Our View of Ourselves Before God
This is Jesus’s longest sermon, a primer on Christian discipleship that describes life in God’s kingdom on earth. It begins by describing our view of ourselves before God.
ASSIGNMENT: Read this lesson, Matthew 5:1-7, Exodus 20:1-17, Isaiah 61:1-3, and Luke 6:20-49.
Now when Jesus saw the crowds, he went up on a mountainside and sat down. His disciples came to him, and he began to teach them. Matthew 5:1-2 l NIV
A Holy Man and a Mountain.
When we read the first two verses of Matthew 5, we naturally think of Moses receiving God’s Law on Mount Sinai. The difference, of course, is that God gave the Law to Moses, while in Jesus, God embodied the fulfillment of the Law.
Jesus didn’t just take a seat because he was tired. In the Jewish culture of the time, rabbis sat to teach, underscoring his position and providing visual credence to his message. You can imagine the large, noisy crowd growing silent as they observed him taking a seat.
Notice that his disciples drew near to hear every word. While it is possible that many people were following Jesus that day, those who wanted to hear everything he had to offer took positions closest to him.
Others were there to join the crowd or, perhaps, witness him perform a miracle. On this day, Jesus was only concerned with his disciples, those determined to follow him.
But that was not always the case. On another occasion, when Jesus wanted everyone to hear him, he sat in a boat near the shore to teach, using the water as a natural amplifier.
Not so on this day. His words were intended for his closest followers, those willing to take up their cross and follow. As his disciples, let’s imagine we are drawing near as he prepares to speak.
“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. [4] Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted. [5] Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth. [6] Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. [7] Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy. (Matthew 5:3-7 | NIV)
Two Authors, Different Audiences
“Matthew’s Gospel is probably well suited for most of us. Middle-class people can hear Matthew more quickly than they can hear Luke. Luke is talking to the poor in a way that will make them feel invited and accepted by God.”1.
Father Richard Rohr opined Matthew’s Gospel was written for the middle class, who might have stopped reading if Jesus’s blessing was intended solely for the economically disadvantaged.
This is how Luke recorded Jesus’s words. “Looking at his disciples, he said: ‘Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God. (Luke 6:20 | NIV) Luke omitted the words “in spirit.” Being poor does not guarantee spiritual rewards, although it can be advantageous when it fosters humility before God.2.
So, what did Jesus say, and what did he mean? He means what he said in both Gospels. Jesus offers hope to people experiencing poverty and the lost. Matthew’s Gospel was mainly written for a middle-class Jewish audience in a way that would capture their attention. For those who recognize their spiritual poverty, Jesus offers the kingdom of heaven (also called the kingdom of God).
Kingdom Is Not Heaven
God’s kingdom should not be confused with heaven. Jesus came to establish God’s kingdom on earth. You won’t be able to say, ‘Here it is!’ or ‘It’s over there!’ For the Kingdom of God is already among you.” (Luke 17:21 | NLT) Kingdom of God residents recognize God as sovereign and strive to live his way in his world. We are in the world, but not of it. Our citizenship is heaven. Bible scholars describe God’s kingdom as “already, but not yet.”
The “poor in spirit” who have inherited the kingdom have discovered they are in a room without doorknobs—a room they constructed through their rebellion against God. There is no way out. Their sin has isolated and imprisoned them. If they are ever to escape, they need outside help. They cannot free themselves. Yet, God, the only one who can help them, sends his son to set them free.
Only after they yielded to the prompting of the Holy Spirit’s patient call did they discover that, no matter who they were or what they possessed, they were covered with the filth and stink of sin that they could not hide or wash off. That awareness is what Jesus called poverty of spirit. And it led them to mourn their guilty, helpless state.
Spiritually Destitute
Think of the tax collector in Luke’s Gospel. “But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner’” (Luke 18:13 | NIV). His words and demeanor indicated his acceptance of the truth that he was nothing in the presence of God. Spiritual destitution is the painful realization that we can never be good enough for God. But thank God, we can never be too bad for him either.
This first Beatitude is foundational. The others build on it. It describes a fundamental trait that is found in every regenerated soul.3. What Jesus is concerned about here is the spiritual condition of those who follow him, specifically a poverty of spirit.4. We must be poor in spirit before we can be filled with the Holy Spirit.5. “No one can receive the Holy Spirit who is not convinced he or she is a pauper spiritually.” 6.
