Sermon Tone Analysis

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Introduction

Good morning !

We are so glad that each one of you have joined us this morning to worship God in Spirit and in Truth, one verse at a time, one book a time.

Thank you Mike and Jeff for the amazing job you did on our lawn yesterday!

We have come as far as verse 3 in Matthew 5, so let us open our Bible’s there.

Read Matthew 5:1-12

Prayer

Lord, thank you for your amazing grace and that your mercies are a new every morning!

We are forever grateful for the sacrifice of your Son the Lord Jesus Christ and desire to live lives that are worthy of you.

Today, as we open the Word in Matthew 5, may your Spirit permeate our hearts and fill our minds with nuggets of truth that will produce change in our lives.

Lord, heal the broken hearted, impart hope to the hopeless, and lift up the person who is downcast and heavy of heart today.

Lord please encourage us and wash us whiter than snow.

We surrender all!

In Jesus Name, we love You! Amen and Amen!!!

Review

Last week we learned a few truths that were needed to help us understand the culture and climate of the day.

This was a very religious culture and the Jews were looking for a conqueroring King that would deliver them from Rome.

The Jews tried and tried to keep the commandments, but could not.

It is here that they added to God’s law.

In fact, the Talmud says that the added 613 laws.

They were trapped in a works-based legalistic system that placed the people in chains.

Jesus came not only to save us, but to save the Jews !

The commandments church, was all about doing, and here Jesus turns the table into all about being with the Beatitudes.

Blessed- makarios- is deep inner happiness, a deep and genuine sense of blessedness, a bliss that the world cannot offer, not produced by the world, not produced by circumstances, and not subject to change by the world or circumstances.

It is not produced externally.

This is a spiritual joy and satisfaction that lasts regardless of conditions; that carries one through pain, sorrow, loss, and grief.

The fullest meaning of the term, has to do with an inward contentedness that is not affected by circumstances.

This verse kills the prosperity message of the day because we see here the greatest apostle living with little and much, but yet still being content, still being blessed!

Show me a person who is grateful and I will show you a person who is content!

David uses the term blessed to describe God himself:

Solomon his son sang:

Paul spoke of the glorious gospel of grace:

Because blessedness is fundamentally an element of the character of God, when men partake of His nature through Jesus Christ they partake of His blessedness.

So, To be blessed is not a superficial feeling of well-being based on circumstance or happening, but rather a deep supernatural experience of contentedness based on the fact that one’s life is right with God.

This cannot be found in anyone else but Jesus, not money, not relationships, not materialism, not careers, not businesses, not homes, not in cars, not in anyone or anything but Jesus!!! AMEN and AMEN!

And many of us, well all of us have tried to fill the void with everything else but Jesus only to find ourselves still empty.

What does it mean to be poor in spirit?

It does not mean that one must be broke financially, but rather spiritually bankrupt.

It is crucial for us to get this one, because without this one, you cannot have the rest.

One must recognize that they cannot do it on their own.

One cannot make themselves holy, it must be a work of the Spirit.

To be poor in spirit means to be humble and not proud.

It means to have a correct estimate of ourselves.

Let’s not forget that the Pharisees taught that righteousness was an external thing, a matter of obeying rules and regulations.

And that righteousness could be measured by praying, giving, fasting, etc.

Here in the Beatitudes Jesus described Christian character that flows from within, not from external observances, but internal character traits and attitudes.

Here in the Beatitudes Jesus described Christian character that flows from within, not from external observances, but internal character traits and attitudes.

To be poor in spirit means having a right attitude toward our sin-fullness.

It is saying I can’t, He can, so I am going to let him!

Its about emptying of self, dying to self, and be raised into the newness of life with Christ.

The religious folks thought that they were doing this through external observation and in Jesus first message he said it is not about that outside of the cup, but rather the inside.

Its not about keeping external things, but rather an inward transformation of the heart.

Phariseeism feeds on pride.

Poverty of spirit, on the other hand, is the foundation of all graces.

You know, if you don’t have poverty of spirit, church, you might as well expect fruit to grow without a tree as the graces of the Christian life to grow without humility.

They can’t.

As long as we’re not poor in spirit, we can’t receive grace.

Now even at the beginning, you can’t even become a Christian unless you’re poor in spirit.

Pride blocks us from receiving the grace of God.

Humble yourself in the sight of the Lord and he will lift you up, higher and higher and He will lift you up....

This is tough my brothers and sisters, because Jesus is saying that if you want happiness, not happen stance, if you want to be blessed as Jesus is teaching to his disciples, then you must be humble.

The Christian life starts here and ends here!

We must realize that we are spiritually bankrupt, know our lostness a desperation.

Because according to the Word apart form God, we can do nothing.

Church, until we admit and accept our spiritual poverty we cannot receive nor understand our spiritual riches that are found in Jesus Christ!

God has blessed us with every spiritual blessing, he has given us everything that pertains to life and godliness but we cannot receive them, or receive Him apart from humility.

So remember in Chapter 3-4 when Jesus and John said, “Repent, for the kingdom of God is at hand?”

Jesus is telling us that the only way to enter God’s kingdom is down, while the worlds ways are up.

Jesus is telling us church that the only way for us to enter into the kingdom of God is through humility and poverty of spirit.

And lets not forget the key verse of this section church:

Matthew 5:20 (NKJV)

For I say to you, that unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven.

The Scribes and the Pharisees did not start off with the traditions of men being exalted above God’s law, they started off with wanting to make the Word of God preeminent and they drifted, there focused shifted from the internal to the external and by God’s grace, Jesus shows up>

In the OT, when the people drifted and fell from grace, God would always send a prophet to call them back.

The prophet would call them out, they would call them to repent and return to God, just like Jesus is doing here.

Jesus is saying, if you want to enter the kingdom of heaven, if you want to be the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus, then the way is down, the way to enter is through being poor in spirit.

Church, we cannot come to God unless we are spiritually bankrupt and understand that we cant do it!

Look at what Jesus said to the church at Laodecia:

Read Revelation 3:14-22

Jesus is a priest, prophet, and King who loved enough that he came to this church and spoke about their spiritual pride.

They had become blind to their short comings, blind to the things they struggled with.

How can we prevent this from happening to us?

Have accountability in your life, because we all have blind spots.

Confess your sin before God and at times the Word teaches us to confess our trespasses to each other.

Stay hear the heart of God and do not get caught up in religious observances or rituals that cannot change the human heart.

Abide in the Vine

Immerse ourselves in the Word of God

Cut the worldly stuff out because it is all about lust of the eyes, lust of the flesh, and the pride of life.

Worship is not just something we do when we sin church, it is a lifestyle...

It is importnat for us to look at the word poor here in this text and this might not be very comfortable for some.

Poor-ptōchos (to-hos')- reduced to beggary, begging, asking alms, lowly, afflicted, destitute of the Christian virtues and eternal riches, helpless, powerless to accomplish an end.

It can also mean destitute of wealth, influence, power, or position.

Classical Greek uses this word to refer to one who is reduced to beggary, who crouches in a corner of the dark wall to beg for alms.

And the reason he crouches and cowers is because he doesn’t want to be seen.

He is so desperately ashamed to even allow his identity to be known.

Beggars have all that stuff piled on, all those things pulled over their face, and they reach like this, lest they should be known.

The word poor here is the same word that is used in Luke 16 where Jesus gives us a parable on the rich man and Lazarus is :

The word poor and beggar is the same in the Greek church.