A Year-Long Journey Through the Sermon on the Mount: Week 5

Chapter 5 – Poverty of Spirit

 

Two of the authors of this chapter talk about being poor, poverty, and scarcity. Philip Yancey wonders “why God would single out the poor for special attention over any other group?” (28) He quotes from another writer the supposed advantages of being poor and contrasts them to the disadvantages of being rich. For example, “the poor know they are in urgent need of redemption” whereas “the rich do not know they are in urgent need of redemption.” (28-29) His point was that the poor know better the grace of God than those who are rich and his focus was on the reasoning behind why many clergy, monks, and saints take a vow of poverty. Dorothy Day also focuses on the vow of poverty taken by saints of the past with her point being that the joyful acceptance of hardship lead to a thriving community.

 

Reading Eberhard Arnold’s portion of this chapter, he speaks about the powerlessness of man, about how we can do nothing without God. To feel the full effect of God’s grace, one must dismantle our own power. To feel the power of the kingdom of God, we must relinquish our own power. In doing so, “we declare our dependence on grace.” (32)

 

I have always understood the beatitude of “blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” to be going beyond being financially poor, therefore I lean more into Arnold’s take on the poverty of spirit. Letting go of power and putting all trust in God is not easy. Especially when you look around at what’s happening today. How can one possibly feel blessed when the world is crumbling around them? How can a person feel blessed when they are being told they are less than human, when an entire gender is being erased from history, when human rights are disappearing faster than you can blink? Where is the kingdom of God in all of this?

 

As Arnold states, “Let us use this day to give glory to God.” (32) The Holy Spirit is awakening the power of the ally. People are waking up to what’s happening and are starting to fight back. Blessed are the poor in spirit because they have relinquished their power to the Triune God, and they will have the strength of the entire Kingdom of God behind them. And when that happens, nothing will be able to stop them.