Poverty of Spirit Part 2: Biblical Examples

Defining Poverty of Spirit and the Kingdom of Heaven

0:02 Again, for the fifth chapter of the Gospel of Matthew, to consider further this morning this foundational statement of the Lord Jesus, which stands at the very opening of this Sermon on the Mount, which we are studying in these Sunday morning services, Matthew 5 and verse 3, Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

0:38 You'll remember that last week we considered what is this kingdom of heaven.

0:45 It has three aspects, the past, the present, and the future. And when the Lord Jesus said, Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven, he was referring primarily to the second aspect. Blessed is the kingdom of heaven, the rule and reign of Jesus Christ by the grace of God in a human heart. For the Scripture says in Colossians 1, we have been delivered out of the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of the Lord Jesus.

1:19 And whenever a man or woman is born of the Spirit, they are brought into not only the family of God, but the kingdom of God, implying very clearly that they've come under the rule and dominion of Jesus Christ. Christ the Lord, who has now become the King of grace to them. Last week we tried to discover what the Lord Jesus did not mean when he said, Blessed are the poor in spirit. He was not speaking of physical poverty.

1:48 He was not speaking of a natural shyness or diffidence. If you used that word last week, fellows and girls, remember he said that's a good word to use and impress your teacher, the word diffidence, a natural retiring spirit, the Lord Jesus would not say. He was not referring to that. He was not talking about merely mouthing the phraseology of humility.

2:09 He was not speaking of a false sense of humility that makes us shirk from responsibility. But we saw at the close of our message last week that poverty of spirit is essentially what those two words reveal, poor and spirit. Blessed are the poor in spirit. And the word poor means?

2:33 It means lacking a normal sufficiency so that a man who's poor in spirit is a man who acknowledges he doesn't have what it takes when he stands before God. Poor in spirit. It's not a poverty that's merely learned by the mind. It's a poverty, a consciousness of my destitute nature in the deep inner recesses of my heart.

3:03 Poor. Poor in spirit. We come this morning to turn to the scriptures and see if we can find illustrations of this matter of poverty of spirit. It's so foundational, the Lord Jesus sets it out as the very basis of all the other characteristics which we're going to see described in the Beatitudes.

Initial Poverty of Spirit: Entrance into the Kingdom

3:29 And being such a basic character trait, character trait of those in the Kingdom of Heaven, we should expect that we should expect that we should expect that we should expect that we should ask God to allow such a person as temosia to, the interests of others, such an miniature living creature as this priceless man who comes with us to this world who tells us everything about their test and human life and, in fact, aspects that in Christ the Father has often looked upon as different from our own conditions is the BI. Voices are manifest. These are😂 meant when he said, perfectly happy are the poor in spirit. The New Testament, many illustrations, but we'll limit ourselves to two or three. Now, this matter of being poor in spirit is a condition which will always attend the entrance of a man or woman into the kingdom of God, and then it will characterize the abiding attitude of the person who has entered. Do you follow me? Fletch are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Upon

4:48 entering into that kingdom, they were made poor in spirit, and the fact that they are members of that kingdom will be evidence in that they are continually giving evidence of poverty of spirit. Now, let's think of it in this two-fold way. First of all, the initial poverty of spirit, which always attends the entrance of a soul into the kingdom of God. This is just another way of saying, blessed are those who have experienced true conviction of sin, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. For no man or woman ever enters the kingdom of heaven until, first of all, they enter the kingdom of God. Second, there is attending that entrance a painful discovery of the exceeding sinfulness of sin, which causes him to stand in desperate need of the grace of God offered to us in Jesus Christ the Lord. One picture is worth a thousand words, so let's take a picture, even though it's a word picture. You'll remember in Luke chapter 18, Jesus drew a contrast between two men who went up into the temple to pray. I believe back some months

6:11 ago, I preached a sermon one Sunday morning on those two men. And the one man stood thus with himself and prayed, saying, I thank thee I am not his other man. Then he gave his credentials. And then the other man, a publican, it says, stood afar off, and would not so much as lift up his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his breast sin.

6:36 And the other man, a publican, was saying, God be merciful, or God be propitiated to me, a sinner. Here's a marvelous illustration of the poverty of spirit which always attends the entrance of the soul into the kingdom of heaven. For Jesus said, that man went down to his house justified. He went down a member and subject of the kingdom of God. Now what was he doing? He was not doing something that would make him a sinner. He was doing something that would make him a sinner. He was not doing something that would make him a sinner. He his father and mother had taught him to do if he was going to be a good boy. The standing afar off from the inner place of the temple, standing at probably the very gate of the outer part of the temple there in Jerusalem, the casting of the eyes to the ground, the not-so-much-as-looking-up-to-heaven, the beating upon the breast was not the mere mechanical response of something that he had been taught to do. These were but poor, outward expressions

7:41 of the deep inner awareness of his heart that as he stood before God, he was nothing, he had nothing, he could do nothing to effect his acceptance in the presence of a holy being.

