“Blessed Are the Poor in Spirit”

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Preacher: Ross Macdonald Scripture: Matthew 5:1-3

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Well, this morning as we actually make our way proper into Matthew 5, beginning in verses 1 and 2, we keep in mind the things we rehearsed last week.
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So as we have moved out of Exodus, leaving the Ten Commands behind in Chapter 20, and now move into the
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Sermon on the Mount, we don't want to lose sight of that wonderful connection that is organic to Matthew's Gospel, the way that he develops this pattern of seeing
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Exodus throughout the first four chapters of the Gospel of Matthew. And then as we look at verses 1 and 2, we find
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Jesus ascending the mountain, His disciples coming to Him, and then relaying the law, as it were, as He refracts the
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Ten Commandments in His own way in Chapter 5. And this whole Sermon on the Mount is really embodying the kind of proclamation and teaching that He had begun
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His ministry in Galilee. Matthew 5, beginning 1 through 3, And seeing the multitudes,
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He went up on a mountain, and when He was seated, His disciples came to Him. Then He opened
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His mouth and taught them, saying, Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
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There will be some foundations I lay this morning for the next eight weeks as we consider the
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Beatitudes. Fortunately, there will be some things I leave out. We'll do a little more, perhaps, technical digging at the
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Beatitudes today than in the weeks to come, but we won't have much to say about that marvelous phrase, the kingdom of heaven.
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When we get to the eighth Beatitude, we'll spend some time to consider what that phrase means in the context of Matthew's Gospel.
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Very significant concept, we just don't have the time to do it. It deserves a sermon on its own. But we do want to consider these verses in three parts.
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Well, first, we want to see in verses 1 and 2, as well as in the first Beatitude, an invitation.
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In fact, we'll see that with each Beatitude, that there's an element of invitation in how
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Jesus presents these blessings, secondly, a declaration as to the blessing itself, and then thirdly, this morning, a consolation, a comfort.
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So an invitation, a declaration, and a consolation. So first, an invitation.
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Matthew 5, 1 and 2. Again, notice this language, seeing the multitudes, he went up on a mountain and when he was seated, his disciples came to him, then he opened his mouth and taught them.
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So we have Matthew being shaped by the story of Exodus, particularly here, as we begin chapter 5, we have
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Jesus put alongside the figure of Moses, something we considered last week. We have multitudes gathering around the mountain.
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In the context of Matthew 5, these multitudes are not coming to Jesus where he is on the mount, but they're gathering around the mount.
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Just for the acoustic effect of being able to hear him teach, they're well below him, perhaps around the base of this mount.
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And Matthew is drawing out more connections than just Jesus, like Moses, ascending the mount.
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We have the fact that he's seated. It's not exactly vital information for us to know.
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We could just simply skip to him teaching, but Matthew records it. Now, at base level, this would have been the posture of teaching.
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It reinforces the fact and the identity of Jesus being a teacher. This is very important for the next several chapters, and we'll have time to talk about that in a moment.
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But also, we have the typical posture of a Jewish teacher. In Luke 4, when
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Jesus is teaching at the synagogue, he stands up to read from a certain place in Isaiah, something we'll see later on,
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Isaiah 61. And then when he closes the scroll, what does he do before he opens his mouth to teach?
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He sits. So we have, in the first century, this common practice of sitting in order to teach.
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But more than that is going on here. Commentators point out, most likely, Matthew is drawing from Deuteronomy 9, verse 9, where a common understanding of the verb there, that Moses dwelt or remained on the mountain, that verb yeshav, most likely, he sat on the mountain.
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And so even there, ancient Jewish commentators recognize Jesus is in a position much like Moses was in a position, sitting in order to teach.
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And again, we see this connection. Moses himself foretold of this great prophet in Deuteronomy 18.
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The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me, he says, from your midst, from your brethren, him you shall hear.
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So Moses, in a prophetic role, speaks of a prophet to come. He says, this one that will come from your midst, from your brethren, this one will be like me.
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And Matthew, if it's not too much on the nose, is saying, here's the one that is like Moses.
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Here's the one you must hear. And by the way, like Moses, he's sitting down in order to teach you, so hear him.
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He's the greater prophet. He's the one greater than Moses. So we have, drawing on this
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Exodus -shaped opening of Matthew, not just a prophet like Moses, but also a deliverer like Moses, a redeemer like Moses.
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As we move to chapters 8 and 9, a miracle worker like Moses. If Moses was the one that God had appointed to rescue
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Israel from the slavery of Egypt, then Jesus is the one that God has designated to deliver his people from the slavery to sin and to the evil one, one greater than Moses has come.
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Now this slavery, this darkness, this bondage of sin is something that Matthew's forecast from the very beginning.
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What do we have in Matthew 1 .21? This angelic proclamation, she will bring forth a son, you shall call his name
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Jesus. Why? For he will save his people from their sins. So here's the one that had been long awaited, the long -awaited deliverer after centuries of darkness.
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Now a light has dawned, a great light. And Charles Quarles in his excellent introduction to the
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Gospel of Matthew says, Matthew's readers would hear echoes of the Old Testament themes of the Exodus and the conquest throughout this sermon.
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Just an example, in the promise, in the beatitude of verse 5, the meek will inherit the earth or the land, same term.
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That's conquest imagery. That's Exodus imagery. These parallels would not have been missed.
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The Sermon on the Mount, in other words, assumes that there's a people who have been mourning, longing for a deliverance.
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They have forlorn hope, they've been waiting for this one to come, longing for the prophet who would speak to them, longing for a greater deliverance, longing for God's promises to be realized.
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If you could get in a time machine and go back in the first century, you'd find all sorts of things. The one thing you would not find is a first century
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Jewish person who thought God's promises have fully come, God's promises have been realized.
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All that God promised our forefathers, all that God promised King David has been fulfilled.
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That was not the view. The faithful were waiting for those promises to be fulfilled. And even in Matthew, this is already highlighted.
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A certain portion of the populace of Israel waiting for the promises to be fulfilled, mourning the fact that they needed to be delivered, mourning that pagan yoke around their neck, longing to see the kingdom realized, longing to enter into the fullness of God's hope.
