1. These Red Letters: Looking at the Sermon on the Mount Part 4: A New Foundation/Born Again

2. Jesus started His ministry by inviting His new people to an entirely new life itself, something He once described to a religious leader as like being born all over again.

3. The temptation we and every person ever has and will always have is to add Jesus into our lives, instead of accepting His life and subtracting ours from it.

4. The point of Jesus message is not to teach better behaviors, but to invite resurrection to a world and humanity that was absolutely dead in its distance from God’s love.

5. Jesus speaks of actions towards other people that flow out of a heart that is towards His Father; He lived out a perfect trust in His Father’s heart and love by treating those around Him as if God felt the same towards them also!

6. Jesus doesn’t play games or say that His life is an easy thing- He demonstrates the difficulty by living with broken people in difficult situations, ultimately being crucified. He suggests that everyone who really wants to know His life should assume they will experience a cross as well.

7. We often agree with all of the words Jesus shares in principle, while disagreeing in practice. Our orthodoxy is nearly perfect. Our orthopraxy is far short. We call this hypocrisy gap, and Jesus says the only cure is that we claim His life fresh every day in the same breath as we lay our own down.