Kingdom Living - The Poor in Spirit

Well, if you would take your Bible, turn back with me to Matthew chapter 5. Matthew chapter 5, I know that I read all of the Beatitudes earlier in our scripture reading, but we will only be dividing verse 3, one verse. If I counted correctly, I believe that's 13 words in the English Standard Version. "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." That's where we were last week, and we will finish this verse up this morning in our message. Now before we get into the message, I want to explain to you my approach with this verse. Now I did not mention this last week. I probably should have.

It might have helped some of you. My approach to this verse is a lot like an old Jeep that I used to have. Some of you know that I had a restored 1976 CJ5. Now that Jeep had an interesting life. A good friend of mine owned it long before I did. And when my friend Dave had the Jeep, it was all original. As a matter of fact, he told me that it was in pretty good shape. The only thing that he ever said was wrong with it back in those days was the color. He said it was that original Jeep, ugly, ugly, mud, brown. Now he eventually sold the Jeep to his dad, and he told me that one day he went by his dad's house.

He went into his shop, and when he went into the shop there, he saw his old Jeep, and it was torn down into a million pieces. My friend Dave asked his dad what was going on. He said that his dad simply mumbled under his breath that he was fixing a few things with the Jeep. Now ultimately, he rebuilt about 98% of the Jeep, and it was far better than it was before. And after it was sold a couple of times, I ended up with the Jeep for a few years. Well that's what I'm doing with verse three. Truthfully, I'm tearing down this verse before you, and my order of tearing this verse down might seem random.

My approach to the verse might surprise some of you. We started last week with the first word in the verse. Remember, we dealt with the word "blessed" quite a bit. Then I skipped over to the end of the verse, and I dealt with that phrase, "the kingdom of heaven." And this morning, I will break down the rest of the verse, which is the middle portion. And I'm very confident that you will see this verse reassemble before your eyes, and it will look much different than it did before. Now I'm not saying that there was anything wrong with the verse. That's not what I'm implying. It's not what I'm saying at all.

Simply I believe that when we are done breaking down the verse and then reassembling the verse, it will look much different, a lot different to you than it did before. Now before we get back into the verse, we need to be reminded of the importance of what we studied last week. Understanding the meaning of this word "blessedness" and this phrase, "the kingdom of heaven" is of utmost importance. I said last week this is foundational. If we do not have a correct understanding of what our Lord means here, then everything we build on top of that faulty understanding will not be in accordance with Christ's teaching.

Like a house without a proper foundation, it will sag and it will settle and it will lean over time. It will eventually falter and fail because it will not be the true Christian life. Now let me show you what I mean. We learn that to be blessed has nothing to do with anything external, nothing. It is an inner work of God within the heart of the true believer. This work is an impartation of God's character that produces an inner joy, an inner blissfulness, and an inner happiness. Well a question, think about this. What does the world say will bring happiness and joy? The world says happiness comes from without.

The world says happiness comes from money and possessions, power and position, even physical beauty. And the list really just goes on and on and on. Warren Buffett will tell you happiness comes from money and possessions. Donald Trump, he will tell you that happiness comes from power and position and money and possessions. Tom Cruise and Katy Perry, they'll tell you that happiness comes from physical beauty, but according to Jesus, you may be as poor as a snake in regards to material things and be the most joyful, blissful, happy person in the county.

And if we do not understand the true source of our happiness and our joy, then everything within the beatitudes cannot be applied to our lives. It just won't work. We also learned that for a true believer, life in the kingdom has a twofold meaning. Yes, we live in the kingdom of this sinful world, but we do not fear. Our God is sovereign over all time, all events, and all peoples. But more specific, we live in the kingdom of the redeemed. As a redeemed people, Christ is Lord over our lives. He is our master. We also possess the kingdom. This kingdom work is the work of the church, and that is true kingdom work on earth in this time.

Christians are given the job to evangelize the world and to grow the saints. And this is done within the life of the church and through the church. Within this kingdom, life is where we live. It is where we work. And it is the arena in which we bring God most glory. Well a question. A question. What kingdom does the lost possess? They are a part of this evil world system. And this evil world system is anti-God, anti-Bible, and anti-man. Lost people live for self and sin. They reside in darkness. They reject God's word, God's ways, and God's work.

