Blessed are you
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Blessed
Blessed
Good morning brothers and sisters, I hope all of you are doing well and growing in God. I have been away fro 2 weeks in Singapore it’s good to finally some back to see all of you again. I thank God that when I was away the Church did not fall apart. In fact I saw that we had many people come to join us last week. We had a few new friends. Thank God. Before we hear the word of God, let us pray and invite the Holy spirit to come and speak to our hearts and also to change our hearts.
How many of us wants to be blessed by God? How do we want God to bless us? When we pray for God to bless us what do we pray? We pray that God will bless us with good health, with money enough for us to use, or money that we cannot finish using, for us to meet the man and woman of our dreams, for children to be safe, for our businesses to do well. Right? So this is our general idea of what a blessed life is looks like. But when we look at the bible, blessing is more than just these things. Blessing in the bible talks about having the favour of God and finding hope in God. Today i want to share from a passage in the Bible that talks about the what it means to be blessed. Let us read Matthew together.
Matt 5:
3 “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 4 “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. 5 “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. 6 “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied. 7 “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy. 8 “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. 9 “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God. 10 “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 11 “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. 12 Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
What did this passage talk about? Did it talk about money or business? No it did not. But it spoke about the reward that is from heaven. Let us see what God is speaking to us today from this passage.
1. Blessed are the humble.
Matt
3 “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 4 “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. 5 “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.
3 “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 4 “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. 5 “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. 6 “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.
1 The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me to bring good news to the poor; he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound; 2 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn; 3 to grant to those who mourn in Zion— to give them a beautiful headdress instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, the garment of praise instead of a faint spirit; that they may be called oaks of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that he may be glorified.
The first part of this passage says blessed are those who are poor in spirit, those who mourn. They shall inherit the kingdom of heaven and they will be comforted.
I think the the first thing that we want to ask is what does it mean to be poor in spirit. When we say poor in spirit it does not mean that we have no courage but it is the knowing that we have no power over our own lives. We cannot save ourselves. We have no purpose for our own lives. We need God to provide for us and lead us. It is only the poor in spirit who know that they need help from God who will desire God and cry out to God and ask God to lead them.
For those who think that they can make it in life by their own strength do not seek God. They will not inherit the kingdom of God. They will spend the rest of their lives trying to make themselves feel important by trying all ways and means to make money so that they can feel like they are worthy of other peoples’s respect. in the end they spend their whole lives trying to make themselves look good for others and not accomplishing anything significant. They may look rich on the outside but are empty on the inside. These are the people who are rich in their spirits.
35 Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.
Only the true bread of life can satisfy us. Only by believing in Jesus and allowing Jesus to fill us with his life and purpose can we be satisfied.
It goes on to say that blessed are those who mourn for they will be comforted. Why do these people mourn? The people when they know that they are weak and sinful and that they cannot change their sinfulness themselves. They mourn because they know that they have a disease of Sin and they know that it is killing them.
And then it says that blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the earth. In the Thai bible, it says polite and gentle. But in the English Bible it says meek. which has a different meaning. It means to be someone who is not proud and is gentle and can control himself. To be meek is to be someone who is not vengeful. Someone who does not need to prove anything to anyone. A meek person will choose not to fight back even when others insult him not because he cannot do so but because he has no need to show his power. Meekness is when someone is confident of who he is in Christ.
This is very different from the world. In the world, everyone is trying to show that they are superior than others and they will do things that are violent and rude just to show it. This is what the world works for. They try to give their own lives worth and they try so hard to do so but in the end they still feel so empty.
13 Who is wise and understanding among you? By his good conduct let him show his works in the meekness of wisdom.
In this verse it says that the wise are meek because they have wisdom in knowing that God is the one who is in control. he does not have to fight for control.
In all these 3 verses, it talks about knowing who we are and knowing who God is. We are not in control of our own lives, God is. We are sinners who keep sinning and God is holy and righteous. We are people who do not have an identity of our own, God gives us our identity and security in him.
2. Blessed are the righteous
6 “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied. 7 “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy. 8 “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. 9 “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.
In these verses, it talks about righteousness. It talks about both wanting to be a righteous person before God and also a desire to see righteousness in the world around us. The culture of the world today talks mostly about what we want for ourselves. it does not really concern itself with righteousness. Most people do not desire to be more righteous. Have you ever heard someone say before “ I think i am not a very good person. I feel very bad about it. I wish I could be more righteous. If it think about it, i don’t think i have ever heard anyone say that to me before.
When we thirst for righteousness, we will begin to do what is right in our lives. If we desire for righteousness, we will desire to be merciful because it is the righteous thing to show mercy to others because we ourselves have been shown mercy by God. If we have a desire to be righteous and merciful, we will have a pure heart that is devoted to God. And if we are focused on God, we will see God. We will begin to know more of God and his ways.
