The Beatitudes, Part 1

I've recently begun a personal study on Jesus's Sermon on the Mount. The first section of this sermon is found in Matthew 5:2-12 and is commonly known as the beatitudes. I have read this passage countless times in my life, whether in Sunday School, church, or even other personal reading. But I never realized the sheer beauty of the passage till recently. I always thought it was simply a shout out to those who suffer for God. A kinda “at a boy” to those who would suffer for God. Jesus was talking about missionaries in Africa, Christians persecuted in communist Russia, or the Apostles being thrown to the lions; not about me. Yet it is aimed at every believer. John MacArthur said “In the beatitudes Jesus describes the character of the Christian faith.” (“The MacArthur New Testament Commentary”, page 39). In other words, the beatitudes describe what a Jesus says a Christian should be. That sheds a whole new light of importance on it doesn’t it. So I decided to delve deeper and really understand what each of the attributes mentioned are and how I can apply them. I have divided them into three sections. I call the first three beatitudes the humble beatitudes.

“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven”
Matthew 5:3
I always thought this was an odd thing for Jesus to say. Doesn’t God want those strong of Spirit? The heroes, like David and Moses. He doesn’t want some weakling who mopes around all day saying “woe is me”. But that is not what Jesus is saying at all hear. This one verse, in essence, describes the whole Gospel. The poor in spirit are those who realize the depth of their own depravity, in other words, the ones who realize they are evil. The ones who realize they need God, or will die. If you are a true Christian, you are poor of spirit. Are you sure that you are? Being poor of spirit is the opposite of self-sufficiency. Are you reliant on God for everything, are you no longer self-sufficient, but God-sufficient? Do you hope in nothing but Jesus Christ? Do you trust in your job, your money, your family, your friends, your spouse, your car, you drink? Or do you trust in your God? Those who solely rely on God are the poor in Spirit. Jesus says that these receive “the kingdom of Heaven”, that is, salvation.

“Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted”
Matthew 5:4
This beatitude I flat out did not get. Why did God want sad people? I don’t want to mourn, that would be a horrible life. This is not a normal type of mourning however, it is a holy mourning. The difference is best explained by 2 Corinthians 7:10: “For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, wheras worldly grief produces death.” This verse helped me understand this beatitude on a whole new level. Jesus didn’t mean worldly grief, the hopeless sadness type of grief that “produces death”. He was talking about a godly grief, a grief over our sins that leads us to repentance. A grief that brings realization to our ugliness before a Holy God and drives us to salvation. A grief that allows us, once we find salvation, to throw off all regret. It is a grief that separates us from our own life and brings us into a life dedicated to Jesus. This is greatly tied to the first beatitude; the elect mourn for they are poor in spirit, so they turn to Jesus, who comforts them and bring them to His Heavenly Kingdom. What a glorious mercy.

“Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth”
Matthew 5:5
I admit, when I read this, I had no idea what the word “meek” meant. I envisioned an old, weak man who had to walk with a cane. I thought of weakness, both spiritual and physical. But being Biblically meek is actually an amazing quality. Meekness is mentioned throughout the Bible in a positive light, although many times is translated differently. The greek word Jesus uses here can also mean humility, or gentleness. In Colossians 3:12 meekness is listed in attributes that help with forgiving and bearing with other Christians; 1 Timothy 6:11 talks of it in the sense of fighting “the good fight of the faith”; James 3:13 talks of the “meekness of wisdom”; Jesus describes himself with the same word in Matthew 11:29 when He says he is “gentle and lowly in heart”. So what is the underlying definition of meekness? “It is that temper of Spirit in which we accept his (God’s) dealings as, and therefore without disputing or resisting is.” (W.E. Vine “Vine’s Complete Expository Dictionary of Old and New Testament Words”, page 401) In other words, it is a complete acknowledgment of God’s sovereignty. God is in control, who are we to say how things ought to be; this is the attitude meek Christians should have.