We are empty buckets designed to be filled with the living water only Jesus offers. Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” (John 4 13-14 | NIV)
Poor in Spirit
“Poor in spirit,” according to Jesus, is a religious designation. Such people are humble before God.7. Spiritual poverty describes a complete absence of pride, self-assurance, and self-reliance, a consciousness that we are nothing in God’s presence.8.
The poverty of spirit is the acknowledgment of our emptiness resulting from the Spirit’s prompting in response to the gospel. It comes from the painful discovery that our righteousness is as “filthy rags.”9.
The hardest part about coming to Jesus in faith is admitting we have nothing to offer. “To be poor in spirit, like meekness, as we shall soon discover, does not imply a lack of courage but an acknowledgment of spiritual bankruptcy. It confesses one’s unworthiness before God and utter dependence on him.”10.
Mourning Our Condition
“Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.” Many of us read this verse and remember Jesus comforting those mourning the death of his friend, Lazarus. Jesus’s actions in comforting the sisters (John 11) coincide with this passage.
Jesus is very much present in our grief. Any believer who has called on him in their grief has experienced his comforting presence. Indeed, Jesus’s actions in comforting the sisters of Lazarus demonstrated the Sermon on the Mount promise that those who mourn will be comforted.
Yet, most New Testament scholars apply these words to believers suffering for their faith or individuals/nations mourning from grief resulting from recognizing sin. They posit that such mourning has nothing to do with the loss of grief; rather, it stems from the recognition that we are lost—separated from God for eternity unless something changes.
Bondage of Sin
“The true Christian is never a man who has to put on an appearance of either sadness or joviality. No, no; he is a man who looks at life seriously; he contemplates it spiritually, and he sees in it sin and its effects.”11. We recognize for the first time that our sin holds us in bondage. And if we want freedom, our only alternative is to fall on our knees before the throne of God’s grace.
Until we genuinely acknowledge we are sinners speeding down the highway to Hell with defective brakes, we will not feel the need for reconciliation with a holy God. But when we do, it sparks an emotional response and, sometimes, even tears. The apostle Paul references such sorrowful mourning in a letter to the Church in Corinth. “Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret, but worldly sorrow brings death.” (2 Corinthians 7:10 | NIV).
Godly sorrow results from recognizing that we have sinned against God. Worldly sorrow is the guilt felt from having gotten caught. Guilt and repentance are not the same thing. Acknowledging our sinful separation brings tears for our sinful behavior and tears of joy at being forgiven and accepted into God’s family.
Not Too Proud to Mourn
If we hope to be truly blessed, we must never be too proud to mourn our fallen, sinful condition. We mourn as though we are losing our very soul, which, apart from Christ, we are. God lavishes grace and forgiveness on us, and we see the locked door open.
His pure light blinds our eyes, and our hearts are flooded with hope and contentment. At this point, we become aware that we are spiritual beings, souls who only inhabit a temporary human shell while awaiting a perfect, resurrection body. We have entered the Kingdom of God.
Conviction and Conversion
But mourning our sinful behavior does not end with our salvation. D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones summarized the passage this way. “Those who are going to be converted and wish to be truly happy and blessed are those who first of all mourn. Conviction is an essential preliminary to true conversion.”12.
The Christian mourns for their sins and the sins of others, along with the damage sin brought into the world.13. Finally, Lloyd-Jones concludes by describing a cycle of sin, repentance, and confession. “He finds himself guilty of sin, and at first it casts him down and makes him mourn. But that in turn drives him back to Christ; and the moment he goes back to Christ, his peace and happiness return and he is comforted.”14.
Sadly, few churches these days offer anything resembling an altar call where those who want to be justified before a holy God sorrowfully kneel before him, seeking forgiveness of their sin and pledging to turn from a dead-end life to the one in abundance that Jesus promises. Godly comfort and true satisfaction only result when the penitent yield their lives to Jesus as lord and savior.
