Attaching to God: Neuroscience-informed Spiritual Formation

109 The Sermon on the Mount and Human Flourishing (with Jonathan Pennington)

• Season 7 • Episode 109

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What is Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount really about?  Is it an out-of-reach spirituality for the really devoted? Is it a practical guide for political action? A reworking of the Old Testament Law? Or an existential treatise on the intentions that guide our actions?

What if it outlines the way toward human flourishing?

Dr.  Jonathan Pennington is a Professor of New Testament Interpretation at Southern Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky.  And a teaching pastor his local church. Dr. Pennington is the author of many books, including Reading the Gospels Wisely, The Sermon on the Mount and Human Flourishing, and Jesus, the Great Philosopher: Rediscovering the Wisdom Need for the Good Life. 

Find out more about Dr. Pennington here: https://www.jonathanpennington.com/

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Introduction: Exploring the Sermon on the Mount

Geoff Holsclaw: What is Jesus's Sermon on the Mount really about? Is it an out of reach spirituality for the really devoted, is it a practical guide for political action? Is it a reworking of the Old Testament law or some existential treatise on human intentions that guide our actions? Well, it's probably a little bit of all those things.

And so much more. I'm so excited that we'll be talking about the Sermon on the Mount and how it relates to human flourishing today. This is the Attaching to God podcast, and I'm your host, Jeff Holsclaw, where we are exploring a neuroscience informed spiritual formation, which really just are fancy ways of saying how do humans best flourish, which is what we're talking about.

Meet Dr. Jonathan Pennington

Geoff Holsclaw: And today we have our guest is Dr. Jonathan Pennington. He is a professor of New Testament interpretation at Southern Seminary in Louisville. Is it Louisville? Kentucky, am I saying it right

Jonathan Pennington: fact that you said it that way shows you're not from here, but that's okay. Louisville.

Geoff Holsclaw: Yeah, exactly. Well, I'm from California. I'll just [00:01:00] butcher everything no matter what. He's also a teaching pastor at his local church.

Uh, he has authored many books, uh, recently reading the Gospels Wisely, uh, the one we'll be talking about today, which is the Sermon on the Mount and Human Flourishing. And then also after that he wrote Jesus the Great Philosopher, rediscovering the wisdom. Um. For the wisdom needed. I wrote that in the wrong, the wisdom needed for the good life.

Well, Dr. Pennington, thanks so much for being on with us today.

Jonathan Pennington: Oh, it's a total joy. Thank you.

Geoff Holsclaw: Yeah, I was so glad to come across your work. I think it was last summer and uh, I was like, oh, sermon of the Mountain, human flourishing. Those are like two of my most favorite topics, so I'm so, I was just so excited. 

The Journey to Understanding the Sermon on the Mount

Geoff Holsclaw: So before we hit record, uh, you were just talking about the process you got into this book and how it's the fruits of like 10 years of kind of labor.

Could you kind of just. Share briefly how that all came about.

Jonathan Pennington: Yeah. Yeah. You know, I kind of feel like my whole life is just a bunch of happy accidents that I'm in Bob Ross kinda way as I look back. Uh, that is [00:02:00] thankfully God.

Geoff Holsclaw: Clouds, happy trees.

Jonathan Pennington: right. With God behind it all for me. Um, yeah, so I have had the great privilege to study the gospel Matthew very intensely for about 25 years, going back to my PhD years.

And then when I started teaching, uh, at Southern. For the not entirely noble reasons of just needing to make some extra income. I, uh, started teaching, uh, this sermon of the mount class as like a J term we called it in those days, like a one week intensive in Januarys. And I, you know, I initially thought, oh, no problem.

I've got a PhD in Matthew. Sure. Sermon of the Mount's part of Matthew. And I very quickly realized I was way over my head, uh, in this, and, and I came to see that. Uh, you know, from the early stages of the church and all the way to today, the single most studied and preached upon and pondered and written about portion of the entire Bible for Christians are these three chapters in Matthew.

Matthew five to seven. And so I realized, [00:03:00] oh gosh, I've got a lot to learn. And I started to, through my teaching and, and reading, started to think. A lot about the sermon and kind of, it really changed my life. I mean, it's not an overstatement to say that that. Deep journey that began 15 years ago. You know, coincided with my own kind of spiritual and therapeutic journey as well, and also just kind of transformed my understanding of Christianity into a, in a deep, deep way of God's care about our inner life and how that works its way out and human flourishing.

So very thankful for that accidental step that I took into the, the sermon and the way God's used it in, in my life deeply.

The Concept of Human Flourishing

Geoff Holsclaw: Well, the title of the book really stood out to me. Uh, the focus on human flourishing, and it is kind of in vogue now with a lot of positive psychology, talking about how do we move just from, um, you know, solving mental health problems to kind of that goal of a flourishing human life. Uh, which taps into a lot of ancient [00:04:00] philosophy.

