Jesus

If there is a field manual for following Jesus, it is the Sermon on the Mount.

The Sermon on the Mount, found in Matthew chapters 5-7, is a handbook to Jesus' vision for enlightened souls, healed communities, and a tangible reality that he calls "the kingdom of God." Here we find Jesus at his most practical, commanding the specific moral actions, attitudes, and disciplines that will save our souls and save the world. This sermon is no philosophical manifesto to study or debate. Like a field manual, the Sermon on the Mount contains clear commands for Jesus' disciples to enact on the field of our day-to-day lives.

This book is also a kind of field manual: a useful introduction to the practice of the Sermon on the Mount. This is not an exhaustive study of every historical, textual, or interpretive issue. It contains a basic overview of the spiritual life, and discussions of some of the most important questions related to the Sermon on the Mount, all for one specific purpose:

The purpose of this book is to help the modern reader understand what Jesus commanded, then do it.

God became a human being in Jesus Christ, first to teach us the enlightened way of life outlined in the Sermon on the Mount, then to show us that life by his own example. To obey Jesus' commands is to be like him, and whatever else we are as followers of Christ, we begin as the people who imitate Jesus and practice what he taught in the Sermon on the Mount. This is what it means to be his disciple, and this is what this book will help you do.