God Has No Grandchildren
Many people warming church pews today have never taken that step. They are essentially Christians by birth or association. Their parents were Christians, and since they were raised in the church and believe in Jesus, they must be Christians, too. But hear this: God has only children, not grandchildren. Or perhaps they consider themselves Christians because they were born in a Christian nation. Again, hear this: The only Christian “nation” is the kingdom of God.
Too many contemporary churches skip the spinach and broccoli and go straight to the ice cream. They preach a welcoming and loving God but omit the part about our sinful nature keeping us from approaching him. Bonhoeffer called this “cheap grace.” Such churches neglect to explain the necessity of seeking God’s forgiveness.
Instead, prospective converts are asked to raise their hand in a room where “every eye is closed and every head bowed” or, worse yet, complete a membership card on their way out. There is no call to repentance, no cry of the sinner for forgiveness. They might not even hear that they are sinners. Instead, they leave the service as happy people, unaware they are still mired in their sin.
Sorrow, Repentance, and Salvation
That is one reason the world cannot tell a “Christian” when they see one. There is no authentic “born again” experience. I am not saying people who raise their hands to demonstrate their intention to follow Jesus are not saved. Only God knows that. What I am saying is that godly sorrow and repentance must precede salvation.
I can only assume that some pastors use the “stealth conversion” method because of sensitivity to people who are afraid to walk to the front of the church as an acknowledgment of their sinful separation from God. Yet, Jesus endured separation from his father to reconcile those same fearful people to a holy God. When God looks at anyone who comes to him in repentance, he sees only Jesus. Publicly declaring faith demonstrates a desire for something better, forgiveness, and being made new and whole in Christ.
Please take a look at what the prodigal confessed when he returned home. “The son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’” (Luke 15:21 | NIV) He realized the gravity of his sin but still wanted more than anything to come home. He was willing to work as a hired hand, but his father welcomed him as a son. It works that way with our heavenly father, too. “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.” (1 John 1:9 | NIV) We confess our sins and are restored to a right relationship with God.
Persecution
In addition to mourning our sinful condition, we may mourn circumstances resulting from our faith in Jesus, especially when subjected to religious persecution. France posited, “Those who mourn are not necessarily the bereaved, or even the penitent. They are the suffering. . . particularly those who suffer for their loyalty to God.”15. Turner agreed and opined, “. . . the focus is more on those who mourn over afflictions and persecutions that arise because of their allegiance to the kingdom.”16.
Finally, there is at least one other way to understand the passage. Some scholars have connected Jesus’s words to Isaiah’s prophesy:
“The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is on me, because the LORD has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners, to proclaim the year of the LORD’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God to comfort all who mourn . . .” (Isaiah 61:1-2 | NIV).
Osborne inferred a reference to “those who have been oppressed but have repented of their sin and centered on God as their source of forgiveness and help.”17. Carson, similarly, drew from the messianic blessing of Isaiah but pointed to a subtler explanation. “The godly remnant of Jesus’s day weeps because of the humiliation of Israel, but they understand that it comes from personal and corporate sins.”18.
The Opposite of Self-will
“Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.” To be meek implies freedom from malice and a desire to get even. Meekness and humility characterize the genuine disciple. Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. (Ephesians 4:2 | NIV) True meekness is the opposite of self-will. Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others. (Philippians 2:3-4 | NIV)
“It is attainable only by God’s grace and makes the recipient pliant, tractable, submissive, and teachable.19. Jesus best exemplifies it.” “Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done.” (Luke 22:42 | NIV)
A Teachable Spirit
Meekness always implies a teachable spirit.20. “We must be ready to learn and listen and especially must we surrender ourselves to the spirit.”21. Mental contentment is one manifestation of meekness. Meekness carries with it some attributes of the fruits of the Spirit, among them patience, kindness, gentleness, and self-control.22. It is a quiet confidence in a God who does not always do what we want but always does what is right.
To understand what meekness looks like in the life of a believer, we can do no better than meditate on Psalm 37:3-7.
“Trust in the Lord and do good; dwell in the land and enjoy safe pasture. Take delight in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord; trust in him and he will do this: He will make your righteous reward shine like the dawn, your vindication like the noonday sun. Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him . . .” (NIV)
“Those of us who claim to be Christian claim of necessity that we have already received the Holy Spirit. Therefore, we have no excuse for not being meek.”23. Meekness must not be confused with weakness. “True meekness is ever manifested by yieldedness (sic) to God’s will, yet it will not yield a principle of righteousness or compromise with evil.”24.
