Sermon preached on Sunday, February 7, 2010 at Garden Valley Chapel during our morning worship service based on Matthew 5:1-2.

Take your Bible if you will and open it to the book of Matthew chapter five - where we will begin our exposition of the greatest sermon ever preached by the greatest preacher who ever lived, the Lord Jesus Christ.

It is most notably referred to as The Sermon on the Mount.

This sermon is found in the fifth, sixth, and seventh chapters of Matthew and in Luke´s gospel in chapter 6, verse 20 through verse 49.

Matthew includes more words of Jesus from the sermon than Luke.

In fact, you could read Matthew´s account in about 10 minutes and Luke´s account in about 4.

Luke is a shorter version of the sermon, though it follows exactly the same flow and progress. The original was probably quite long, possibly hours!

This is that famous Sermon on the Mount.

It is so famous and powerful that we can hardly overstate its influence.

The theologian and preacher Augustine of Hippo (A.D. 354-430), for example, described it as "a perfect standard of the Christian life."

The Puritan, William Perkins (1558-1602), said of the Sermon on the Mount, "It may justly be called the key of the whole Bible, for here Christ openeth the sum of the Old and New Testaments."

The faithful pastor (called by Spurgeon), Thomas Watson (? - 1689 [?]) said -

"In this portion of Holy Scripture you have a [summary] of religion...the Bible epitomized. Here is a garden of delight, set with curious knots, where you may pluck those flowers which will deck the hidden man of your heart. Here is the golden key which will open the gate of Paradise. Here is the conduit of the Gospel, running wine to cherish such as are poor in spirit and pure in heart. Here is the rich cabinet wherein the Pearl of Blessedness is locked up. Here is the golden pot in which is that manna which will feed and refocillate (revive) the soul unto everlasting life. Here is a way chalked out to the Holy of Holies."

More recently, the theologian and Christian writer A.W. Pink (1886-1952) wrote "Herein Christ is seen discharging His prophetic office, speaking as never (uninspired) man ever spoke."

Whether you call it "a perfect standard of the Christian life" or the "key of the whole Bible," it is simply THE GREATEST SERMON EVER PREACHED.

Why is that? Because it came from the lips of Jesus - THE GREATEST PREACHER WHO EVER LIVED, "speaking as never (uninspired) man ever spoke."

God over the course of possibly 1,800 years (from Job, ca. 2200 B.C. [?] to Nehemiah, ca. 400 B.C.) God was "accustomed to open the mouths of the prophets" but now it is God in Christ who opens His mouth and speaks these very words recorded for us by Matthew´s gospel.

Listen as I read a portion of this sermon. Read Matthew 5:1-12.