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We find that, for instance, in John the Baptist's ministry. What is John the Baptist depicted as in the
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Gospel of Matthew? The fulfillment of Isaiah's prophecy from Isaiah 40, preparing the way for the
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Lord to come. And so as John the Baptist is preaching, we find droves going out to him to receive what?
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A baptism of repentance. When we go to Matthew chapter 3, that's emphasized three times.
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We find in 3 verse 2 that John is preaching, repent. We find in 3 verse 8 that he's warning the
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Pharisees, bear fruit worthy of repentance. And then we find in verse 11, him saying,
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I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance, but he who's coming after me is mightier than I.
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So you have the people coming out to this Jesus. Coming perhaps still a little bit wet, still a little bit moist from having been baptized with a baptism of repentance.
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Perhaps some of those peoples now are assembled around the base of the mount. They've come to this one.
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This one who teaches unlike anyone has taught. This one who's about to perform works and wonders that have not been seen until the days of perhaps
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Moses. Jesus, the one who surpasses John the prophet. He's not worthy to stoop and lose the sandal tie.
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The one who surpasses even the great lawgiver, Moses himself. Jesus, the exemplary teacher of righteousness.
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So again, as we work our way through Matthew 5 through 7, we see this great emphasis,
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Jesus is the teacher. He sits down in order to teach his disciples. When we work through Matthew 8 and 9, we see
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Jesus beginning to be presented as a great healer, a great miracle worker. These two themes presenting in a
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Moses -like way the identity of Jesus, the fulfillment of Isaiah saying, a great teacher, a great healer will come and deliver
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Zion. So we read, his disciples came to him. Very important.
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His disciples came to him. Multitudes gather. His disciples came to him.
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Then he opened his mouth and taught them. Very important. Very important.
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Surely there is some benefit to being at the base of the mount overhearing what Jesus is teaching.
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But Jesus is not primarily concerned to inform every single person in the crowds at the base of the mount.
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His purpose in preaching the sermon on the mount is to teach the disciples that come to him. This is not unique here in Matthew.
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When we get to Matthew 28, what happens in the commission? Disciples are made and they're taught to obey all that Jesus has commanded.
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Disciples are made out of every nation, every tribe and tongue, teaching them to obey all that I have commanded.
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So his disciples come to him. Of course, these disciples have already received, as it were, the proclamation of Jesus' preaching.
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We read in Matthew 4 .23, Jesus went throughout Galilee teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom.
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So disciples have already been made. These disciples, as it were, were those called by Jesus. I don't think we have to limit this just to the 12 that Jesus has chosen.
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There are many disciples that are coming to be taught by the Lord. And this, of course, is the very first mention of Jesus' teaching in 4 .23.
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In 5 .2, that's the only verb that's used. No longer is Jesus proclaiming, Jesus is now strictly teaching.
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And I think that's very important. This shift from proclamation to teaching is significant for how we view the
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Sermon on the Mount itself. We should not understand it in the vein of John the
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Baptist's sermonic call to repentance. Jesus is not giving a sermon so much as he's teaching.
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Very important difference. It's funny that it's been called the Sermon on the Mount. It's not like the sermons from John the
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Baptist in Matthew 3. Jesus comes to instruct, to teach, to form his disciples, to shape their identity, to give them a certain way, a way of forming their character and their conduct in his kingdom.
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What does it mean to belong to the kingdom of God? What type of virtue, what type of character, what type of walk does a child of God have?
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This is what is contained within this body of teaching. And again, this is a huge theme for Matthew.
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In fact, it runs throughout the Gospel. Almost every chapter you find some reference to Jesus as a teacher. We get to 23, verse 10,
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Jesus tells his followers, not one of you is to be called teacher, for truly you only have one teacher, capital
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T. So we understand there's something unique about the ministry of Jesus teaching his disciples the manner of who belongs to the kingdom.
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Robert Morgan, I think he's right to say, the sermon is addressed in the first place to disciples, even if, as today, it's overheard by crowds.
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It's fine for people to overhear, it's fine for passersby to overhear. This teaching, this sermon on the mount, is for those that have come near to Jesus as his disciples.
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So it's not enough to gather by, it's not enough to overhear, it's not enough, it's never enough, to keep a safe distance from Jesus.
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I'll keep showing up, but I'm not going to get that close. I'll keep applying some comfortable, generic principles of Christianity to my life, but I'm not going to carry a cross.
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I'll keep, perhaps, stoking a little bit of curiosity, interest in what these
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Christians are all about, especially these weirdos here in the center of Barrie, but I won't actually conform my life to the scriptures.
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We read here in Matthew 5, verse 2, his disciples came to him, he opened his mouth and he taught them.
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So that's the invitation. Come to him if you would learn. Come to him if you would be taught.
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You can't be taught from far away, you can only be taught if you come. Now assuming you've come, how are you to be taught?
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Well the Beatitudes are often treated poorly. The Beatitudes are often treated as grandiose proverbs for all.
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Politicians use the Beatitudes in this way, they love quoting a Beatitude here or there. And again,
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I would just pull it out of their mouth and say, I'm sorry, that's not for you unless you've come to Jesus as one of his disciples.
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These are not general maxims, philosophical expressions. These are not proverbs for all.
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They're not indiscriminate thoughts about ethical principles. They are pronouncements, declarations of God's saving activity on behalf of his people.
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The blessings that correspond to their life in him now and correspond to the future that he will bring to them, the future that is realized.
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In so far as Jesus is teaching his disciples, he's reconstituting Israel, major theme in Matthew's Gospel.
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Israel is now redefined. There's a new mount, there's a new Moses. There's a new identity among those who constitute the people of God.
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They are those who are now with the Lord, following after the way of the Lord. And so there's this huge exclusion now of anyone who will not come to Jesus.
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John came to prepare the way of the Lord. Jesus now opens the way of the Lord. He is the
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Lord in flesh. And so this, though an invitation, is also far more than an invitation.
