The Sermon on the Level Place

Luke 6:17-20

In Matthew 5-7, Jesus gives a lengthy discourse which has come to be famously known as “The Sermon on the Mount.” Luke presents a parallel picture in Luke 6:20-49, with two glaring exceptions:

One, Matthew has Jesus going up on a mountainside (thus the title we all use) and sitting down, whereas Luke has Jesus going down to a level place (thus my title for this posting) and standing. Two and more significantly, Luke’s version is much shorter.

What is going on here? Is this a case of one or both of the gospel writers being inaccurate? A couple of options present themselves.

First, it could be a simple matter of interpretation. Matthew was there and he pictures for us how Jesus was up on a mountainside and he gives us all the details, including every last utterance that day. Luke, who probably got his information from Paul who got his from a mix of Peter, John Mark and others, notes that Jesus spends the night on the mountain, then connects with his disciples up there, and finally descends to a lower part of the mountain, finds a level place to accommodate a lot more people and starts talking, still on the mountain. At times he sits and at times he stands. Luke provides us a shortened version of what Jesus says.

Second, it could be that we have two different events and that Jesus says very similar things at both events. I don’t doubt that Jesus shared his ideas and stories over and over again. Either one of these options is highly plausible. Either way, there is no big deal.

So Jesus descends to a more level place on the mountain, which happens to be somewhere in Galilee. Luke notes that a large crowd of his disciples are there along with a great host of people from all over, including Jerusalem and Judea to the south and Tyre and Sidon to the north. Pick up on this. He has lots more disciples than the Twelve and even more than the crowd out of which he picked the Twelve that morning.

Word travels like a prairie fire in a drought that Jesus has chosen a handful of his disciples as special envoys. This is a significant move for Jesus who has led his following without any structure up till then. They get the sense (correctly) that Jesus is about to make some very significant statements.

Meanwhile, word is getting around about Jesus – how he heals the sick and drives out evil spirits. Other preachers do this too. But there’s something different about Jesus, especially the way he stands up to the religious authorities. All Jews felt oppressed by the Romans. But the masses of the poor among the Jews also felt oppressed by the religious leaders who lorded it over them with their Scriptural overtones much as American slave-masters had the Scriptures about obedience beat into their African slaves. So they flocked by the droves from everywhere to this man who was standing up to such oppressive leadership – and getting away with it.

They are deeply attracted to him, even trying to touch him for, Luke the doctor writes, “power was coming from him and healing them all.” It is an amazing day.

At first, Jesus ministers to everyone. Then he focuses his attention on his disciples, not necessarily just the Twelve, but certainly on those who self-identify as his followers, and he begins to teach them.

What he had to say to them has since been interpreted by Dispensationalists and others as for a future utopian age called the Millennium. Jesus’ words continue to be dismissed as irrelevant for today as they were by the religious leaders back then – not just by modern skeptics and unbelievers, but by Believers who, while taking the Bible’s apocalyptic writings literally, spiritualize the words of Jesus, afraid of what might happen if people were to truly take him seriously for the here and now. Jesus speaks words of truth, clearly intended for the present day, for those who heard back then and for those like us who hear now. As he concludes, “Blessed are those who hear and put these words into practice.”