Matthew 5:3 Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Jesus is calling on us to humble ourselves before Him. We are not prominent, proud, pompous, powerful, people who can get what we want. We need Him. We are to come humbly asking Him to work in our lives.
I want to be careful to die to myself. I want to let God live through me so that this verse can be right for me. Tozer had this to say about the ordinary world we live in compared to what Jesus was teaching.
In the world of men, we find nothing approaching the virtues of which Jesus spoke in the opening words of the famous Sermon on the Mount. Instead of poverty of spirit we find the rankest kind of pride; instead of mourners we find pleasure seekers; instead of meekness, arrogance; instead of hunger after righteousness we hear men saying, “I am rich and increased with goods and have need of nothing”; instead of mercy we find cruelty; instead of purity of heart, corrupt imaginings; instead of peacemakers we find men quarrelsome and resentful; instead of rejoicing in mistreatment we find them fighting back with every weapon at their command.
A. W. Tozer, The Pursuit of God (Camp Hill, PA: WingSpread, 2006), 103–104.
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