Happy are the Poor

“Happy are the poor people!” That just doesn’t sound right.

It seems to make more sense to say, “Happy are the rich! Happy are the ones with nice cars and pretty houses and a big yard! Happy are the ones with a beautiful wife and well-behaved kids! Happy are the ones who get promotions, bonuses, and exotic vacations!” That makes a lot more sense.

But here’s what happens when we make riches, possessions, and other worldly achievements our primary goal. We begin to think that those things are never enough. We begin to compare. Want more. Never really satisfied. Make a mad dash for something else. Hustle toward some other elusive goal that seems to never quench the thirst for more.

Several years ago I joined a team traveling to Kenya. And we visited some places that were decimated with poverty. Well below the poverty level of anything I had experienced back home. No electricity. No running water. Limited rainfall. No crops. No where near a civilization that I had been accustomed to seeing in the States. Essentially in the middle of a desert. Theses people were poor poor. And happy. But how? Why?

In the Bible there’s a guy named Matthew. He was a former tax collecter who began following Jesus. This guy was not poor. He actually gained his riches from Jews, essentially robbing from his own people. Something like the modern day IRS.

He records a sermon preached by Jesus very early on in His earthly ministry. I’d like to think of it sort of like his State of the Union address. What Jesus would say in his inaugural speech would set a tone and expectation for what would follow in the days to come as he traveled throughout Palestine.

And the preamble of this speech begins, “Blessed are those who are poor in spirit for they will inherit the kingdom of God.”

When Jesus comes on the scene, the Jewish people were hoping for a leader, ruler, warrior–a Messiah– who would lead them to victory and deliver them from Roman rule. A visionary leader who could establish laws and provide freedom accompanied with power and prestige. Yet Jesus says, “happy are the poor.”

What the people envisioned and what Jesus proclaimed had a very stark contrast. A kingdom was coming. But not as the people hoped for or expected. This kingdom that Jesus was coming to establish on the earth was an other-worldly kingdom. One that would turn everyone’s current way of thinking and presuming on its head.

He begins with ‘poor in spirit.’ In a sense, He says that those who would recognize their spiritual bankruptcy, their poverty, their lack–they can then begin to realize the possibility of gaining great riches.

Every human being comes into this world wretched, wicked, evil, depraved. We hate to admit this because somewhere along the way we want to believe that we’re good enough. That we’re capable of doing enough. Or that our ways can somehow become acceptable to an ethereal judge standing outside of space and time at the end of our lives.

Jesus was coming to establish His kingdom rule here on this earth. And from the onset He assured His listeners that the self-righteous comparing themselves to others through pride and the works-driven crowd trying to earn their righteousness through good deeds would have no part of this new kingdom.

Jesus declares that those who would inherit the coming kingdom are the ones many considered to be outcasts and outsiders in their current place within the community.

Brokenness has a way of putting life into perspective. To see we actually don’t have control. Or power. Nothing, really. Life has a way of humbling us. Realizing that we are poor. Broken. Needy. And in the words of David Crowder, it creates a “beautiful collision,” when our filth and depravity collides with His unabated pure and holy righteousness. When our honesty and humility meets His sovereignty and grace our world will absolutely be changed.

We can spend a lifetime chasing dreams and building our own little kingdoms made with sand, only to see them dissipate or implode under the reign and rule of God’s kingdom. Or we can admit our need to a Savior’s intervention and receive the invitation He’s extending to us to be partakers of the heavenly kingdom He is establishing here on earth. But it comes with a cost; putting to death our own little kingdom and conceding to His kingdom rule in our heart.