What Are The Beatitudes?
What Do They Mean To Me?
The Beatitudes are ATTITUDES that should BE in your life!
The Beatitudes are God's children's characteristics!
The Beatitudes are a blueprint for happiness!
The Beatitudes are a foundation for building a home in Heaven!
Verses 3 -thru- 6 are inward-directed, while Verses 7 -thru- 12 are outward-directed!
They will be the law of this world during the Millennial Reign of Christ Jesus!
They express Christ Jesus' mind to His disciples, even today!
In Matthew 5:1-16 is shown the relationship of the Kingdom of God to your self!
God's advice is:
"Be emptied of self to be filled with God!"
Throughout the Beatitudes, the word "BLESSED" means:"Spiritually Prosperous!" |
The Latin word for blessed, prosperous or fortunate is "beatus", from which we get the word "Beatitude".
About spiritual prosperity, see: James 4:8-10; and Psalms 1:1-3
BORN AGAIN
Verse 3 - "Blessed are the poor in spirit; for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven."
This first Beatitude (Verse 3) is the foundational key to all of God's other blessings.
Christ Jesus says: You are to lay your spiritual pride in the dust, for even God cannot spiritually fill you while you are already spiritually full of yourself. Empty yourself of spiritual pride, make yourself spiritually poor, and God will bless you by making you spiritually prosperous.
For most all people, their greatest spiritual need is to discover and understand the depth of their great spiritual need.
All humans are born naturally poor in spirit; i.e. unreceptive to God's Holy Spirit; spiritually dead from God's perspective. Human souls do not become spiritually dead to God's Holy Spirit during their lifetimes, they have been born in that spiritually dead condition ever since the days of Adam.
However, human genius has invented and conjured-up myriad forms of merely human spirituality in an attempt to fill the deeply felt, tangible, spiritual void left by an absence of authentic contact with God's Holy Spirit.
That merely human level of spirituality is what the world knows as "Religion".
Christianity is NOT a "Religion", Christianity is a Kingdom, it is a relationship with God through Christ Jesus. Being "Born-Again" frees or releases one from "Religion", those former powerless rituals, those former worthless ceremonies, those former suspect sacraments - NOT found in the Holy Scriptures - that comprised one's former "Religious" and spiritual beliefs or practices.
The Bible is what GOD! says.
"Religion" is what MAN! says God says.
The world is full of pious and devout "Religious" practitioners seeking and questing after transcendental contact and experiences with God. While truly "Born-Again" believers in Christ Jesus have THAT much-sought-after spiritual contact with the REAL God which the other seekers and questers so ardently endeavor to find in man-made "Religion"!
Do not enter into the imaginary psychological construct that "poor in spirit" could mean either humbleness, contriteness, despair or low self-esteem, for it has no such meaning here. That attitude about the meaning of "poor in spirit" is self-deception by entry-level Christians, or it is self-delusion by wishful-thinking spiritual lightweights who reside in a theological fantasy-land.
When you stop being spiritually prideful; when you stop deceiving yourself through vanity and philosophy; when you realize, psychologically, you are spiritually bankrupt, and desperately need a saviour because you have no ability to please God in and of yourself (Romans 3:9-12); when you admit that you are weak, spiritually, in the face of trials and testings; and admit that without Christ Jesus' spiritual help your soul is really hurting; you will be led to become "Born-Again", that second (spiritual) birth which activates (catalyzes) spiritual contact with God through His Holy Spirit.
Christ Jesus announced that after your natural (of water) birth that brought you into this world as a living soul you must also be born of the spirit.
"Born-Again" means you believe Christ Jesus is the Son of God; is your Lord; is your Saviour; is your High Priest; it means you accept that He died for your sins and that through Him sins are forgiven; and you accept that He arose again from the dead, is alive today in Heaven, and is to soon return for those souls whom HE considers to be His own believers.
And becoming authentically "Born-Again" opens you up to baptism in the Holy Spirit, making you eligible to receive God's spiritual blessings in your new spiritual life, leading to...
Which puts one on God's short-list of people whose prayers He even hears!
Since you naturally are born with only human-level spirituality; born spiritually bankrupt; born spiritually dead to God's Holy Spirit; then IF you expect to see, or enter into, the Kingdom of Heaven you absolutely MUST become spiritually prosperous by being spiritually...
BORN - AGAIN!
About "Born-Again", see: JOHN, Chapter 3
REPENTANCE AND
FORGIVENESS
Verse 4 - "Blessed are they that mourn; for they shall be comforted."
Mourners are sorrowful and heartbroken.
The guilt that convicts us causes us to mourn because of our sins.