And if we do not understand the arena in which we live and work and give God greatest glory, then we will miss true kingdom work. Listen, we'll miss the bullseye. So you tell me, from where do we get our happiness? How do we possess this joy, this inner blissfulness, this inner happiness? In what arena do we as Christians live? What work do we possess as given by our Lord? I believe you know the answers to those questions. And I believe we do know those answers because we've been very thorough. And I think we are ready now to see how this work of blessedness may come about.

And this will enable us to have all that is promised within this one verse. Now I want us to break down the rest of the verse, and that is dealing with the word "poor" and then dealing with the word "spirit." Again, this comes right out of the verse. Now in examining this word "poor," I will show you what the word is and what the word is not. Now get that in your mind. We're going to look at what the word is, this word "poor," and what this word is not. So number one in our outline, what? What is this word "poor"? What is this word "poor" right here in verse 3? Now believe it or not, there is a good bit we need to see here.

But before we can see what it is, we must see what it is not. And I'm not trying to confuse you by going back and forth. There are great mistakes some have fallen into. Truthfully, that totally derails the teaching of the Beatitudes. First, what this word does not mean. What this word does not mean. Some have taken Luke's account of the verse. Luke gives them an account of the Beatitudes, and they have taken Luke's account and they have developed a terrible misunderstanding. Luke's account of the Beatitudes gives a shorter version of Matthew's verse, verse 3.

Luke's verse reads, "Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God." Now a question from Luke's account. Is Jesus teaching this great work of blessing, this great work of happiness, comes from material poverty? We must understand that Luke is giving an abbreviated version of the verse. Matthew explains what this poverty means. And this is not poverty in relation to material possessions or monies. There are some who have made this teaching all about poverty. There are some that have taken vows of poverty, and they have lived a life of rejecting material possessions and money. And that's a terrible misunderstanding.

Some have also made the mistake of making this poverty a poverty of the human spirit. A poverty of the human spirit. Now let me explain this. Through their own efforts, they put themselves down in the doldrums or down in the pit. They are always down in the dumps. These people are like Eeyore off Winnie the Pooh, who was always gloomy and depressed and pessimistic. We're familiar with that character. He was in the doldrums all the time, was he not? And this is not what this verse means. Some adopt that condition, and they are living out the meaning of this verse in the flesh. This is something that man can do.

So this is what the verse is not, what the word is not. But then second, the true meaning of the word poor. In the original language in which this was written, there were two words for poor. One word describes a person who works to earn a living. This speaks of a man who uses his hands to meet his own needs. This is the working man. And our day we would say, he was the blue collar man, and that's very accurate. This man does not have anything extra in life, but he is not destitute either. That's the picture of the first word that's used in the original language, this word poor.

But then the other word that is used in the original language, it describes a man who is absolutely in poverty. He is in absolute poverty. This is the one who cowers down because of their poverty and in their low position in society. One commentator says they are beaten down to their knees because of their poverty. He is completely destitute. He's completely broken down. And this is the word that is used here in verse three. But there's another layer that needs to be seen here. There is more here than the simple meaning of the definition of the word. We also have the cultural meaning which must be seen.

I have said that most of the crowd that was here, most of the crowds were Jews. The backdrop of everything that's going on here, it was the Jewish people, the Jewish religion and their Jewish culture. The Jews had a unique way of communicating this word poor. They described this poverty in stages. They began by simply saying poor. They went on to further state that this man is poor. He has no influence, no prestige, no power. And he can't even help himself in life. And then they went another layer and they went to even say that this man is beaten down. He's even oppressed by society because of his position.

And then they finally come to describe this man as one who puts his total trust in God because he absolutely has nothing. His poverty has him on his knees. He is cower down. He is broken in despair. And he is in despair before God. We see this picture of this poor man many times in the book of the Psalms, specifically Psalm 34 verse 6 reads, and I'm quoting, "This poor man cried and the Lord heard him and saved him out of his troubles." This poor man is seen all throughout the Psalms. The poor man is seen in Psalms 35, 10 and 68 verse 10, chapter 72 verse 4, chapter 107 verse 41, and 132 verse 15.

And in a sense, this poor man within the Psalms is seen as a man who is dear to the very heart of God. And that is exactly what we have here in verse 3. The Jewish understanding of this situation described the man as totally helpless. He is destitute and he is desperate. He is beaten down and even rejected by society. He is helpless but humbly, depending on God, totally trusting in God. So this word poor has nothing to do with material possessions. It has nothing to do with money. It is not a self-imposed, gloomy, eeyore spirit.

