Inconsolable & Out of Options: Blessed are the Poor in Spirit and those who Mourn

Sustaining Faith in a Cynical Age

There is a cynicism that has crept into the church. We’ve been criticized, mocked, attacked, and dismissed in our culture (and really throughout history).

For the fathers and mothers of our Pentecostal faith, many were ridiculed and rejected.

This past week I spent some time with a group of pastor praying through the subject: Sustaining Faith in a Cynical Age....it occured to me that’s exactly what Jesus is addressing in the first of the Beatitudes.

Matthew 5:1-4 “When he saw the crowds, he went up on the mountain, and after he sat down, his disciples came to him. Then he began to teach them, saying: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for the kingdom of heaven is theirs. Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.”

“Blessed are…?”

There are a few ways to translate “blessed”....from the Greek word meaning “blessed”, “happy”, “fortunate”, “prosperous”...

..but in its original context of the best translations might be “blissfully content”

When my attitude and outlook is formed into the ways of Jesus…I live blissfully content!

Psalms 1:1-3 “How happy [blissfully content] is the one who does not walk in the advice of the wicked or stand in the pathway with sinners or sit in the company of mockers! Instead, his delight is in the Lord’s instruction, and he meditates on it day and night. He is like a tree planted beside flowing streams that bears its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. Whatever he does prospers.”

Poverty in Spirit

Poverty in spirit is my awareness that I need God’s help and mercy more than I need anything else. Poverty in spirit is getting free of the rile of fear, fear being the great force that restrains us from act of love. Being poor in spirit means letting go of the myth that the more I possess, the happier I’ll be. It is an outlook summed up in a French proverb: When you die, you carry in your clutched hand only what you gave away.

- Jim Frost “The Ladder of the Beatitudes

We can’t think of this only as monetary poverty…although man of those hearing Jesus on that day would fit that description.

…and there is something about being at the bottom of the pecking order of the economy that can draw out a sense of desperation that I think Jesus is getting at.

....remember it seems clear in Scripture that Jesus had the means for food, shelter, clothing, etc....but Jesus never let any of that define how he viewed the Father....

Jesus lived with a spirit that could not be satisfied with anything less than bread from the Father’s table (daily bread/presence).

we live to have options…if this doesn't work out, then I will do that…if i don’t like this I will go there…if I don’t like that church or that assignment I will just go somewhere else....

Peter gives an example of being poor in spirit

Jn 6:53-60 “So Jesus said to them, “Truly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life in yourselves. The one who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day, because my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink. The one who eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in him. Just as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so the one who feeds on me will live because of me. This is the bread that came down from heaven; it is not like the manna your ancestors ate—and they died. The one who eats this bread will live forever.” He said these things while teaching in the synagogue in Capernaum. Therefore, when many of his disciples heard this, they said, “This teaching is hard. Who can accept it?””

Jn 6:66-68 “From that moment many of his disciples turned back and no longer accompanied him. So Jesus said to the Twelve, “You don’t want to go away too, do you?” Simon Peter answered, “Lord, to whom will we go? You have the words of eternal life.”

Principle: When our hearts are full with the comforts and conveniences of the world, there is little room for the Kingdom God.

Those who Mourn will be Comforted

In a similar way, those of us who have experienced great loss or pain know what it means to be humbled and desperate.

Talking this week with some friends about a person I deeply respect and I asked, “What do you think it was that made such a change in that persons life?”

Their answer was, when he experienced a desperate place of brokenness, his life began to change.

Think of this quote from a Church Father names Ephraim (died 373):

“Until we have cried, we don’t know God.”

- St. Ephraim

There is a nasty way of seeing God that slipped into the church in modern history where following God meant being the most prosperous, most powerful, most admired, most popular people in the world...

This kind of thinking causes us to miss out on the very presence of God.

Turns out, the suffering, difficulty, or pain in your life might be the very things that makes you desperate enough to turn to the God of Comfort...

And Jesus promises YOU WILL BE COMFORTED!

[musician to piano]

PROMISE: If you are mourning today. If you are facing a trial in your life. Just know this…God is with you.

Your trial might be the very thing God will use to reveal himself in ways you never imagined possible.

Psalms 6:7-9 “My eyes are swollen from grief; they grow old because of all my enemies. Depart from me, all evildoers, for the Lord has heard the sound of my weeping. The Lord has heard my plea for help; the Lord accepts my prayer.”

A few years ago I lost one of the dearest people in my life…friend, mentor, like family to us…but instead of destroying my life it did two things...

It released a new level of grace (the broken vessel released a new oil).

God was inviting me to a new level of surrender, to know him more.

When you surrender to the path of Jesus....

Anxiety and Fear no longer Control Your Perspective

The things that used to hold a grip on your life lose their grip.

You can laugh in the midst of the storm!

2 . Your words become Hopeful and Joyful

Persecution, famine, trial, and death have tried to end God’s people from the beginning…but Jesus taught us to say like Job...

Romans 8:35-37 “Who can separate us from the love of Christ? Can affliction or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written: Because of you we are being put to death all day long; we are counted as sheep to be slaughtered. No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.”

3. Relationships Thrive and Grow

When you learn to weep with those who are weeping, the love for your neighbor, your spouse, even your enemy grows stronger.

It’s amazing how the enemy will use things that make no difference at all to destroy our love for one another...

When you see with Jesus’ eyes all of a sudden those things no longer matter so much…love becomes our motivation.

4. You get in on the Kingdom Now!

Confessing the Beatitudes

*Church Response in Bold

Blessed are the poor in spirit,

For theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are those who mourn,

For they will be comforted.

Blessed are the meek,

For they will inherit the earth.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for justice,

For they will be satisfied.

Blessed are the merciful,

For they will receive mercy.

Blessed are the pure of heart,

For they will see God.

Blessed are the peacemakers,

For they will be called sons and daughters of God.

Blessed are those who are persecuted for the sake of justice,

For theirs is the kingdom of heaven.