Tag Archives: beatitudes

Beatitudes 8 – Persecuted for Righteousness

Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. (Matthew 5:10, NIV)

Notice the first seven beatitudes describe the character of those who are saved and commit themselves to Christ, while the final one describes the result or cost of choosing this life. And the last has the same reward as the first: the reward of the kingdom of heaven, which is our future glorification in heaven with Jesus. This makes clear the intent of the beatitudes, which Jesus used to start the sermon on the mount, is to describe the character of the saved and the blessings and cost of salvation.

In summary, the character includes the humility of recognizing our need for Christ, the brokenness of repenting for sin, the trust in God required to be low and meek, the heart-change of desiring the righteousness of God over the pleasures of the world, and the self-denial of showing mercy, seeking reconciliation, and desiring that our enemies find salvation. The blessings are salvation, comfort, leadership, fulfillment, mercy, seeing God and becoming a mature child of God. And the cost is the sacrifice required to walk with Christ, which results in persecution from the world.

This last point of persecution is not at all the least significant of them. Notice that what follows the beatitudes is a further explanation of persecution, not of any of the other beatitudes, making persecution a point that Jesus did not want missed.

“Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.” (Matt 5:11-12, NIV)

Some things to note are that this persecution is a public and aggressive pursuit and not simply whispers or rumors, that Jesus equates righteousness with himself, and that Jesus compares those who are persecuted for him with the prophets.

Jesus wanted to be clear: choosing Christ is a huge, life-changing decision that puts us in opposition to the world. James wrote, “friendship with the world is hostility toward God,” (Jam 4:4, NASB). How often do those leading others to Christ make this point clear? Probably not at all, yet here Jesus begins the first and most comprehensive sermon in the New Testament, the introduction to Christian living, with this very important consideration.

The modern church is too seeker-friendly and not Christian-friendly enough. Church is for Christians, not non-believers, and Jesus himself was described as often encouraging others not to follow him. Read Luke 9:57-62, John 6:60-66, and Matt 19:16-22, and see how Jesus did not try to talk anyone into staying with him. Instead, he makes it clear what we have to give up in order to follow him. If we are not willing to take the hard road of self-sacrifice and persecution and pay the cost of being a disciple, we are not worthy of Christ, and are not welcome in heaven.

He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me; and he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me. He who has found his life will lose it, and he who has lost his life for My sake will find it. (Matt 10:37-39, HCSB)

As Christians, we can consider every struggle a test to reveal and strengthen our faith. If we fail the test, that may mean we do not truly love Jesus, or maybe it means we need to dig deep within ourselves and discern what we truly love. If we want to love Jesus, it is a choice. We must choose him over everything else in our lives. We must ask ourselves, “what is getting in the way?” Throughout my posts on the beatitudes, I have provided examples of things in our life that come before God and need to be changed. When we recognize our weakness of faith, and take action to rectify it, the test becomes a strengthening!

Remember, each beatitude begins with “blessed are those who,” indicating that those who embrace the Christian life will consider it a joy to pursue each of these, no matter how difficult. This does not mean that in the moment we laugh and rejoice. We certainly are not rejoicing while we mourn or in the moment of persecution, but our joy comes from knowing that there is a future reward for all that we endure for the sake of Christ, a joy that fills us with hope that gets us through these trials.

However, it is important to acknowledge that many, yes many, will fall away due to persecution, devotion to the world, and simply because it is so difficult. Jesus told the parable of the seeds (Matt 13:3-23) explaining that most would fall away, and he warned of the coming tribulations where many Christians would betray one another and that wickedness would be so great that, “the love of most will grow cold,” (Matt 24:9-12). This is not only a faith check, but also a stern warning that we must prepare for hard times! The more attached we are to the world, the more difficult the Christian walk will be for us.

…you will be hated by all because of my name. But the one who endures to the end will be saved. (Matt 10:22, NRSV)

Are we ready to endure to the end, no matter what persecution comes our way? It all comes down to this: we must love God most.

Blessings! – Shamar Covenant

Beatitudes 7 – Peacemakers

Leave a reply

Blessed are the peacemakers,
for they will be called children of God. (Matthew 5:9, NIV)

We must first understand God’s peace before we can understand how to be a peacemaker. After looking through the use of the word peace in the New and Old Testaments, we find that God’s peace is an inner calmness resulting from a certainty of being right with God. This begins with believing Jesus is Lord and is proved by our obedience, which over time grows our faith and gives us God’s peace, no matter our circumstances.