Once you realize that in spite of all your self-actualized goodness, fairness, kindness, justification, sanctification, and in spite of all your loving charitable works, that you do not qualify for salvation or heaven if you are not spiritually "Born-Again", you will come to Christ Jesus in genuinely authentic (not false) repentance for all your sins.
For even one tiny little sin is problematical if you have not confessed it to Christ Jesus and repented by committing that sin no more, ever.
And, don't imagine you can confess and repent of the same sin over and over again, for the spiritual fact is that once you confess and repent of a particular sin you must turn-away from that confessed sin and never commit it ever again, or else your repentance is not genuinely authentic.
If you can get-into sin and NOT be troubled or bothered by it, you are NOT a child of God!
Once you are "Born-Again"; once you confess your sins to Christ Jesus; and once you truly repent (in a genuinely authentic manner) by putting those particular sins behind you forever; you receive God's forgiveness. And being spiritually "Born-Again" opens you up to baptism in the Holy Spirit, making you eligible to receive God's spiritual blessings in your new spiritual life.
Many sin and do nothing effective or permanent about it.
Where there is no mourning there is no confession or repentance; where there is no repentance there is no forgiveness or spiritual blessing from God; where there is no forgiveness from God there is no salvation.
(1 JOHN 1:9) (MICAH 7:1-7)
And please keep in mind Christ Jesus' words: "For if you forgive men their sins against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive your sins; But if you forgive NOT men their sins against you, NEITHER will your heavenly Father forgive your sins." Matthew 6: 14-15 - Literal Expanded Version. |
Remember, Christ Jesus called the Holy Spirit "The Comforter", to be sent at Pentecost.
MOURNING OVER YOUR SINS LEADS TO REPENTANCE.
REPENTANCE LEADS TO FORGIVENESS.
FORGIVENESS LEADS TO SPIRITUAL COMFORT.
RELIEF FROM FEELINGS OF GUILT FOR YOUR SINS IS SPIRITUAL COMFORT.
RELIEF FROM FEAR OF CONDEMNATION IN HELL FOR YOUR SINS IS SPIRITUAL COMFORT.
SPIRITUAL BLESSING FROM GOD IS COMFORT.
About "The Comforter", see: JOHN 14:15-18 JOHN 14:26 JOHN 15:26
GROWTH IN GRACE
Verse 5 - "Blessed are the meek; for they shall inherit the Earth."
Meekness means you are under God's spiritual control.
Here, meekness is not a contrite or humble spirit in the face of an ugly, unfair and unjust Gentile dominated (unbeliever dominated) world.
Meekness means: Once you are "Born-Again", once you are spiritually activated to God through His Holy Spirit, your new-found spiritual power and your considerable spiritual authority are constrained (by God) so that God, through His Holy Spirit, can spiritually lead you, spiritually teach you, and spiritually prove and test you in Holy righteousness and in practical spirituality.
Holy righteousness means that once you are familiar with God's entire Word, Witness, Testimony and Counsel, Christ Jesus will come in unto you and live (inside you) the Holy, righteous, spiritual life He wants you to lead without much pious or devotional input on your part. Christ Jesus does the spiritual hard work concerning morality and righteousness that humans (even "Born-Again" Christian humans) can not successfully accomplish to God's satisfaction on their own. Your meekness, here, means that you yield spiritual control over to Him, for He will direct your paths from here on out.
Practical spirituality means (At that same level of spiritual achievement.) God will prevent His authentically "Born-Again" believers from running-off-at-the-mouth spiritually. He will constrain His own from unauthentic spiritual endeavors like the flesh-fed worldly practice of babbling in uninterpreted tongues while claiming an enhanced level of spirituality; and He will prevent genuinely "saved" believers from advocating the false gospel of "Health and Wealth" as if it were an absolutely guaranteed blessing from God.
GOD'S GRACE IS GOD'S OWN LOVE IN ACTION.
To grow you in grace, so that you will be enabled to inherit the Earth, God through His Word will start you with spiritual milk like a newborn babe, and He will grow you in grace up to the point where you can mentally digest spiritual meat. Where you will then be able, through His power, strength and mighty dominion of genuine authority and holiness, to trust and believe God's promises for you. Where you will be led to find His narrow path of righteousness, for you now have His Truth for how you are to spiritually conduct yourself. Where you will be enabled to find the strait (strict) gate that leads to salvation, for you have become an heir to God's Kingdom while alive on this Earth.
In your meekness, God spiritually changes you from a "Born-Again" nebbish (a spiritually foolish, out-of-control, child-like believer) to a "Born-Again" mensch (a spiritually mature, under-control, somewhat-perfected, believer) without letting you become too rambunctious and over-the-top, spiritually, before you are ready to become an effective witness for Christ Jesus.