This word poor pictures one who is a destitute beggar, one who is cower down on his knees, but he is not before man. He is before God. Now this takes us to the second word that we need to examine. Again, we're right here in the middle of the verse. We need to look at this word spirit. Look back at the verse with me, if you would. I said are the poor in spirit, right there in the middle. Now this leads us to our second major truth and that is what is this word spirit? What is this word spirit? Now this previous word poor, it had many layers that we need to unravel.

There was a lot that we needed to see, but this word spirit is not that complicated. It's rather simple. This word spirit refers to the deepest consciousness of the man. The very being are the inward part of the man. This is speaking of his heart and his mind and has nothing to do with his body. This is the inner being. When you think of man, he is a lot more than a body. A man is a lot more than a name. Man has an inner being. And this is more than personality. This is more than talents or even abilities. Mankind has a spirit. Mankind has an inner self. Now I want you to engage your thinking with me, but think about it for a moment.

Sitting right here this morning, you are much more, much more than a physical body. You are much more than your name or your talents or your abilities that have come from God. Even your experiences in life. There is a spirit residing within you. There is an inner you. And that's what's spoken of here in verse 3. Now remember, I told you that I was breaking apart verse 3. Many would see this as random because we started at the beginning, then we moved over to the end, and then we came back to the middle. But I had a purpose here with my approach. Remember, we took this word blessed. It was the dominant word. Nine times it's seen.

And then this phrase, "Kingdom of heaven." This is all inclusive. The phrase, "Kingdom of heaven," is applied to every one of the Beatitudes. We took them first, and now we're right here in the middle. And I'm going to reassemble the verse for us as I have broken it down. And I'm doing my very best as from what we have learned the past couple of weeks. Now listen. "The one who is humble, is broken down beggar before God. The one who comes to God on their knees with empty hands, a broken spirit, and lips simply begging. God works in this person to produce a joy, an inner blissfulness, an inner happiness.

God does this work in the very being or their character. This is the one who possesses the kingdom. It was given to them by Christ. He is their Lord. He is their master. And they live life in this sinful world for Him. They are the ones who possess kingdom work, which is the work of the church within the world. And they are joyful servants of King Jesus, doing the work of King Jesus on earth until He comes to take them home." That's the meaning of the verse. I love a title that one commentator gives. His name was William Barclay. He calls this "The Bliss of the Destitute." The Bliss of the Destitute.

He goes on to say, and I'm quoting, "Oh, the bliss of the man who has realized his own utter helplessness and who has put his whole trust in God, for thus alone he can render to God that perfect obedience which will make him a citizen of the kingdom of heaven." And I believe we have a firm understanding of the verse. I believe we understand what this verse means. Verse 3, "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." Now I want to move on to some application. And with the application, I want us to look at two words.

We're going to look at the word "salvation," and then we're going to look at the word "sanctification." This word "salvation" and this word "sanctification." So number one, I want us to see that being poor in spirit, this which we have described and learned for two weeks, this is the key to man's salvation. You need to get this. This being poor in spirit from verse 3, it is the key to man's salvation. Let me explain. "No man, no woman, no young person can be born again without being broken in their spirit by God and coming to God as a beggar. No one can be born again unless this work is done within them." Now think about this.

The opposite of the poor in spirit is pride. Let me say that again. You need to hear that. The opposite of this poor in spirit is pride, and no one is ever born again while they are in their prideful condition. That was the great sin of Lucifer, the book of Isaiah tells us. "Oh Lucifer, he rose up in pride. If one is not born again, they are being just like Lucifer. They are saying, 'I will be as God. I will be as God.

I will rule my life and I will rule my own world.'" And listen folks, "There is no one in the kingdom who is not poor in spirit." This is the fundamental characteristic of the true Christian and the fundamental characteristic of true citizens of the kingdom of heaven. And listen people, this one verse is one of the greatest statements within the scriptures supporting the doctrine of justification by grace in Christ Jesus alone. I've taught you that doctrine. This one verse proves man's inability to please God by any of man's efforts. And that is why it is the first statement within the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus made no mistake.