In addition, Paul wrote, “having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,” (Rom 5:1, NASB) and in Acts 10 we see Peter explain the gospel of peace to Cornelius. Our gospel is one of peace, and the conversion experience is our first taste of the peace of God, when we know and accept the forgiveness that comes through Christ. Being a peacemaker means we are bringing this peace to others. However, it is not that simple.

The word for children that Jesus uses in this beatitude refers to a legitimate heir. When referring to Christians, it refers to maturity: an heir made legitimate by faith and proved so by obedience, which is the fruit of repentance that demonstrates maturity. Thus, Jesus was referring to those whose maturity in the faith has been demonstrated by obedience over some time. We cannot expect new believers to truly be peacemakers, because it requires a maturity in the faith that is acquired over time and through hardship.

A true peace is demonstrated by how we respond to struggles, and going through struggles is the only way we grow in faith and in godly character. Paul wrote, “…we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope,” (Rom 5:3-4, NIV). It takes time and experience to see that suffering produces perseverance and character, which results in hope and leads to joy the next time around, since we have seen what comes from our suffering. We may not walk in God’s peace as immature believers, but as we continue to work through living out our faith, we should grow a greater and greater peace during our trials.

We become peacemakers when we are walking in God’s peace and sharing that peace with others, which does not necessarily mean that we are evangelizing. We could be sowing the seed that the evangelist reaps. Yet, I cannot stop here, because Jesus did not. In his sermon on the mount, he took everything to its extreme to teach us how to walk with Christ as a fully mature child of God.

One of the most difficult times to obey God is when we have to love our enemies, but this is the height of truly loving God, because he loved us in our wickedness and opposition to him (Rom 5:8, Eph 2:11-22). I know this is not easy, and that we are rarely able to “turn the other cheek,” much less truly care for someone who could be harming us. Yet, when we can love our enemies, what peace we have in our own hearts! It takes tremendous faith in God to live this out.

Also, while we do walk in peace by loving our enemies, and perhaps even create some peace within them as well, our love for them must include a desire to see them experience the peace of God by accepting his forgiveness and entering the kingdom of heaven. The heart of a peacemaker desires God’s peace even for our enemies, which means we desire to see them saved and with us in heaven!

This is all very theoretical and easy to write and talk about, doing it is entirely another matter. Someone cut me off the other day and my heart was filled with anger and revenge, and this just after praying that I would love my enemies. It is so easy to allow our hearts to drift away from righteousness in moments like that. Still, this is only the beginning. What if someone at work, who we have helped many times, is now trying to get us fired so they get an advancement? There is a personal relationship there, a hurtful betrayal, and a need for justice that wells up within us. We must forgive them, and love them, and not seek revenge or try to harm them in any way. Not easy!

Finally, what if someone we love very much is murdered, could we forgive the murderer? Could we love them, and want to see them in heaven with us? I cannot begin to understand that pain, so this is entirely academic for me. Yet, I want to be able to love my enemy, so I must begin by loving that guy who cut me off, and sharing God’s peace with the guy who betrays me, and hope that I am strong enough to want a very real, even violent, enemy to find peace with God through Christ. I want that peace dwelling within me, and I want to share it with others.

And if we can love our enemies, even desiring they experience the peace of Christ’s forgiveness, then how should our relationships with our spouses and fellow Christians look? Full of peace and joy and hope. Is that what Christian homes and fellowships look like? Is what appears on the surface of things genuine, or only a show? Remember, we must be pure in heart before we can fully experience God’s peace and reach the peacemaker’s maturity of faith and intimacy with God.

I do not want to minimize how challenging this can be, especially for those who have experienced tragic hurt and loss. When this life seems so awful, we must remember that our present peace comes from a hope in heaven, not this life (Heb 12:2). The reward of this great struggle is becoming a mature heir of God, no longer a slave or even a friend, but an intimate family member in God’s kingdom. John was so excited about this: See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! (1 John 3:1, NIV). And when we feel the same way, we will want to love our enemies, forgiving them, and sharing God’s peace with them.

