Who Is The Most Poor In Spirit — Sandeep Poonen

The Kingdom Belongs to the Poor in Spirit

Who's the most poor in spirit? I was thinking about this, how God is so poor in spirit. What does it say? Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. What does poor in spirit mean?

Is poor in spirit like you're useless? Poor in spirit is a negative thing? Is poor in spirit not a compliment, but a criticism? It's a criticism on this earth, but in heaven, it's everything. Blessed are the poor in spirit, because theirs is.

Who owns the kingdom of heaven? God does. Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is. Not that they'll get into the kingdom of heaven. Theirs is the kingdom of heaven. They own it. It's theirs. The poor in spirit are the people who own the kingdom of heaven.

God's Humility in Becoming Human

And the greatest example of that is God. How can I explain to you why God is poor in spirit? Dear brothers and sisters, we can meditate on Jesus and find out a lot about how poor in spirit Jesus was. Just think about the great condescension, condescension to come so low.

Christ's Permanent Humanity

The great humility of Jesus, to say, I'm no longer gonna be God, but I'm gonna be a human being. And Jesus didn't say that, I'm gonna be a human being for 33 and a half years. Even now, he's a human too.

He's God and man. He didn't temporarily become a human being. He's permanently now a human being as well as fully God. He's fully God and fully man for all eternity. And the best picture I can think of is, what if you decided one day to become a garbage fly?

Not for 33 years to save garbage flies from eating all the filth, but for all eternity, you completely changed. And you gave up being the wife of this person or the husband of this person and the mother and father of this person and the son and daughter of this person.

The Incarnation as the Greatest Humility

You said, no, I gave up all equality with God. I'm gonna become a fruit fly. Can you fathom that great humility? What poorness in spirit? What complete lack of holding on to I'm God or I'm somebody? God is gonna look for such people in heaven too.

Theirs is the kingdom of heaven. God's gonna look for people who are gonna be poor in spirit when you get to heaven. And so when God asks us to do anything, we say, God, sure, I'm poor in spirit. If you could become a human being, what is the...

I mean, Isaiah 55, verse eight and nine, right? That says, as high as the heavens are above the earth, that's how high God's ways are higher than man's. So for God to come and become a man was the greatest distance that anybody has ever traveled.

Nobody's ever traveled that distance. God to become a man. That's how poor in spirit God is, that he's willing to become a man. We can never compete with that poverty in spirit. God's just saying, be like me.

Poverty in Spirit as God's Virtue

Don't think of yourself as anybody. Be willing to become lower and lower and lower. So that's gripped me, dear brothers and sisters, as I thought about who is the poorest in spirit? It's God. It's not we're poor in spirit because we sin.

It's not we are poor in spirit because we're useless. No, no, no. Poverty in spirit is the attribute of God. Poverty in spirit is the virtue that those who own the kingdom of heaven have. And if God is the ruler of the kingdom of heaven, he's poor in spirit.

Humility Within the Trinity

He doesn't think of himself much. As I shared, you know, a couple of weeks on Sunday from John 15, 13, that the Holy Spirit doesn't speak on his own initiative. The Holy Spirit is God. He doesn't need to check with anybody.

But it says in John 15, 13, that the Holy Spirit does not speak of his own initiative. But he says, hey, Father, Son, Holy Spirit, what are you saying? And that's what the Holy Spirit speaks. What great humility.

That's how it is. We ought to be. That's the poverty in spirit that we need. It's the attribute of God. It's the attribute of Jesus. And if we want to meditate on that, meditate on God who became man.

Just think about the great condescension, how deep God's stooped to become a human being. I think it's the greatest distance anybody will ever travel. God to become a man.