Uh, kind of the pursuit of philosophy in the ancient world wasn't just about how do we know what we know, but rather. It was, you know, how do we live the good life? And you get into that, uh, quite a bit. Can, can you set the, the, the table a little bit? Like what are some of the key contextual words you mentioned too, at the beginning of the book that we kind of need to know in order to get into the world of the Sermon on the Mount?

Jonathan Pennington: Yeah. 

Wisdom Literature and Ancient Philosophy

Jonathan Pennington: Well, as I began to study it, uh, one of the big turning points was that I. Came to see that the Summer of the Mount is wisdom literature, um, which is a concept that is of course all throughout the Old Testament and into the new as well. Um, but what I did not understand, uh, based on my own kind of deficiencies in my previous education is that that's what ancient philosophy was about as well.

The love of wisdom that is, it's the, it's what the word means. The way I had learned philosophy, and I think most people, was that it was this kind of esoteric like abstract thing. Like when you leave the room, do chair, does the chair still exist? [00:05:00] How would you know that? You know, which can be interesting, you know, discussions.

But I had to educate myself in the ancient philosophy. Of of the Greek and Roman worlds, which are intersecting with Christianity for sure and realize, wow, this is the reason why Aristotle did his work. This is why the stoics. Um, right now I'm reading a ton of Epictetus and he's very much the same way as well, contemporary of, of Paul and, um, slightly younger contemporary of Jesus as well.

This is what they cared about. They realized that we humans have always needed to know what does it mean to really be human, and how do you find. The good life or what the Old Testament would call, call shalom. Like how do you really, um, find the flourishing life? 

Translating Key Terms: Makarios and Telios

Jonathan Pennington: So as I began to dig into that and see that it wasn't just in Greek and Roman philosophy, but it was actually in the Old Testament, in the New Testament as well, two of the big words that really came to the fore that are right there in the [00:06:00] sermon are the Greek word Rios and the Greek word te us or Telio. And those two words, I often, you know, joke or, but it's true. I spent five years trying to figure out how to translate that word, makarios, so I'm not joking. I like beat my head against that word. I had lists of like all the potential, uh, translations into English of the word Macs, and then I, I just read everything I could find on it and it finally dawned on me that.

Every other language, Greek, Hebrew, Latin, tons of modern languages that I've talked with people, Chinese, Portuguese, Spanish, German, they all distinguish two ideas that we have collapsed together into the one English word Blessed. So if you look at the Beatitudes, this first famous opening to the Sermon on the Mount.

The reason we call them beatitudes is because the Latin word beatus means flourishing or happy. That's what it [00:07:00] meant. And it turns out that's what the Greek word means. Arias, and the Hebrew word behind it as Asher like the name Asher is a great name. It means flourishing or happy. And I came to realize that.

Wow. I've always read the Beatitudes where it says in our English, Bibles blessed. And that's not horrible, but it does kind of miss what Jesus is actually doing here. I think what he's doing is what? All what the Old Testament wisdom is doing, what the Greek and Roman wisdom was doing, and that is painting a picture of what true human flourishing looks like, really painting a picture of what it means to thrive as a human.

And what really dawned on me is that the Bible's not afraid of, of asking that question. And Jesus, his very first sermon, he starts off with nine statements about what it means to flourish or thrive. So that was a real eyeopener for me, uh, that I did not realize the Bible [00:08:00] cared about that. And so I began to read broadly and began to realize, oh my, this has been a common understanding throughout the church's history, that Jesus is a philosopher and that he is answering what the true.

Human flourishing is so, that's the one word, but kass, I don't know what, I don't know if

Geoff Holsclaw: All right, well, let's,

Jonathan Pennington: pause there

Geoff Holsclaw: so then what is your, yeah, let's pause there really quick. What is your preferred translation then?

Jonathan Pennington: I mean, in this book I translate as flourishing, but it's not, it's not perfect, you know? And what happens?

Geoff Holsclaw: Flourishing, happy, blessed, uh.

Jonathan Pennington: I mean, happy is not gonna work probably in English now 'cause it's, it means kind of like a temporary emotional state only Shalom. You know, would be in the category or flourishing. And the reason I came upon flourishing is because in this, in the translations of Aristotle, they used to translate this same word and same idea of Nia and other Greek word that's used [00:09:00] for it.

They used to translate it as happy, but because English has changed and happy doesn't work, now they translate it flourishing. So that's where I really got it, is to, ah, this is what, this is the better way to translate it. But it's not perfect and it is kind of a. Flourishing word now, like you see it everywhere.

And what happens over time is words get tired, you know? And so eventually flourishing probably won't work as a translation. Just like happy didn't. But for now, I think it's the, probably the preferred one, so,

The Role of Ethics in Philosophy and the Bible

Geoff Holsclaw: Well, I want to go back really quick just to the schools of philosophy, uh, that you were talking about. 'cause I studied philosophy in undergrad. I'm a trained theologian. I love all this stuff, right? And when I was learning it, it was kinda like the three perennial philosophical questions were like, well, what exists?