What is the reward for this? Jesus says that you will inherit the earth. What does this mean? If you are completely meek you will take over the world with an army full of fellow meek people? Of course not. What I think it means can be found in the Old Testament reference Jesus was quoting from. Psalm 37:11 says “But the meek shall inherit the land and delight themselves in abundant peace”. What will meekness get you? Abundant peace. You know God is in control, so why should your life be in turmoil, stress, and pain? Your life is in the hands of a loving and sovereign God, why should you fear? Christ has overcome the world. Be meek, and inherit peace.

So what should we do about this in our own lives. The most important would be to make sure you are truly poor in spirit. Have you realized your own inability to achieve fulfillment? Only Christ can give you that fulfillment, you simply must realize your own poorness of Spirit. Also mourn for that poorness of spirit. Mourn to the point where it brings you to repentance. Check yourself Christian, that you are still mourning. We do not become perfect once we repent. Keep godly mourning alive in your life, make your mourning turn you to repentance, and there you will find comfort. The last application is perhaps the most important. Be meek. This is so hard. Look in detail at your life, where are your troubles? Once you have found them, realize that God is in control of all of these situations. He knows about each trouble in your life, he has put you where you are at this exact moment. Find peace and surrender to God. I encourage you to pray about all three of these things. Ask God to make you realize you are poor in spirit, ask that you might mourn your sin, and that you might be meek. I can speak from experience that praying over these things will give you an amazing peace, and a new understanding on life. When I prayed I realized God had saved me from my poor soul, that He would comfort me when I mourned to Him, and that He was in control of all the world, I have nothing to fear. God is Good.

Meditations on Ephesians 4:29

I’ve recently been reading a book on spiritual disciplines entitled “Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life, by Donald Whitney. One of the disciplines that this author stresses is memorization and meditation. These two things I have greatly neglected in my spiritual life. I’ve memorized verses in AWANA and Sunday School, but I’ve never memorized simply for my personal benefit and growth in my relationship to God and my battle against sin. This author emphasizes that a few key Bible verses are not enough. He references Ephesians 6, where it talks about the sword of salvation, that is the Word of God, the Bible, in saying that one of the reasons we fail in many spiritual battles is that we are ill-equipped for battle:

“The Word of God is the ‘sword of the Spirit,’ but the Holy Spirit cannot give you a weapon you have not stored in the armory of your mind. Imagine Yourself in the midst of a decision and needing guidance, or struggling with a difficult temptation and needing victory. The Holy Spirit rushes to your mental arsenal, flings open the door, but all He finds is a John 3:16, a Genesis 1:1, and a Great Commission. Those are great swords, but they’re not made for every battle.” (Whitney 44)

So I decided to equip for battle. But simply putting to memory is just not enough. I want to meditate on it day and night, like the Psalmist in Psalm 119. I want to have these swords polished and sharpened for the days that they are needed. One of the important things in starting out on memorization is to find verses that will pertain to your struggles. I picked Ephesians 4:29 as my first verse to memorize. I struggle with saying things that are stupid, or mean jokes, or taking things too far. So, I decided to memorize a verse that would remind me to not do these things. Below is the verse, and my meditations on it.

“Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear.”
Ephesians 4:29

The first thing I noticed when I meditated on this verse was the usage of the word “Corrupting”. This word appears to be important, it describes the type of talk we should stay away from. Some translations use the word “unwholesome” or “harmful” (the version above is the ESV), but I like the word corrupting. The word suggests that there was something that worked, something that was good, and then got messed up somehow. It implies that the sin of “harmful” talk is something that has corrupted what was good. This shows us the attitude we should have toward Christianity. The Bible is not about do’s and do not’s, it is about restoring what sin has corrupted, the human soul. Only God can slowly restore what has been corrupted, first through the shedding of blood (Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross), Salvation, and then the work of the Holy Spirit, Sanctification. This verse deals with the second aspect, the Holy Spirit will help us throw off any corrupting talk from our mouths.
The next phrase in the verse is also interesting: “but only such as is good for building up”. This leaves no doubt about what kind of talk is corrupted: something that tears down. How hard is it to always build up? This seems like an impossible command if you look at it like always having to complement, or always having to be cordial. It doesn’t mean what you say always has to be nice, or soft. Building someone up can sometimes be hurtful for a while to the other person. Wouldn’t you say that a parent being stern with his son after he has stolen something from the market is a good thing. What about the best friend who tells her friend to break up with her boyfriend because he is not a christian? These situations are not compliments, but they are building up. Building up can be done in so many ways other than compliments, that is where the second part of this phrase comes in.

“...as fits the occasion...”. Another great phrase. We must be sure that our building up fits the occasion. Whether we need to be stern, kind, loving, tender, tough, brotherly, fatherly, motherly, self-controlled, angry, or any other attitude is reflected by the occasion. We must be sure our building up fits the occasion. How do we know if it fits the occasion? If it is helpful. Some translations say “profitable for building up”. This might emphasize the point better; we must build up in a profitable way. I think the best way we can prepare for this is to pray that the Holy Spirit might give us wisdom to discern profitable building up in all sorts of occasions we might find ourselves in. (See James 1)

Why do we do all this? “...that it may give grace to those who hear.” We should build up to show grace. Grace is a most unusual thing, an amazing and glorious thing! Jesus showed us the most amazing grace in history with His death and resurrection, all to redeem us from our sin. For nothing we did; we did not deserve it to any extent. We were lost, ugly in our sin, whores and slaves to unrighteousness, a dead people. God loved us however, and he saved us from ourselves. He showed us the most amazing grace that has ever and will ever exist. This is the beauty of Christ. We are recipients of a Divine Grace that we do not deserve, why should we not pass along this great gift through our mouths. Let no corrupting talk come out of the mouths of those who have been given a grace that has restored their souls! Give grace because you have received it! What a beautiful way to talk, what a beautiful way to live, what a beautiful Savior to give us the chance!