Blessings! – Shamar Covenant

Beatitudes 6 – Pure in Heart

Leave a reply

Blessed are the pure in heart,
for they will see God. Matthew 5:8, NIV

To understand purity of heart and seeing God, we must look deeper than the surface of things, or else we will misunderstand Jesus and fall into the same trap as the Pharisees.

To be pure is to be innocent and guiltless before God, and that is what we receive by faith (Col 3:13-14, Eph 2:8-9) when we become a Christian, which might lead us to believe we automatically are pure in heart. However, sin is a barrier to seeing God (Isa 59:1-2), so if there is anything more to do, it would be guarding our heart from the temptations of sin and training it to desire the righteousness of God. The problem is this becomes “sin management” and does not incline our hearts toward God in the least.

For instance, the Pharisees kept themselves pure and were very “good” people, as far as the appearance of addressing sin goes. Yet Jesus said, “I warn you—unless your righteousness is better than the righteousness of the teachers of religious law and the Pharisees, you will never enter the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matt 5:20, NLT). Jesus was explaining to us the core issues that go deeper than outward obedience. I believe it is vitally important to look at the example of the Pharisees, and to be extremely wary of assuming that we would never be like them, because we are often so much like them.

Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cummin, and have neglected the weightier provisions of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness; but these are the things you should have done without neglecting the others. (Matt 23:23, NASB)

Jesus rebuked them for neglecting the more important matters, but notice that we are not to neglect the smaller matters, either! Sin does matter, obedience is important. Yet, the law was never meant to save us, rather it was to direct our attention to the mercy of God, and to Jesus (Heb 10:1-18). Our obedience, the acts of taking off old ways and putting on new ones, must also involve a change of our heart. Note how Paul describes our daily sanctification:

You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; to be made new in the attitude of your minds; and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness. (Eph 4:22-25, NIV)

How often do we skip the “made new in the attitude of our minds” part and focus on the sinful acts? Doing this will always make us like Pharisees. Remember, their partial obedience lead to total failure regarding salvation!

Peter said to the church, “By obedience to the truth, having purified yourselves for sincere love of the brothers, love one another earnestly from a pure heart,” (1 Pet 1:22, HCSB) showing that our purifying obedience should lead us to what matters most: loving one another. This is the command that Jesus left us, to love one another (John 13:34-35, 15:12-13). When asked about the greatest commandment, Jesus added the second, “Love your neighbor as yourself,” because our loving one another is how we show our love for God.

The problem is that we can do acts of kindness, even to our enemies, and still be checking a box on our obedience list. This is further complicated because seeking to be pure, not only in deed but also in heart, will always involve doing God’s righteousness. So how do we get to purity of heart, then?

I believe the answer is in seeing God. To see God is to be close to him, at a very intimate place, one we reach by first opening a door that is only opened by humbly coming to God, recognizing how he shows us his love, and then showing others that same love.

Go back through the beatitudes and notice that we gain access to the kingdom of heaven by making ourselves poor and acknowledging our need for God, and in doing so we see our sin for what it is and we mourn, and recognizing our humble place before our Creator leads us to become meek toward others and give up all our rights in this life. This humility leads to a greater understanding of God, his righteous character, and a hunger for it grows within us. By this time, we have recognized our desperate need for the magnificent mercy of our Lord, a mercy that we receive only when we give that mercy to others, which opens the way to true intimacy with God, a purifying of our hearts through humility toward God and toward others.

If all this seems way too academic and theoretical, this should make it as simple as it gets:

For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. (Matt 6:14-15, ESV)

We cannot be intimate with God until our sins are forgiven (Eph 2:13), and our sins are not forgiven if we are not willing to forgive others. “But God demonstrates his own love for us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us,” (Rom 5:8, NET), so we also should show our love to others by forgiving them, holding nothing against them. Forgiveness is not, “I’m sorry,” but a heartfelt, humbling repentance that desires to make things right, and to not wrong again. Read Psalm 51 for a poetic expression of someone asking for forgiveness.

Our hearts are pure when we have let go of all our offenses against others and have sought reconciliation with all those we have offended (Matt 5:21-26). And when our hearts are pure, we can see God clearly, face to face, experiencing the glory of his presence, his character, his love. Oh, what a blessing! May I hold nothing against anyone and be as forgiving as our Lord is to me!

