SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 3/27/2020
10:59 AM
My Worship Time Focus: PT-2 “The
Meaning of the Poor in Spirit”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Matthew 5:3
Message of the
verses: “3
"Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”
I want to continue to talk about why
the verse that we are looking at is talking about people being poor in spirit
and not just poor in a financial way.
And to do that we want to look at the public ministry of our Lord as
found in Matthew 8:20 “20 Jesus said to him, "The foxes have holes and the
birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His
head.’” We can be sure as we look
through the gospel writings that neither He nor any of His disciples were not
destitute and never begged for bread.
Paul was beaten, imprisoned, shipwrecked, stoned, and often economically
hard pressed; but Paul never had to beg for bread. It was like a badge of honor for Paul that he
worked as a tentmaker to help pay for his own expenses while in the
ministry. He talks about this in Acts
20:34 and also in 1 Cor. 9:6-18. I am
also thinking about another section from his letter to the Philippians when
they had sent him a gift and Paul was thankful for the gift, but he was even
more thankful for those who sent it to him as he knew that God would reward
them for doing this.
John MacArthur writes “On the other
hand, no New Testament believer is condemned for being rich. Nicodemus, the Roman centurion of Luke 7,
Joseph of Arimathea, and Philemon were all wealthy and faithful. That ‘not many mighty, not many noble’ are
called (1 Cor. 1:26) is not because they are rejected due to their positions or
possessions but because so many of them trust only in those things (1 Tim.
6:6-17).
“That is the point of the first beatitude. The ‘poor in spirit’ are those who recognize
their total spiritual destitution and their complete dependence on God. They
perceive that there are no saving resources in themselves and that they can
only beg for mercy and grace. They know
they have no spiritual merit, and they know they can earn no spiritual
reward. Their pride is gone, their self-assurance
is gone, and they stand empty-handed before God.”
What
is talked about in this highlighted paragraph is something that is genuine and
not fake, as someone acting like a spiritual beggar, but recognizing what one
really is. This is talking about
something that I have put on my “steps of faith” each day most of last year and
much of this year and that is humility.
Isaiah 66:1-2 states “1 Thus says the LORD, "Heaven is My throne,
and the earth is My footstool. Where then is a house you could build for Me?
And where is a place that I may rest? 2 “For My hand made all these things,
Thus all these things came into being," declares the LORD. "But to this one I will look, To
him who is humble and contrite of spirit, and who trembles at My word.” I want to look at one more verse here and it
comes from Psalm 51, a psalm of David that he wrote about his sin with
Bathsheba and her husband and how he is humbled over his sinfulness: “The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; A
broken and a contrite heart, O God, You will not despise.”
There
is a story by Jesus from the 18th chapter of the gospel of Luke
where He tells the story of a Pharisee and a tax collector and in this story He
tells the difference between these men.
One was bragging about all he did and then the other who could not even
look up to the Lord because of his sin and asked the Lord to be merciful to him
a sinner. The Lord states that only one
went away justified and it was not the Pharisee, as the tax collector was poor
in spirit.
There
are many other stories that show this point to be true, and many of them are in
the pages of the Old Testament, and for time sake I will not go over all of
them. One story has to be with the Law
given at Mt. Sinai. And with that we
must understand what the Law was given in the first place as there are
different reasons. Paul states that the
Law was a tutor to bring people to Christ.
Another thing Paul writes about this subject is found in Romans 5:20 “The
Law came in so that the transgression would increase; but where sin increased,
grace abounded all the more.” Think
about that for a moment that the Law came in so that the transgression would
increase. Paul writes the following in
Romans 7 “Ro 7:7 What shall we say then? Is the Law sin? May it never be! On
the contrary, I would not have come to know sin except through the Law; for I
would not have known about coveting if the Law had not said, "YOU SHALL
NOT COVET.’” The Law is perfect and only God could live on
this earth completely keeping the Law, but we can’t and so we understand that
because the Law is perfect that we cannot keep it on our own, but only through
the power of the Holy Spirit. However
before we became believers we have to understand that we cannot keep it and therefore
as our verse states we are “poor in spirit,” and therefore we should come to
Christ as Savior and Lord.
I
will conclude this SD with another quote from John MacArthur, the last
paragraph that he wrote from this sub-section:
“If God’s Old Testament standards are impossible for man to meet by
himself, ho much less attainable by one’s own power are the standards of the
Sermon on the Mount. Jesus here teaches
not only that people must love God but that they ‘are to be perfect, as [their]
heavenly father is perfect’ (5:48), and that unless their righteousness exceeds
the external, man-originated ‘righteousness…of the scribes and Pharisees,
[they] shall not enter the kingdom of heaven’ (5:20).”
Spiritual meaning for my life today: I am thankful that the Lord is showing me
more about humility, and that He humbled me in order to accept Him as my Savior
and my Lord.
My Steps of Faith for Today: Continue to
learn contentment, humility, and to find joy in the studying of His Word.
3/27/2020 12:02 PM
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