Journal of European Baptist Studies, Volume 9, Number 2, January 2009

Such characteristics correspond to specific 13 Stassen and Gushee, Kingdom Ethics, p. 135. See also, G. Stassen, ‘The fourteen triads of the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5:21-7:12)’, Journal of Biblical Literature 122 (2003), pp. 267-308. 14 G. Stassen, Living the Sermon on the Mount (San Francisco: John Wiley, 2006), p. 8. 13 Stassen and Gushee, Kingdom Ethics, p. 136. 16 Ibid., p. 140. 17 Ibid., p. 135. 18 Ibid., p. 25. 42 Journal of European Baptist Studies practices of people who are living in God’s already existing reign as active participants in the kingdom vision. These are the practices which Jesus commands his followers to do, for it is only by doing them (rather than merely preaching about them) that one can go ‘beyond the righteousness of the Scribes and the Pharisees’ (Matt. 5:20). These acts are realistic and attainable precisely because they are nothing more than specific practices that characterise the kingdom of God, which is a present reality for Jesus’ followers. For instance, when Jesus commands his hearers to love their enemies (Matt. 5:44), he reinforces this command with a practice, prayer (‘pray for those who persecute you’), which corresponds to the peace which is a characteristic of God’s reign. It may be objected, however, that Jesus does not always offer a transforming initiative. This is certainly true in the case of Jesus’ teaching on divorce (Matt. 5:31-32). Stassen argues, however, that the lack of such a transforming initiative on this subject in the Sermon on the Mount is supplied by Paul in his First Epistle to the Corinthians, in which the apostle commands his readers who were married to ‘be reconciled’ (1 Cor. 7:10- ll). 19 In other cases, Jesus’ command may seem unrealistic or even absurd, as in the case of Jesus’ advice to those who lust to pluck out their eyes or to cut off their right hand (Matthew 5:29-30). On this point Dietrich Bonhoeffer offers a helpful perspective. He argues that since it is impossible to take the command either literally or non-literally, ‘we are placed in a position where there is no alternative but to obey (Christ)’. Jesus maintains that those who obey him will be ‘sons of (their) Father who is in heaven’ (Matt. 5:45). 20 Thus, Jesus’ followers participate now in the life of the kingdom of God in such a way as to translate the internalised spirituality of the Beatitudes into moral action based on obedience to the kingdom vision set out by Christ. Stassen explains that ‘the virtues of the participants (in the ‘drama of the reign of God’) fit the drama: we participate now and will be participating in God’s merciful, compassionate 21 deliverance’. We may conclude, therefore, that for Stassen the Sermon is a vision of life in the kingdom of God. His confidence in the moral efficacy of the Sermon on the Mount is related to his belief that this vision of the life in the kingdom of God can be translated into ethical norms wh