This Sunday at Christ Church and in our Community Groups, we are wrapping up the Sermon on the Mount, arguably the greatest and best-known sermon the world has ever known. In this sermon, Jesus is offering His followers a radical picture of how to live the good life – how to be supremely happy. He gives us image after image of what it looks like to live in His Kingdom and walk the way that leads to life. It looks like learning to live without anger and lust, learning to love our enemies and to live without holding onto grudges. He teaches us how to pray, how to think about our money and possessions, and how to be a light to the world.

But as we have looked at these teachings and wrestled with the standard Jesus is setting, we have found the way to be narrow and difficult. In fact, we have found following them to be impossible on our own. But we have also learned that, instead of trying harder to be better, we need the indwelling presence of God because something inside us has to change.

Jesus said that if we will follow Him and apprentice our lives to His, that’s exactly what happens. Our minds and hearts are transformed. As we soak in Jesus’ words and attach our lives to His, change takes place. 

A great analogy for this comes from James Bryan Smith in his study, “The Good and Beautiful Life.” He says this kind of transformation is like making a pickle (I know, just stay with me….). I don’t know much about making pickles, but I do have Google! You take a cucumber and store it in a brine/vinegar solution. Over time, as it soaks in the solution, it begins to change. Eventually, it transforms from a cucumber into something new and different – a pickle! (For more on this, ask Brian Swain…. he’s from Atkins, AR, known as “The Pickle Capital of the World!” I think he was once the pickle toss champion…but that may be just a rumor).

This is such a great image for us as we spend time with Jesus personally and with each other, as we “pickle” together, seeking to live in the Kingdom Jesus has established. As we meet on Sundays, as we serve and pray together, read and study God’s Word in Community Groups and on our own, and as we share our faith with others, transformation is taking place.

And our lives, Jesus says, are being established on a foundation that is unshakable, even when storms come. We are learning together how to live the way that leads to life – a life of joy and supreme happiness!

So thankful that we are on this journey together!