Poor in spirit
Day 217
October 19, 2020
“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” - Matthew 5:3
Whether it is at a traffic light or a train station, here in Puerto Rico or in a foreign country, most of us have seen poor people beg for money. While some of them are young, many times, they are older and crouched over due to age, disease, or the struggles and addictions of their lives. When you see a person like this, in a terrible physical condition, crouched over and desperately seeking help, compassion fills your heart.
This is the spiritual condition that Jesus describes in Matthew 5:3. The original Greek word is “ptochos” which can be defined as “those crouched down” or “beggarly.” While Jesus certainly spoke and ministered to the physically poor and had compassion on them as well, Jesus here speaks specifically of the poor in spirit.
The phrase, “In Spirit” (pneuma in the Greek) can mean breath, Holy Spirit (new life), truth. Therefore, someone who is poor in this area is lacking the life-giving Spirit of God, that new “breath.” This is someone, who like the crouched down beggar, recognizes their desperate spiritual need for help and who humbly reaches out to the only One who can supply that need.
While the blind needed to see and deaf to hear, what did this group need? The poor in spirit? The gospel. For in the gospel lay a kingdom that belonged to them. This was great news to a group of people looking for hope. For many of the spiritually poor were also physically poor. In the physical world, there was no hope for them to hold onto. This group of people, who the society despised at worst and ignored at best, clung to the promise of Jesus, that they were heirs to the kingdom of God.
Jesus spoke of the poor often in the Scriptures. In fact in Luke 4:18, he says that God sent him to preach to the poor. And in Galatians 2:10, we are reminded to remember the poor. Are we being like our master Jesus? Who are the poorest in our community that need to hear the hope of the gospel? Search for them, preach to them, and share with them the hope of eternal life.
If Jesus isn’t your master, you too are among the poor in Spirit, but only if you recognize your need for God, love Him, and look to Him alone for salvation. For just being “poor” does not make one an automatic heir of the kingdom. Revelation 13:16 tells us that the poor are also among those in the last days who will reject God can give their devotion to the Antichrist and the Beast. If you haven’t received Christ as your Lord and Savior, humble yourself: repent of your sins, turn to him like a beggar and receive the gift that He freely offers.
Read Matthew 5:1-12