Happy Are The Humble - Part 1

Christian businesswomen on the Mount, Jesus said blessed are the poor in spirit. What does it mean exactly have you become conspirators of the room to point Jeremiah explains how understanding this unusual term can help you experience joy and satisfaction from how to be happy. According to Jesus, is David this message happy friends. I've been to Israel now probably five or six times, maybe more than that, but at least that many times and every time I have gone to Israel are tour guides have taken us to the Mount of Beatitudes and their I have taught a passage of Scripture, usually from where were studying right now in the book of Matthew and we have enjoyed imagining in our mind's eye what it was like when Jesus stood on the Mount of Beatitudes and taught these great principles we've called this series how to be happy. According to Jesus, and today were going to get the first installment how to be happy and humility.

Happy are the humble, since the Scripture.

How does that happen. How does a person find happiness and Melanie were about to find out as we open our Bibles to Matthew chapter 5 in verse three and now let's find out how you become happy by becoming known and is a former CBS News writer for Dan Rather and is best known as a speechwriter for Ronald Reagan and George Bush after they were out of office. She shared her behind the scenes observations about happiness in her best-selling book. What I saw at the revolution she wrote it is embarrassing to live in the most comfortable time in the history of man and not be happy. We all have so much think of the set of the honeymooners wanted Ralph and Alice crammed in half back in 1955 small rented apartment with the table, two chairs of Bureau picture on a faded wall. The set designer was obviously spoofing the average family will think of the set of family ties the couches the lamps the VCRs, the color TVs the art on the walls, the children with expensive, orthodontia we have so much more than mom and dad that we can help but feel defensive about feeling so bad, said Peggy Noonan.

We feel defensive about paying off our charge cards so late and about being found in the den surfing channels at 3 AM in the morning and she gave us a visual picture. She said it's 1956. It's in the summer a man comes home from work. Parks the car slouches up the driveway.

His white shirt and cling softly to his back.

He bends for the paper surveys the lawn waves to a neighbor out of the house, comes a son who is freckled 10 years old.

He jumps on his father. They twirl on the lawn. Another day done now. One of the lawn eat fish cakes watch some TV go to bed, get up the next day and do it all over again is a happy no. Why should he be. We were put here to be happy and because he does not expect to be happy. The knowledge of his unhappiness does not play on him. He looks perhaps to other more eternal forms of comfort and then Peggy Noonan said somewhere in the 70s or in the 60s we started expecting to be happy and if we were not happy. We changed our lives we changed our town. We changed our family we switch jobs, and society has been straining and cracking in the storm ever since. I think she wrote. We have lost the knowledge that happiness is overrated. We have lost somehow a sense of mystery about us, about our purpose about our meeting about our role, our ancestors, she said believed in two worlds and understood that this world was the solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short one.

We are the first generations of man actually expected to find happiness here on earth and our search for it has caused such unhappiness and then she said if you do not believe in another higher world.

If you believe only in the flat material world around you.

If you believe that this is your only chance at happiness. If that is what you believe, then you are not disappointed when the world does not give you a good measure of its riches. You are devastated and that is where so many are today who have bet everything on happiness here and now and yet here is Jesus in the greatest sermon ever preached, and what he opens his mouth. The first words that come out of his lips are the words of happy, the word means. Blessed are contented or highly favored happy. Could any word have been more incongruence in that day or evening hours. Happy those who listen to Jesus when he preached the sermon, let me tell you what it was like for them. They were dupes of the Roman Empire conquered, vanquished, subdued people.

They were poor. They were dejected. Most of them poorly dressed, they were pawns of an alien government.

Their lives were without hope and expectation. And here comes Jesus saying happy are you, how could their miserable lives in any way be described as happy. Philip Yancey, one of my favorite writers, that if I had been sitting in the audience when Jesus delivered the Beatitudes. I think I would've left the meeting doing confused and outraged, but certainly not comforted 19 centuries later, he wrote the crisis of the sermon on the Mount still has not gone away for me though I have tried at times to dismiss it as theoretical access more I study Jesus, the more I realize that the statements contained here in his words lie at the very heart of who he was and who we are supposed to be the first 96 words of this great sermon call the sermon on the Mount, Jesus gives us the agenda for his kingdom and someone is said it's a kingdom into tenses, the present and the future where what God does now within us foreshadows what he will do for us someday in the open for all to see Jesus begins his sermon by saying happy or blessed, blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of God.

I must tell you when I first read those words I thought maybe I missed the translation I had all my translations and see if I can find something that would help me feel more comfortable about what I was meant to say I looked it up in the new English Bible. This is what it says. How blessed are those who know they are poor. The kingdom of heaven is theirs, let him help a lot so I got down JB Phillips off the shelf and here's what he said how happy are the humble minded, for they already own the kingdom of heaven suddenly realize that when Jesus said blessed are the poor in spirit. He wasn't talking about material poverty. There is no premium in the word of God on being poor. There is no evidence that there's any value in trying to be as poor as we can be is true that Jesus seemed to single out the poor for special attention that he gravitated toward those who had very little that he himself by all the worldly standards of his day was poor but this is not about having no material goods, so those of you who are doing quite well can relax not about that. Nor is it about having a poor spirit, which is like he's a poor spirited person has no enthusiasm.