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It's a pronouncement and a re -identification of the people of God. Jordan Ryan, a tremendous monograph on this point, he says,
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Matthew's narrative of the sermon intentionally evokes elements of a synagogue setting, a synagogue teaching, right?
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We said that. Jesus is in, as it were, a rabbinic mode, sitting down in order to teach.
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In the Sermon on the Mount, Ryan says, Matthew has constructed what we might call an eschatological synagogue, an end times synagogue.
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It's not the assembly of a local community. It is the ingathering of the people of God. This is something that Matthew is projecting.
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We have it again in the Great Commission. So that's the first point, an invitation. Here we are in the
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First Beatitude. How are you going to receive this teaching? Are you going to come to Jesus in order to be taught by him, discipled by him?
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If you would be a disciple, you must be discipled. The Sermon on the Mount is Matthew's form for discipleship.
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This is kingdom living. This is what it means to be a Christian. What did we say last week from Luke Timothy Johnston?
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This is the epitome of Jesus' teaching. This is the essence of Christianity. But not only do we have an invitation, secondly, we have a declaration.
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A declaration. Blessed. Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
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Blessed. That's a declaration. Blessed are the poor in spirit.
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For the next seven Beatitudes after this, we'll have that same formulaic statement. Blessed are.
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Blessed are. Blessed are. Each time a declaration. Each time with a surprising twist, as it were, on those who truly are blessed in this kingdom of heaven.
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So this is the First Beatitude, the first word of this sermon that begins. The first discourse in the
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Gospel of Matthew. The Beatitudes. Now, where does that word Beatitude come from? Beatitude comes from the
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Latin beatitudo, from beatus, blessed. That's where we get it. Just means blessing. Blessing.
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Blessed are the poor in spirit. We're going to be a little technical for a moment, but that's
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OK. We'll make up for it in the end. There's a lot of debate about how many
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Beatitudes there are, right? Scholars have run out of things to investigate, so they spend a lot of time just debating things like this.
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How many Beatitudes are there, right? So the number of them has been debated.
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Some say there's seven. Some say there's eight. Some say there's nine. A strange minority say there's ten.
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I honestly have no idea how they got that. But generally the debate goes between seven to nine.
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You would say, well, what difference does that make? Well, here's why I think it's worth our consideration.
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It helps us see that Matthew is not just hobbling together a few disconnected facts.
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He's not just chronicling things. There's an artistry to how this teaching is portrayed.
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The structure of the gospel has a certain literary beauty. There's ways that we can connect emphases just by appreciating the structure.
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Certain things are held forth or noticed that we would perhaps not notice if we didn't appreciate the structure.
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So the ancient church, for good reason, wanted to see seven Beatitudes. Again, they had to lop off a lot to make that argument.
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There's seven statements. But of course, you have to do something with that eighth time that Jesus says blessed are.
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In fact, Jesus says that nine times total. But seven is this perfect number.
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There's so many elements of seven that the ancient church wanted to, in a certain way, make it fit.
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The strongest case, I'm convinced, can be made for eight Beatitudes. And that would be the same statement spanning verses three through 10.
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Some argue verse 11 would be a ninth Beatitude because it also contains this declaration of blessing.
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So you have blessed are, blessed are, third person. Blessed are the poor in spirit.
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Blessed are those who mourn. Blessed are the meek. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness.
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That's all third person. Verses three through 10, eight statements. Then you get to verse 11.
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You have blessed are, but we switch from the third person to the second person. Blessed are you when you are persecuted for my name's sake.
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And so commentators notice that shift. You have a repetition of eight. Then you have a blessed are, but we've shifted now to the second person, and the next verses, 12 and 13, it's all second person.
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You are the salt of the earth. You are the light of the world. Now Matthew has a penchant for triads.
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We're gonna see this throughout the Sermon on the Mount. He loves putting things in threes. And so arguably, if we have nine
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Beatitudes, we have three series of three. That would be very delightful for an ancient reader to come across.
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It's three being this number of perfection times three. Perfect perfection. But we notice that that ninth
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Beatitude has broken the pattern of the previous eight. Again, we've shifted away from the third person to the second person, and also, the ninth
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Beatitude is simply expanding upon the eighth Beatitude. It's still about those who are suffering for righteousness' sake, those who are being persecuted.
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And so for good reason, I think we can say there are eight Beatitudes, or the closest I would give ground is
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I would say eight plus one, if we want to say that there's a bridge somehow to the body of teaching beginning in verse 12.
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And there's a reason that I think this is important. First of all, in the first four
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Beatitudes, there's alliteration. This is just, again, some of the artistry. Those that are blessed in Greek, each one begins with the letter
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P. The first four. So we can see a halving of the eight, the first four.
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The first four are also thematic, as far as those who are suffering, those who are indignant, those who are in need or deprived.
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Also, the beginning and the end, if we have eight, the first and the eighth Beatitude both contain the kingdom of heaven.
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The first and the eighth Beatitude are both in the present tense when speaking of the kingdom of heaven.
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For theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Every other Beatitude in between is in the future tense.
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They will be. And so we have what we would call an inclusio. In other words, a literary unit in the first eight
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Beatitudes. And that's very important because Matthew doesn't want us to miss a theme that he's been developing.
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We have something we discussed last week, this idea of the kingdom being already and the kingdom being not yet.
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Now, we're not gonna talk a lot about the kingdom of heaven this morning. That'll be at the end of the eighth
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Beatitude. But Matthew wants us to notice little things like a subtle shift in tense.
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And when we have this unit of these eight Beatitudes and the kingdom of heaven is bracketing this discussion of blessing, then we have a kingdom of heaven that is present.
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And that when we open the book cover, as it were, if the cover, if the first Beatitude is the kingdom of heaven is theirs, the kingdom of heaven is theirs, and in between all the blessings are found, they will be.
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Matthew wants to show us this tension that's already implicit in the gospel. The kingdom is both now and not yet.
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In chapter 417, the kingdom is at hand. But then we're taught to pray in the
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Sermon on the Mount, may your kingdom come, may your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. And so there's something present and something future about this kingdom.
