Hi everyone. Let’s begin our look at one of Jesus’ most famous teachings in Matthew 5:3.
“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”
This is the first of eight ‘blessed’ statements that Jesus made while speaking to his followers. Each of these statements presents a certain characteristic or quality which Jesus considered to be praiseworthy or beneficial. However, as we noted last time, these are not characteristics which would normally help you get ahead in this life.
So what did Jesus mean when he made this statement in verse 3?
There are three main questions to ask:
1. What does it mean to be “blessed” in this context?
2. Who are the “poor in spirit”?
3. What is the “kingdom of heaven”?
Blessed
What did Jesus mean by “blessed”?
Some English translations of the Bible will use “happy” rather than “blessed” here, but this doesn’t seem to best describe what Jesus was trying to get at. His intended meaning was possibly more along the lines of “This is good news for….”.
The reason for this is probably twofold:
First, it’s a message of hope for those who might typically be written off or ignored by wider human society. Very often it was the downtrodden and the despised who came to Jesus and found that his message and his mission included them too. By contrast, those in positions of wealth or privilege, such as the religious leaders of the Jewish people, often wanted to challenge or even silence Jesus.
Second, it’s a warning to those who do not so easily fall into the category of “poor in spirit”. We’ll look at this more when we get on to asking what “poor in spirit” means, but for now suffice it to say that many people who were thought by wider society to be farthest from God were actually starting from a better place when it came to their humility and their willingness to accept Jesus as their Saviour.
Poor in spirit
What did Jesus mean by “poor in spirit”?
Let’s begin by considering what he probably didn’t mean.
First, he wasn’t referring to those who were materially or financially poor. While such people were obviously a major concern for Jesus – and the responsibility for their needs and their well-being is a big part of your life if you’re a Christian – that’s not what he is addressing here.
Second, he wasn’t describing a weakness or a deficiency of character in the way we might use words like “mean-spirited”. It wasn’t intended to be a criticism or a rebuke.
So what did he mean?
Let’s look at how three popular Bible commentaries describe it:
“‘Poverty in spirit’ is not speaking of weakness of character (‘mean-spiritedness’) but rather of a person’s relationship with God. It is a positive spiritual orientation, the converse of the arrogant self-confidence which not only rides roughshod over the interests of other people but more importantly causes a person to treat God as irrelevant. To say that it is to such people that the kingdom of heaven belongs means (not of course that they themselves hold royal authority but) that they are the ones who gladly accept God’s rule and who therefore enjoy the benefits which come to his subjects.”
(R T France, New International Commentary on the New Testament)
“The kingdom of God belongs to those who know they have no resources, material or spiritual, to help themselves before God.”
(Michael J Wilkins, NIV Application Commentary)
“The poor in spirit in the sense of this beatitude are those who recognize that they are completely and utterly destitute in the realm of the spirit. They recognize their lack of spiritual resources and therefore their complete dependence on God…it is the opposite of the Pharisaic pride in one’s own virtue with which Jesus was so often confronted (and which has all too often made its appearance in later times).”
(Leon Morris, Pillar New Testament Commentary)
I said earlier that Jesus was not referring to those who are poor in material terms. Nevertheless it seems clear that such people are far more likely to recognise their own lack of spiritual wealth or resources.
Contrast his words to the church in Smyrna:
“I know your afflictions and your poverty – yet you are rich!”
(Revelation 2:9)
with those to the church in Laodicea:
“You say, ‘I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.’ But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked” (Revelation 3:17)
Allow me to clarify: Jesus was not saying that the materially poor are blessed while the materially rich are not. What he was saying is that those who recognise they are spiritually poor are blessed, and those who are materially poor are far more likely to recognise this about themselves.
He may also have been trying to subvert a common belief in the Jewish society of the time which said that wealth and privilege were evidence that a person had been blessed by God as a reward for their virtue, whereas poverty or disability were signs that a person was being punished for their (or even their parents’) wrongdoings.
Wealth is generally seen as a blessing in our world, but you must recognise that it can so easily blind you to recognising your own true spiritual condition before God.
Kingdom of heaven
What did Jesus mean by the “kingdom of heaven”?
If you’re a Christian, the first place your mind might go is to the events we are promised will occur after Jesus returns to the Earth in glory. He will begin a time of eternal peace and happiness for those who love and trust him. No doubt that’s what he is promising here. After all, as we have seen, these “blessed” promises all refer to personal characteristics which are unlikely to bring much success or glory in this life.
This is very much a message of hope for what God has promised in the life to come: those who acknowledge that they have nothing to bring before God and instead rely entirely on his love and his mercy will be granted a place in paradise when Jesus returns.
And yet, as the rest of this chapter will show, there is always more to Jesus’ message than simply “wait for the kingdom to come”. The hope of forgiveness and eternal life which we share should change the way we think about life now. Not only that but it should change the way we behave towards God and towards each other. Our trust in this promise should be visible to the others in the way we live.
While the kingdom of heaven will not truly arrive until Jesus returns to the earth, those of us who believe in it should be inspired to think and to speak and to act in such a way that we can give each other tiny tastes or glimpses of that kingdom right now.
How can we do that? And how can we recognise when we’re not doing it? That’s the question I’ll try to answer next week as we consider what it looks like to put this verse “Blessed are the poor in the spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” into practical living.
Thankyou. God bless.
Nihilist to Christian 