Picking Flowers

Most people would agree that parenting is defined in the large crimes of a child; I would disagree. Now, sure it takes great parenting to deal with the times you find pot in a ziplock bag under her pillow, or a Playboy magazine under his bed, but these moments might never come if you are a champion parent in the small crimes. My dad taught me this lesson one Sunday in early April.
I was nine or ten, a kid. We lived in a town called Apple Valley, my dad was the pastor of a small Baptist church. You’re probably picturing some town in Vermont with hills filled with the scent of freshly grown apples as a cool wind blows north from the orchard. You would be wrong. The name Apple Valley is a lie. Located in California’s Mojave Desert, probably the only Apple tree in Apple Valley was grown by an eighty-something lady in her last years. The San Gabriel mountains separated us from the palm trees and beaches of Southern California; we were the nowhere outside of somewhere. Instead of wooded hills we had fields of dirt and sand filled with tumble weeds and Joshua Trees. Nothing green grows in Apple Valley except by costly irrigation and constant care by a green thumb. Flowers are rare.
On a particular April Sunday the service had contained my youthful energy to a breaking point. Once the final song had been sung, me and my gang trotted out of the sanctuary into the spring sun. I had three main friends back then. Tim was the tall one in the group; he had black hair and a five o’clock shadow by the time he was ten. Kevin was skinny and was the fastest, also the most full of energy. Kev could run a mile and not even return winded. Troy had a hilariously high pitched laugh and was the rebel of the group. I was the hands down leader of our little group; I usually came up with the things we would do to fill up time.
That particular day we just sat in the front of the church building. The church’s concrete courtyard was surrounded by a blacktop parking lot on one side and the upside-down dixie cup-like church building on the other. Flanking the entrance doors were two squares of dirt, supported about three feet from the ground by four walls of stone slabs. On these small walls is where we found ourselves that Sunday; probably talking about Star Wars.
Temptation entered our little minds when the desert wind began blowing across the courtyard. Like the apple to Eve was a strong desert wind to four bored boys. A weird trick of architecture created a swirled wind against one side of the church. If you threw something into this whirlwind, whatever you threw swirled up to the heavens before flying out to desert. We had plenty of time to kill before our parents finished their after-church conversation hour, so we began looking for things to throw.
Now to understand the depth of our rebellion you have to know two things. First, remember what I told you before; we lived in a desert where green things are discouraged. Two, you have to know Ray Harris.
The first thing you noticed about Ray Harris was that he was big. Maybe over 350 pounds. He had a grey and black peppered beard that might have belonged to Abraham, and his breath always stank. His voice was deep and raspy when he taught the mysteries of Revelation to my Sunday School class. Ray Harris was a great and old man. He cleaned and gardened the Church and the Christian School for next to no salary, or maybe for free; I can’t remember. What I do remember is the many times I would be in my dad’s office and hear Ray coming in from watering what plants the church had, heaving his bad breath all over the hallway. Everyone in the church loved Ray Harris.
Going back to that windy Sunday afternoon in April. Ray had just planted beautiful pink and purple flowers around the single bushes that grew in either plot of the dirt flanking the church doors. He had probably spent his whole Saturday afternoon crouched over, the desert sun beating down on his old body, raking those plots of dirt into submission. The same plots of dirt that four bored boys sat around after church, looking for something to throw into the gusty wind. The flowers were the obvious choice; bright so you could easily follow their flight and light enough that the wind could easily give them wings to fly away. I can’t even remember if I had a second thought about Ray Harris, or about his hard labor or his lost Saturday; I just picked those flowers right out of their prepared soil. The flowers did indeed take off on the whirlwind, swirling around and around and around until flying high into the cloudless sky and disappearing towards the mountains. We picked and picked those flowers till nothing was left of Ray Harris’s handy work but a few roots and tilled soil.
And that was it, I thought.
Once the fun of flowers and wind had been exhausted, we probably played tag or some such game till our parents took us one by one into vans and SUV’s back to our homes. I was taken home in our green van without having a second thought of my crime. The Sunday afternoon then progressed normally: football and food. Until, that is, my dad asked me the question. I don’t know if he noticed the flowerless garden or someone saw us in the act and ratted us out. All I know is that my innocent Sunday was disrupted by the question my father asked me: “Did you pick the flowers out front of the church today?”
I was truthful. The story spilled out of my mouth; from picking to whirlwind I told all. I don’t know if any of my friends got in any trouble over the flower incident, but I sure did. My dad rarely got mad at me, rarely. I didn’t get in trouble much, but I got in trouble that Sunday. I believe it was the last time I was ever spanked.
It wasn’t that I had picked and thrown flowers, that wasn’t the crime; it was that I had picked Ray Harris’s flowers and thrown them. Respect. It was all about respect. My dad wanted me to have respect for everyone I ever met. Ray Harris had worked hard at those flowers, and I had destroyed them for my own pleasure. I had placed my interests above Ray Harris’s. That little flower picking was an expression of a selfish soul. My dad saw this and put a stop to it. Put other’s needs ahead of your own and respect others; these values my dad made sure I remembered.
For years afterward I wondered why my dad was so heated over such a small thing. He never got mad at me, but something about that flower incident got him worked up. Later, though, I recognized the beauty of my dad’s parenting; he solved big problems at little times. My dad understood that if I could respect something as small as Ray Harris’s flowers, I could respect my mom enough to be back by curfew; I could respect my teachers enough to do my best in class; I could respect myself enough to decline an offered bag of weed. My dad understood this. Ray Harris’s flowers may have saved me from many a sinful path.
Parents listen up: enough small crime lessons learned, and the big crimes might never come.