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And we have that just in the first eight Beatitudes. But there's something realized in the lives of his people now, but there's also something that they're awaiting, a comfort, a presence, a hope in God.
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Now, why this declaration? Why this blessing?
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This is how he begins his sermon. I've preached hundreds of sermons.
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I've never once began a sermon with blessed are you. What a way to begin a sermon.
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What a way to begin a teaching. Why does Jesus declare this? Well, most likely he's drawing an allusion to Moses, right?
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We've seen that already. The last thing that Moses does to the people of Israel is he blesses them.
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The very end in Deuteronomy 33, in 34, he dies after God shows him from Mount Pisgah the land that he will give his descendants, the land that he's not allowed to enter at that point in redemptive history.
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But in chapter 33, the last act of Moses, the last ministry that Moses carries out on behalf of Israel is blessing.
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And so we read in Deuteronomy 33, now this is the blessing with which Moses, the man of God, blessed the children of Israel before his death.
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And so if we're carrying away from Moses to come to Jesus, it makes sense that Moses, like Jesus, is in this position to bless the people of God, blessing the people of God.
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And then he walks through each tribe, blessing each tribe, all 12 tribes. And then he concludes in verse 29, at the very end of Deuteronomy 33, the conclusion of his blessing, happy are you,
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O Israel, who is like you, a people saved by the Lord, the shield of your help and the sword of your majesty.
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Your enemies will submit to you and you'll tread down all their high places. So we have this blessing which the man of God blessed the people of God, and the conclusion of that great series of blessings is happy are you,
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O Israel. Now you'll notice this translation, verse 29, happy are you, happy are you,
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O Israel. It's a good translation, happy, blessed. Important work by Jonathan Pennington.
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He would argue for flourishing, this idea of abundance, of flourishing. Of fruitfulness. Happy, fruitful, flourishing, abundant, blessed are you,
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O Israel. God is the God of your salvation. And this word in Hebrew is esher.
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We begin Deuteronomy 33 with a typical verb, especially in the first five books. Barak, so the man of God blessed them.
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But then when we actually come to the blessing, it's this word esher, very important. In the construct where it's often used, asher.
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Now why is this important? I see eyes rolling back. I'm telling you this is important.
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This is the key word for blessing in the Old Testament. The key.
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Asher in the Septuagint is always rendered blessed, or what we have here in the
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Greek in Matthew 5 for the Beatitudes, makarios, blessing. So sometimes the
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Beatitudes are more accurately described as makarisms. That's just Greek instead of Latin.
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Makarisms, blessedness. But it's all coming out of this key word, esher. Esher is blessedness.
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Esher is happiness. Esher describes the state of one who has been blessed, the condition of being blessed.
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And so esher is this condition, this status, this state. This is why we say it's a declaration, not an offer.
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Not a if you come, then I will bless you in that way. No, no, it's a declaration of who has been blessed in this way, of who belongs to the kingdom, of who has this status of fruitfulness, of happiness, of blessedness.
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We find this throughout the Old Testament. This word appears constantly. Blessed are all who take refuge in the
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Lord. Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, Psalm 32. Blessed is the man who makes the Lord his refuge,
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Psalm 40. Blessed are those who dwell in your house, Psalm 84. Everywhere we go, hundreds and hundreds of times, you'll remember from our church retreat.
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Blessed is everyone who fears the Lord, who walks in His way, Psalm 128.
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It's all esher language. We could go on and on ad nauseum. So as a whole, the
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Psalms, like Proverbs, more rarely in the Prophets, declare that the righteous are blessed.
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The people of God are blessed. They are makarioi, they are asher. The very first word, in fact, of the very first Psalm.
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We go to Psalm 1, we go to the first word of Psalm 1. Blessed. Now we can begin to understand what
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Jesus is drawing from when He opens His mouth to begin to teach. He's inheriting this whole way, this whole format of understanding how
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God moves in redemption to bless His people. Blessed are you. And with that,
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He, like pulling lines deep in the sea, communication lines, He's pulling all of these things up, running through the
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Pentateuch and the wisdom literature, all the way even through the Prophets. He's drawing all of this toward the people that are now redefined by His disciples having come to Him.
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And He says, blessed are you, blessed are you. And if we begin with Psalm 1, if the
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Psalms are essentially a book of prayer, a book of how to live in the paths of God, how to walk before God, how to praise and enjoy and worship
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God, if that's what the book of Psalms are, then in microcosm, that's what the Sermon on the Mount is. Kingdom living.
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And we find then that Psalm 1 has a deep connection with the
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Sermon on the Mount. Something that Jonathan Pennington, I mentioned, his very important book,
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The Sermon on the Mount and Human Flourishing. Very good book. I've been cautioned by a few to stop mentioning books because the
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Amazon cart gets unwieldy, so I apologize. Psalm 1 and the
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Sermon on the Mount are essentially parallel by the time we get to Matthew 7. And again, this is what
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Jesus is introducing even here, just with these words, blessed are. A Jewish reader, one who would constantly sing and recite the
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Psalms, wouldn't have missed that connection. So many of the Psalms begin with blessed are or blessed is.
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And so when Jesus opens his mouth, he presents himself as a teacher of righteousness, as a teacher of God's wisdom.
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This is how you are to live in God's way. That's not a mere coincidence. Jesus is, as it were, expanding
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Psalm 1. Pennington points out, both Psalm 1 and in the Sermon on the
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Mount invite the hearers to come onto a path of wisdom. And it contrasts that path with the way of the world, right?
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This narrow path versus the broad path of destruction. In both Psalm 1 and in the
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Sermon on the Mount, this metaphor of fruit bearing trees, some unto judgment, some unto salvation.
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Both speak of judgment as a separation of the righteous from the wicked. That's how Psalm 1 concludes.
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That's where Jesus concludes the Sermon on the Mount. Both contrast those whom the Lord knows from those whom he does not know.
