The Poor in Spirit

August 9, 2026

Matthew 5:1-11

I suspect we are all familiar with the Beatitudes of Jesus. They are among his teachings that most people have either heard or read. The Beatitudes teach us what it means to be a serious follower of Jesus. Some writers say that they are an important summary of Jesus’ teaching. Like many First Century Bible writings, we might find them hard to understand. However, I suspect that those who first heard Jesus teach the Beatitudes might have understood them. The reading begins with Matthew setting the scene for us: “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.” On the north side of the Sea of Galilee is a large hill upon which is a relatively modern Roman Catholic Church that was built in 1938. It is called the Church of the Beatitudes because it was built on the hill where Jesus taught his disciples what we call The Beatitudes. It is a lovely small church in which a nun guards the Host. I had the privilege of sharing the holy space with her. I prayed; she guarded. Although Jesus saw the crowds, he did not teach the crowds the Beatitudes. He sat down in the normal teaching posture for a First Century rabbi. In our culture, we stand up to teach; Jesus sat down to teach. The Beatitudes were not for the crowds but were taught to the disciples. I suspect the crowds would not understand them or would be confused by them. The Beatitudes are eight essential statements of faith. They begin with the basic understanding of faith: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of Heaven.” And it ends with the last statement: “Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me.” They are clearly in conflict with First Century Jewish culture and are also in conflict with our 21st Century culture. In the First Century, rich people would be considered blessed by the Lord God, not the poor. “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” This is Jesus’ opening statement to these important teachings. In our culture, we either hate or admire the rich people. Who is more blessed, Elon Musk or the person sitting beside you? When Elon Musk became the first trillionaire, it was at the top of the news for the day. Of course, when his stock price went down, he reverted to his multi-billionaire status. The meaning of poor in spirit is often misunderstood. Some people translate “blessed” as happy. “Happy are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of Heaven.” I do not think that happy is a good synonym for blessed. According to Thomas Jefferson and the signers of the Declaration of Independence, we Americans have the right to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” The popular understanding of happiness is having a profound sense of wellbeing that is contingent on outside events. My family would say that they are happy when they have a large bowl of ice cream. Happiness is contingent on the outside event of having a bowl of ice cream. Blessedness is not contingent on what is going on in your life. In my illustration, blessedness is not contingent on ice cream. Whether or not one 1 has a bowl of ice cream has no effect on one’s state of blessedness. The Psalmist once said, “. . . Blessed is the people whose God is the Lord (Psalm 144:15b).” That’s right on target. Our blessedness has to do with our relationship with the Lord God in Christ Jesus. John MacArthur, pastor and Bible teacher wrote that blessedness is, “A deep inner happiness, not produced and not affected by emotion or changing circumstances . . . a kind of happiness that is not subject to outside forces but only inside ones produced by God in the heart.” Being blessed by the Lord is a state that nobody can take away from you. There are no circumstances that can take it away from you. Like Paul wrote, “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword (Romans 8:35)?” The answer is that nothing can separate us from God’s love in Christ Jesus. Nothing can separate a Christian blessed by Jesus from his or her blessedness. Poor in spirit it not about being financially impoverished. There is nothing essentially good about being financially poor. Jesus did not say, “Blessed are the poor.” He said, “Blessed are the poor in spirit.” He was not talking about being financially poor. Being spiritually poor means, one recognizes that he or she comes before the Lord with nothing but unworthiness. It means we recognize our spiritual bankruptcy. We bring nothing to the table when we submit ourselves to Christ Jesus and receive God’s grace. We recognize we are totally and completely dependent on grace and that we have nothing to offer God but rely entirely on his mercy and grace for our salvation. It is like stanza 5 of the old hymn: “Just as I am, poor, wretched, blind…” John Piper, pastor and writer, says, “The only people who will ever come to Jesus are those who know they are spiritually and morally crippled.” John, the writer of the Book of Revelation, listed the issues Jesus had with the seven churches in Asia Minor. The church he was most critical of was the church at Laodicea. It was a church that did not recognize its spiritual poverty. In fact, they thought they had everything and had no need for anything. Jesus said they were lukewarm and that he was about to spit them out of his mouth. In chapter 3 of Revelation Jesus lays on them a critical statement: “You say, ‘I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.’ But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked (Revelation 3:17).” Instead of recognizing their spiritual poverty, they were caught up in their pride and self-sufficiency. According to the Boss, Christ Jesus, in order to enter the kingdom of heaven we have to recognize our spiritual poverty. In order to possess the kingdom of heaven, we have to recognize our spiritual poverty. The Bible is filled with people who recognize their spiritual poverty. When I think of the apostle Peter, I think of his boldness and impulsiveness. I think of him denying Jesus after he was taken into custody by the temple authorities. However, Peter made a statement recognizing his spiritual poverty when he saw Jesus’ power at Lake Galilee. He fell on his knees and cried out, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord (Luke 5:8).” He recognized Jesus’ power and as a consequence he saw his own sinfulness. Peter recognized his spiritual poverty. Jesus spoke a parable to the Pharisees who did not recognize their spiritual poverty. They were confident in their own righteousness and looked down on everyone else. I doubt that in hearing the parable that the Pharisees understood its essential important message. Two men 2 went up to the temple to pray. One was a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. At this point the people listening would expect Jesus to come down on tax collectors and praise the Pharisee. Hey, they were the good guys. They obeyed all 613 rules and regulations of the Jewish faith. They were the blessed ones, or so they thought. The Pharisee stood by himself and prayed. He obviously did not want to be ritually contaminated by the tax collector. He offered this prayer: “God, I thank you that I am not like other people—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get (Luke 18:11-12).” He certainly was not offering a prayer confessing his sin. He is telling God what a good guy he is. “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).’” If we were the Scribes and the Pharisees listening to the parable, we’d think, “He has good reason to stand at a distance and look down at his feet. He cheated his fellow citizens out of tax monies for the Romans.” Imagine what they might have thought when they heard Jesus speak the punchline. “I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted (Luke 18:14).” Although this account is not specifically about recognizing one’s spiritual poverty, don’t you think the tax collector recognized his spiritual poverty as he offered his prayer to the Lord God for mercy? Martin Luther, founder of the Protestant Reformation in Europe in the 16th Century, was a remarkable Christian. When he was young, he entered an Augustinian monastery in order to earn his salvation. He did everything he could think of in order to seek salvation. He fasted frequently, prayed for hours, went to confession and did all the things the church required. However, all those spiritual disciplines left him with was a serious sense of failure. He was attacked by guilt as he was unable to please God by doing what was required by the church. However, he came to recognize that salvation was not earned by works but is a free gift of God and that transformed our Protestant understanding of the Christianity. Before he died in February, 1546, at age 62, he wrote his final words on a slip of paper: “We are beggars, this is true.” He was reflecting on his belief that we rely entirely on God’s grace. Martin Luther, as brilliant as he was, recognized his spiritual poverty. It is a hard thing to recognize one’s spiritual unworthiness before God. We have been brought up in a culture that teaches the anthesis of recognizing spiritual poverty. Our culture, like many others, is one that values pride. It values self-esteem. It values self-reliance. It values self assurance. It does not value acknowledging that we are nothing before the Almighty God. One person wrote, “There must be an emptying before there can ever be a filling.” We have to empty ourselves of pride and all the other self-focused stuff that our culture teaches and values. William Carey was a 19th century missionary in India who dealt with many obstacles and illnesses. He put the entire Bible into six languages and parts of it into twenty-nine other languages. What did he have written on his gravestone? “A wretched, poor, and helpless worm, on Thy kind arms I fall.” He recognized his spiritual poverty even though we’d call him a spiritual superstar. Jesus tells us that if we want to enter the kingdom of heaven, we must recognize our spiritual poverty. 3 A sermon preached by CH (COL) Michael W. Malone at Veterans Memorial Chapel