Blessings! – Shamar Covenant

Beatitudes 5 – Mercy

Leave a reply

Matthew 5:7, Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy. (NIV)

The word used for mercy here assumes the ability to fill a need. Jesus was not speaking of feeling pity or compassion, but actually doing something for those in need. Matthew gives many examples of Jesus demonstrating mercy by healing people who were blind or lame. These people were not able to work and had to rely on begging to survive, which meant that healing them was much more than mere physical restoration. Instead of struggling to survive, they could work and provide a more comfortable living for themselves.

For us who do not experience creation miracles, we can still fill the needs around us according to our ability, especially within the church. The apostle John said it this way:

If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person? Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth. (1 John 3:17-18, NIV)

Christians must live this out (John 13:34-35). If it does not come naturally, then we must cultivate this quality within ourselves by looking for needs and recognizing ways we can help. This will always require a sacrifice, as well as a confession of our pride and selfishness. It may mean deciding against the luxury model car, the bigger house, the fancier clothes, the overseas vacation, etc., and instead willfully choosing a more modest lifestyle so that there is extra that can be used to help those who cannot afford a vacation, because they struggle to make rent. Think about how it looks if some in our church are comfortable and living at ease while others struggle to survive? If we do not take care of one another, how can we convince the world we have love in us?

There is more to mercy than helping others materially. Notice the reward for mercy is receiving mercy. If that seems odd, look at something else Jesus said. Shortly after the beatitudes, Jesus shows us how to pray, and immediately follows it with this statement:

For if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins. (Matt 6:14-15, NIV)

If this statement seems more like hyperbole than something intended to be literal, read the parable of the unmerciful servant in Matthew 18:21-35, and notice what happens to the servant who failed to show a fellow servant a fraction of the mercy he had received from his master:

Then the master called the servant in. ‘You wicked servant,’ he said, ‘I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?’ In anger his master handed him over to the jailers to be tortured, until he should pay back all he owed. This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother or sister from your heart. (Matt 18:32-35, NIV)

Without forgiveness, our eternal destiny is hell, a place of torture where we must pay the debt we owe. When we truly recognize how much we need God’s forgiveness, and see that we must extend this same forgiveness to others, the weight of these statements becomes tremendous. This is why the beatitudes, and our Christian walk, begin with being poor in spirit and recognizing how much we need God.

Our offenses against our perfectly righteous heavenly Father are infinitely more egregious than anything we could hold against a fellow sinner. This makes the parable of the unmerciful servant so pertinent and compelling. Anger is a good indicator of unforgiveness within us because it quite simply is always unforgiveness. It needs to be countered with mercy.

Personally, I know that I often mask my anger by calling it frustration, impatience, or even hurt, yet no matter what I call it, there is still a need for mercy and forgiveness in each circumstance. My frustration has never helped a situation get better, but when I have an attitude of mercy and genuine compassion, resolution always comes more peacefully. And when it does not, I must remember Jesus on the cross and allow myself to be low while others hurt or even oppress me, and then I can trust Christ for refuge instead of relying on my own strength or wit.

This may seem like a harsh and difficult standard, but it gets more so. Jesus taught that even our thoughts and words about others can reveal an angry, murderous attitude toward them.

You have heard that it was said to the people long ago, ‘You shall not murder, and anyone who murders will be subject to judgment.’ But I tell you that anyone who is angry with a brother or sister will be subject to judgment. Again, anyone who says to a brother or sister, ‘Raca,’ is answerable to the court. And anyone who says, ‘You fool!’ will be in danger of the fire of hell. (Matt 5:21-22, NIV)

When we think or speak of someone as an “idiot” or call someone “stupid,” we are murdering them in our heart by making them less than us, or putting them beneath us. The Pharisees were doing this when they questioned Jesus dining with tax collectors and sinners. Jesus’ response was that he came for the sick, not the healthy, and that the Pharisees did not understand Hosea’s writing, “I desire mercy, not sacrifice.” (Hos 6:6, Matt 9:13, 12:7)

Imagine how we appear to God… would words like “idiot” and “stupid” apply? The error of the Pharisees was failing to see how much they fell short of the glory of God and acknowledging their need for the obliteration of their own sin. We do the same thing when we insult other people. Politics is an obvious example, because even within the church I see so many Christians putting others down for ideas they believe are good for the country. We must be different from the world! This demands humility, which is why the first three beatitudes build a foundation of humility.