8:03 This man knew what it was to be poor. To be brought to the place where he was so stripped down by the consciousness of his guilt and depravity, and remember, he wasn't a man who was in dire physical need. He wasn't just hopping on the religious bandwagon to have God help him out of a pinch. He was a publican, and like most publicans, most of those tax collectors, he was no doubt well-to-do, as Matthew was. And so it wasn't a sense of physical need that drove him to this expression of deep poverty. It was the revelation that as he approached the holy God, all he could do was stand off at a distance and cry, God, have mercy on me, a sinner, and he dared not so much as lift up his eyes to heaven, the dwelling place of that holy God before whom he felt so unclean. This man could sing long before the words were written, just as I am without one plea. That thy blood was shed for me, and that thou didst me come to thee, O Lamb of God, I come,

9:15 just as I am, poor, wretched, blind, Christ, which is healing of the mind, yea, all I need in thee I find, O Lamb of God, I come. This man knew this by experience. That's what poverty of spirit is. It's that deep inner awareness that before a holy God, I have nothing to commend myself to him.

9:42 Then we see another expression. Another illustration in the life of the prodigal, the prodigal son. The young man who, when he left his house, was barking loud about his rights. I want what's due to me. I want what's coming to me. I want to do this, and I want to do this. And he was just so cocky and sweating about, exerting his own adamant ego, that he began to be in want. The Scripture says he came to himself. When he comes back to his father, what does he say? He says, I want you to know this, dear. When he came back to his father, he didn't say, Look, Dad, I've made a mess of things, and I'm really down and out. And you know, it's a terrible thing to be hungry. And I know you're my father, and you'd feed me. And I have confidence

10:30 in your father's heart, so I need some food. Can you help me? No, he didn't come talking about food, though he was hungry. He didn't come and say, Look, Dad, I'm getting kind of tired of running around in rags, and I'm getting kind of sick of having people hold their nose when I walk by. I'd like to be in a place where I can be a little bit more away, so I can have a bath once in a while, and a decent change of clothes. And I know you'd give me that. No, he didn't come concerned about any of his physical needs, though he had plenty. He was hungry. He was destitute. He was penniless. But he said, I will arise and go to my father and say what? Father, I've seen in thy sight, and in the sight of heaven, and am no more worthy to be called thy son. And that's when he came to his father, expressing the consciousness, not that he was longing for some delivery. He was longing for some deliverance out of the difficulty that his sin had brought upon him, but it was the sin itself that broke him and drove him back, seeking reconciliation with his father. That's what poverty of spirit is. It's not necessarily the drunkard groveling

11:34 in his spew and saying, Oh, God, help me out of this mess. He may be as proud as the devil. It's not the family who's been bereft of physical things, and in a sense of utter helplessness cries out to somebody. It's not the family who's been bereft of physical things, and in a sense of utter helplessness cries out to somebody. It's not the family who's been bereft of physical things, and in a sense of utter helplessness cries out to somebody. Oh, God, help me. Oh, no, this is not poverty of spirit. Poverty of spirit is always attended with the language of the bitter awareness that we've sinned and offended a holy God.

12:06 You see, one man, the publican, who had no physical need, another one, the prodigal, who had tremendous physical need, and yet their language is both the same. It's the language of the deep inner awareness that they've offended. is God, and that's the thing that brings into the presence of God this deep awareness of faith. I'm disturbed by the contrast between the hymnody of another generation and much of the hymnody of our day. And if you have FM sets, you listen to this WFME. Some good things come over there. I'm not wiping it off with one stroke of the hand, but I'm disturbed by much of the music, modern hymnody and modern Christian music, so-called. You notice the concept is about Jesus being our lover and being our guide and being our friend. I want one to be close beside me, one to guide me, one to help me. But the older hymnody

13:07 had a different note. And you know what the note was? It was the note of coming to Jesus with a sense of guilt and of shame, not a sense of anxiety. And taking him as my heavenly lover, but a sense of guilt and taking him as my substitute, a sense of defilement and taking him as the one who could cleanse. And so we take some of the old English hymns, the one I quoted earlier, Jesus, thy blood and righteousness, my beauty are my glorious dress. Mid flaming worlds in these arrayed with joy shall I lift up my head. Come ye sinners, cool and rest. Weak and wounded, sick and sore, Jesus ready stands to save you. Full of pity, joined

13:57 with power, he is able, he is able, he is able, he is willing. And then the other verses go on, nor of sickness, fondly dream all the sickness he requires is to see your need of him. This is the note that the scripture sounds. Not coming to Christ to find fulfillment of a psychological ache primarily.