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And both emphasize hearing and heeding God's revelation. So if Psalm 1 is this fitting summarization of all that follows in the book of Psalms, then
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Jesus begins his Sermon on the Mount in very much the same way. He wraps up and enfolds all of that blessedness, language, and wisdom into the
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Sermon on the Mount just by opening with these beatitudes. Jesus is not only presented in this way as the fulfillment of Moses, but also as the fulfillment of Isaiah.
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We've already alluded to that with John the Baptist ministry. This is very important. Matthew is presenting
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Jesus as the fulfillment of Isaiah, just as much as Jesus is the fulfillment of Exodus. Jesus is the yes and amen of all of God's promises.
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So there's this huge theme of the kingdom being restored in Isaiah. This becomes the backdrop to these beatitudes.
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So much of the language of the heartache of Isaiah is being reflected here in the
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Sermon on the Mount. But don't fail to notice, blessed is the very first word.
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Blessed is the very first word. Of all the soul -searching, heart -convicting words that will follow, and they will follow, blessed is the first word of this sermon.
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Though we will be overwhelmed by the intensity of the searchlight of God's commands, though it will strip us bare if we allow our conscience to actually be exposed to the light of Jesus' teaching here, though there will be a winnowing and a thrashing and perhaps a pain that we feel deep -seated at the very core of our character and personality, the first word of Jesus' sermon is blessed.
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What was the first word of John the Baptist's sermon according to Matthew 3?
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Repent. John, as it were, characterizing as the greatest prophet from all of the prophets that came before him, as it is characterizing all of the ministry of the letter, all of the condemnation of the law, the first thing he has to say is repent.
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Jesus, as one full of grace and truth, comes to preach this to his disciples. What's the first word from his lips?
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Blessed. You see Jesus embodying the gospel of God.
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He's speaking to the people just in the contrast that Matthew is creating. And with that, we come to our third point, a consolation.
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A consolation, a comfort, because who is blessed in the first beatitude? Blessed are the poor in spirit.
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There's the twist. Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
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The expression poor in spirit is difficult. This is the only place it occurs in the Bible. We don't have this phrase anywhere else.
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It seems to combine or draw upon a lot of similar language that we do have throughout the Bible.
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I'll give you a few examples. Psalm 34 18, the Lord is near to those who have a broken heart and He saves such as have a contrite spirit.
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This is very similar language. In fact, you could translate contrite spirit as a crushed spirit.
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Broken -hearted, crushed. And what does the psalmist say? The Lord is near. The Lord is near to them.
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Or Psalm 51, the great psalm of Davidic repentance. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and a contrite heart.
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These, O God, you will not despise. Or Isaiah 66 2, for all these things my hand has made, says the
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Lord. All those things exist, but on this one will I look, on him who is poor and of a contrite spirit who trembles at my word.
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So Jesus is not saying something different from the psalmist or from the prophets. He's reaffirming everything they've ever said.
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Jesus knows that those that draw near to him are poor in spirit. That's what the psalmist declares.
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The Lord is near to those who are poor in spirit. Other people over here, other people are interested, but only at a distance.
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Disciples draw near to Jesus. Why? Disciples are poor in spirit. The Lord is always near those who are poor in spirit.
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This word poor, leave aside in spirit for a moment. You just have it there in the language of the
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Psalms, right? Broken in spirit, contrite in spirit. It speaks to the inner dimensions and qualities of a person, that you could say that the innermost character of their personality.
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And so it's not externally dustcloth and ashes, but it's internally this sense of brokenness and destitution.
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But in Luke, in the parallel and in the Sermon on the Plain in Luke chapter 6, we read he lifted up his eyes toward his disciples and said, blessed are you poor, full stop, just poor.
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So what's behind this language of poor? Well, the adjective translated as poor here,
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I mentioned it's a P word, tokoi in Greek. It's from a verbal form that means to fall or to bow down.
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You never want to make too much of that. Just because a word comes from something doesn't necessarily mean that's how, that's what's being communicated or that's what a hearer would necessarily connect.
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If you look at the roots of most of our words, those roots have no bearing on what we mean when we use them or what's heard when we say them.
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So you have to be careful about saying, well it means this because the root is that. But here I think you at least get the conceptual world of what a poor person is like.
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One who's bowing down, one who's falling. You get this sense of the posture is the most important thing in this word.
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It's from a verb, toso, to fall, to fall down, to bow down.
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So the idea is there's a posture, there's a posture of begging. There's a posture of I'm unworthy and I have to bow and as it were crawl because I'm in need.
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Perhaps you've seen, you know, city streets and you've walked by people and usually they're more detached nowadays.
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They have like a sign on cardboard and they're completely disinterested. But I remember in my youth so often that going, visiting
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Boston and seeing people that were bowed down, holding up a cup. They won't even look you in the eyes. The highest thing is their need, their cup.
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Won't you provide something? I'm needy. And that's the idea here. This is not a well -to -do peasant.
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This is not a, well, you know, things could be better, you know, more oatmeal would be nice but, you know, our shabby suits doing just fine.
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No, this is a beggar. This is a beggar. Poor here as Ernst Baml in a theological dictionary points out, it denotes complete destitution.
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It's one who has been forced to seek the help of another. That's the poor. There's other words for peasant or deprived.
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This is poor. This is beggar. This is, I can do nothing for myself. All I can do is beg that someone else will help me.
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That's the language. In the Old Testament this language connects.
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The poor are always those who recognize they cannot help themselves and so they're forced to cry out to God. They're depending entirely on God to show them mercy and that's why they have this broken contrite spirit.
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It's why they're crushed. And so we find, for example, just a few quick examples,
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Psalm 69, I am poor, sorrowful. Let your salvation, O God, set me on a high place.
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He's saying, I need to be saved. That's how poor I am. I need someone to rescue me, to take me out of the flood, out of the pit, put me on a high place.
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And then the humble will see this. They'll be glad. And you who seek God, your hearts will live. The Lord hears the poor.
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The Lord hears the one crying, begging. Psalm 86, bow down your ear, O Lord.
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I'm bowed down. I'm crushed. You bow down your ear to hear me. I'm poor.