Uh, that's like metaphysics or ontology. And then how do you know what exists, which would be epistemology? And then. What do you do about what exists? Which would be like ethics, right? So you have metaphysics, epistemology and ethics. And the ethics was kind of last and it was, you know, blah. [00:10:00] It's kind of this weird kind of add-on I think a lot of times, but ancient philosophy, um. And a lot of people have now done more work. Uh, 'cause I think our modern kind of lenses, uh, corrupt, ancient philosophy, it was much more like a, a question. It was really a training for living is, and it was a rigorous training. It's, uh, and it's like an exercise of how to get into the best kind of life. Uh, and so then.

Um, to say something like, well, Jesus is giving us an exercising toward a good life, or that the Old Testaments, uh, is giving us a training for the good life. At first, I think a lot of people are like, oh, that's weird to say, and then you start thinking about it and you're like, well, that's clearly what it's doing.

Like it's off. You know, Psalm, Psalm one gives you the two roads, right? You know, blessed is the one, uh, who doesn't walk and step with the wicked or stand in the way of the sinners or sit in the company of mockers. Uh, but instead what? Delights on the law of the Lord and meditates it, right? You're given these two ways.

And then as the Psalm goes, [00:11:00] one way leads to life. You're the tree that's planted by water and the other one is chaff. That's blown away, right?

Jonathan Pennington: Exactly right. And that's the same word that Jesus uses. The Hebrew, the Greek, and the Latin. In Psalm one is the exact same word that's in the, it's exactly right. Yeah. Yep.

Geoff Holsclaw: All right. So that's, uh, and I said it wrong, the first of Markos. Right. Uh, blessed beatitude, happy or flourishing. So then, what's the other word that, uh, which is also kind of rooted in the philosophy too,

Jonathan Pennington: Yeah, it is. Yeah. And you're absolutely right. I mean, the whole philosophical system, it's really a bummer how we teach philosophy now because metaphysics and epistemology become everything, but they didn't care about those things if they didn't lead to ethics. Like that was the whole point of doing all that work.

Right. Um, and I think that's true for the Bible as well. And the other word that they used a lot was, it's actually a group of words that. Our in English would be like TEL so that this tell route, so Telio, Teo te, which means something like, um, uh, [00:12:00] wholeness or the mature goal. And so the. Telio, uh, anthropo.

So the complete person is what the goal of philosophy is. So it's all deeply related, and only the whole person, the mature person, the philosopher, the lover of wisdom, only that person will experience. What we're really made for, which is to flourish. And that would be, it's amazing how the Greeks and Romans talk about this, but of course the Bible talks that way too.

That only the complete person, the, the telio on air. The Telio anthropo, so the Greek phrases that are in the New Testament as well, uh, are, is the only one who could experience true human flourishing. The Bible's understanding of that is that, of course, that requires a relationship with God as well, but it does mean the reason they emphasize wholeness is because if our reasoning and our hearts, our interior [00:13:00] person and our will, or our actions, our discombobulated or disconnected, that's the opposite of being whole, and it's actually what Jesus calls hypocrisy.

Like when we, when we hear the word hypocrisy, we think of someone who preaches something and then lives differently. And that's certainly a kind of hypocrisy. There's actually a, a deeper, more challenging kind of hypocrisy, and that's where you actually live a good life, but your interior person is different than that.

In other words, where you are maybe externally obedient and even externally, quote unquote righteous, but your heart isn't full of love and compassion and faith really. And that's what the Pharisees represent in the Sermon of the Mound and all of Matthew is this, this anti teleo, this anti teleo, which is where they actually have good behavior, but their hearts are far from God.[00:14:00] 

And that's. That's at the core of the whole. Vision that Jesus is giving. God sees and cares about our interior person, not just our exterior behavior. He wants us to be Teos. And so that word is what he uses in Matthew 5 48 in the summer of the Mount, which is I. A super bummer in the way it gets translated.

It gets translated in English as be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect. And that is, that's really hard because that in English sounds like you have to be sinless. But in the old and New Testament, there's nobody who is sinless and there's no expectation that we're sinless, but we can actually be blameless. Righteous without being sinless. And that's the idea. In Hebrew of Tamme or in the New Testament, telio like that, God knows that we're not gonna be perfect, but that he is inviting us to pay attention to our interior person [00:15:00] so that our outsides and our out insides can, over time imperfectly become matched.

And that's what it means to be telio.

Geoff Holsclaw: so I wanna drill down on that a little bit because just like the English translations, it is, you know, be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect. Um, I. And that talks about, that's in a passage about, uh, loving your enemies and praying for those who persecute you and the high cost of, of following Jesus.