The spiritually meek shall inherit the Earth, but not those who are out of God's spiritual control. The spiritually mature will commune with God through His Holy Spirit, while the spiritually child-like will be left to their own fleshy and worldly spiritual devices.
God gives you a little taste of the grapes from the "Promised Land", and He even gives you a little glimpse of the "Promised Land" itself; for said "Promised Land" is God's spiritual rest, which is the Earth that the meek inherit.
About "Meekness", see: MATTHEW 11: 28-30 JAMES 1:21
SPIRITUAL FUFILLMENT
Verse 6 - "Blessed are they who do hunger and thirst after righteousness; for they shall be filled."
Divine Righteousness - as opposed to Self Righteousness.
Those who have had a little taste of the grapes from the "Promised Land", and those who have even caught a little glimpse of it from afar, will develop a continuing spiritual appetite.
They will feed this continuing spiritual appetite by seeking God's will by the method of seeking His righteousness and holiness through His entire Word, Witness, Testimony and Counsel to find happiness in His grace and in His spirit. Matthew 6:33
Your spiritual fulfillment will demonstrate that you have been to spiritual Zion and, through Christ Jesus, are actually anointed to lead others to God's salvation - if they will come.
Spiritual seekers who are in God's Word (in Christ Jesus) and have God's words abiding alive inside of them will be filled with righteousness.
The only level of righteousness we can attain to as mortal humans is spiritual (Divine) righteousness.
THE MAGNIFICENCE OF MERCY
Verse 7 - "Blessed are the merciful; for they shall obtain mercy."
Mercy is compassion in action; it is not softness, it is not sentiment.
It is by God's mercy we are renewed daily.
It is by God's mercy that we are not all consumed in condemnation.
The time will come when you will want God's mercy more than anything in the universe. If you are not a genuinely authentic possessor of salvation, that time will be the occasion when Christ Jesus initiates the "Great White Throne" judgment day referred to in Revelation 20:11-15.
God's chosen ones demonstrate mercy by combining pity with action; and this will lead to being the object of God's mercy. You can definitely depend on God's forgiveness and mercy when you are actually forgiving and actively merciful to all others. Love the Lord your God completely, love your neighbor as you love yourself, and love your enemies.
BASIS OF MERCY
God is just: Sin must be punished.
Showing mercy is to withhold judgment when it is due.
God is not fair: You deserve hell, but God is willing to forgive.
BLESSINGS OF MERCY
The upright are merciful. PSALMS 18:25
Mercy reproaches judgment. JAMES 2:13
Those who have received God's mercy are most able to show mercy to others.
If you are NOT merciful, you are NOT an authentic Christian!
A church congregation without mercy is a fraud!
RITUAL AND
SPIRITUAL CLEANSING
Verse 8 - "Blessed are the pure of heart; for they shall see God."
Purity, as referred to in the Bible, is a lack of ritual and spiritual contamination with pagan, heathen religious and devotional practices or beliefs.
The heart, as referred to in the Bible, is the center of your mental, emotional and moral being.
You see God when you see His truth (John 5:24) and knowing His truth leads to fellowship with God.
God loves you just as you are, but He does not want to let you remain in your current spiritual condition.
God wants you ritually and spiritually cleansed through His entire Word, Witness, Testimony and Counsel; and He wants your sins cleansed (sins forgiven and guilty feelings removed) by the blood of Christ Jesus.
God wants you ritually and spiritually cleansed (Accomplished in you by God; to His satisfaction!) in order for you to become ritually eligible and spiritually enabled to come boldly before His Throne of Grace in prayer without a guilty conscience.
AGENTS OF PEACE
Verse 9 - "Blessed are the peacemakers; for they shall be called the Sons of God."
First comes pureness of heart, then comes spiritual peace.
End your ritual and spiritual war with God and find peace through Christ Jesus.
If you practice or believe anything "Religious" that God considers pagan or heathen,
you are ritually and spiritually at war with God.
You will be peaceful with God only when you first receive personal, spiritual peacefulness by your forgiveness of others, and then by your knowing that Christ Jesus has forgiven your own sins.
Through faith in actually being forgiven, you can peacefully function ritually and spiritually without guilt or without fear of judgment and condemnation from a fierce, angry, wrathful God.
Christ Jesus makes no truce with sin, you must surrender to His Lordship to find spiritual peace.
DON'T pray for peace, PRAY for righteousness and you will find peace!
Authentically finding this spiritual peace leads to an inheritance as a Son of God.
GALATIANS 3:26 ROMANS 5:11 ROMANS 10:15 ROMANS 12:18 PHILIPPIANS 4:7
Believe God and that He can do these things for you; then you can exchange your strength for God's strength.