We desperately need God’s mercy. However, there is a requirement for his mercy: If we are not merciful, we do not receive his mercy! This ought to compel us to grow in mercy. If all of us in the body of Christ are taking care of the needs within the church, then everyone’s needs will be supplied. This means not only material provision, but an attitude of the heart and a perspective of mercy in our thoughts and words. We must extend mercy to others, we must forgive others, and we cannot see others as beneath us or even as equal, but rather as being better than us (Phil 2:1-4). The result will be a true family of Christ.

Blessings! – Shamar Covenant

Beatitudes 4 – Hunger and Thirst for Righteousness

Leave a reply

(This article is part of a series that begins here.)

The fourth beatitude is, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.” (Matt 5:6, NIV)

The word translated “filled,” or in other translations “satisfied,” is always used in the context of food, not some sort of spiritual satisfaction. The word literally means filled with food, to have enough to eat, or even to be gorged with food.

This means Jesus was pointing to a real physical satisfaction coming from hungering and thirsting not for food, but for righteousness. Moses also wrote about this.

He humbled you and let you be hungry, and fed you with manna which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that He might make you understand that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by everything that proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord. (Deu 8:3, NASB)

We cannot live without food and water, but God provides our food and water, therefore it does makes sense to desire him more than physical sustenance. However, Jesus was not telling us how to get our food and drink, rather he wanted us to look beyond our physical needs and toward what truly satisfies.

When Jesus spoke to a Samaritan woman, he was directing her attention from the immediate physical need for water to the eternal need of salvation, as well as to an active and dynamic relationship with our Heavenly Father.

“Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 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)

The woman responds, “give me this water,” but instead Jesus tells her to call her husband, exposing her sin. This will always happen when we approach the light, because we must deal with our sin when we come to God (1 John 1:8-10).

The Good News is that Jesus died for our sins, but everyone knows this already. So many songs and teachings speak about the magnificent and far-reaching grace of God. Not so many speak on the need to repent, though. This is a great loss! The message of Christ in all the the gospels is, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near!” (Matt 3:8, 4:17, Mark 1:4-5, 14-15, Luke 3:3, 7-8, 5:32, John 3:19-21).

As I mentioned in my post on the mourning beatitude, sin separates us from God. The repentant heart knows this and seeks reconciliation with God by asking for forgiveness and turning away from our sin. Jesus did not die so that we can live for ourselves and embrace our sin, but so that we can live for him (2 Cor 5:15) and become the righteousness of God (2 Cor 5:21).

This hunger and thirst for righteousness will express itself as a desire for God that will permeate our whole life, our every thought and attitude, and this will lead us to a true physical satisfaction surpassing even our basic human needs. This makes it clear that walking with Jesus is not an experience of a vague feeling of love or a vain appreciation for his sacrifice on the cross. It means we truly love who he is, his righteousness and holiness, and have a deep and powerful desire to be like him. Desiring to be like God makes repentance a natural and beautiful part of our relationship with God.

And if we desire the righteousness of God more than food and water, where is our complaining about jobs and spouses and money and every other issue that upsets and stresses and depresses us? Getting there is not easy, we must train ourselves to desire righteousness on a daily basis. Did you miss that?

There will be moments when what we truly desire will force its way to the surface and expose our heart’s condition. David set us an example in this when he had to flee from his home after his own son took over his kingdom. David was in the wilderness between Jerusalem and the Jordan, a refugee in his own kingdom, when he wrote this:

God, You are my God; I eagerly seek You. I thirst for You; my body faints for You in a land that is dry, desolate, and without water. So I gaze on You in the sanctuary to see Your strength and Your glory. My lips will glorify You because Your faithful love is better than life. (Psalms 63:1-3, HCSB)

In a moment of crisis, there is great urgency and we respond with whatever is truly in our hearts. David’s response was to recognize the terrible situation he was in and turn to God, remembering what he had seen and experienced, remembering who God is and what God does.