And I think, um, I, I love. How you use a sermon amount to also make kind of broader arguments about how we read the Bible. Uh, and so a lot of people miss that. The Bible's all about human flourishing. Uh, and it gets wrapped up not just in how, uh, these words are translated into English, but kind of like the broader constellation of concepts that we are using to interpret scripture.

And I think that perfect one, um, be perfect. And it's used in a, like a very strictly moral. Purity kind of way you tell a story. 

Humanity: Sinful or Beautiful?

Geoff Holsclaw: I, I [00:16:00] want you to tell a story about when you ask a class, which is typically of like Southern Baptist or reformed oriented people, and you ask them what comes to mind when you say the word humanity.

Can you tell that story? How, how it usually plays out in your classroom?

Jonathan Pennington: Yeah, I still do this, uh, regularly and in churches too, and I'm glad to report that the answer's changing. I'm really happy over the years, but

Geoff Holsclaw: All right. Well, tell us how it used to come up, and

Jonathan Pennington: But in my, but in my environment here at, at my seminary, it often still is the wrong answer, and that is, I say, okay, I'm gonna do this like. Kind of verbal Rorschach test kind of thing, like, and that is, I'm gonna say a word, humanity.

And you tell me, I, I'm gonna say a word. You tell me what the first word that comes to mind when I say humanity. At least in my tradition, the answer's often been sinful. And that's a huge mistake. And that is not the primary thing the Bible talks about is humanity. Yes, we are definitely sinful. [00:17:00] Yes, we, uh, need to be delivered from that.

We're dead in our sins, but the. First word that the Bible would say and the continued word, the foundational word would be, I think, beautiful or good, uh, tove in Hebrew or kalos in Greek, which would mean kind of this combination of good and beautiful, like it's, we kinda use two different ideas. One good being moral and beautiful being aesthetic, but.

It's kind of good. Good. Beautiful together is what tove means. It's, there's an excellence to it. And this is the primary thing that's true of humanity, that we are loved and we are tove or good because we're made in the image of God. We, the, the distinct thing about humans is that we alone image God. We mirror God and so.

The sinfulness comes in and cracks and muddies and distorts that image, but it doesn't remove that. That's primarily who we are. And so this is one of the obstacles to the whole [00:18:00] understanding of human flourishing in the Bible is that if we start with. This very low anthropology this or the what I have to call it, the worm theology of what it means to be human.

That I'm just a worm and I'm nothing. Not only are we violating the fundamental teaching of the Bible, that to be human is to be made in the image of God, which is glorious and beautiful and good, and to it also really distorts our ability to see that God does care about our human flourishing and that we can actually live good lives.

Not in our own power, always grace. But we really can and should be beautiful. You know, as as Sarah Groves, the great Christian artist says, kinda riffing onto eu, this is grace, an invitation to be beautiful. And I, and I love that. That's like a great line that I think is all throughout the Bible.

Geoff Holsclaw: And I, I think that, um. That kind of reflexive, like humanity is sinful, doesn't just keep us from understanding that flourishing is part of, or the main part of the, of the story of the Bible. [00:19:00] It also creates this wedge I think between a lot of like, um, contemporary kind of appropriations of, or engagements with psychology and attachment theory

Jonathan Pennington: That's right.

Geoff Holsclaw: neuroscience kind of fields and then Christian doctrine.

'cause we feel like, you know, and I see this online as people will jump from kind of a conservative Christian environment to a therapeutic environment, be. And their whole reasoning is basically like, I've been told that I'm awful my whole life and I want to be told that I'm good. And it's like, well, the truth is somewhere in between because there's.

There's really no good therapeutic model that basically says everyone is always good all the time. Like, right. Uh, and most theology, that's good. Doesn't say everyone's bad all the time. Right. But there there is these kind of polls, which is unfortunate. Well, so to continue to moving on, so if we could just kind of believe, which I, you and I do, and hopefully listeners that, uh, the Bible is this kind of document of human flourishing.

The salvation is. Then you point out that like for [00:20:00] the Bible, human flourishing kind of centers around these three different things, and one is that it's God centered about the relationship with God. Uh, is that it's future oriented, that there's kind of an esca, eschatological view, renew of all things. Uh, and then also that it's outward focusing, which is a little bit different than some of the philosophical schools that also speak of human flourishing.

I also think that's also different than maybe some of our. Therapeutic ways of speaking about human flourishing. So could you fill those out a little bit, however you want. Um, those couple that we use.

Jonathan Pennington: That is a really good question. I don't think anybody's ever asked it that way. I'm really, really glad for that. I've had an opportunity to talk about the certain amount a lot, and I really appreciate that, that way of framing it and, and I, and what you just said about the therapeutic mode, I mean. 

Therapeutic Turn and Mental Health in Christianity

Jonathan Pennington: Man, I feel that too.

