Recently we've been hearing about and meditating on the beatitudes, in the Sermon on the mount that Jesus preached in Matthew 5:3-12. Out of everything Jesus could have started with to talk about, He started with this one: "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven" (v3).
We've learned that being 'poor in spirit' is like the 'master key' to the Christian life, to walking as a disciple of Jesus. And I believe Isaiah 66:2 is a precious picture, referring to this very same person who is poor in spirit - "humble, and contrite of spirit, and who trembles at my word."
I've found it helps me personally to meditate on truths of God's Word in terms of pictures and parables, and so here is a story below that hopefully can help us to appreciate the character of someone who is 'poor in spirit' and aspire to have the same attitude:
AN ILLUSTRATION
One day there was a lavish banquet for a King, where many high ranking people were feasting at a large table with him. And there was a servant who was serving food to the attendees, but by accident he spilled food and drink all over two men at the table. One of the men was furious, lashing out in anger that the servant would be so careless, but the other man was calm, patient, and gracious.
Here is the back-story of the calm and gracious man who did not complain, and why he had a totally different attitude and mindset at that table:
This man was once convicted as a traitor to his country. He was condemned to death, and awaiting in prison for the day his punishment should come. But the King - out of nothing except his mercy, not only pardoned this traitor and released him from jail, and then he invited him to that dinner, into his home for the banquet. The guests, the whole town, and the traitor himself could not believe the King would do such a thing - to have mercy and invite someone in who had done something so terrible. It was a mystery. Only the King Himself knew why He would do that for this traitor.
It blessed me to think about: how should that man sit at that dinner table of the King? Take a moment and consider what it should be like for this person who has been freely pardoned to sit down among the King's table. This traitor who has been shown mercy - if he is at a King's dinner table, the only thing he can do is put himself BELOW everyone else, including the servants there.
He does not any longer carry the punishment for his past crimes, but he does carry the acknowledgement of them along with the gratitude of the King’s undeserved mercy. The only thing he can do is attend reverently with a quiet, undeserving gratitude. Now, if anything negative happens to him during that dinner, he is without complaint because he recognizes: "I do not deserve to be here anyways. How can I complain about anything?"
He (the forgiven/pardoned one) would be the one at the table who is totally calm when food was spilled on him, because he says, “I don’t deserve to be here, but I’m so thankful I am.” That attitude gave him mercy and patience. He had a humility, and a reverence. He had a "humble trembling" before the King.
FREEDOM
This man should be in jail right now, but at the King's pardon he is free. And so inwardly, he is free too from all negativity. He also has a precious affection for that King, and even for others at the table, because it is a principle: the one who has been forgiven much loves much (Luke 7:47). We love because He first loved us (1 Jn 4:19).
We are sinners. Sin is serious, and it's costly, the penalty is death. But God forgave us for our sin out of His great mercy, when we deserved only death. He freed us. God freeing us should mean that we “free” others (in our heart), and we LOVE easily, and freely.
"Blessed are the pure in heart" - one characteristic of "pure in heart" means someone who is too full of gratitude and humility to carry a 'speck' of negativity toward anyone or anything else. In place of it is: gratitude and humble reverence for the merciful King, and eagerness to show the same grace and love toward others. "Blessed are the pure in heart" is one of the beatitudes which Jesus spoke in Matthew 5. These should "be the attitudes" of everyone who has seen God's grace.
That's why the beatitudes (and the whole Sermon on the mount) starts with these 6 words: "Blessed are the poor in spirit". "I don't deserve anything... I'm only a begging-receiver of goodness which I don't deserve". This is where we have to start from: being "poor in spirit." From that point on, it is not about us anymore, but about the King. We are zeroes, He is everything.
A TWO-SIDED COIN
Regarding trials, contently receiving suffering from God's hand is like a two-sided coin for us: on one side, we see that we are zeroes. Who are we to argue with the King's ways after what He did for us (Rom 9:20)? And on the other side we see that even those are God's good for us and an act of mercy from the King (Rom 8:28). So we continue to walk in 1. Fear (reverence), and 2. Gratitude. There are always those two sides when walking through trials before the Lord.
So much peace is lost because we are shaky on one of those two sides: 1. We are clutching something we feel we deserve (irreverence for God), or, 2. We don't trust the goodness and power of the King who has already been so good to us (ingratitude makes us forget His past goodness, and doubt His goodness for the future) - Psalm 78:11 "They forgot His deeds And His miracles that He had shown them.", Romans 1:21 "For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened."
HUMBLE TREMBLING
With a humble trembling – "Who am I that I should get to sit at this table?" We have to approach the Lord’s table with only two things: humility (reverence before God) and gratitude; with our head down in gratitude and humility. "Lord, whatever happens, I’m free with a hope and I don’t deserve it, and I thank you."
Psalm 40:2 "He brought me up out of the pit of destruction, out of the miry clay, And He set my feet upon a rock making my footsteps firm. 40:3 He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God; Many will see and fear And will trust in the LORD."