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I'm needy. Preserve my life. This is life -threatening. If you don't help,
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I'm going to die. That's what Psalm 86 is saying. Please preserve my life.
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Please hear my cry. I'm crushed. Blessed are the poor in spirit.
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Theirs is the kingdom of heaven. This is the first beatitude. So why put this at the very front?
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Why not begin somewhere else? Why not begin with those who are seeking righteousness?
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Why not begin with those who are showing mercy? Why begin here with those who are crushed, those who are beggars, those who are crying out?
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Why begin here? I love what Thomas Watson says on this.
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He says, why is this at the forefront? I answer, Christ does it to show that being poor in spirit is the basis and foundation of every other grace that follows.
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You may as well expect fruit to grow without a root as other graces to come without this kind of poverty.
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Until a man is poor in spirit, he cannot mourn. Until a man is poor in spirit, he cannot hunger and thirst after righteousness.
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You're not hungry till you're begging. You're not mourning till you're hopeless, helpless.
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You have toddlers. Some of them are hungry right now. What's their reaction? They're not content in their hungriness.
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They're not quiet in their hunger. You take a long ride and lunch is going a little bit late. What happens?
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It's like a existential crisis. We miss lunch. Jesus is saying, my disciples, the ones that draw near to me, have come to me because they're crushed, because they're begging, because they're destitute, and the kingdom belongs to them.
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Of such is the kingdom. For the ministry of Jesus, this is definitive.
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This is part of his own self -acknowledgement of why he has come and how he has come.
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And this is where we draw back to Isaiah 61. Matthew goes on to cite this in chapter 11.
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In Luke, it's right in Luke 4, at the beginning of his ministry, when he closes that scroll, having read from Isaiah 61, the
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Spirit of the Lord God is upon me. The Lord has anointed me to preach good tidings to the poor. Centuries of longing, of being crushed, of begging, now being answered with a glad word.
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Comfort, comfort ye my people. This is now being fulfilled. When Jesus sits down, what does he say in Luke 4?
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I tell you the truth, today this has been fulfilled in your hearing. The one who has come to preach good news to the poor, the one who has come to answer the cries of the beggar, that one is me.
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And so Isaiah is being fulfilled, something that Matthew already pointed to. Jesus' ministry is presented at the beginning of Matthew as light to those sitting in great darkness.
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And what does Matthew say? This was spoken to fulfill what Isaiah had prophesied.
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Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Now there's a twist, there's a twist.
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You think of Jesus' own day, when John the Baptist is preaching repentance, who are the only people that are bone -dry?
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The righteous, the keepers of the law, the
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Pharisees, the Sadducees. They come just like the multitudes come. We're interested.
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What's all this clamor about? Why are so many coming? We want to hear, we want to overhear, we want to stay comfortably distant.
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We want our great robes, our tephilim, all the evidence of our virtues and righteousness.
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We want to stand down in contempt on some camel -cloth laden, locust -eating prophet.
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We'll decide if he's worth hearing or not. And what does John say to them? Brood of vipers.
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Who warns you of the wrath to come? Bear fruit worthy of repentance.
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You will not draw near to the Lord unless you come as these have come, poor, crushed, empty, helpless, hopeless, sinful, sitting in darkness.
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That's the twist. Those who view themselves as spiritually rich expect to enter the kingdom.
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Are they not the ones, the spiritually rich, who say, Lord, Lord, in chapter 7, didn't we cast out demons in your name?
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Didn't we do many great wonders in your name? Look at the kind of power, look at the kind of authority, look at the spiritual riches we have.
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And what does Jesus say to them? Depart from me. I never knew you. I was never near you.
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You were never near me. You don't belong in the kingdom. The kingdom belongs to those who are poor in spirit, those who are empty, those who have no right to claim it, no thought that they could somehow inherit it, and yet it's been given to them.
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That's the twist. That's the consolation. That's the blessing. Now, we need to make sure that we don't always assume we're the poor in spirit, right?
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We have a tendency to always say, yeah, those Pharisees over there. We need a big mirror to say, what about this
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Pharisee right here? We're offering, we're often lauding, as it were, our accomplishments, our gains.
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We can't help but compare ourselves to the people sitting to our left or to our right. All right, he's got me there, she's got me there, but at least
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I've got this, and I'm definitely way ahead of them. We kind of mount ourselves up, and in all these ways we jeopardize our own inheritance of the kingdom.
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Paul would say, what do you have that you didn't receive? What about you is truly self -made?
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You know, the world loves a self -made man. What about you is truly self -made? So Thomas Watson, he says,
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I distinguish between being poor in spirit and being spiritually poor. He who is without grace is spiritually poor.
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In other words, is not spiritual, is not spiritually minded, is not attuned to the prompting of the Spirit.
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The one who is without grace is spiritually poor, but he is not poor in spirit. He's not accomplishing what
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Jesus says is blessed. He doesn't know his own condition. He's in the worst sense poor.
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He has no sense of his poverty. The Emperor having no clothes. This is what
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Jesus said to the church at Laodicea in Revelation 3. You say, I'm rich. I've become wealthy.
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I have need of nothing. It's like the church at Corinth. You know, Paul says, oh, you're wealthy.
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You're reigning like kings. I wish I could reign with you. I wish I didn't have to bear a cross and suffer for his namesake.
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You guys have it all figured out. Everything's already realized. There's nothing future oriented for you. Well, that's a church at Laodicea.
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I'm rich. I'm wealthy. I have need of nothing. What does Jesus say of that church? You don't know that you're wretched.
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You don't know that you're miserable. You don't know that you're poor. You don't know that you're blind.
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You don't know that you're naked. That's what Jesus says to the church at Laodicea. An old
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Puritan said, if the blessed are those who are poor in spirit, then the cursed are those who are proud in spirit.
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It's a curse to be prideful. It's a curse to be proud in spirit.
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Cursed are you to have a bounce in your step because of some merit you cling to, you claim to.
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Cursed are you. Many people, another Puritan would say, many people are too good to get into heaven.
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They're too good to get into heaven. Good in their own understanding. Good in their own self -expression. There's a difference between a hypocrite and a child of God.
