The dedication demanded in the Sermon on the Mount is not a new law or moral teaching. Instead it is forgiveness. Its vital element is the light and warmth of the Holy Spirit. Here is Christ: the essence of salt, and the strength of the tree that bears good fruit. The Sermon on the Mount shows us the character of a community, which shines like a light for the whole world.
- Eberhard Arnold
May 09,2025
- Eberhard Arnold Meeting transcript, October 1934Jesus experienced the utmost humiliation, which led Him very much lower than He had been at His birth in the feed-trough, in the manger. When Jesus was hung on the cross and crucified, the high official, that proud representative of the whole Roman Empire, said, shortly before this overpowering humiliation, “Behold, a man!” Behold the man! Jesus, the man! He who reveals God as a man, this is the one whom we seek. He who reveals God as love, this is the human being with whom we want to have communion.
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This is the essence of true religious experience: richness in God and poverty in oneself. These contrasting elements always belong together: becoming one with God, and yet always longing for him; firmness of heart, and weakness of soul; the justice of God’s love, and the suffering of injustice.
- Eberhard Arnold
What the Kingdom of God means is made clear in the Sermon on the Mount, in the Lord’s Prayer, and in the words, “Enter by the narrow gate!” This means, treat people as you wish them to treat you. This is generally overlooked. You will not be going the way of discipleship until you do for everybody all that you ask from God for yourself, that is, absolute social justice and the peaceable atmosphere of God’s Kingdom. We are envoys of the coming Kingdom of God; we serve only one law, the law of His Spirit.
- Eberhard Arnold