He started right here on purpose. But you know in all my years of being saved, working in the life of the church, serving in the church, I've noticed something. Occasionally you'll run across someone. They do not know when God saved them. They do not have a biblical testimony. They've never been converted. And they might have religion. They might try to fake it. But you know when you really get down to it, they're not poor in spirit. You know when you come across someone who's truly been born of God, whether they were saved at 9 or 19 or 39, they will communicate to you how God broke them down, God reduced them to a beggar.

They will communicate to you how they came before God destitute because God had done this work in them. That's one reason why I have a hard time. I just have a hard time believing someone can be born of God and not know when it happened. I just have a hard time with that because when someone is lost and they're rebellious against God, they're in their pride and in their arrogance and they're serving sin and self. It's the spirit that breaks them down and he produces a work of poverty in their life and then they're able to cry out as God enables them to. See, that is a fundamental characteristic of a Christian.

And I've noticed there are a lot of people, they cannot communicate that. Now I'm not saying yours will look like mine, no. But they'll be able to say, "Look, God broke me down. I was a beggar and oh God saved me." And my question for you is this, "Oh, friend, did you just ask Jesus into your heart? Did you just tack him on to your life?" See that's what the problem is with so much of our evangelism today. It's just adding Jesus to your life. It's just making your life better. No, that is not biblical salvation.

Biblical salvation is when God brings you down to the very bottom of the bottom of the bottom and you can't look down because you're already down. Does that happen to you? Or have you just become more religious? Have you just asked Jesus into your life just to make you better? This is not something that you can do with your own. I can't do it for you. Look, God, the Holy Spirit must produce this work of poverty and spirit within you in regards to salvation. Now, a couple more statements that echo what I said in our introductory message.

The title of that message was "The Sermon." Right here with verse 3, "Jesus is destroying any notion that man can live what is taught in the Sermon on the Mount on his own." Right away. Only God can enable a man to be broken like this. Otherwise, it is a worked up, depressive, eeyore spirit which comes from the flesh and behind that is always flesh and pride. One of the most respected works on the Sermon on the Mount comes from an old English pastor long since passed. His name was Martin Lloyd Jones. He says this work of being poor in spirit is absent of pride, absent of self-assurance, and absent of self-reliance.

Listen, people, this poor in spirit is a work of God and it is the key, the key to being born into the kingdom of God. And let's continue in this application. I want us to see number two, being poor in spirit is the key to sanctification. Being poor in spirit is the key to our sanctification. Now, to understand this, we must go back and remember who is there in the crowd. Remember verse one says that there was a great crowd before Jesus on that day. Now within the crowd there was a disciple specifically, but mostly the crowd consisted of Jews. Now in my mind, I have envisioned it this way.

Jesus says, Jesus was teaching there on the front row, you had the disciples. And then behind the disciples, you had the great crowd of Jews and then sprinkled in there were a few Gentiles, maybe in the back. Now what is my point? The disciples had already been called of God. One commentator said that the Sermon on the Mount was their ordination service. Oh, that's pretty powerful. In the first statement within the sermon, Jesus gives them the key to their sanctification, which was desperately needed for these men. These men had to remain broken.

They had to continue to be broken down beggars before God, always understanding their great need for God to work in them for their sanctification, their growth. See the opposite would have been these men believing that they could work up their own spiritual growth. The opposite would be them believing that they could produce a work of sanctification. This would be nothing more than self effort and it would come out of pride. I have noticed lots of people in the life of the church, they take this work of sanctification and they try to do it in the flesh. They try to do it in the flesh.

You know, when most Southern Baptist churches, they are just filled with what's called hyper-moralism. You know, read your Bible more, pray more, and witness more. You know, you can do all of that in the flesh and it will never change your heart. Just read your Bible more, pray more, give more. You can do all of that and never be made more like Christ and sanctified. And see, I've noticed that there are a lot of people, they are a lot like Nicodemus. Nicodemus came to Jesus at night and what happened was he had the proverbial cart before the horse.

He was trying to live a sanctified life before he was born of God and Jesus just shoved all of that aside and said, "You must be born of God." And there are a lot of people like that. They're trying to produce the life, the sanctified life in the flesh. Reading the Bible, listening to sermons, doing all of these good things outside of the work of the Spirit within. And my question for you is this. Is your sanctification coming about because God is working in you? The Word is working in you. The messages that are taught are working in you. Sunday night Bible study is working in you. Our series and proverbs on Wednesday night is working in you.

