some of you may be tasting the sweetness of such sovereign, sustaining grace for the first time this morning. That is the work of the Holy Spirit in your life, and I urge you to yield to it and be mastered by sovereign, sustaining grace.

Others of you have lived in this sweet assurance for decades. It has sovereignly sustained you in the worst and best of times. Pain has not pushed you into bitterness; pleasure has not lured you into idolatry; God has kept you. He has held you fast — with all his heart and all his soul.

He has done it for your church, and he has done it for Dana and Christa and Anna and Mary and Betsy, and he will — with all his heart and all his soul. This is sovereign, sustaining grace. To know it, rejoice in it, and reflect it is why you exist.

Not grace to bar what is not bliss,     Nor flight from all distress, but this:The grace that orders our trouble and pain,     And then, in the darkness, is there to sustain.However long the sorrows last,     This mighty grace will hold you fast.

Audio Transcript

What role do young Christians play in leading and guiding a local church? It’s a good question, especially in light of young Christians honoring older Christians. Here’s the email: “Pastor John, hello! I’m a young pastor in Missouri. Lately, I’ve noticed older Christians in the church appealing to 1 Peter 5:5. It has been used to silence younger believers in the church. What should be the role of younger members of the church in relation to older members in, say, church business meetings, when older members seek to shut down conversations and to avoid discussing uncomfortable topics? I would love your input on how to navigate through this sticky and confusing topic.”

It seems to me that most human cultures from around the world give evidence that something is written on the human heart to tell us that younger people should respect older people. Now, by respect, I mean accord them a certain deference, a certain honor, show a readiness to serve them, and give serious attention to what they say.

Honor the Old

I think that’s what the Scriptures say. For example, Leviticus 19:32 says, “You shall stand up before the gray head and honor the face of an old man, and you shall fear your God: I am the Lord” (Leviticus 19:32).

And Paul cautions Timothy in the exercise of his pastoral authority toward older members. He says, “Do not rebuke an older man but encourage him as you would a father, younger men as brothers, older women as mothers, younger women as sisters, in all purity” (1 Timothy 5:1–2). And I think that’s Paul’s way of saying, “Yes, young man, Timothy, yes, you have pastoral authority to guide and correct older people, but there’s a way to do it that shows a special respect for them as older.”

Now, I start my answer to this question that way, for this young pastor in Missouri, because I think this tone ought to color all our dealings in the church. I think older people in the church should be treated with a peculiar kind of respect that is different from the young people. Peter says, “Honor everyone” (1 Peter 2:17). Respect all men. And then he says with the same word, “Honor the emperor” (1 Peter 2:17).

All people should be honored or respected as human beings, but that does not mean that all human beings should be respected in the same way. Similarly, all ages should be respected, but an 80-year-old is not to be respected only in the same way you respect a teenager.

Made Wise by the Word

But, having laid that foundation that is crucial for the culture or the ethos of a church, there is a clear and powerful stream in the Bible that warns us against assuming old equals wise. It doesn’t. It may.

An older person may be wiser because of his age. It often works this way. In fact, it should. The old men gave good counsel to Rehoboam in 1 Kings 12, and the young men gave stupid counsel (1 Kings 12:6–11). Oh my goodness, consider the centuries-long horrors that came from that stupid counsel. That’s the way it ordinarily works: young people don’t have wisdom yet, and older people do. But this is not always the case. A long life should be a good teacher, should produce wisdom, and long study of God’s word should yield a ripe mind and heart so that our older men ought to be the great repositories and our older women ought to be the great sages of the church. It should, and we ought to hope for it, expect it, look for it.

“There are some young men who have been shaped more deeply by the word than some old men.”

But it is the case that, often, there are arrogant, stubborn, foolish, lazy, ignorant old men, and there are humble, patient, wise, diligent, knowledgeable young men. We simply dare not equate age with wisdom or youth with folly. The Bible is very clear that is a wrong way to think. For example, Psalm 119:100 says, “I understand more than the aged, for I keep your precepts.” That’s the reason why we dare not equate wisdom with age. The word of God makes the key difference, not the years lived. There are some young men who have been shaped more deeply by the word than some old men who have been very neglectful of the word all their lives. They are still in the church, but they are not as wise and mature as people thirty years younger.

Jeremiah

For example, Jeremiah was hesitant to speak God’s word because of his youth. And God got a little bit upset with him. He says in Jeremiah 1:5,

“Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations.” Then [Jeremiah] said, “Ah, Lord God! Behold, I do not know how to speak, for I am only a youth.” But the Lord said to me, “Do not say, ‘I am only a youth’; for to all to whom I send you, you shall go, and whatever I command you, you shall speak. Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you to deliver you.” (Jeremiah 1:5–8)

That’s a strong word from God for a man who’s saying, “I’m too young.”

Timothy

Paul was just as concerned that Timothy would be cowed by his own youth as he was concerned that Timothy would be disrespectful of older people. So not only did he say to encourage rather than rebuke older men (1 Timothy 5:1), but he also said, “Let no one despise you for your youth, but set the believers an example in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity” (1 Timothy 4:12). In other words, do not let your youth keep you from ministering the word with power and courage to older people.