And the last part say blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called sons of God. When we believe in God, we have peace with God because we have become children of God. When we live our lives for God, we begin to be a testimony to the people around us and we help people to come to know God and thus helping them to have peace with God and those around them.
Before I came to know God, my life was in a mess. I did not desire to be righteous or merciful. I just desired to be happy. And I would do whatever it took for me to be happy. Many times that means sinning. I stole things from a shoe shop i was working at when I was younger. I felt good about it. I felt that it was something exciting and that I was quite smart because I didn’t get caught. I felt that what i did was wrong deep inside but I didn’t really think much about it. That was when I did not know Jesus and my spirit was dead. i did not know God I had no purpose in life. And I spent most of my days in my youth like that. No hope, no purpose. But when I received Christ in my life and God filled me with a new spirit, my life changed. I began to have a desire to do what is right, I wanted to be righteous, i had a desire to show mercy to the people who have hurt me, I began to experience what it feels to be forgiven and not feel guilty in my heart. I finally had a pure heart and i began to hear from God and allow God to lead me. And i began to share about what God has done for me in my life.
I had a friend in army who was gay and i shared christ with him. He didn’t really say that the was interested in knowing God, But he listened to me share. Sometimes he would make fun of me. One day, he didn’t come to camp and no one knew where he was. He didn’t come to camp after that day. Later I found out that he has some problem outside where he stabbed someone and was caught. He was sent to prison. and I did not see him from that day on. A few years later, I received a letter and when I opened that letter, I was surprised to see that it was from my friend who I was sharing about Christ with.
He wrote in the letter to thank me for sharing christ with him. He remembered what i shard with him when he had time to think about his life in prison. he cried out to God and when a pastor visited him in prison, he received Christ. He says that his life is now changed and that he has repented and decided to leave his old life. he attends the church service in prison.
God changed my life so that i can bring someone else to God. Someone who was like me who was broken and needed God to come and save me.
3. Blessed are the persecuted
When we become Christians and our lives are changed and we begin to shine for Jesus, there will be persecution that will come because we become very different from the other people in the world.
10 “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 11 “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. 12 Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
There will be people who will hate us because of the message that we share. they may be our friends or even the people who are closest to us. Our family members. Satan will use them to shut you up and force you to give up you faith in Jesus Christ. Satan does not want us to lead more people to know God. Satan is afraid of what God is doing in our lives. If Jesus was persecuted and tortured, we who are his disciples will also experience the same. But in the end, God will be glorified.
I have younger sister who is in a relationship with a girl. i still love my sister, but i do not agree with her lifestyle. Recently there has been a debate in Singapore about weather they should take away a law that does not allow gays be open about their lifestyle.. The gays want the government to allow them to express themselves freely in Singapore. I don’t agree with this and i participated in signing a petition to keep the law. And i sent it to all my FB friends asking them to sign it. My sister was very angry when she saw it. She asked me to delete the post. I explained to her that i was not targeting her. She is living in australia and it does not affect her. Anyway Singapore does not enforce the law actively. I told her I would not take the post down. She was so angry that she does not want to speak to me anymore. I was very sad. I asked myself if i had done the right thing.
My conviction of what is right cause my relationship with my sister to be broken. But as i prayed, I was convicted that I need to to stand for what was right. I pray that in the end, my sister would know that her lifestyle does not help her become complete but is destroying her life. I pray that my decision to stand for God will help her to know that this is not God’s plan for her and that God is the answer for her life. I pray that I will see receive a reward in heaven where i will meet my sister in heaven because she has come to know God.
All these things that Jesus is talking about is the characteristic of the most blessed people. Who are these people? They are the people who have put their trust in the Lord Jesus Christ. The first part of this passage talks about salvation where we learn that our lives are bankrupt without God. We have nothing good in our lives. we are poor in spirit and we mourn for our spiritual condition.
The second part talks about having a change in our perspective and our desires in our lives for righteousness. the last part talks about the opposition we will face when we become Christians.
It is interesting that this is the first sermon that Jesus preached. In all saying all these things, Jesus outlined all the things that he had to go through. Jesus was poor in spirit, Jesus depended on God to lead him and to guide him and Jesus mourned for the people whom he came to save. And Jesus was meek, when the pharisees hit him, spat at him and crucified him, he asked God to forgive them for they do not know what they do. Jesus was was righteous and merciful and pure in heart and Jesus brought peace between God and man. And Jesus was persecuted for us.
In all this Jesus was pointing to what is a disciple should be and he not only preached it but demonstrated it with his life for us to see and to follow. And he proved that he is the true son of God by dying on the cross and rising again on the third day.
Do we the blessed people in this passage? Are we following what Jesus had called us to do?
They are to be poor in spirit knowing that they have nothing without God. They will mourn because when they come to know Christ, they know that they are sinners and that there is no good in their lives and only Jesus can change their sinful lives.