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There's a difference between a play actor, someone who doesn't know they're poor, versus a child of God who's been broken, has that crushed spirit, that contrite heart.
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Watson spells this out, the hypocrite is ever telling you what good he has. I feel bad about this, but you know, look at this, and look at that, you know, and this is going on, and most people
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I know aren't like this, and wouldn't do these kinds of things. A hypocrite is ever telling you what good he has. A child of God complains about the good he lacks.
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A child of God is like a poor man, Watson said, he's always telling you his needs. You see some of these
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YouTube videos, it's kind of, I don't know, it's kind of iffy. You wonder, are they really trying to help the poor?
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Can't you help the poor without GoPro footage? But if you're getting this monetary kickback by documenting your charity to two million people, is that really, aren't you supposed to, doesn't
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Jesus say something in this very sermon about not letting your right hand know what your left hand is doing? So I would say these charity channels have their reward in full, but you watch these, and it, more often than not, when they go up and they say, hey, are you hungry?
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You know, can I help you in any way? The ones I've seen, all of a sudden they get this huge shopping list, it starts with, can
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I get you a sandwich and a drink? And then it ends with a trip to Walmart with a huge cart full of sweaters and a tent and a camping stove and all sorts of stuff.
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Oh, if you're gonna help me, I've got all kinds of needs, there's all sorts of things that I lack, and that's what Watson is saying.
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A child of God is like a poor man, he's always telling you what he needs, it'd be nice if I had this, I wish I had that,
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I really need this, it's hard without this. Since a poor man has nothing to help himself with, he's ready to starve unless he gets help, he'll beg, he'll express his need, he'll bring his complaint.
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Now, a child of God doesn't use that to deny God's work of grace, he doesn't do it in some plague of self -condemnation, the point is he's always mourning the fact that I've received grace and yet I need much more grace.
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Luther on his deathbed, maybe apocryphal, but I like it, when he was dying, one of the last recorded statements he made, you figure this great man, this great
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Reformer, if anyone could claim to all sorts of things that would amount to some stature, some reason that he should be received into the kingdom, it would be
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Martin Luther. And when he's on his deathbed contemplating, standing before the judgment seat of Christ, you know what his last words were?
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Wir sind bettler, das ist wahr. We are beggars, this is true. I'm just a beggar.
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He took off that Reformer cap, he laid aside all his wreaths of glory, he said when I come to God in my last throes in this life,
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I come as a beggar. You always come to God as a beggar. Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
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The blessedness of the kingdom belongs only to the poor in spirit, there are no others.
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It's an emphatic pronoun, it's place in Greek, that you have a pronoun in this place.
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Theirs is the kingdom of heaven. It's only theirs, it's exclusively theirs.
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There is no one in the kingdom of God who is not poor in spirit. There is no one who is drawn near to Jesus, who doesn't have a crushed spirit, have some sense of need, has come begging to receive him.
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And perhaps you're sitting here this morning and that's the only reason you haven't come, you have way too much pride to beg. You say
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I'd rather starve to death than beg, and so you will, so you will. Lloyd -Jones says it is the fundamental characteristic of the
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Christian, and all other characteristics are in a sense the result of this one, being poor in spirit.
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We cannot be filled until we're first emptied. You can't fill a vessel with new wine unless it's emptied of its old wine.
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This is one of those statements that reminds us there has to be an emptying before there can be a filling. There's always two sides to the gospel.
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You have to be stripped bare before you'll be covered, you have to be empty before you'll be filled. As the best creature was made from nothing, a
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Puritan says, when a sinner sees himself as nothing, God makes him into a beautiful creature.
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I love that. In other words, he who is vile in his own eyes is very precious in the eyes of God.
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For thus says the high and lofty one who inhabits eternally, whose name is holy, I dwell in the high and holy place with him who has a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, to revive the heart of the contrite ones.
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Do you see God's desire there in Isaiah 57? What does he do when the beggar comes? What does the prodigal's father do when the son returns?
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He revives his broken spirit. He revives his contrite heart. I mean, the prodigal wasn't even crushed, was he?
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The prodigal son was just trying to bargain his way forward. That's how abundant the blessedness and the goodness and the mercy of the
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Father is. I dwell in a high and holy place. No one dares approach me, but I bend down my ear to the needy, and if you're begging,
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I've come to revive you. I don't hear you until you're broken, until you pour, until you're begging from the innermost part of your life, but if you're crying from that place,
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I always come. Some people are afraid to beg because what if I don't get heard?
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What if I put it all on the line and I'm not received? What if I only fall deeper into the pit?
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What if I lose it all? And Jesus says, all who come to me
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I will receive. In no way will I cast them out. All that the Father gives to me will come. So what does the
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Lord require of you? What does the Lord require according to this first beatitude?
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Does he require you to clean yourself up? Does he require you to scrape up a meal?
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Does he require you to have something in your hand as you approach him? What does the
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Lord require of you? Come ye sinners poor and needy, Joseph heart, his great hymn, weak and wounded, sick and sore,
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Jesus ready stands to save you. Full of pity, full of love, full of power.
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Let not conscience make you linger. I'm too dirty to come.
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It's too twisted, too dark. I've been there a thousand times.
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I can't come a thousand and one times. He won't have me. Let not conscience make you linger, nor a fitness fondly dream.
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Well, I'll come after I clean my, you know, a little bit. I need to kind of protect my personality, my reputation, my dignity.
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Nor a fitness fondly dream. All the fitness he requires is to feel your need of him.
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That's what he requires of you, to realize you're a beggar and come to him begging. That's all he requires, is that you put the cup out, is that you prostrate before him.
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All he requires is that you know you need him, and so you cry out to the one you need, the one who alone can help you.
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That's all he requires of you. So why won't you come? Blessed are the poor in spirit.
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Blessed are those who recognize they were beggars and came to the one who could help. Came to the one who is full of mercy.
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Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. So this morning, you have been invited to come.
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You may say, well, I came 13 years ago and, you know, the stadium when I was led to pray the sinner's prayer.
