Blessed are the Poor in Spirit

Blessed are the poor in Spirit for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven

Sunday, May 3, 2020

8:58 AM

CS Lewis

When I read the Beatitudes – and reflect on what they mean- I realize how unconverted I am. Last week, Jesus opened his public ministry with the word, “Repent.” It means to change ones mind. I sometimes find myself astonished that, after thirty years of preaching and celebrating the sacraments, how little progress I have made in the transformation of my mind. I continue with the illusion that something this world offers will give me happiness: clergy pension plan, vacation, health, money, reputation, influence, the attention of a certain person – anything except the Kingdom of Heaven. Or maybe I have begun to imagine that, when all is said and done, those things are the Kingdom. As I get older and experience modest success, the temptation becomes stronger. Like a sledge hammer, the Beatitudes are meant to shatter such an illusion.**

This public address of Jesus set the pathway for his whole ministry and set in motion the events that led to his death and resurrection. I often wonder what was in Jesus's mind when he began his teaching.

Was he perhaps thinking about the insurmountable Mountain before him that the Father was requiring him to climb?Was he thinking about the terrible plight of the human race? Was he thinking about the 12 men he had appointed to follow him?Was he thinking about the future church and what that would look like or was he thinking about what heaven would look like when the redeemed would be with him in heaven.

We will never know until eternity and we can ask Him what was going through his mind when he began this sermon.

There are some indicators that Jesus had some very definite things on his mind that are revealed in the following two chapters.

We know from the text that Jesus was more interested in what was on the inside of man that what was showing on the outside. The condition of the heart was his primary concern. Mt 5:21-48 Sinful deeds begin in the heart What is seen on the outside must Glorify the Father. 5:16. Our Righteousness must look different than the Pharisees. 5:20 . Our motives must be pure. 6:1

So then lets look a little closer at the First and second beatitudes.

Matthew 5:3 Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven or another translation say "the kingdom of heaven is theirs". All the great preachers seem to agree that there is a clear order in the way Jesus lays out the beatitudes.

He begins with the most foundational of all the Beatitudes because without the first one none of the others would be possible for us. To be poor in spirit is the starting point and praise God that it is because it shows us the only way for us to be in the kingdom at all, unless we are poor in spirit there would be no way to come to God it highlights for us the way in which man can ever come to God. Lloyd Jones likens it to a ladder the first step has to be close to the ground so that all who will may begin the journey.

Lloyd Jones goes on to say: this, of necessity, is the one which must come at the beginning, for the good reason that there is no entry into the kingdom of heaven, or the kingdom of God, apart from it. There is no-one in the kingdom of God who is not poor in spirit. It is the fundamental characteristic of the Christian and of the citizen of the kingdom of heaven, and all the other characteristics are in a sense the result of this one.

Spurgeon says

"This Gospel blessing reaches down to the exact spot where the law leaves us when it has done the very best within its power or design. The utmost the law can accomplish for our fallen humanity is to lay bare our spiritual poverty and convince us of it. It cannot by any possibility enrich a man, it's greatest service is to tear him away from his fancied wealth of self- righteousness, show him his overwhelming indebtedness to God and bow him to the earth in self despair. The law rends the goodly Babylonian garment of our imaginary merits into ten pieces and proved our wedge of Gold to be mere dross. And thus leaves us naked, poor and miserable. The first beatitude is placed low enough to be reachable to those at the earliest stage of Grace. Had he begun with Blessed are the pure in heart none would feel able to attain"

To be poor in spirit then is to be aware of our complete spiritual and moral depravity before a Holy God and to know there is not one thing I can do about it. It is to be brought before the all powerful king pleading for mercy not just for the wrong I have done but for everything I am and fall on His Grace. It is the complete opposite of what this world holds up as being praise worthy, virtuous and valuable.

John Piper says:

" Every man has a creed by which he lives whether he can articulate it or not and the creed by which the majority of the world lives is that, real joy and happiness is to be found in the pursuit of Self-reliance, self-confidence self-determination and self-esteem and any Messiah who comes along and proposes to replace self-reliance with childlike God-reliance, and self-confidence with submissive God-confidence, and self-determination with sovereign grace, and self-esteem with magnificent mercy for the unworthy — that Messiah is going to be a threat to the religion of self-admiration. That religion has dominated the world ever since Adam and Eve fell in love with the image of their own independent potential when they saw it reflected back to them in the eye of the serpent: “You will not die; you will be like God.”

