BLESSED!
“Blessed Are the Poor in Spirit”
Pastor Brandon Hovey | 06.16.2013

Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven.  (Matthew 5:3)

For this is what the high and exalted One says-- he who lives forever, whose name is holy:
“I live in a high and holy place, but also with the one who is contrite and lowly in spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly and to revive the heart of the contrite.” (Isaiah 57:15)

These are the ones I look on with favor: those who are humble and contrite in spirit, and who tremble at my word.  (Isaiah 66:2)

You’re blessed when you’re at the end of the rope. With less of you there is more of God and his rule. (Matthew 5:3, The Message)

To be “poor in spirit” is to admit that your spiritual bankruptcy and need for God. It is an acknowledgment that your problems are beyond yourself and that you do not have the power to change.  To be poor in spirit is to throw yourself onto the mercy and love of God.

The line between good and evil is never simply between “us” and “them.” The line between good and evil run through each one of us.                                      -Aleksandr Solzenitsyn


The Pharisee prayed, “God, I thank you that I am not like other people- robbers, evildoers, adulterers-or even like this tax collector...But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner.’ “I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God.  For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”                         (Luke 18:11, 13-14)


If you “have a past,” struggle with sin, are broken and imperfect, and turn to God for help, then according to God, you are blessed (e.g. approved by God), and you are a king or queen in God’s Kingdom.