It's like I'm so thankful for the, as it were, in some ways, the therapeutic turn of American culture, like that we're way more sensitive to people's mental health. Like when I was a young Christian, that was not even a word. That wasn't even a [00:21:00] phrase. And if Christians talked about it, it was seen as anathema or something, you know?

But, so I'm.

Geoff Holsclaw: your sin and pray more and your mental health will get better. Stop being depressed. If you would just, uh, yeah. And get off your medication and you need to trust God. It's like, yeah, we don't want to go back there at

Jonathan Pennington: in as.

Geoff Holsclaw: Yeah.

Jonathan Pennington: Glad we're better than that. 

The Swing to the Opposite Side

Jonathan Pennington: But of course, as you probably know, and I see all the time as well, the swing to the opposite side where there's no sense of like virtue, no sense of like endurance and grit, and even embracing suffering as maybe part, I mean, we've lost that. And then it also becomes very self, it can become very self-consumed.

You know, it'll just be, get rid of toxic people in your life or whatever. It's like, well, there's. I think we need a little bit bigger biblical idea than that. And, and so I do think this is what this is talking about. So yeah, it's God-centered. Like we're not gonna experience true human flourishing unless we are, and to the, and we will only [00:22:00] experience it to the degree in which we're connected with our makers since to, to live well means to live.

Here's how the Greek philosophers, like Epictetus would describe it, fuss according to nature and from a biblical perspective are according to nature is made by God. So we can't, we might experience some kinds of human flourishing as a non-Christian, but we can't really experience shalom apart from that.

So that's for sure. 

Future Oriented Vision of Christianity

Jonathan Pennington: Um, it is future oriented, which is a really tricky one because. In much of the Christian tradition, we've kind of ended up deferring human flourishing to. The eschaton or to the end. Um, but it's not only in the future, but it's consummated in the future. New creation, like the vision of Christianity is a time of shalom.

When God will set the world to write, we're not gonna be delivered out of this into a disembodied existence in heaven, but God is gonna recreate the [00:23:00] heavens and the earth a new creation where we experience the shalom we're made for. It's like, you know, if you, you just look at it in the book of Revelation.

The two big themes in the Old Testament are garden and city, and the Book of Revelation intentionally combines these in the final chapters of that. We live in a flourishing place in this garden city that with the presence of God. So it's certainly future oriented, but the.

Geoff Holsclaw: the leaves. The leaves of the trees that grow by the, the river of life are for the healing of the

Jonathan Pennington: Beautiful. And the, the trees that were in the original garden now are partaken of without condemnation, you know, of life and, and knowledge. And in fact, there's no need for the sun 'cause God himself is present. So it's this beautiful picture. You know, the paradox is that, that we shouldn't defer. Human flourishing only to the future, which is what we tend to do.

The Paradox of Suffering and Flourishing

Jonathan Pennington: And I think the genius of Christianity's teaching, including Jesus and the Sermon on the Mount and including the Beatitudes, is that in a [00:24:00] paradoxical, mysterious way, suffering and loss is actually one of the main places we experience true human flourishing. And I think that's what really distinguishes Christianity from.

Stoicism, for example, and other philosophies, and that they would say, you kind of have to get rid of negative emotions and you have to get rid of negative experiences, Christianity would say, and and unfortunately, a lot of the therapeutic mode would say that as well, like today. But the reality is that it's in these moments of.

Deprivation and loss and, and kind of being at the end of our rope that we actually experienced true human flourishing. That's that, that's just like so profound and so true that we don't wanna defer that completely off to the future. And then finally, yeah. Go ahead, please.

Geoff Holsclaw: just wanna pause on that. I, I love that because there is that balance, right? Because there are certain Christian traditions that basically just punts [00:25:00] all good things to eternity, and we just kind of have this meandering around in this life and bearing our

Jonathan Pennington: This life stinks, so you just need to get through it, you know? Right.

Geoff Holsclaw: And it's just, uh, getting to heaven, uh, and social work, or even personal sanctification, right? Just gets, you know, pushed off. But then there is also, I think then the opposite, which is like all good things, uh. Should be had right now, which you can get in the Prosperity Gospel. But there's just other parts of American life, which is basically, if your life isn't the way you want it now, get rid of people, change your job, you know, make changes.

All good things should be yours now. And the idea of like, good things come to those who wait, which I know is kind of, you know, a trite saying, but I've been reading the Psalms quite a bit and when, uh, recently and the word for hope and waiting are basically the same word in the Psalms. And so any kind of. Yeah. And faith too, right? So any kind of like hoping in God is actually AWAI on God. Um, and so there is that eschatological [00:26:00] kind of movement that we endure and suffer. Um, and all suffering can't be, you know, that, that attempt is just unrealistic. Uh, so

Jonathan Pennington: to vilify, to be vilified. And that that is, I think the biggest problem with our many aspects of our therapeutic culture now is, yeah, there's no space for suffering as educational. But again, of course we don't wanna make it. Trite or use that as a power tool, you know, teach you a valuable lesson, you know?

