“Blessed
are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”-Matthew 5:3
I
have read this verse at the beginning of Matthew quite a few times. I never gave it a lot of thought, except for
the few times as a kid I remember thinking – “Gosh this sounds sad, I hope I’m
always happy and have plenty of chicken nuggets.” Valid thought as a child…
It wasn't until I moved to Uganda and met the
poor in spirit, the great street child theologians, the 3-year old preachers of
Jesus that this verse became real to me and wrecked me forever.
A
lot of us have heard the stories or even experienced the great awakening of God
happening among the persecuted, the poor, and the desperate around the
world. I’m not writing this page to just
bring a single, apathetic tear or the token- “bless their hearts.” I don’t want you to feel sorry for the poor in
spirit; I want us to hunger and thirst with them, learning from their example. I’m writing on this page in much agony and
pain, begging God to help America become “poor in spirit.” Now please don’t misunderstand me, I’m not
promoting the so-called “poverty gospel.” I’m not saying move out of your house and into
a cardboard box (unless God is actually calling you to do so- don’t put Him
past it!). I am not praying for my country
to break out in civil unrest, experience famine, or massive epidemics. I just
think there is something very fundamental that we can learn from the poor,
something that will change us, something that will leave us desperate for the
riches they do have. They will teach us about the Kingdom of Jesus Christ.
Jesus
tells a story of a wedding feast (Luke 14: 15-24). The master of the house prepares a wonderful feast;
he wants to fill his house with guests.
He sends out his servants to invite the guests in. The problem is the first people he invites
say no! They have all these excuses for
not coming.
“Sorry
Jesus, I just bought a field, and I must go see it.”
“Sorry,
just bought some new oxen, on my way to try them out…”
“Sorry,
I just got married, I can’t come.”
When
the master of the house finds out that everyone refused, he becomes angry and
orders his servant to quickly go out into the streets and invite the poor, the
crippled, the blind and the lame. The
rich and affluent were too busy; they had better things to do.
I
thought God was sending me to Uganda to help people and “end poverty”. In reality, God called me to Uganda to sit
and eat at the banquet table with the poor, to learn from their desperation, to
weep and mourn, to hunger and thirst, to become poor in spirit. I think Heidi Baker says it best in her book “Compelled
by Love”-
“The poor will never say
no to a feast. They will come to eat
spiritual food and to eat physical food.
But the Lord is setting out a spiritual banquet for His Western bride
too. The challenge in the West is that
many are too full. We have smorgasbords,
buffets, and restaurants at almost every corner. So, people in the Western world are often
just not hungry. In my travels to the
Western world, I see that the church is often surviving on spiritual crumbs.” –Heidi
Baker
“The poor you will
always have with you, but you will not always have me.” – Matthew 26:11
We
are called by God to clothe the naked, feed the hungry, and learn from their
poverty in spirit. Maybe that’s why we
will always have the poor with us, because the Kingdom of Heaven belongs to
them and we must have our eyes opened to the Kingdom. Jesus has set out a banquet for each one of us;
He is still inviting people in.
I
don’t want to be too busy or preoccupied with the things of this world that I
miss out on the invitation to be with Jesus.
In reality, we are all poor and orphaned until we enter into the family
of God. When Jesus looks at us he doesn't see rich or poor, African or American, liberal or conservative, hipster or prep, young or old; He sees His kids. He wants to be with His children forever, and
He expects that we will drop everything to be at His banquet table. Being poor in spirit does not mean that we are
miserable and miss out on all the fun and chicken nuggets. Being poor in spirit is the great awakening
you have been longing for, it is the key to your personal revival, it is the beginning
of a glorious forever with Him.
"I think the work of the Church in this developed and rich Western Hemisphere is more difficult than in Calcutta, South Yemen, or other areas where the needs of the people are reduced to the clothes needed to ward off the cold, or a dish of rice to curb their hunger- anything that will show them that someone loves them. In the West the problems the poor have go much deeper; the problems are in the depths of their hearts."- Mother Teresa
