Wednesday, July 30, 2008

Blessed Are The Poor In Spirit, For Theirs Is The Kingdom Of Heaven.

6:28 PM by Christi Bowman

A few weeks ago, out at Rockford Christian Camp, I listened to Park Forest's youth minister, Stephen Lamb, speak at campfire Tuesday night. He told Tony Campolo's story of the Hawaiian prostitute, Agnes. As he told the story God said to me "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven" I mulled that over a bit as campfire was wrapping up. If God was telling me that people like Agnes are the poor in spirit, and that theirs is the Kingdom of heaven then what was he telling me...what did that mean?

I went back to our camper and he sent me to Matthew 25. Matthew 25 is the famous "least of these" text. It sums up what it means to be poor. God told me to apply hungry and thirsty, stranger and naked, sick and in prison to the spirit and I would have what poor in spirit meant to Him. Being hungry and thirsty in your spirit, being a stranger and naked in spirit, and being sick and in prison in your spirit usually doesn't make a person one of society's most esteemed...yet God says theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven. He then took me to Matthew 19:30 "But many who are first will be last, and many who are last will be first." He knew I was confused and He spelled it out for me. I don't know how He is going to work everything out, but that is none of my business. He made it clear to me how he feels about prostitutes.

I read "My Utmost for His Highest" everyday, by Oswald Chambers. One that I have read recently is "Am I blessed like this." That particular devotional talks about how profound it is when Jesus speaks into a situation with a Beatitude.

"We soon find, however, that the Beatitudes contain the "dynamite" of the Holy Spirit. And they "explode" when the circumstances of our lives cause them to do so. When the Holy Spirit brings to our remembrance one of the Beatitudes, we say, "What a startling statement that is!" Then we must decide whether or not we will accept the tremendous spiritual upheaval that will be produced in our circumstances if we obey His words. That is the way the Spirit of God works. We do not need to be born again to apply the Sermon on the Mount literally. The literal interpretation of the Sermon on the Mount is as easy as child’s play. But the interpretation by the Spirit of God as He applies our Lord’s statements to our circumstances is the strict and difficult work of a saint."

We sang a song in church, not one of my favorites, but the words made me think. The song was "No Tears". The God who has revealed Himself to me, the God I am getting to know better and better every day, He has shown me a thing or two about His capacity to love. My God is not going to end the world and end sadness until every last one of His sheep are in His protection. I don't know what that means...I don't know what that looks like. I do know that the God who wouldn't let me rest until I had bought dinner for the prostitute in Chicago last night won't rest until all the prostitutes...all the broken people of the world are at rest in Him. The reason I know this is because He says "THEIRS IS THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN" and in Revelation 21 He calls His words "trustworthy and true". There won't be any death, suffering, crying, or pain in heaven (Revelation 21:3-5), because their isn't an end to this world...there isn't a heaven for us until we, as the body of Christ, redeem this broken world. WE are to bring the Kingdom of God to this place. We are to fill the earth and SUBDUE it (Genesis 1:28). Not hide in our churches. He won't dry our eyes because His own aren't dry. There IS sadness in heaven right now and there will continue to be until Heaven belongs to the poor in spirit. Until the poor in spirit get to rest in Him FIRST. Until they get there on the back of the body of Christ...US.

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