Jesus is clear, though, right from the beginning paragraphs of this sermon, that the new routine will hurt. Not the pain of working muscles that haven’t been used for a while, though that is certainly true. These sentences are more like the warnings of side effects we hear during every medicine commercial.

At the time Jesus spoke these words, they may have sounded unnecessarily somber. Within a year or two, and millennia later, these words aren’t prophecy. They are the evening news. Around the world, Christ-followers are dying right now. At this moment.

I’ll be more accurate. They are being killed right now. Because of Jesus. Because they decided, somewhere, somehow, to identify with Jesus, people are being killed and harassed and robbed and tortured and exiled.

Jesus was clear: being identified with Him is dangerous.

He said:

Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you. (Matthew 5:11-12)

And then, a couple years later, he was insulted, he was lied about, he was persecuted, and he was killed. He described in this sermon what happened to him, before it happened.

I find his words oddly comforting for a couple reasons.

First, he speaks historically about what only he would know. He says to rejoice because there will be a great reward in heaven. The prophets were persecuted and, he implies, they got a great reward in heaven. How would Jesus know that? He was there when they got the reward.

Second, he speaks predictively about what only he would know. He says to rejoice because there will be a great reward in heaven which, Paul says, happens to Jesus. According to Philippians 2:5-11, He (Jesus) willingly “became obedient to death.” God then lifted him up.

But there is a condition in his blessing.

The persecution comes “because of me.” It’s a response to what Jesus said, not how we change it. Sometimes we decide what Jesus would like. We think that He would really like it if we told people to stay off the lawn he made, for example. We don’t ask him, we just decide. We create our own routines. And then when people get mad, we think they’re mad at him. They aren’t. They are mad at us for deciding for him and for them what he is saying.

For this blessing, we have to speak as he speaks. And shut up when he does.

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Matthew 5:11-12