He has no zest for life. Each poor spirited is not that is not about not having material wealth.

It's not about being poor spirited when Jesus says in this first beatitude. Blessed are the poor in spirit. He is talking about his kingdom on this earth and that he is telling us that his kingdom on this earth is an inward kingdom.

And this is a poverty of spirit, poverty of heart that is best understood when we say it is the exact opposite of the spirit of pride. Some have said this is a synonym for humility. One commentary that I read says it this way. Blessed are the desperate. With nowhere else to turn the desperate just made turned to Jesus who is the only one who can offer the deliverance they long for someone painted a picture for me like this.

A person who is poor in spirit is a person who is begging on the inside will know what it's like to see beggars on the street. If you been any big cities are always people who are begging somewhere but this is a picture of someone who inwardly is begging he is hungry and anxious and realizes he has nothing inside nothing inwardly, on which he can depend and so he reaches up his spiritual hands any bags for what God will give him Blessed are the poor in spirit.

There is a passage of Scripture in the book of Luke that tells us what this means in a story we all know well turn with me to Luke 18 when you Luke chapter 18, just over a few pages in your Bible and I want you to jump down with me in the 18th chapter of Luke to verse 10.

Two men went up to the temple to pray, one was a Pharisee and the other tax collector. The Pharisee stood and prayed like this, God, I thank you that I'm not like other men, extortion, or's unjust, adulterers, or even as this tax collector. I fast twice a week. I give tithes of all that I possess in the tax collector, standing afar off, would not so much as raise his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying God be merciful to me a sinner, blessed are the poor in spirit me tell you why Jesus told that story I don't have to guess because if you look in verse nine we learned why he told also.

He spoke this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others.

They trusted in themselves.

They were not poor, spiritually they had not understood in their own heart.

How desperately they needed God and so they were trusting in all of their outward accouterments of righteousness. And in verse 14 Jesus tells us that this man, the publican went down to his house justified rather than the other.

For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself he was poor in spirit will be exalted.

That incredible story when you lay it down on top of Matthew chapter 5. What does it mean to be poor in spirit. Does that mean I have to walk around feigning humility saying I am a worm.

I am worthless to remit anybody like that I stay as far away from people like that as I can.

False BIOS of the Pharisaism. That's what it is a poverty of spirit is not something we wear on our sleeve.

It is an attitude of heart and I thought maybe the best way I could try to get our arms around it today is to give you a little profile of somebody who would be like that. What would be the characteristics of a person who is poor in spirit.

Interestingly enough, in the story of the publican and the Pharisee, the richest of the two was the one who was poor in spirit. Tax collectors had great resources. Most of it through extortion. Frankly, but they were some of the wealthiest people in Jesus day the rich man the publican.

He was the one who prayed God be merciful to me a sinner that proves once and for all that poverty of spirit has nothing to do with our outward resources or material abilities.

It's an inward attitude of heart. Blessed are the poor in spirit. What would you expect to see if you saw someone like that. Well the first thing I wrote down is that those who are poor in spirit will recognize that they are out of step with the ways of the world. I read the owner of the Chicago Bulls gave summary statement of the rules governing Michael Jordan. This is what he said. He said Michael Jordan is living the American dream. He said the American dream. Listen to this now is to reach a point in your life where you don't have to do anything you don't want to do and you can do everything that you do want to do. That's the American dream and I dare say that some of you today are pursuing mentoring, trying to get yourself into a place where you don't have to do anything you don't want to do and you can do everything that you do want to do. No wonder JB Phillips decided to coin the Beatitudes for this kingdom. Here are the Beatitudes for this world. Happy are the pushers for they get on in the world. Happy are the hard boiled, for they never let life hurt them. Happy are those who complain, for they get their own way. In the end.

Happy are the blasé for the never worry over their sins.

Happy are the slave drivers for they get results happy are the knowledgeable men of the world, for they know their way around. Happy are the troublemakers, for they make people take notice of them the Beatitudes of the kingdom of this world, let me tell you something, my friend, if you live according to the kingdom manifesto, Jesus Christ, even for one day you will find yourself in conflict with everything that's going on around you.

You will feel the tension you will feel at the very core of who you are.

Can I get a witness you know what I'm talking about. If you are poor in spirit, in the sense that Jesus meant it. One of the first evidences of that will be that you feel like you're walking to a cadence that's different than everybody else's. You have to show up every day and seller try to be in tension with everybody around me. It will come naturally to you. If you are walking after Jesus Christ.

