Pride: The Kyrptonite Of The Poor In Spirit (Blessed Are The Poor) Series

The Beatitudes: 2015 Summer Sermon Series

Pride: The Kyrptonite of The Poor in Spirit (Blessed Are The Poor)

6/14/15 CFBC, Chester, IL Dr. Mike Fogerson, Speaker

Introduction:

A “Blessed” is mentioned nine times in the Beatitudes.

1 Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Matthew 5:3 (NASB)

a Blessed does not mean “happy” although some modern versions of the Bible does translate makarios as “happy.”

aa Matthew 5:3 (NCV) 3 Those people who know they have great spiritual needs are happy, because the kingdom of heaven belongs to them.

bb Happiness is 1) subjective (a feeling), 2) a temporary state, 3) and is dependant upon circumstances.

cc Being blessed is 1) objective, 2) permanent state, 3) dependant on God’s grace & our choice; not upon fortune or chance.

b The Beatitudes not only come from Jesus, but also leads us to Jesus.

aa The sermon is the arrow and Jesus is the bull’s-eye.

bb The Beatitudes are God’s answers to our greatest questions . . . they describe the attitudes that we are to have as Believers.

2 Being blessed is our summa bonum, “the greatest good.”

a Everybody wants, looks for, in search of blessedness, but not everyone knows where it is.

b The reason is not everyone has the map . . . but in these verses, Jesus is giving us the map of our lives.

aa This is the greatest of all treasure maps to the greatest of all treasures, and it is given to us absolutely free as a gift.

bb Ethics professors can give us instructions on how to live on earth w/ a human heart . . . The Man from Heaven tells us what “eye has not see, nor ear heard, nor has it entered the heart of man”

1 Cor. 2:9 (NKJV)

B Jesus didn’t demand us to be successful, but to be obedient.

1 He didn’t demand us to sell the Gospel, but to proclaim the good news.

a He didn’t demand us to accept the world, but to be different than the world.

b We aren’t called to convert the world or fill churches; that’s God’s job.

2 Our job is to sow the seeds, w/o sugar coating it; God’s job is to make it take root & grow.

a Our job is to be obedient and it starts with a “poor spirit”.

b God will do all the rest . . . apart from God we can do nothing; without us, God will do nothing.

3 The Psalmist wrote, “ . . . I had rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God, than to dwell in the tents of wickedness. Psalm 84:10 (KJV)

a We see in the Beatitudes our job description for “doorkeepers” in the House of God; the other job is “dwelling in the tents of wickedness”

b The shocking thing is that these are the only two jobs in town.

aa Jason Aldean sings a song “Church Pew or Bar Stool” (btw, the theology in this song is awful), but describes not wanting to be labeled as either one of these kinds of people.

bb The truth is . . . your either a doorkeeper in the house of God (church pew) or your dwelling in the tents of wickedness [bar stool] in the Kingdom.

c Matt. 5.3, “Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the Kingdom of heaven.”

I Being Poor in Spirit shapes us.

(Too often we’ve been shaped by the world around us—squeezed into molds of the worlds choosing (marriage, divorce, materialism, sexuality, dress, morals, etc.,), But God wants us live differently and it begins by being poor in our spirit.)

A All throughout Scripture, God’s most effective & most used servants exemplified being “poor in spirit.”

1 Moses showed he was poor in spirit when God called him lead Israel out of Egypt by his response, “Who am I, that I should go to Pharaoh, and that I should bring the sons Israel out of Egypt?” Ex. 3:11 (NASB)

a Gideon proved he was poor in spirit when God asked him to deliver Israel from the Midianites when he said, “O Lord, how shall I deliver Israel? Behold my family is the least in Manasseh, and I am the youngest in my father’s house” Jud. 6:15 (NASB)

aa Young David demonstrated his poor spirit when God promised him his own forever kingdom when he said, “Who am I , O Lord God, and what is my house, that Thou has brought me this far?” 2 Sam. 7:18 (KJV)

bb Isaiah verified his poor spirit after God gave him a glimpse of the throne of the Lord Most High when he said, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God of hosts, the whole earth is full of His glory . . .woe is me, for I am ruined! Because I am man of unclean lips and I live among a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, and the Lord of hosts’ (Isa. 6.3b, 5)