Our daily life prepares us for these real tests of our faith, where we may have to choose the righteousness of God over our basic needs (would you lie to avoid getting fired?). We must not wait for the urgent moment, we must live today with a proper sense of urgency! What are we doing to develop a hunger and thirst for righteousness that is completely confident in the provision of God?

Maybe we should get up a little earlier so we can read the Bible for 30 minutes in the morning, instead of sleeping in and speed reading the little paragraph of a “morning devotional” that is a product of someone else’s time in the Word. Maybe we should take notes during our pastor’s sermon and try to do what we learn during the next week, so that we actually change and become like Jesus, instead of putting on a face of faithfulness week after week. Maybe we should deny ourselves and take up our cross daily and walk with Jesus, instead of living for ourselves.

Blessings! – Shamar Covenant

(The next article in this series is Beatitudes 5 – Mercy)

Beatitudes 3 – Meek

Leave a reply

Matthew 5:5, Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.

The word meek literally means to be patient under persecution or to be overly submissive, and it is also translated as gentle and humble. We need more than a definition, though.

One analogy says meekness is like a wild horse that has been tamed, which has all the strength but is under control. I do not like this comparison. It seems that human nature will always focus on having the power rather than seeing the submission required to be “under control.” We put on a face and pretend we have denied ourselves, but inside we hold onto our status and strength.

My pastor had a better explanation. We cannot be meek if we do not have power: a homeless person can be humble toward me, but not meek, since I have all the advantages over him; he can, however, be meek to another homeless person. To be meek, we must first have power, status, or privilege, then we give it up. When I am meek, I approach the homeless person as being above me, not below.

But then I thought about the wild horse analogy further and realized that when a horse is tamed, it is called broken, and a well-tamed or broken horse does only what it is told to do. In other words, it is a slave to the rider, doing everything it is directed to do and nothing that it is not. This is the better part of the analogy, one I have never heard spoken of in church. We are meek when we give up our power and serve others, the way Jesus said in Matt 20:25-28.

“and whoever wants to be first among you must be your slave; just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life — a ransom for many.” (Matt 20:27-28, HCSB)

Jesus set the example when he entered Jerusalem on a donkey, and in Matt 21:5 it uses the same word meek (translated “gentle”) to describe him doing just this. Does this example impact us as it should? Jesus is God, and yet he came into Jerusalem not as a king, but on a beast of burden, denying all the rights owed him as our Sovereign. He came gently, submitting himself to his own creation all the way to the cross.

Another example of meekness in action occurred when Jesus washed the disciples’ feet in John 13. He took the role of a lowly servant, a slave even, not their king, and certainly not God Almighty. He had all the power and authority, and gave it up to serve them. Jesus told a story that may help clarify my point, since I do not believe we understand the relationship between master and servant:

“Suppose one of you has a servant plowing or looking after the sheep. Will he say to the servant when he comes in from the field, ‘Come along now and sit down to eat’? Won’t he rather say, ‘Prepare my supper, get yourself ready and wait on me while I eat and drink; after that you may eat and drink’? Will he thank the servant because he did what he was told to do? So you also, when you have done everything you were told to do, should say, ‘We are unworthy servants; we have only done our duty.'” (Luke 17:7-10, NIV)

That servant was more like what we would call a slave. How many of us think and act like a slave toward anyone? Are we truly willing to give up our status and be a slave to others? No. We set our hearts on a nice home, a nice car, and a good, respectable job, we look down on those who have less, and we completely miss the importance of becoming like Christ in this way.

In Luke 9:23, Jesus said we must deny ourselves, meaning we must give up all our desires and what we feel we are owed. If it feels unfair when a co-worker gets the promotion we worked for, we are claiming the right to the promotion, but Jesus said to give it up. We ought to be happy for them and wait patiently for what God has for us, which could mean losing our job rather than getting a better one!

Do we feel a right to a peaceful home, comfortable living, and good health? I have seen a pastor horribly offended at God after becoming terminally ill. He felt he was treated unfairly, and he was a miserable man because he thought he had the right to a long life and a peaceful death. Instead, he should have said, “I am an unworthy slave; I have only done my duty,” and accepted the circumstances that God allowed.