When you find His spiritual rest and peace is when the exchange of strength happens.
PREPARING FOR
PERSECUTION
Verse 10 - "Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake; for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven."
Verse 11 - "Blessed are you, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake."
Verse 12 - "Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you."
Take a stand for Christ Jesus and you will be persecuted.
Christians are to be different from the world, which makes Christians divisive.
Christians who are truly authentic and who are genuine possessors of salvation are not of this world. Christians are chosen-out of this world, and the world hates effective evangelical Christians without a cause.
You can conform to the world and never be persecuted. "SECRET" Christians are ineffective, but safe from the world's persecution of Christians. Christ Jesus calls that strategy a cop-out.
Christians are not to please other people, Christians are to please Christ Jesus by being a testimony against the sinfulness of this world. Christians are to be the "salt" of the earth, and salt irritates the worldly, salt stings sinners, when God's Word is rubbed into this decaying putrefying world it burns like it is salted with fire. Christians are to be the "light" of the world, and light reveals spiritual truth, light exposes religious lies, light illuminates the darkness where sin abides. Being "salt" and "light" attracts attention, and once an effective evangelical Christian is noticed they are open to persecution.
The world does not hate the helpless baby Jesus in a manger or in His mother's arms; the world does not hate the helpless, crucified, dead Jesus hanging on the cross; the world does not hate the kindly Jesus who healed the sick and fed the multitudes. Those views or aspects of Jesus offend no one. The world hates the resurrected Christ Jesus who will put an end to the works of Satan. The Name and the cause of Christ Jesus offends the world.
If you are not persecuted, reviled and lied about one wonders if your witness and your testimony are the ones God wants for you?
MARK 13:9-13 LUKE 21:12-17 PHILIPPIANS 1:29 2 TIMOTHY 3:12 1 PETER 4:14-19
For you to make a firm spiritual impression and receive a strong reaction you must demonstrate the reality of the life of Christ Jesus shining forth in your life, your witness and your testimony.
If you partake of God's righteousness you are led to rejoicing and gladness over great rewards in heaven, and you develop patience in persecutions, in sufferings and in trials.
God's highest goal is not your physical comfort but your spiritual comfort. God's will and purposes supersede your physical comfort.
Christians will be persecuted if they are fully committed to evangelization of the gospel of the kingdom in God's mighty power, strength and truth. So rejoice and be exceedingly glad. Shout, sing, leap, jump, dance and be happy. Somehow the world has identified you as a Christian and the world now hates you because of Christ Jesus' name.
ASK YOURSELF: If, in the future, the government began rounding-up "suspected" Christians (including "secret" Christians), and if Christians were dragged into court and put on trial for the crime of being authentic Christians, and if YOU were put on trial too, would there be enough (or any) evidence of your Christianity to convict you? Would the evidence convict you of being a True - Bible Reading - Word Knowing - God Centered - Christ Jesus Abiding Christian? Or would you escape conviction because there was not enough (or not any) evidence for the world to declare that you are guilty of being a Christian?
ISAIAH 40:28-31 HEBREWS 11:1 -and- 33-34
WHAT FOLLOWS THE BEATITUDES?
IN MATTEW, CHAPTER 5
There are wonderful instructions on
how to NOT be a "Secret" Christian.
Verse 13 - "The Salt Of The Earth" Verse 14 - "The Light Of The World" |
And: Don't Miss The Seven [7] Beatitudes
Found In The Book Of Revelation
Rev. 1:3 - BLESSED is he who reads and those who hear the words of the prophecy, and heed the things which are written in it; for the time is near.
Rev. 14:13 - And I heard a voice from heaven, saying, "Write, 'BLESSED are the dead who die in the Lord from now on!'" "Yes," says the Spirit, "so that they may rest from their labors, for their deeds follow with them."
Rev. 16:15 - ("Behold, I am coming like a thief. BLESSED is the one who stays awake and keeps his clothes, so that he will not walk about naked and men will not see his shame.")
Rev. 19:9 - Then he said to me, "Write, 'BLESSED are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb '" And he said to me, "These are true words of God."
Rev. 20:6 - BLESSED and holy is the one who has a part in the first resurrection; over these the second death has no power, but they will be priests of God and of Christ and will reign with Him for a thousand years.
Rev. 22:7 - And behold, I am coming quickly: BLESSED is he who heeds the words of the prophecy of this book."
Rev. 22:14-15 - BLESSED are those that do His commandments, so that they may have the right to the tree of life, and may enter by the gates into the city. Outside are the dogs and the sorcerers and the immoral persons and the murderers and the idolaters, and everyone who loves and practices falsehood.