Elihu

In August of 1982, two years into my ministry at Bethlehem, I came back from vacation, and I preached a message titled “Let the Young Speak.” And I remembered it after all these years because I felt it was a risky message. “Let the Young Speak.” The church was made up overwhelmingly of older people — wonderful older people, in fact.

I was 36 years old, but newer, younger people were streaming to the church. And it would only be a matter of time till this church — at that time it was 113 years old — would see young names on the ballots and young people at the business meetings, standing up perhaps with something to say. I thought I should head off at the pass any notion that only older people have biblical maturity and wisdom. So I chose as my text Job 32, which is when Elihu speaks. Elihu gets ready to speak and rebuke Job. And he’s going to rebuke Eliphaz and Bildad and Zophar because he thinks all of them have got it wrong.

And I think Elihu’s right. I argued in the sermon that Elihu’s a good guy; he’s not one of these bad teachers. And there are all kinds of reasons for that. But here’s what that text says:

Now Elihu had waited to speak to Job because they were older than he. And when Elihu saw that there was no answer in the mouth of these three men . . . [he] answered and said: “I am young in years, and you are aged; therefore I was timid and afraid to declare my opinion to you. I said, ‘Let days speak, and many years teach wisdom.’ But it is the spirit in man, the breath of the Almighty, that makes him understand. It is not the old who are wise, nor the aged who understand what is right. Therefore, I say, ‘Listen to me; let me also declare my opinion.’” (Job 32:4–10)

“On any issue, we ask, ‘What does the word of God say?’ not, ‘How old is the speaker?’”

I concluded in that message that being old and being young is not decisive in who is qualified for office or who has the greater wisdom. The word of God decides, the Spirit of God decides what is wisdom. On any issue, we ask, “What does the word of God say?” not, “How old is the speaker?”

Clothed with Humility

It’s the same for the elders in 1 Peter 5:5. Those “elders” to whom the young are told to be submissive are not just older people; they are the same elders from 1 Peter 5:1. They are pastors, they are officers (pastor and elder are interchangeable offices in the New Testament). When the younger members are told to be subject to the elders, it means that they should show a special deference to the pastoral leaders of the church.

But the most important exhortation is probably the second half of verse five, which says, “Clothe yourselves, all of you [that means young and old, officers and laypeople], with humility toward one another, for God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble” (1 Peter 5:5). So the older people and the younger people should clothe themselves with humility.

Looking back on those early days of ministry as a 35-, 36-, 37-year-old, surrounded by very old people, that’s what they were like. It was just wonderful. I think we both labored to clothe ourselves with humility toward each other. And I think that means that, in the church, both older and younger will make every effort to submit their wills to the word of God. It’s not age and it’s not youth that is decisive in settling what is true and what is wise; it is the word of God.

Imagine that moment when Jesus first opened his mouth to begin his Sermon on the Mount.

The Gospel of Matthew sets the scene. Jesus has been baptized by John (3:13–17) and endured forty days of wilderness fasting and temptation (4:1–11). He has quietly begun his public ministry in the region of Galilee and called his first disciples (4:18–22). He started by teaching in synagogues. But now as his fame spreads, the crowds swell, and his ministry is increasingly consigned to open air (4:23–25).

Seeing the crowds, Jesus goes up a mountain. The gentle slope will serve as a natural theater where he might be seen, and his words heard, by the masses.

Has humble Galilee ever seen anything like this — anyone like this? Not only does this tradesman’s son heal, but he speaks with a captivating weight. The scribes borrow their authority (as they should) from Scripture as they teach and explain God’s word. But this man, perfectly in sync with Scripture, somehow speaks on par with Scripture — and even in some enigmatic sense, his authority seems to rise above it.

There are whispers. Might this be the prophet to come? Might this be the Messiah himself? It all makes for an electric moment — the air thick with energy and excitement.

A hush ripples through the crowd. He is about to speak. What will Jesus say? How will he start? What will be the first topic he addresses at such a poignant moment?

He opens his mouth and says, “Blessed . . .”

Ninefold Happiness

Remarkably, Jesus’s first topic — his repeated first topic — is to the blessedness, the happiness, of his hearers. He assumes they want to be happy, and he makes an extended appeal — a holy, perceptive, profound appeal — to their happiness. Not just once but over and over again.

The refrain of these precious opening words, which will come to be known as “the Beatitudes,” addresses the deep and enduring desire of the human heart to be happy — that is, blessed.

Blessed are the poor in spirit. . . . Blessed are those who mourn. . . . Blessed are the meek. . . . Blessed . . . Blessed . . . Blessed . . . Blessed . . . Blessed . . . Blessed . . . (Matthew 5:3–11)

Nine times Jesus makes his stunningly hedonistic appeal and tops it all off with the exhortation — for those in the face of persecution no less — “Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven” (5:12).

The opening salvos of Jesus’s most famous sermon promise true happiness. His refrain is reward; his charge is “rejoice and be glad.” Many of us today are so familiar with these Beatitudes that we miss the shock, the scandal, the gall of a preacher unleashing such a pleasure-seeking manifesto on an unsuspecting audience.