The Word and the Spirit and prayer and God's people. God is working in you. He's working from the inside out and it's not just what you're doing on the outside. There's a great example which may help us. We see this reality, this sanctifying reality in that great two day event in the ministry of Jesus in John chapter 6. The crowds were following Jesus. His popularity was unreal among the people. But Jesus knowing the hearts of the people, he began to identify the real reasons why they were following him. Some followed him because of the great miracles. Others followed because they wanted to make him a physical earthly king.

Another group, they followed because they just had the miraculous meal. But Jesus knowing their hearts. He proved them by his call to partake in the cross. And so all left except the 12. And when Jesus questioned them, Peter said to Jesus, Lord, Lord, where are we going to go? You have the words of eternal life. See Peter was broken. He was destitute. He was truly poor in spirit. And that was the key to his sanctification at that time in his life. And listen, people, this poor in spirit is the key to our sanctification. So what have we seen in application? This poverty and spirit go back to the verse. Blessed.

Oh, this inner work of joy, blessed are the poor in spirit. And look, this is the key to our salvation. This is the key to entering the kingdom of heaven and true salvation. And this is the key to our true sanctification, growing in the Lord, maintaining this poverty and spirit. And without this work, you can forget salvation. Without this work, you are still in pride and in your sin and in yourself. And without this work, there's no sanctification. It's only externals. And look, without this work, you can forget the rest of the attitudes because it just won't happen. At best, you'll build on a faulty foundation.

It'll teeter, it'll totter, and it'll fall because it's not of Christ. Now before I close, I need to give you a few tips here. Because see, as born-again Christians, we're going to go out into the world. We're going to go home. We're going to go into the weeks to come. And we're going to desire to live this life. We're going to take this verse and our notes, and we're going to pray, and we're going to seek God. And we're going to want this work in us. We're going to want sanctification, maintaining this poverty and spirit. But you need to have your eyes wide open, and this will help you.

First, get it in your mind that you will be called a fool by the world. Those outside of the church, they will call you an idiot for believing that being poor in spirit will bring you joy and happiness and an inner blissfulness. They'll scoff at you, see the outside world. They want all the money they can get, all the possessions they can get. They want the movie star good looks, and they think that all of this is going to bring you happiness. And they'll look at you, and they'll call you a fool. And then second, you'll be misunderstood by many within the church. Listen, you'll be misunderstood by many within the church.

Some may accuse you of trying to be holier than thou. They may feel you're trying to be more godly than they are. You may be misunderstood by many in the church, because listen, the church has forgotten this teaching. The church is so much like the world in regards to acquiring happiness and joy and purpose in life. And I'm sad to say, you'll be understood by many within the life of the church, and I know that from experience. And then third, you'll be encouraged by the few. You'll be encouraged by the few who are just like you. You'll be drawn to those who are broken before God.

You'll be attracted to those who possess this great joy, this happiness, this work that God is doing within you and within them. And they possess and they desire this true brokenness before God, and God will bring you together and you'll be the few and you'll encourage them and they will encourage you. So I want you to have your eyes wide open when you begin to try to live this verse. Now let's go back to the verse. You might say, "Pastor, we've looked at it. We're going to continue to look at it." Oh, because we need to have this in our minds. You need to memorize this verse.

You need to be able to recite it, not just the words from the paper, but the mean, because we've broken it down and reassembled it together. What does he say? "Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs and the kingdom of heaven." And you know, I go back to that illustration, my old 1976 CJ 5. It was broken down and reassembled and it looked so much better after the work. Now I'm not saying anything was wrong with the verse, but I believe you see this thing a whole lot different now because I believe God's enabled me to help you have understanding as to what this verse means. Now what have we looked at this morning?

Last week I gave a title that I knew that I would add to and it was called Kingdom Living. This morning we're looking at Kingdom Living, the poor in spirit. Take courage. Born again Christian, take courage. This is not a hope so. One commentator that I read said this was a judicial pronouncement, a judicial statement. Jesus said the work will happen and it will. So take courage, Bo, but if you are not born of God, I encourage you to come to Christ. I ask you to come to Jesus that you might be born of God and enter into the kingdom.

I pray that God is giving you understanding and that this verse will take root in our lives and make us into the people God wants us to be. Let's pray.