14:20 But coming to him conscious of this poverty. I am nothing. I have nothing. I can do nothing.

The Necessity of Poverty of Spirit for Salvation

14:30 I stand in need of one to plead my cause before the fox. This is the poverty of the spirit which is always characteristic of those who enter the kingdom of heaven. So we may set it down as an absolute rule that this work must be done in your heart. If you are to have any grounds to claim that you are a member of the kingdom of heaven.

14:56 You see, all of us are poor and blind and naked, but the problem is we don't know. We're all this way. By nature and by practice, we're poor, we're blind, we're naked, but we don't know it. Like the lay of the sins, we know not that we are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked. And God in his mercy wants to give us true riches, but he's never going to force them on us. He wants to give us. True sight, but he's not going to force it on us. God wants to give us true purity of garments, but he's not going to force them on us. So what must be done? The spirit of God must open our eyes to see that we are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked so that we will look to a source outside of ourselves for heavenly riches, for heavenly garments, for heavenly bread. For heavenly. The spiritual hearing. And so when Jesus said, blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs and theirs only is the kingdom of heaven, he was reminding us that unless there has occurred in your heart and life this painful discovery of your utter poverty in the presence

16:18 of a holy God, you know absolutely nothing of what it means to be in the kingdom of heaven. The experience of the publican, the experience of the prodigal, must be yours, must be mine. God offers the bread of life, but we don't want it. We're feeding on the husk of the world of saints and of time, and we think that that's the bread of life, and the Lord has got to show us what you're eating is husk.

16:52 And then we'll take the bread of life. We drink it polluted streams, and we think those streams are the pure water of life. The Lord's got to convince us that those streams at which we drink are polluted and are defiling and will destroy us before we thirst for the bread of life or the water of life. We think that the garments with which we clothe ourselves seriously are pure, spotless garments, and God's got to show us that it's best, even the best of our garments are as filthy rags in his sight. But God's got to convince us of that. Amen. And before we cry out to be robed in the perfect, spotless righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ, and every man, no matter who he be, will one time in his existence discover his spiritual poverty. Every man. We either discover our spiritual poverty now by the

17:49 illumination of the Holy Spirit as the fire of the convicting Spirit burns through the ear of our respectability and consumes the flimsy rags of our own righteousness, either that painful self-discovery comes by the fire of Holy Spirit conviction now or by the fires of hell later. For Luke chapter 16 records the man whose self-discovery never came in life. It came in eternity, and it was too late. He passed day by day, the beggar.

18:33 His physical poverty was so obvious that before the eye of God, this man's spiritual poverty was just as obvious as the poverty of the beggar. But he didn't know it. And it says after he died in hell, he lifted up his eyes, and the fires of hell exposed to this man. You're wretched. You're miserable. You're poor. You're blind. You're nascent. You have nothing to commend you to God, but you didn't know it. So you never knew it. You didn't know it. So you never sought the riches in Christ. You never sought to be clothed in His perfect righteousness. So now you're there in a place where there's a great gulf fixed, and you're there for eternity. Oh, dear men and women, as we face the words of our Lord Jesus, perfectly happy are the poor in spirit. Don't take them lightly. For unless

19:29 you have come to this place of an awareness of your poverty and your destituteness, you stand in terrible, terrible despotism of having the fires of hell revealed to you, your poverty before God. You say, Pastor, why is this necessary? Well, I think we've already hinted at this. One servant of God said, until we see our wants, we never see Christ's worth. Until we see our wants, we never see Christ's worth. And then he said something else that I believe is so true. He said, until we see our wants, we will never come to Christ on His condition.

20:26 A starving man doesn't bicker with someone who offers him bread. A starving man sees someone holding forth bread, and he says, sir, what must I do to have the bread? And he says, you've got to go down and eat a mouthful of dirt first. You say, all right, but give me bread. You've got to stand on your head for ten minutes. All right, but give me bread.

20:53 You've got to walk on your knees around the block. All right, but give me bread. You see, a starving man doesn't bicker with the only one who can meet his needs. He says, lay down your terms. I'll come and get bread on your terms. A starving man. If you take a man who's twelve, he might just like an extra piece of bread with a little peanut butter and jelly on it for sort of a little dessert. And he comes. He says, hey, I see you've got some bread for me. Yes? Can I have some?