Overcoming My Idol

My biggest struggle is acceptance. I love to be liked. I love to have friends and family who love me back. I love to be the center of conversation. I love to be the one that everyone loves. I have loved this love of like more than God, and that is my sin. Of course, with this sin came my other crowning sin, pride. I was proud of my Christian walk. I have never smoked a cigarette or drunk a beer. I never touched drugs and curses never flew from my mouth. I was proud of my “success” as a Christian. Yet I was sinner through and through. My life was based on acceptance. I would sometimes do my devotions purely so I could tell people I had done my devotions. I would sometimes tell jokes to friends that I knew I shouldn’t have for laughter. It is so funny how we chastise bible characters like Esau for doing something so stupid as selling his birthright for a bowl of soup, then we turn around and do the same thing. I would sell my birthright for a laugh. In fact, I would sell more, my very soul. Praise God he has redeemed and saved me from such a worthless trade. I now realize how foolish I was (and still am). I used God to feed my pride and need of acceptance. I turned the best good the world has ever known into an avenue to gain popularity and privilege. Jesus pinned me in Matthew 23:25: “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean”. Francis Chan once said to his church: “God doesn’t want you hear singing ‘hallelujah’ if your life screams ‘crucify him!’”. I was a Pharisee. My cup was clean as could be on the outside, but filthy inside. I sang loud and well “Hallelujah!” on Sunday, yet deep in my heart I yelled “Crucify Him!”. Yet God forgives; even such evil as I have done. Finally broken by God, I laid all my life bare before Him (as if it all was not already). I surrendered everything. I prayed for the Holy Spirit’s help with my addiction to pride and people pleasing. I had to give up my ambition, my strength, and all the wisdom I thought I have. It was all God’s. I prayed that He might take my life and do with it what He will. Like the song says, I got to the point where it was well with my soul. Everything God could will was well with my soul. Whether I pastored a church of 40,000 or 4. Whether I married a beautiful wife or lived alone. Whether I was hated or loved. I realized God was the only one I needed to please. God is the only thing I must have pride in (Jer 9:23-24). I deny life that I may gain real life (Matt 16:25).

Let me be clear, I have not conquered my sin; yet with God’s help I am improving. I struggle daily with the reasons I do the things I do. Also, realize that I did not begin improving by praying and then going back to what I was doing before. One of my favorite verses is Exodus 14:15. The Israelites are trapped by the Red Sea and cry out to God, and He says to Moses “Why are you crying out to me? Tell the Israelites to move on.” The Israelites knew God’s promises, they saw His power in Egypt with the plagues. They should have had hope and faith in God, prayed to Him for help, then moved on. We have God on our side, why are we afraid to do anything? Of course, God doesn’t need our help, but He wants us to truly love Him, so he gives us choices to make. In fact, trials and temptations are suppose to create perseverance in us (James 1:2-8).

So what did I do specifically to “move on”? I have to always ask myself if my reasons for doing anything is for man or God. Even while writing this article I asked God if I am writing this so others will think better of me, or if I am writing so others may avoid my mistakes. I don’t volunteer to pray aloud as much as I used to; to avoid the temptations of “babbling like the pagans” or praying “to be seen by men” (Matt 6:5-8). When I sing praises to God I do so softly, or sometimes don’t even sing, but listen to those around me, or pray. So that no one can praise my voice, for it does not deserve to be praised. I don’t raise my hands or kneel, so I do not draw anyone’s attention to myself. I praise my God silently. In theological discussions I listen more than I speak (although there is always a time to speak). I don’t ask questions I know the answers to. I have devotions in secret, so no one will find me. And I do not hope that someone finds me while in my quiet time with my Savior. Don’t misunderstand me, most of these things are not evil, it is simply that I have found that in my life these restrictions help me avoid temptation.
What are your struggles? What do you put above God? What can you do to truly put those idols behind you? Identifying your idol is the hardest part. Once you know your enemy, attack it. Take it fully from your life if you can, run like Joseph ran from Potiphar’s wife. Pray to God for help, He is faithful and will always give you a way out of your temptation (1 Cor 10:13). With God’s help, you can do it. You can do all things through Christ who gives you strength (Phil 4:13). You are never lost to God; He can bring you back from your sin. “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” (Matt 19:26) Give up your life, that you might gain real life!