Our Blessed God

Part of the reason we miss this edge in Jesus’s message is because our word blessed has lost much of its power. In the first century, blessed was no overused hashtag. It wasn’t Christianese, suffering from overuse and shallowness. “Blessed” in the Hebrew Scriptures was “the man [whose] delight is in the law of the Lord” — so rich and full and sweet a delight that “on his law he meditates day and night” (Psalm 1:1–2). Blessed was no small promise from the mouth of Jesus to the ears of the crowds.

“The kingdom of heaven is, first and foremost, the sphere of God’s happy smile and favor.”

The Greeks had mused about the “blessedness” (makarismos) of their gods as “the transcendent happiness of a life beyond care, labor, and death . . . the happy state of the gods above earthly sufferings and labors” (TDNT). In 1 Timothy, Paul applies the term to the Father of Jesus Christ. He is “the blessed God” who has entrusted Paul with “the gospel of his glory” (1:11). He is “the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords” (6:15).

Accordingly, Peter van Mastricht, favorite systematician of Jonathan Edwards, would come along centuries later and define divine blessedness as God’s

perfect enjoyment of his own self, from which there is said to be fullness of joys with his face (Psalm 16:11). In it is contained not only an exact knowledge of his own self, a knowledge proper to him alone (Romans 11:34; 1 Corinthians 2:11), but also a fullness, repose [rest], and joy in himself, in the communion of the persons, and in all his works (Proverbs 8:30; Matthew 17:5). (Theoretical-Practical Theology, 2:489)

In other words, to be God is to be happy — infinitely, unshakably happy. Because what makes him happiest — who makes him happiest — is infinite and unshakable: himself. God is not an idolater; he has no greater joy than himself. He is supreme being — highest, infinitely so, in value, glory, beauty, and happiness. God is far and away, utterly unrivaled, the most valuable and most delightful reality. And before anything else existed, through his creative mind and hands, he was fully satisfied in himself. He alone is the bottomless source of all delight, even for himself. He is God, and to be God means to possess and enjoy infinite bliss. And apparently, to be inclined to share it.

Our Blessing God

What’s so stunning in Jesus’s repeated call to true happiness is that it presupposes God’s willingness, even eagerness, to extend his own happiness to his creatures. The blessedness Jesus promises is the blessedness of God himself shared with his people. In fact, as his disciples and their expanding circle come to learn, Jesus himself stands among them as the fully human (and divine) expression of God’s happiness.

Jesus comes as an extension of his Father’s own blessedness, and he offers that blessedness to those who hear him in faith. The kingdom of heaven — so prominent in Jesus’s teaching — is, first and foremost, the sphere of God’s happy smile and favor.

Unexpected Conditions

Still, the repeated invitation to such blessedness is not yet the end of the surprise. Nine unexpected, seemingly upside-down qualifications follow Jesus’s ninefold promise of God-given happiness. Counter to our natural expectations, these promises are not for the strong, the glib, the proud, the vindicated, the exacting, the worldly triumphant. This happiness, the happiness that comes from God himself, is on offer to the weak, the lowly, the despised, the ones who look foolish and shameful in the eyes of the world —

the poor in spirit . . . those who mourn . . . the meek . . . those who hunger and thirst for righteousness . . . the merciful . . . the pure in heart . . . the peacemakers . . . those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake . . . . (Matthew 5:3–10)

The blessed God is not into icing the cakes of otherwise happy people. He takes the empty and fills them, from the very bottom, with his surpassing blessedness. He takes the needy and shares with them his own boundless bliss. He recruits those who lack, that he might fill them. He receives the dependent, that his own joy in them might be seen to be as rich and full and thick as divine joy really is.

The happy God, in his fullness and bounty, in his infinite joy and delight, generously overflows to give, enrich, comfort, feed, extend mercy, show himself, adopt, vindicate, and reward all who will abandon the pretense of being fine without him and gladly receive the lavish abundance of his grace and mercy.

Happiness Rewards the Humble

Jesus’s opening lines in this sermon call us to acknowledge the depth of our emptiness, recognize the extent of our neediness, even glory in our lack and our dependence, and acclaim the fullness of God’s generous provision and contagious happiness.

He is both the blessed God and the blessing God, who sent his own Son not only to speak of our blessedness in him but to secure it. The happy God is the giving God — giving mercy, the kingdom, the whole earth, and great reward (Matthew 5:3, 5, 7, 12). He comforts and satisfies (5:4, 6). He reveals his own heart to his children and calls them his sons (5:8–9).

This happy God and Father makes his sun rise, and sends his life-giving rain, even on the evil and unjust (Matthew 5:45–46). He rewards those who seek him in secret (6:4, 6, 17). Indeed, he knows what his children need before they ask, and he is eager to give good things to those who ask (6:8, 32; 7:11). He feeds them far better than the birds (6:26) and clothes them far better than the lilies (6:30). He gives daily bread, forgives debts, and delivers from evil (6:11–13, 15).

“Blessed . . . Blessed . . . Blessed . . .” Jesus says. And he invites us into the very happiness of God.