My truck broke down recently and the question was raised, do I have a right to a car? Is taking the bus beneath me? Nope. I am no better than those who ride the bus, and I had to be ready to continue making payments on a disabled vehicle. I made a choice to refuse to be upset by my circumstances. I realize that taking the bus is far from slowly dying. However, if I cannot handle losing my vehicle and riding the bus, how can I handle losing my life? Am I too good to ride the bus, or too gifted a minister to warrant a slow, uncomfortable death? Jesus said I am an unworthy slave.

We must prepare ourselves for greater struggles by meekly accepting our circumstances, refusing to be offended or hurt, and treating others as better than ourselves. We must joyfully look forward, not to what we can gain in this world, but to our place in heaven, where there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain (Rev 21:4). The beatitudes are about a change of perspective, a heart change, becoming like Jesus by changing the way we think about everything.

But to this one I will look, To him who is humble and contrite of spirit, and who trembles at My word. (Isa 66:2, NASB)

The meek will inherit the earth, which means that for God, only those who deny themselves any status and privilege are fit to exercise authority in the kingdom to come. God waits to give true power to those who prove their faith by living as slaves without rights, and who are not offended by the struggles that come their way.

Yet, meekness is not a means to power, rather it is how we draw near to Jesus by making us like him.

Blessings! – Shamar Covenant

Beatitudes 2 – Mourn

Leave a reply

The second beatitude is, “Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.” For weeks I struggled to understand what Jesus meant by mourning. Finally, though there are many great examples of godly mourning in the Bible, it was Psalm 51 that made it most clear to me.

David wrote this psalm after Nathan called out his sin with Bathsheba and Uriah, events recorded in 2 Samuel 11-12. The psalm is David’s beautiful repentance for his adultery and murder, sins we can all relate to.

Yes, that is a true statement. All of us should be able to relate to David’s sin! It was no accident that Jesus mentions adultery (Matt 5:27-28) and murder (Matt 5:21-22) in his sermon on the mount as being sins we commit in thought and word, and not just deed. Lust and anger are equivalent to adultery and murder in the eyes of our perfect and flawlessly righteous Heavenly Father.

If only we felt the sting of adultery with our lustful thoughts, realizing that we are cheating on our spouse (or future spouse) when we flirt with or consider someone else lustfully! If we could see ourselves stabbing a knife in someone’s chest when we get angry and then say, or even think, insulting things about them, would we be so inclined to allow these thoughts and words?

These sins are wickedness that separate us from God because he cannot be in the presence of sin (Isa 59:1-2). David recognized this, and it caused him to mourn his sin.

Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones you have crushed rejoice. (Psalm 51:8, NIV)

What are we mourning, though? If we avoided sin and pursued righteousness as acts of obedience to a harsh Master who decides whether we go to paradise or hell, the only love in our obedience would be love for ourselves, since we would be seeking our own good.

That is not why David obeyed. The object of his love and his strongest desire was not for himself.

One thing I ask from the Lord, this only do I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to gaze on the beauty of the LORD and to seek him in his temple. (Psa 27:4, NIV)

David adored God! He had a deep love for who God is, so full of righteousness and love and mercy and power, and he found more beauty in God than anything else. When David sinned, he recognized it as separating himself from the one he most loved and desired.

Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight; so you are right in your verdict and justified when you judge. (Psa 51:4, NIV)

Do we feel this way about our sin? Do we feel this way about Jesus?!

With this in mind, the way we pursue godly mourning is not by looking at our sin, but looking at Jesus, seeing how lovely he is, and falling deeply in love with him. We must adore Jesus. To do this, read his word and see his beauty, meditate on his truths and understand his purity, obey his word and experience his righteousness.

Then, we will mourn when we recognize our sin, because we feel it separating us from what we most adore, Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior.

What follows mourning is comfort, as Jesus says, which David also understood. Our sin separates, but repentance restores. David knew that God would forgive his sin completely.

Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean; wash me, and I will be whiter than snow. (Psa 51:7, NIV)

David knew the way to God’s forgiveness was repentance, a contrite heart that was broken and mournful over the sin, a heart that desired to be right with God.

My sacrifice, O God, is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart you, God, will not despise. (Psa 51:17, NIV)

First, we fall in love with Jesus, then we recognize the separation our sin causes and mourn this experience, and finally we experience the comfort of God’s restoration resulting from our broken and contrite heart. This cycle continues throughout our life because we can always love Jesus more, and we will never cease to sin and need to mourn that sin.