When we have this "humble trembling" before God everyday, this fear of God, many things change for us. Consider this pardoned man, and how he would be at that table, and see that we now have to live in the same way:
A CHANGE OF CHARACTER WHEN WE RECOGNIZE WHAT WE ARE AND WHERE WE'VE COME FROM
-
If the food was greatly overcooked, and the servants decided to give him the most overcooked piece of meat, he would still be thankful for it. He overcomes complaining and negativity in his heart because he can see and taste the King's great mercy. Everything on that table no matter how overcooked or undercooked tastes precious to him, sort of like how sunshine or cloudy skies to a newly freed prisoner are both beautiful! - "Blessed are the pure in heart"
-
We will be merciful to others. Imagine if the Kings servant or child bumped into this forgiven traitor... the fact that he was forgiven so much should definitely help him fight his anger in the moment. He would be very gracious ("Blessed are the merciful")
-
Imagine how different this traitor's past is than what his future will be. He has a eager desire to live rightly now, differently: "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness"
-
Imagine if he was spoken rudely to - I don't think this man would get disturbed, because he does not consider himself to have rights, because he remembers where he's come from - "Blessed are the meek". What rights can a person claim who was supposed to be put to death?
-
If a servant asked him if he could help move some chairs around, he would have no problem, he would be happy to do it. Love always makes cheerful servants.
-
There is a new joy, because there is a new hope compared to where he was headed.
Do you see how being 'undeserving and grateful', changes a person's whole attitude?! It changes how they carry themself, how they treat others, how they view others, how they view and respond to situations, it changes their hope, outlook on the future, their view of the past... it changes everything. This is what the gospel of God's mercy and love in Jesus for sinners does for us.
And I believe it's why Jesus started the greatest sermon ever preached with this one statement: "Blessed are the poor in spirit."
Everything in the Christian life hinges on that one thing: My recognizing that I am nothing but an undeserving beggar that has to stand in a reverential, bowing, undeserving, humble fear of the Lord who chose to love a wretch, and a worm (Isaiah 41:14). Most people tend to feel like they are 'pretty good' people. But the Bible says that we were God's enemies (Rom 5:10).
A sick person with terminal disease has no interest in medicine until he sees just how sick he is. But once he acknowledges that his life is over without medicine, he becomes desperate and grateful for it! This is why we must recognize the immensity of our sin, and how undeserving we are.
We can think about these things with our mind, and that's good. But we also need to ask God for the Holy Spirit to open our eyes and give us "spiritual revelation" to actually see the full depth of God's mercy and love so that we can live like this. See that Paul prayed exactly this for the Ephesians:
Eph 3:14 For this reason I bow my knees before the Father... 3:16 that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man, 17... and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, 3:18 may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, 3:19 and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God.
SELF-FOCUSED EXPECTATIONS
Now imagine this traitor came to that dinner with many expectations of what the King and others should still be doing for him, how terribly evil that would be. He becomes upset because this other guest got the bigger portion. The dessert was pie, but he wanted cake. They didn't let him sit where he wanted to. He's complaining about the servants being too slow. Then he questions the King for being unkind and thoughtless for allowing these things to happen, telling the King how he needs to handle things. What a tragedy for so many to live like this - even Christians.
2 Timothy 3:1-4 "But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come. For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God."
It is a sad thing for so many who say they believe in the Lord, they know they are sinners who deserve Hell, they know Jesus had to die for them, they know this life is temporary, they know they have to stand before God at the judgment one day and look back over their life, they know God is all powerful and (in their mind) they know He is all loving, but still to sit at the Lord's table as if we deserve something and as if our own comfort at this 'one dinner' was all that mattered. I've personally spent too much time chasing comfort, and living distracted from the 'only thing necessary' (Luke 10:42), and I see that the more my mind is set on 'other things' for myself, the more sin comes in. I want my future to be so much more whole-hearted and single-minded for the Lord.
And this is the importance of living a life of overflowing gratitude for the cross, where God sacrificed His Son and Jesus died for us undeserving sinners. To keep that with us will preserve these right attitudes in us.
2 Peter 1:9 "For he who lacks these qualities is blind or short-sighted, having forgotten his purification from his former sins."
As Christians we are basically just takers, and receivers. How can we make demands? And what can we give God that He doesn’t already have? We can only bow in gratitude, kissing His feet, recognizing that He is everything; as we often say in our church - we are zeroes apart from Him. It is also very humbling to see that Jesus Himself lived this needy life before the Father as a zero, even though He never sinned! How much more can the Lord surely help us to have a mind of 'poor in spirit', who are sinners.
LIVING "IN VIEW OF GOD'S MERCIES"
The Bible uses a phrase, "In view of God‘s mercies" (Rom 12:1) – that means I remember there’s a reason for that mercy, and I have an obligation now to live in light of all that mercy (the verse goes on to tell us how to live: "In view of God's mercies... present your body a living sacrifice for God"). I don’t condemn myself over my past sin, and at the same time, I should have a reverence and a humble trembling, knowing that I’m sitting at a table that I don’t deserve to be at, but He chose to love and value me as His own. And so from here I have a sight set on pleasing the One who loved me; because I don't belong to myself anymore - He bought me. Salvation is free to me... but it was not free. What a price He paid (1 Corinthians 6:20)!
May the Lord help us to walk in an immense fear and reverence and gratitude for the One who showed us such mercy.
“But to this one I will look, To him who is humble and contrite of spirit, and who trembles at My word." Isaiah 66:2