When a person really knows and discovers his true spiritual poverty, that knowledge has been revealed to Him. "It has been spiritually revealed to him and once it has been revealed to him it comes as a sledge hammer blow that shatters us completely as we are made aware that we are under the wrath of a Holy God without hope in the world. First comes the crushing the mourning and the emptying of self before we are made aware of the soft gentle voice that bids us come and enter in to the gift of Grace and Mercy from a merciful God. "Poverty of Spirit empties a man so that God can fill him.

Charlotte Elliott was a famous humorous poet during her youth. At the age of 32, she suffered from a serious illness that left her disabled for the rest of her life. Then her lifelong spiritual mentor César Malan, a Swiss minister and hymnologist, counseled her to replace her rage and inner conflict with peace, and simple faith in God; from that day on, she turned her literary talents to writing hymns. Of the 150 hymns she wrote the one that is most remembered and has had perhaps the biggest impact on the lives of Countless believers down through the years since it was penned in 1834 is:

Just as I am I come.

Just as I am, without one plea,

But that Thy blood was shed for me,

And that Thou bidst me come to Thee,

O Lamb of God, I come, I come.

The repetition of the short line, “O Lamb of God, I come,” is a commitment to a Jesus-centered life. People aren’t “good enough” or “not good enough” to come to Jesus. It is through God’s initiative, pardon, promises and free love mentioned throughout the hymn that everyone can come to Jesus. Just like Elliott, people will face “conflict,” “doubt” and “fighting fears within [and] without,” but one can find rest in Jesus.

Spurgeon says

To be poor in spirit is to be among the dying ones at the pool of Bethesda to whom Jesus is known to come. Such a man opens his mouth and the Lord fills it, he hungers and the Lord satisfies him with good things. Above all other evils, we have most cause to dread our own fullness. " Our imaginary goodness is more difficult to conquer then our actual sin, Human weakness is a small obstacle to salvation compared to human strength".

So what is so great about being poor in spirit? We are blessed or happy because the true condition of our hearts has been spiritually revealed to us by a Kind and loving God and because we have seen it, own it and have cast ourselves into the merciful arms of a Holy God, we have been granted an audience with the king of Kings. We will be welcomed into the inner courts of the throne of God in the heavenlies. whatever that might look like, we know that it is be beyond our feeble imaginations, beyond our wildest dreams, That is what the Scriptures mean when they say, “No eye has seen, no ear has heard, and no mind has imagined what God has prepared for those who love him.”1st Corinthians 2:9-14 and it is ours to enjoy for ever.

So what examples do we have in Scripture of a person who is poor in Spirit.

The wonder of it all is we did nothing to secure this amazing magnificent gift. The text says the Kingdom of God is given to the Poor in Spirit. Its already done the hard part has been done by Jesus.

We see it in Jacob as he wrestles with God in Gen 32: 24-28

Gideon displayed it in Judges 6: 15-17

Isaiah showed his heart in Isaiah 6:5-8

David in his deep repentance displayed this character in Ps 51:1-12

Peter in Luke 5:8 acknowledges his desperate condition

And Paul in so many passages shares this truth with us.

William Carey: William Carey did not have high self-esteem. He castigated himself again and again for his sin. When the fire of 1812 destroyed dozens of his precious manuscripts, he didn’t blame the devil. He said, “How unsearchable are the ways of God!” And then he accused himself of too much self-congratulation in his labors, and said, “The Lord has smitten us, he had a right to do so, and we deserve his corrections.”

WILLIAM CAREY

Born August 17th, 1761

Died June 9th, 1834

The secret for William Carey was not self-esteem. He was poor in spirit to the very end. “A wretched, poor, and helpless worm,” he calls himself, knowing very well his sin and failures. How could he persevere for 40 years over all obstacles — as a homely man, suffering from recurrent fever, limping for years from an injury in 1817, and yet putting the entire Bible into six languages and parts of it into 29 other languages — what was the secret of this man’s usefulness and productivity for the kingdom? The tablet on his grave reads, A wretched, poor, and helpless worm, on Thy kind arms I fall.