Right. Yeah,

Geoff Holsclaw: yeah. Or trauma. And we don't wanna minimize trauma, right? 

Outward Focus of Biblical Flourishing

Geoff Holsclaw: So there's that difficult balance between, so the last one is the outward focus, uh, of the biblical view of flourishing, which I think is also somewhat unique.

Jonathan Pennington: is. And you know, a couple of books that were so crucial for me at the very beginning of this whole journey of understanding the sermon, understanding Christianity in this deeper way. Um, don't appear much in the book, uh, just because I. I don't know if you've experienced this as an author, but like some of the [00:27:00] stuff you read early on that shaped you, and especially 'cause I'm a really slow writer.

By the time I got to writing the book, those things had shaped me, but I kind of forgot about 'em. I didn't even like realize how much they shaped me. And so they, they kind of get a less than proportionate, uh. Airtime, you know, in the book. But one of those was Ellen Cherry's God in the Art of Happiness, which was so helpful to me.

And she especially points out the tendency to defer happiness to the future that it develops in the Christian tradition. So that was really helpful. But another one was the several works by Nicholas wto, long time Christian philosopher at Yale, uh, from the Dutch reform tradition through Grand Rapids, et cetera, originally and.

His works on justice and love were really helpful. Particularly he did a lot of work on educating for Shalom. That's one of the collections of his essays. And I so distinctly remember sitting in the library on, in December, probably 15 years ago, just distinctly, it was cold. There was nobody [00:28:00] there reading Wrf and having one of those moments where like my mind expanded.

And what he talks about is that. The problem with Aristotle is that it ultimately, the human flourishing idea, ultimately becomes be about your own personal flourishing. Yes, there's always a corporate element you can't flourish apart from society, et cetera, but it really does become about yourself. And you see this in the stoics as well, like for the stoics, which becomes the dominant philosophy by the first century of Jesus' day.

You really, the key to being happy is to kind of disconnect yourself from all, um. Uh, anything that would make you attached to this world, you just kind of, whether it's your children, your wife, your job, you just kind of connect. It's kinda like Buddhism, you like, you like disconnect yourself so that nothing can affect you.

Right? Well, that is not Christianity. Um, not only its view of emotions, which is very sophisticated, but [00:29:00] also that what. Walter Sorf points out is that Christianity is outward focused and that the whole point of us experiencing human flourishing is that we're part of a community of God's people who are doing good in the world and are.

The language I would use is from one Peter two. We're priests. We're a kingdom of priests of human flourishing to others, and he calls it eism, um, which is from the Greek word for peace or shalom. Um, I find that a really hard word to say. And one of the first times that I was lecturing on this many, many, many years ago, the very first like public lectures I gave on biblical human flourishing, I accidentally.

Pronounced it as ization, so like the urin, the urinating of the world. So ever since then, I decided I'm not gonna try to say ization again. Uh, so I have gone with, um, flourishing instead or sha.

Geoff Holsclaw: Oh, that's

Jonathan Pennington: If you will, but I do think this is such a beautiful part of the Christian understanding. [00:30:00] It's not just about me.

It's about God's work inviting me into a kingdom community of other people who are being redeemed, and then we are engaged in blessing the world with the same Salton light truth.

Geoff Holsclaw: without. 'cause we've had this quite a long introductory run up to, uh, why the Bible and the Sermon of the Mount could be understood as, as in this trajectory of human flourishing. What like passages then in the Sermon of the Mount then become like. More poignant or understandable. Um, and we don't have to go, obviously we don't have time to go through the whole sermon, but you know, I know you, you kind of put the, the Lord's Prayer right in the center as it kind of like, uh, but then there's other, other parts.

So just as a, uh, illustration, like, or we could talk about the Beatitudes, but what, what are some examples of kind of how this way of viewing the sermon on the Mount helps us?

The Beatitudes and True Human Flourishing

Jonathan Pennington: Well, I do think the Beatitudes a good place to start 'cause that's where Jesus starts as [00:31:00] well. And he gives nine statements of what true human flourishing looks like, which is where the Blessed translation is really unfortunate because when we read the Beatitudes in English, it makes it sound like if we do these things, God will bless us.

But that fundamentally misses that. This is wisdom literature. This the Beatitudes are Jesus putting his arm around us. These disciples, and then by extension to us, just like a father or a mother or an aunt or uncle or, I had this wonderful aunt and uncle who did this in my life at some crucial points in my life who kind of put their arm around me and said, Hey, this way of life isn't gonna bring you the life that you long for.

You know, but this way of life is, and that's what Jesus is doing. That's what Proverbs one to nine is. You know, Solomon is putting his arm around, um, his son. This is what Aristotle is doing in the Nico McKean ethics. He's saying, my son, following these ways. And so I think right from the beginning, Jesus is painting a picture of what.