It will be the most natural normal thing sense that something is out of sync in the world but you have a sweet peace in your heart that you are exactly where you want to be number two. Those who are poor in spirit will realize their emptiness apart from God. That's really what it means not that you are worthless, but that what it really counts in terms of real life that God is the key to it that Jesus Christ is the answer when Jesus speaks of the poor in spirit. I think he means the opposite of everything that is summed up in the word pride. The poor in spirit is the man who does not boast about his talents or his attainments because he knows he has nothing that he did not receive if he is gifted is because he is been given much.

Remember Sampson in the Old Testament, you remember him a haircut that ruined the life remember him. Here is Sampson standing there in the valley of historic, surrounded by the lords of the Philistines and the Bible says Key West.

Not that the Lord was departed from him. It was not bad enough that Sampson lost his power when his hair was cut off, but it was really discouraging to read that he did not understand.

He went out as he had gone out before the fight and he got in the middle of the battle and realized he was powerless.

Someone is said that no man is so ignorant as he who knows nothing and knows not that he knows nothing. No man is so sick is he who has a fatal disease and is not aware of it no matter so poor as he was destitute and yet thinks he is rich.

That's the pitiable thing about the Pharisees wasn't so much what they believed it was their utter lack of knowledge of how poor they actually were in the sight of God.

Jesus gives us a dramatic story about that. He was a great storyteller. The illustrator of all illustrators. He told a story about a man who had everything in life and in a self-satisfied soliloquy one night this man said so, thou hast much goods laid up for many years. Take diet easy drink and be merry and Jesus said, thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of the and then often skip this Jesus addendum to that story was so is he that lay up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God while you remember the Laodiceans.

Some of you who study the New Testament, remember that the church mentioned in the book of Revelation the church to which John the apostle wrote a letter it was possible for a church not to be poor in spirit as well.

The Laodicean church was like this and John wrote this in the power of the Holy Spirit.

He said to that church, because you say I am rich, have become wealthy, and have need of nothing, and do not know that you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked is a sad thing when a person is empty and they don't know it, you know I run out of gas a lot I need to tie don't watch the gas gauge and small is running out of gas, which you know what I got out my driveway and I looked down at my almost pulled back and said Don I'm taking your car. But then, what would she have done, you know, and so I looked at the gas gauge and I mean it wasn't just on empty. It was clear beyond empty over on the peg. Why live at the top of the hill so blessed is the man who knows his tank is empty.

I coasted all the way down the hill, you know, it's hard to steer a car with power steering when the engines turned off. But I made it I must've coasted for a mile and 1/2.

You know what I had just enough gas to get from where I stopped coasting when uploading the gas station, it coughed. It is bad to have an empty tank but it's even worse not to know the tank is empty. Soon, I'm trying to say many women is a person who has poverty of spirit is a person who has the proper assessment of who he is inwardly without God is a wonderful thing to know who you are.

Without God, so that you can then find out all you can be with God. A person who does not have a poor spirit who continually builds himself up and trust in the outward things of life is a person who will find it very very difficult ever to humble himself and come to God seeking grace. Isn't that why Jesus said that it is harder for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven been for a camel to go through the eye of a needle.

Was he saying that rich people can go to heaven know he was saying that rich people have so many things outwardly to trust in that sometimes they find it very difficult to realize the poverty of their own spiritual and so they go on their way trusting in all the outward things before it's too late. They never make a change will we have to finish all this up tomorrow when we meet together as we continue our discussion of happy are the humble and going through all of these Beatitudes like that on Friday will take on happy are the hurting, happy are those who mourn, who suffer.

The Bible's list of things that cause joy is almost counterintuitive to you understand them and hopefully we can bring some understanding to these principles as we go through this passage of Scripture together.

Never has there been a time when more people are trying to find happiness than today. We think we know an answer that the world doesn't talk about very much. We found that answer in the Scripture so thankful for all of you who are helping us during the summer months as we continue to battle the coronavirus and try to figure out how to get life back going again. The one thing that continues to happen is everyday. We teach the Scripture and every day.

Many of your listening and you are joining us in our Bible study and you're telling us about through your emails and your letters and were so grateful to have this growing congregation when everything seems like it's not growing when crowds are diminished in the churches and in the malls what's happening on the Internet and women is just beyond understanding in a huge, huge number of people are listening to the radio. A huge number of people are watching on television, and many many hundreds of thousands of people are listening. God takes the things that the enemy means for evil, and he makes them from good limits of that right now.

Take good notes.

Probably never experienced anything like this again. At least I hope you don't. But in the meantime, God's teaching is something let's be faithful to him tomorrow for more information on Dr. Jeremiah series how to be happy.

According to Jesus, visit our website that we offered to help in strengthening the magazine Turning Points and now devotional sign up today@davidjeremiah.org/radio that when you do ask for your copy of Bible study John divinity of Christ. It's not of the Jeremiah Bible study series individual study tours for the gift of any amount you can also purchase the Jeremiah study the English standard and international vision as well as an standard or large print in the new King James in your choice of several attractive, options, visit Jeremiah.org/radio 50 times. Join us tomorrow as we continue to be happy. According to Jesus, that's here on Turning Point for taking time to listen to and from these in