HAPPY SATURDAY! WE ARE HOME!
BY PARRIS BAILEY
“BLESSED ARE THE POOR IN SPIRIT, FOR THEY WILL SEE GOD”. MATTHEW 5:3
I find myself many times while doing my morning walk dwelling on different scriptures that pertain to my children, my church and our precious city. When Jesus got up that day and preached the Sermon on the Mount, his first sentence was “Blessed are the Poor in Spirit….” I often wonder what it will take to become “poor in spirit”. This August marks 40 years since I became a Christian. God brought me to a place early in my life that I was undone. (Thank God!) Thomas Watson calls it “broken in the sense of their unworthiness”. The world thinks people are blessed when they live up on a pinnacle, they are full alright- swollen with self excellency and self sufficiency. “If thy hands are full, it has no room for God”. (Augustine) Christ says we are blessed when are brought low for then we see how precious Christ is. Martha was cumbered about with “many things” but Mary chose the “best part”. Jacob blessed Issac when he prayed saying, “God give thee of the dew of heaven, and the fatness of the earth, and plenty of corn and wine.” (Gen. 27:28) When we seek Him first we will receive not only divine happiness but the other always comes. He indeed saves the best for last.
When God becomes “our good” he gives us plenty of His fulness, grace for grace. He is a sun, a shield, a portion, a fountain, a rock of strength, and an horn of salvation. Every moment he brings fresh beauties, supplies and delights all springing up from Him. For He makes us “drink of the river of thy pleasures”. (Ps. 36:8)
Poverty in spirit can also mean self- annihilation. We become so fixated on our sins, seeing no goodness in us that we run to the mercy and grace of God. Calvin said, “they see nothing in themselves and fly to mercy for sanctuary”. In the gospel of Luke there is a story of the Pharisee and the Publican. Luther says; “Therefore see to it, that you properly follow this publican, and become like him. Namely, in the first place, that you be not a false but a real sinner; not only in words but in reality and from the heart acknowledge yourself worthy before God of his wrath and eternal punishment, and bring before him in truth these words, “me a poor sinner;” but in the same flight lay hold of the other words: “Be thou merciful to me,” by which words you take away the point and edge of the law and thus cast and turn from you the judgment and condemnation the law seeks to force upon you.”
We all can say yes I am a sinner, but still God is gracious to me, I am God’s enemy, but He is now my friend. I should be condemned but He makes me His precious child. Happy are the poor in Spirit, happy are we when we are hungry-we will see God daily in our lives and be filled to overflow!