Sometimes, despite the risk of being called intolerant by those who refuse to acknowledge sinful behavior, we must confront sin with God’s word. Our intentions must be pure, and our confrontation must be characterized by gentleness, respect, and unwavering firmness.
Hungering and Thirsting
“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.” The metaphor of hunger and thirst points to the prior chapter, specifically Matthew 4:4, in which Jesus, when tempted, declared, “Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from God.”
This Beatitude reveals precisely where we are as Christ’s disciples. “We are not hungry and thirsty after righteousness as long as we are holding with any sense of self-satisfaction to anything that is in us, or to anything that we have done.”25. Righteousness is a term denoting all spiritual blessings. This text refers to the “righteousness of faith whereby a sinner is justified freely by divine grace through the redemption that is in Christ.”26.
“The one in whom the Spirit graciously works desires not only an imputed righteousness, but an imparted one too; he not only longs for a restoration to God’s favor but to have God’s image renewed in him.”27. Not only do we desire Christ’s salvation, we long to be like him. This results in an interesting dynamic. As we hunger and thirst for more of Jesus, we are filled, which produces more hunger and thirst.28.
There is also an implication in this passage that a Christian will take positive action to avoid those activities that negatively impact their pursuit of righteousness. “I suggest that if we are truly hungering and thirsting after righteousness we shall not only avoid things that we know to be bad and harmful, we shall even avoid things that tend to dull or take the edge off our spiritual appetites.”29.
Discussion
1. Did anything you read offend you or raise concern?
2. Does it make a difference in the sermon whether “poor in spirit” refers to financial rather than economic destitution?” How/why?
3. What was it like to discover you were a sinner needing a savior? Do you include that in your testimony?
4. Is sharing v.5 with someone grieving a loss acceptable? Why or why not?
5. How does meekness differ from society’s expectations and our own natural, human responses? How do we remain meek but not weak?
6. Why would a “saved” individual repeatedly hunger and thirst for righteousness?
7. Do we attain righteousness, or are we made righteous? Can you provide support for your answer?
9. Do you think we ever reach a point where we are satisfied with our sanctification?
10. What does it mean to you to be wholly surrendered to God?
Footnotes:
[1] Richard Rohr. Jesus’ Alternative Plan: The Sermon on the Mount, (Cincinnati, OH:Franciscan Media), p.104, Kindle Edition.
[2] Carson, Matthew, Location 6138, Kindle.
[3] A. W. Pink, An Exposition of the Sermon on the Mount, Arthur Pink Collection, Book 22, Faithful Classics (Prisbrary Publishing, 2012), Location 236-37, Kindle.
[4] Lloyd-Jones, Studies, 35.
[5] Ibid., 45.
[6] Chambers, Studies, Location 200, Kindle.
[7] Talbert, Matthew, 76.
[8] Lloyd-Jones, Studies, 40.
[9] Pink, Sermon, Location 223-25, Kindle.
[10] Carson, Matthew, Location 6148, Kindle.
[11] Lloyd-Jones, Studies, 51.
[12] Ibid., 45.
[13] Ibid., 48.
[14] Ibid., 49.
[15] R. T. France, Matthew: An Introduction and Commentary, Tyndale New Testament Commentaries (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1985), 115.
[16] David L. Turner, Matthew, Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2008), 150.
[17] Grant R. Osborne, Matthew, Zondervan Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2010), 166.
[18] Carson, Matthew, Location 6176, Kindle.
[19] Pink, Sermon, Location 363-65, Kindle.
[20] Lloyd-Jones, Studies, 58.
[21] Ibid., 58.
[22] See Galatians 5:22-23.
[23] Lloyd-Jones, Studies, 58.
[24] Pink, Sermon, Location 382-83, Kindle.
[25] Lloyd-Jones, Studies, 75.
[26]Pink, Sermon, Location 437, Kindle.
[27] Ibid.
[28] Lloyd-Jones, Studies, 70.
[29] Ibid., 76.
Revised:12/06/2022