David’s wickedness with Bathsheba and Uriah occurred when he was about 50 years old, twenty years after he first became king of Judah, when he should have been well established in godly disciplines. That is why godly mourning is foundational to our faith, and something critical for every Christian to understand.

Blessings! – Shamar Covenant

Beatitudes 1 – Poor in Spirit

1 Reply

The beatitudes begin the sermon on the mount, found in the gospel of Matthew, chapters 5 through 7. This sermon starts with Jesus saying, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” What does “poor in spirit” mean, though? We cannot obey the Bible if we do not understand it, and I must be honest, I read this for years and years without knowing what Jesus was telling us to do!

To understand this, I first looked into what the words actually mean. The word translated “poor” means beggar or pauper, referring to the state of poverty not the act of begging, so it refers to a condition of need. Spirit is more difficult to understand. It is similar to soul in that it can refer to our mind, will, and emotions, but the clearest difference is that animals have souls but not spirits, because spirits are the part of us that is eternal. Our human spirit is what makes us special and different, it is what connects us to God in a way that animals cannot.

Therefore, one who is poor in spirit is one who draws near to God with their inner being from a condition and perspective of need.

This state of need implies we understand that God is our Creator and the highest authority in our life. He is also our source for everything: provision for daily needs, protection from physical and emotional and spiritual harm, wisdom and guidance, happiness and satisfaction, and especially for our salvation from our sin and wickedness.

We must appeal to Jesus for every single thing we need. For most of what we do, this means giving God the credit, such as thanking God for the strength to do our jobs, the faithfulness we give to our marriage, and the wisdom to make good choices. This seems simple, but I do not believe many of us do this, because most of us do not realize that we cannot do anything for ourselves without God’s help. It takes humility to recognize how much we truly need, that we are completely helpless without God.

Our core nature always wants to believe that we are sufficient either in our self or something other than God, like our work or society or money. This is the nature that Jesus commanded us to deny within ourselves before we follow him (Matt 16:24), because our flesh will always lead us away from God. It is impossible to reach God if we are following something going a different direction.

We also need to understand the meaning of “blessed” in “Blessed are the poor in spirit.” The word blessed is also translated as happy in other translations. This word is used throughout the beatitudes, so understanding it is key to understanding this whole introduction to the sermon. This word refers to what we seek for happiness and fulfillment, to what satisfies us.

Another way to think of it is by asking what gives our lives meaning and purpose. Compare the beatitudes to what we spend our days chasing after to make us happy. For most of us, this would be family, money, career, recreation or the like, and church is something we use to feel okay with ourselves about what we have done. Jesus wants to realign our thinking on happiness.

Blessed are the poor in spirit is like saying that we are seeking satisfaction in giving up our self sufficiency to come to God in humility and seeking happiness in embracing a state of need, dependence and struggle. This could be very austere if it ended there, but it does not.

The verse concludes with the result of coming to God in humble need, and that result is the promise of a place in heaven! This is the ultimate desire of a Christian, to live in the presence of God in his kingdom of heaven. This is where we belong (Phil 3:20).

As Christians, we believe that God is all good and without any evil, and our desire is to exist with him where there is no sin, no death or mourning or crying or pain (Rev 21:4). We renounce this world as our home, claiming to be strangers here and citizens of a heavenly kingdom (Heb 11:13-16). Many of us would agree, yet we still do not approach God poor in spirit.

I believe most of us fail to commit to changing our thinking and working on living differently. If we want to be with God, it is because we value who he is, which means we should want to be like him. Here, in the sermon on the mount, Jesus explains who God is and what it takes to be like him, and it is not an easy calling! We will never complete this task in this life, but we must desire it and strive toward it, every day with all our heart and mind and soul and strength (Mark 12:30).

Blessed and satisfied are the poor in spirit, who approach God in a state of dependence on Christ, in humility and full submission to him, for this is the foundation of any genuine relationship with Christ, and is the only way to secure a place with him in his kingdom of heaven. I encourage you to think about what you seek in your heart for fulfillment and joy, and compare it to what Jesus spoke of in his sermon on the mount.

Blessings! – Shamar Covenant