21:24 Well, there's some conditions. What conditions? Forget it. You see, he's not starving. He'll take it or leave. But a man starving takes bread on any condition. Isn't this our basic problem? We bicker with Christ. We have a lot of bickering with Jesus. He turns. If any man will come after me, let him deny himself. Take up his cross and follow me. If any man comes to me, he said to unsaved people in Luke 14. If any man comes to me, he said to me, and hate not father, mother, wife, children, his own life also. He cannot be my disciple.

22:05 I was talking with a pastor who came burdened in heart just several days ago. He was waiting here when I got back from making some hospital calls. And he's all broken up about some people who seem to be saved this past summer when they had special meetings in their church. But now the issues are beginning to press in upon this young man, young married man.

22:28 And then there's a man who's got a lot of bickering. He's got a lot of bickering. He's got a lot of bickering. He's got a lot of bickering. He's got a lot of bickering. He's got a lot of bickering. He's got a lot of bickering. He's got a lot of bickering. He's got a lot of bickering. He's got a lot of bickering. He's got a lot of bickering. He's got a lot of bickering. He's got a lot of bickering. He's got a lot of bickering. He's got a lot of bickering. He's got a lot of bickering. He's got a lot of bickering. He's got a lot of bickering. He's got a lot of bickering. He's got a lot of bickering. He's In the course of this conversation, the pastor was dealing with him about Christ having the place of supreme affection in the heart.

22:35 And he said this to the pastor. He says, you mean that Jesus Christ is to be put even beyond and above my wife? The pastor said, of course. He saw he's to be supreme.

22:47 He said, well, I can tell you one thing right now. If it was a choice between my wife and the Lord, I know what choice I'd make. I'd choose my wife.

22:58 You see what the problem is?

23:01 He thinks he can take or leave the bread. But he's not the made destitute yet. If you really believe that repealing Christ would mean that he's going to a devil's hell without the bread of life to feel the long starvation of a lost soul for eternity, he'd say, if even Christ required for me to leave my wife, I cannot leave him. He's the bread of life.

23:32 He's the only source of hope. And all this. Littering with Jesus is rooted in the fact that we know so little of what it is to be poor in spirit. Isn't it true?

The Blessings and Demands of Poverty of Spirit

23:50 And would the God of the day will soon come upon us as a church summer where through the ministry of this place the Spirit of God reveals to men and women, look, you're just not a person who's done a few bad things and needs a little help. You're wretched. Invisible. You put on your braids and see.

24:11 In this they cry, What must I do to have true riches? What must I do to have bread? We lay out the invitation of the gospel. Jesus says, come.

24:21 There's a free salvation. The offer is free. But as one man of God says, the demands were as total as the offer was free.

24:32 We lay before them, if you want Christ, you must want him on his terms. His terms are absolute submission. Total abandonment. Unreserved commitment.

24:41 Submittal. Dear ones, I've never seen yet a man or woman brought to real poverty of spirit who was not glad to come to Christ on his terms.

24:53 Never once have I seen it. I've seen some who began to move toward Christ and thought they'd hold Christ until you laid out the conditions. Uh-oh, no, no, they didn't want bread. That's bad.

25:07 Sure, they'd like a piece of bread with peanut butter and jelly, but they weren't starving. See the difference? This is why poverty is so great. This is why poverty is so great.

25:14 This is why poverty is so great. Why poverty of spirit is absolutely essential and why it's the mark of everyone who's entered the kingdom of heaven. Someone has said a great cable can't go through the eye of a needle unless you unwind it and put it through a strand at a time.

25:30 And that's what poverty of spirit does. It takes the proud human heart and it unwinds it. The spirit surrenders to the kingdom of heaven. So there is this initial aspect.

25:43 But you say, Pastor, how can such a person be happy? Jesus said happy. Blessed are the poor in spirit. Well, I think you see the answer.

25:52 The blessedness is not so much in the awareness of my emptiness, but the blessedness lies in the fact that my emptiness and the consciousness of it has driven me to Christ.

26:05 The painful discovery of my nakedness has led me to put on his robe of righteousness. The painful discovery of my barrenness has led me to Christ. In whom dwells all the fullness of the Godhead body. Well, so much for the initial.

Continuing Poverty of Spirit: An Abiding Condition

26:26 Now let's think of it as a continuing principle. Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Attending their entrance to the kingdom, poverty of spirit was born in their hearts by the Holy Spirit as a characteristic of God's dealings with them. But our text says, not blessed are, blessed, are those who were poor in spirit, but blessed are the poor in spirit.