Hosea and Our Idols

So I have recently begun to read Hosea for devotions. This little book towards the back of the Old Testament is often swiftly read over by daily bible readers eager to get to the Gospels. Yet this little book has taught me so much in the past two days. The story is very simple; Israel has fallen away from the one true God and have replaced Him in their hearts with idols. The prophet Hosea, following God’s orders, then marries the prostitute Gomer to represent to Israel what they are doing to God. Gomer, after having three children with Hosea, gives in to her old temptations and returns to the brothel. God uses this illustration to pierce the hearts of the Israelites. In chapter 2 God tells Israel of their evil. He rebukes them and warns that, because they did not turn away He will make “her (Israel) as bare as on the day she was born, I will make her like a desert.” (Hosea 2:3). This chapter is perhaps one of the best pictures of how God works through the trials for “the good of those who love Him, who are called according to His purpose” (Romans 8:28). Of Israel God says “I will block her path with thorn bushes; I will wall her in so that she cannot find her way. She will chase after her lovers but not catch them...I will take away my grain when it ripens, and my new wine when it is ready. I will take back my wool and my linen, intended to cover her nakedness...I will ruin her vines and her fig trees, which she said were her pay from her lovers...I will punish her for the days she burned incense to the Baals...and went after lovers, but me she forgot” (Hosea 2:6-7, 9, 12-13). The first thought many Christians have when they read this is “I don’t worship any idols. I don’t have any wooden statues or incense to deities.” That thought is what many times keeps people from learning things for these Old Testament books. We still have plenty of idols in our day! They just changed their names. Mark Driscoll once said “Idols are normally good things, that we turn into god things, and that makes them bad things”. I’ll give you some examples: a young Christian man who wants to look for a good Christian wife. Obviously, that is not a bad thing, it is a very good thing. Yet if that becomes a quest, a life-consuming goal to the point where the young man loves the idea of this woman more than God, that is an idol. Same thing can happen in a marriage or friendship. Anything we place above God is an idol. Some other idols can include pleasure, pride, jealousy, jobs, family, Christian ministry, sex, people pleasing, knowledge, education, grades, perfection, being spiritual, recognition, leadership, and so many more. The root of all sins are idolatry! That’s why Hosea is such an amazing book; we all are like Israel. We all forget about God, we all cling to other lovers, we all burn incense to our own Baals. So God, in His all-knowing love, blocks our paths, unsatisfied us, punishes us. Takes away our comfort, our security, our money, our lovers. We are left naked like the desert. Yet this is not the end of the story. Gomer is saved by Hosea, who buys her back and brings her into his house and loves her. God uses an even better illustration. “I am now going to allure her; I will lead her into the desert and speak tenderly to her...I will betroth you to me forever; I will betroth you in righteousness and justice, in love and compassion. I will betroth you in faithfulness and you will acknowledge that I am God.”(Hosea 2:15, 19-20) This reunion is so wonderful that the Bible says, “‘In that day’, declares the Lord ‘you will call me “my husband”; you will no longer call me “my master”’”. (Hosea 2:16). This grace is so amazing that any anger or resentment or reluctance we feel melts away. The fear we had because of his punishment, that fear that makes us call him “master”, is gone when His embrace turns our fear into love as we utter through our tears “husband”. We change our name of God from a fearful name to one of affection. How amazing is God’s forgiveness. It changes fear to love, and turns a sinner into a saint. Turn from your idols, and run back to God!