True human flourishing looks [00:32:00] like that part isn't surprising because all philosophers, rabbis, sages, gurus, whoever, wizards, which wizard is a weird word, but it means someone who's wise, like Gandalf or something. It's not just the male version of a witch. That's a warlock. A wizard is someone who's wise, um, and they're so wise, they can even control things.

That's what Gandalf kind of is doing. But this is what Jesus is doing right from the beginning. That's not surprising. What's surprising is the things he defines as true human flourishing are not what we'd expect. They are involve suffering. Again, they involve often deprivation and loss. They involve self-control, like where you're not just getting what you want, you're making peace.

You're showing mercy to those who've wronged you, um, to be. Meek, which is the translation we use, is a kind of unfortunate translation as well. 'cause it, what the Greek word there prouse means is kind of like [00:33:00] a, a self control that doesn't have to win. So it's not meek in like a milk toasty way. It's more like, um, you have enough strength and centeredness in God that you don't have to get the credit.

For something that's, that's what pro means. So all these ways that Jesus paints a picture of right at the beginning of the sermon are an invitation for us to pay attention to our lives and our habits and our hearts, and recognize that the inclinations we have about what's gonna make us happy or often misguided, you know, and we need to be guided.

Um. So it starts there, the whole rest of the sermon's about that as well. It ends with these images of two different ways. The final one being the Fran Moss man, or the wise person, uh, which is language from Aristotle as well, or the moron, which is the Greek word for fool. Uh, that's where we get the word.

Geoff Holsclaw: Okay. I [00:34:00] like that. That's good. Not the wise and foolish builder. It's the wise and moronic

Jonathan Pennington: Yeah, exactly. That's what it is and that's how it ends. So that shows us and all throughout that, again. God loves us and just like an aunt or an uncle or a mother or a father or a mentor at work wants us to actually do well, just like I want my adult children to have a good life. So I put my arm around them, especially in times of suffering in crisis and, and I.

And my new grandson that I just had, I Lord willing, God will gimme many years with him and I will put my arm around him and say, there's a way of life that's gonna bring you the life you long for. And there's a way of life that's not, and this is the invitation from God out of his love for us. I.

Geoff Holsclaw: So that is so beautiful. Um, I want to end with two questions. Uh, they're kind of, um, they're kind of criticisms from two different sides. One would be, um. 

Grace and Virtue in the Sermon on the Mount

Geoff Holsclaw: Well this, it, it seems like Jesus is just telling us to do a bunch of stuff and isn't [00:35:00] that work's? Righteousness. And where is faith and salvation by faith alone and where is Grace in the Sermon on the Mount?

Um, how would you answer that, maybe given some of these categories that we've been talking about today?

Jonathan Pennington: Hmm. Such a good question. Yeah, I mean, I think the relationship of a father to a son or a mother to a son or daughter or father to a daughter or aunt and uncle, I think really gets at that. It's my love for my children and my love for my grandson and my friends and my congregation, people I love and my is.

It's all rooted. All my invitations and exs and guidance to them is rooted in the fact that I, that I love them and that they're not my sons or daughters or grandchildren or friends. They're not earning my favor by listening to me. They are. Um. You know, stepping into the goodness that God has made for them through [00:36:00] an imperfect sage.

You know who, who I am. You know, Jesus is the perfect sage, but we're in these line, this line of. Out of love and out of grace. We invite people into a way that's gonna bring flourishing it. It's really unfortunate that we have come to think of grace as the opposite of virtue and grace as the opposite of habitation or habits.

It's. It's rooted in grace, beginning, middle, and end. But there's still a call, there's a call to live life in a certain way because some ways of life are gonna bring you flourishing and some are not. You know, so I I, I'm like so far into my thinking along these lines that I sometimes have to stop and remind myself, wow, we, the way we've talked, especially in Protestantism, has really been unhelpful to kind of pit these things against each other.

Um, so I, I don't know if what I just said helps, but I.

Geoff Holsclaw: No, I think so. And, and it goes back to that, uh, what we talked about, uh. Philosophy is being this training for life. [00:37:00] It's kind of like, it's all, like, while you were talking, I was kind of like, oh, so it's like an intervention. It's like where, you know, your uncle or your, your dad or your sister or your brother basically was like, Hey, um, I love you no matter what, but if you keep going down this road that is death for you and here's what it might look like.

Here are the habits, um, that lead. To life that lead to a flourishing life. And Jesus is, and I think sometimes we get this, um, like you said, especially in our Protestant circles, it's like, well, so is Jesus telling us to earn our salvation? Like I have to do these things so I can get saved. And it's like.

Uh, that's, that's not what we're talking about. Uh, what we're talking about is a whole life. Like what you were saying. This is the, this is how a whole life functions. Whole life are perfect. Right. That's the, but the flourishing people don't do these things and they do do these things and they build over here on rocks.