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Listen, it doesn't matter how long you've been a Christian or whether or not you're a Christian, there's always an invitation to draw near to Jesus.
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We are beggars, this is true. You've been invited to come near the
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Lord Jesus this morning, to come to him poor and needy. Do you know your poverty?
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I remember, I've shared this probably five times, it just still impacts me. After some of the horrific earthquakes in Haiti, this was maybe 15 years ago, 16 years ago, you know, the
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UN, as they often, as bureaucrats tend to do, they tend to just sort of indiscriminately give supplies and never actually teach people how to use them wisely and carefully.
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A lot of times, all sorts of seeds are sent to Haiti, but they're never able to yield anything. So people end up just opening these bags and eating the seeds sort of raw.
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It's looking for some nutritional intake. They're not able to sustain crops, they don't even know how to do it, they overcrowd and they're not able to manage their terrain.
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And so the mothers would always prioritize their children, and so you had these pictures that were being circulated in the headlines of Haitian mothers that were so starving that they would tie a sort of belt around their stomach and make this knot to just press their stomach toward their spine, because it would trick their body into thinking their stomach was full.
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If I could just tighten that knot, I won't know that I'm starving to death. And let me tell you, there's many people who are at the base of the mountain, not willing to draw near to Jesus, and they say, well
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I'm not that poor, I'm not that starving, let me just keep tightening this knot. It's delusion, it's self -deception.
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To be a human being is to be a beggar in need of the grace of God. You don't have to go very far, you don't have to climb the mountains to understand the perfections of the law to see that every way in your life is crooked, that you can't amount to doing much good for any length of time consistently, and even then it's pockmarked and stained by so much selfishness and pride.
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You've been invited to come to Him in a poor and needy. You've been invited to be a disciple this morning, to be taught by Him what it means to learn from Him, to follow
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Him. So the only question you have to ask is, what prevents me from being blessed if blessed are the poor in spirit?
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That's the question. What prevents you from being blessed if Jesus says the poor in spirit are blessed?
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Are you blessed this morning? Then you must be poor in spirit. If you have some sense of lack or want, or I'm just not blessed in the way
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I want to be, well let me encourage you brother or sister, you're just not poor in spirit enough, because Jesus says blessed are the poor in spirit.
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When you are poor in spirit, then you find the Father's robe, the Father's ring, the Father's feast. When you've truly come to the end of yourself, then you find that hand that scoops you up out of that miry clay and sets you on a high place.
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But until then, you'll keep treading, you'll keep wallowing, you'll keep longing and daydreaming about what should be, what could have been, what needs to be.
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You'll never get there. Blessed are the poor in spirit. Jesus' invitation.
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He's speaking to his disciples. I don't know if you're among them or if you're at the base of the mountain overhearing.
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All the same, Jesus has come. Think of yourself in the midst of the crowd. Jesus has been teaching and now people are coming out of the work, demoniacs, lepers, blind, paralyzed.
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What a madhouse. Can you imagine that crowd? And you're standing among them.
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Let me close by reading this excerpt. I very encourage, I don't endorse a lot of what he wrote, but an old
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German theologian Helmut Thielicke, and he was resistant to the
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Nazis in Germany during World War II and became a Protestant theologian after the fact, and he has a little collection of sermons on the
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Sermon on the Mount, and I was so moved reading them this week. I'm just gonna close reading this, because as we begin the
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Gospel of Matthew, as we overlay Exodus and Isaiah into the opening chapters, as we see one greater than John the
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Prophet, one greater than all of the prophets, one greater than the lawgiver Moses, when we see Jesus, we begin to understand there's something different about him.
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This is not just a prophet. This is not just a miracle worker. This is not just a mighty man of God. So let me close reading these words and then we'll pray.
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Just suppose that suddenly all the hospitals and asylums were emptied. Could you bear the sight of the crippled, of the mutilated?
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Could you bear to listen to the shrill cacophony of mumbling, babbling voices, the shrieks of the tormented?
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All these miserable people gathered around Jesus, because in some mysterious way,
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Jesus attracts the miserable. He draws sinners and sufferers from their hiding places like a magnet.
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Undoubtedly, the reason for this is they sense in his person something they can't see in any other.
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For one thing, they see he stands among us as one of us. He passes the test of misery.
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He himself is a man well acquainted with grief. He doesn't act like the upper 10 ,000 in our world who build exclusive residences so they never have to see the misery of the world around them.
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These crowds are grateful for a Savior coming into their slum, grateful that he doesn't close his eyes when their shadow of suffering passes by him.
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But at the same time, they see in him something more, something far more incomprehensible. The fact that the powers of darkness and guilt cannot touch him.
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In fact, mysteriously, these powers retreat whenever he comes near. To be sure, his heart is shuttered beneath all the onslaughts of hell in the wilderness.
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Speaking of the wilderness trial, for after all it was his will to possess a human heart to which no temptation, no dread is foreign.
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But Satan was defeated, was left leaving that wilderness without accomplishing anything whatsoever.
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And the same thing happened on the cross. There too, Jesus was clutched and clawed by pain, the dread of abandonment.
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But again, his spirit burst through that deadly encirclement and found his way to the
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Father's hand. No wonder they try to get near him. They gaze in wonder that his hands could do so much good and never weary of blessing.
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Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
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Let's pray. Father, thank you for your
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Word. Thank you for your mercy. Thank you for your promises. Thank you for your comforts.
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Thank you for who you are. Thank you for what you've done. Thank you that your heart is toward the humble, that your ear is bent to the needy, that your mercy shines toward the beggars, toward the miserable, that you,
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Lord, draw near to them long before they ever take pains to draw near to you. And may you be doing that in our midst even this morning.
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Who here is vexed? Who here is miserable? Who here is crushed in spirit, Lord? Fulfill this blessing in their life even now, we pray.
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Fulfill it in our lives. Fulfill it in our body. May we not be like the church at Laodicea, self -deluded, self -deceived, self -contented like the
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Pharisees who refused to be baptized and therefore could never enter into your kingdom. But let us be as children, wholly dependent upon the mercy and provision of our