Luke 6:20-23 English Standard Version The Beatitudes 20 And he lifted up his eyes on his disciples, and said: “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God. 21 “Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you shall be satisfied. “Blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh. 22 “Blessed are you when people hate you and when they exclude you and revile you and spurn your name as evil, on account of the Son of Man! 23 Rejoice in that day, and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in heaven; for so their fathers did to the prophets. Jesus' identity has been established by the angelic messengers, His Father speaking from heaven, His overcoming temptation, and the signs and wonders that He has performed (and all the prophecies that His birth and ministry have fulfilled to this point).
This is Luke's very condensed form of the Beatitudes that we see in Matthew 5, and it reads slightly different, though the words ring with pretty much the same message. In Matthew 5 we read instead, "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." "Poor" or "Poor in spirit" here is not referring to one's economic status or the size of your bank account or how much money you carry around in your wallet or change purse or money bag. It is Jesus' pointing them to their spiritual bank account. Remember that he's just had conversations with the self-righteous Pharisees who think they are not like the spiritually bankrupt "sinners and tax collectors" that Jesus has been hanging out with. Jesus is saying once again that those that realize they are sick and need a doctor are blessed. They will come to God knowing they bring Him nothing other than their broken and contrite heart, and they will not be turned away and will be blessed for how they humbly approach God. The will be counted among those who inherit the kingdom of God (Jesus will talk much more about the "kingdom of God" or the "kingdom of heaven" as we continue). Again, this second Beatitude is about a spiritual principle, but it's not clear that it is unless we compare it to Matthew's version that says, "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied." We aren't simply talking about those with hungry bellies and saying everyone who is hungry will get enough food to eat. We know that's not true as Jesus will tell us in Scripture that we will always have the poor among us. We do have compassion on the poor and the hungry and the homeless, but this verse is pointing us towards those who hunger and thirst for a relationship with God and that deeply desire to have the righteousness that can only be imputed onto us by Him. Jesus says that when we desire to once again be made in His image and desire His righteousness to fill us that we will be filled to overflowing. This is not the self-righteousness of the Pharisees, but the work of the Holy Spirit living in and through us. This next one is very similar in both accounts. Those who mourn will be comforted and their weeping will be turned into gladness. What is that about? What is it that brings us sorrow in this life that we will forget about in the life to come and we will exchange for all the blessings that the Lord has for us? This probably partially points to us mourning and grieving over our sin and how it has offended and hurt God and broken our relationship with Him, and we can be sure that He will comfort us as He has taken our sin away and made it as far as the east is from the west and will remember it no more--it will never be counted or held against us. There are also many other things that we will "lose" in this life that will make us weep, specifically we will give up jobs, homes, friends and family members because we love Jesus supremely and must follow Him in obedience wherever He leads--some will even lose their physical lives, but no one can actually take your life because you are eternal and you are simply transported to heaven if you belong to God, "To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord." So then our time of trial and misery here living as aliens and ambassadors in a nation that is many times hostile towards us is only temporary, but the cost is worth it when compared to the everlasting joy that will be ours when we are united with Jesus, or Beloved, forever and ever. He will reign in perfect righteousness and justice will roll off His shoulders like His royal robes. Of His kingdom and dominion there will be no end, and He shall reign forever and ever. Philippians 3:7-11 English Standard Version 7 But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. 8 Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ 9 and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith-- 10 that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, 11 that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead. I've already talked a bit about the next one (as did Paul in the passage I quoted from Philippians 3:7-11). You will be blessed even though all men speak all kind of evil against you and hate you and do the same kinds of things to you that they did (or tried to do) to Jesus and the prophets of the Old Testament. The world has always hated God and his messengers (see the Parable of the Tenants). The world lives in rebellion to its King and when He sends His envoys they are abused, mistreated, and even killed as a message to the King of the rebellion. The King eventually would send His own Son saying "Surely they will listen to Him" (this is the Father sending Jesus to us). But they would do the same to Jesus as they had done to the others and thinks that somehow if they kill the Blessed One, that they would somehow be able to steal His blessing and inheritance. That's not how it works. Instead the King and all His wrath will be poured out on those who are wicked. One day justice will be done and those who have been the target of the world's abuse and mistreatment for the sake of the gospel will be vindicated and rewarded (and we will throw those rewards at the feet of Jesus to show how worthy He is) and those who have lived in rebellion to the King and His gospel message will be judged in an eternity of hellfire not only because their sin debt already is infinite in measure, but because they will never stop sinning and hating God and living in rebellion to Him even when they are in hell--they will never repent. There are no second chances. "It is appointed man once to die, and after that the judgment." There are no after-death conversions. We will forever remain in whatever state we were in when we died. None of these things sound like things we would rejoice or be happy over. Jesus will teach more on most of these issues throughout Him ministry, but this would be intriguing to people as this was the exact opposite of what they expected to hear. They imagined God's favor and blessing would look like riches and full bellies and a life free of trouble (the false gospel that we hear so much now called "the prosperity gospel" was pretty much taught by the Pharisees and was a false gospel based on God's blessings being in proportion to your own self-righteousness. If you did good things, God would bless you. If you did bad things, God would punish you). This doesn't make any sense to the casual observer, but to those of us who have lived through it, it makes complete sense that we know God more deeply as we go through the hard times and lean on Him even more. How we respond in the "bad" times (which is still for our good and His glory) speaks much louder to the world about how genuine our faith us. The devil said of Job that he only loved God because God blessed him so greatly, but if the LORD would take away His blessing and take away Job's health and comfort, the devil was sure that Job would curse God. It didn't happen. Job wasn't sure why it was happening, but Job never really questioned the goodness of God. Job 1:21 English Standard Version 21 And he said, “Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.” I encourage you all to read the book of Job at some point if you haven't already. It shows us that these Beatitudes are true and were true in the Old Testament. This is not something new for us starting here in the Gospels. May we also love God so supremely that even if we lose everything else around us that we will not stop loving Him or wanting all that He has to offer us in Himself and the blessings that are not merely for this life, but more importantly for eternity to come, and may we also be about telling others how they too can experience God's blessing and favor forever and ever (though it may not mean living what they think is their "best life now"). Comments are closed.
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Daniel WestfallI will mostly use this space for recording my "journal" from my daily devotions as I hope to encourage others to read the Bible along with me and to leave a legacy for others. Archives
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