They don't build their life on sand or they don't claim to be [00:38:00] followers of mine and yet don't do what I do and Right. He's just kind of, you know. Because those things, it's not a salvation question, it's a, um, what is flourishing your life question. And I think a lot of times we get those categories mixed up and we're like, we're so Pauline that we can't hear, uh, Jesus in the gospel of Matthew.

Jonathan Pennington: I don't think that's what Paul meant either. I think we misread Paul, you know, I think saying the same thing actually. But you're right that those are the categories we've often used. Um, yeah, so that was well said. Couldn't better.

Geoff Holsclaw: Well, I wanna ask you that, and if you don't have an answer, that's fine. So, uh, 'cause, but I get this from the, the other direction. 

Spiritual Formation vs. Activism

Geoff Holsclaw: So if you don't have a spiritual formation question, then, then that's okay. But from some of my more activistic, um, Christian friends, I. They will say, oh, all this spiritual formation stuff is totally overrated.

Silence, solitude, meditation, contemplation, whatever that might mean, like, and they'll say, that's nowhere in the Sermon on the Mount. We should just do the Sermon on the Mount. Enough of this spiritual formation stuff. Just be good [00:39:00] disciples and followers of Jesus. How would you respond to that?

Jonathan Pennington: Yeah. Yeah, that's great. I mean, first of all, I, I think the summer of the mountain is. About human flourishing, just in the sense that like the whole Aria statements are about internal postures of heart. I mean, if you look at them, they're not about activism. They're about being learning to be a certain kind of person on the inside, because that'll bear fruit.

And I think that would be my main answer is that, you know, um, spirituality without habituation is hypocrisy. Activity without a heart connected to God is mere activism. And I, and I think you know, the truth is always a knife edge between, you know, two pits on either side. I think activism is often doing good things with a disconnected [00:40:00] heart and that

Geoff Holsclaw: Mm-hmm.

Jonathan Pennington: that's a recipe for disaster.

'cause what happens with activism. It in, it tends towards the negative, and that shapes you deeply. In other words, it's what I often call the religion of anti-religion. So much of activism is energized by what's wrong with X, Y, Z, what's wrong with X, Y, Z institution, X, Y, Z culture, X, Y, Z person. And what happens is that when we give ourselves over to.

Criticism as the primary mode that goes against our nature because we're designed by God to be builders and gardeners and organizers, and artists and poets and creators. Only rarely are we supposed to be engaged in criticism. There is a time, you know, for a prophetic word, there is a time for change. You know, whether it's slavery or whatever it is, but.

What's interesting is that the people that give themselves over to that rarely, [00:41:00] if ever, end up as healthy people. I dunno if you've observed that, because the activism itself ends up shaping and becoming one's identity rather than activity being a overflow of a transformed heart. So that's the, that's the distinction I would make.

Geoff Holsclaw: Juan and I just wanna end with, uh, you. Early on, you focus on, you talk about the heart and how, um, you know, and we can think about Psalm 51, you know, creating me a clean heart and that create language is that kind of, that creation out of nothing. Language is we need new hearts. And, uh, and you point to this, um, the Lord's Prayer as being kind of the center of the sermon, which is where you do get that intersection of the two love commands.

So we, we pray to our father in heaven and that his will would be done and his name would be honored and his kingdom would come, which is. Love and God orientation. But then there's other prayers for my relationship to myself and my body, and my sustenance to forgiveness and deaths amongst others, as well as to temptations and [00:42:00] disasters in the world.

Uh, you know. And, and so that is kind of that center of that, you know, if we want to call that contemplation or discipleship or your devotional life or however, right? But those two things kind of fit together. So I'm just bringing that up to kind of go full circle to the name of this podcast where, you know, like we need to attach to God, uh, as the flourishing point of our life.

And that rebounds then into flourishing of others and of all creation, that those two things always go together.

Jonathan Pennington: Thank you. Yeah, that's

Conclusion and Resources

Geoff Holsclaw: Well, thank you so much for jumping on with us. This has been so fun, uh, for me, uh, and hopefully for others. Where can people find what you're doing or can you update us on some of the work, uh, you're doing and where people can check that out?

Jonathan Pennington: Thanks so much. It's been an absolute delight for me as well. Uh, yeah, just jonathan pennington.com or www jonathan pennington.com has hundreds of sermons and lectures and various things on the podcast we have there. Um, I. Various. I do a lot of coun [00:43:00] counseling, coaching, consulting with churches and pastors and individuals, um, and other resources are there.

You can just find everything there. So.

Geoff Holsclaw: And like I said before, his book, the Sermon on the Mountain and Human Flourishing, it's a great resource. If you wanna get up to speed on some of these things, this is a deep dive. You know, it's, it's not just bedtime uh, reading, but if that's something you've been wanting to study after this conversation's been curious to you, it's such a great book.

Thank you for the time that you put into that. And thank you for, uh, the time today.

Jonathan Pennington: Thank you so much. Great.