26:55 Our Lord Jesus is speaking of an abiding, present condition of heart. Now, do we have this illustrated in the scriptures? I mentioned earlier in the message, we have many illustrations in the Old and New Testaments, but I want to limit myself to two this morning. First of all, we want to think of Moses.

27:12 And I'm going to ask you, if you will please, to turn to Exodus chapter 3. As we behold in Moses a clear illustration, a poverty of spirit in a child of God. You remember that Hebrews 11 says, by faith Moses, when he was come to years, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter, choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season. Moses was, as best we can discern, probably about 40 years of age when he left Egypt.

27:48 And the scripture makes clear that he was a saved man. He did this by faith. He turned his back. He turned his back upon all that Egypt had to offer and identified himself not only with the people of God, but the scripture says, esteeming the reproach of Christ, greater riches than the treasures of Egypt.

28:05 He had enough commitment to whatever revelation he had of Christ. So he was a saved man. But now God puts him in the backside of a wilderness. He's been there, as best we can discern, for about 40 years.

28:20 And now God comes to him and says, time has come to deliver my people. Exodus chapter 3, notice now, verse 9, or verse 8, I am come down to deliver them, my people, out of the hand of the Egyptians, to bring them up out of that land into a good land. Verse 9, And now therefore, behold, the cry of the children of Israel is coming to me. I have seen the oppression wherewith the Egyptians oppressed them.

28:45 Come now therefore, and I will send thee unto Pharaoh, that thou mayest bring forth my people. Now get this, God says in verse 8, I am come down, to deliver my people. Verse 10, I will send thee, that thou mayest deliver my people. You see, God's deliverance is always in terms of the man who will use it.

29:08 I'm going to deliver. Moses, you're going to deliver. Now what was Moses' reaction to this announcing by God? Verse 11, And Moses said unto God, Who am I, that I should go unto Pharaoh, and that I should bring forth the children of Israel out of him?

29:28 Moses' first reaction when God said to him, You're going to be my instrument, Moses, through which the promise given to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob is going to be fulfilled. I promised them a land, and now the time has come to fulfill the promise, and their cries come into my ear. Moses, you're going to be my man. What was Moses' response?

29:50 Did he say, Well, Lord, it's about time. I'm so glad you've made a wise choice. I had my liberal arts education down in Egypt. Now I've had my Bible school education out here in the backside of the wilderness.

30:03 And, Lord, I feel I'm quite prepared for the task. And though I'd be glad if you chose someone else, I feel you did a wise thing in choosing me. Certainly now I've had all these years of preparation, and certainly you wouldn't prepare me for nothing, and have a job for me to do. So, Lord, I'm glad you sort of agree with me that I'd be a pretty fitting one to do the task.

30:26 Oh, no. There was a time when he thought this, you know. Remember, he went out and tried to be the deliverer on his own steam. He saw one of the Egyptians bothering one of the Hebrews, and he went out and killed him.

30:37 Who's going to be the deliverer? Sure, mighty Moses. In forty years' time, he was drawn by the bullet. And what did those forty years do for Moses?

30:51 Well, perhaps the most blessed thing they did for Moses was to strip him down and to make him a man who was cool. So that now, when God gives him a commission, gets the contract, forty years before, with no commission from God, he goes out and seeks to come to the defense of his people. Now, with a clear word of commission from God, he says, God, who am I? I'm not the man.

31:20 Shoot somebody else. You've got the wrong person. I'm not qualified for this. He's a man who had a deep awareness of his utter prophecies.

31:32 And all those years were used of God to batter him down and strip him down until he said, and remember this, nobody was looking on. He wasn't making a good impression for his people, for his elders. He was out in the wilderness, no one there but the angel of God in the bush, the fiery bush, and Moses. Nobody else.

31:53 He wasn't saying this for the crowd. Moses was just giving vent to the inner consciousness of his heart. I am nothing. I have nothing.

32:07 And I can do nothing. Who am I, Lord, that you choose me? Now, remember, Moses wasn't, there's that word again, a diffident man. Behold him marching into peril with his rod and saying, Back my people go!

32:22 He says, Who's Jehovah that we should hear him? Moses says, All right, you watch. He wasn't a bashful man. He wasn't a timid man who stood back cowering in the shadows with his knees mocking.

David's Illustrations of Abiding Poverty of Spirit

32:33 But he was a man who was poor and stiff. And then another wonderful illustration in the life of David. Certainly, a man who's called a man after God's own heart ought to give some clear evidences of poverty of spirit. And we'll look at two little instances in the life of David.

32:49 First of all, in 1 Samuel chapter 18. David is a beautiful picture of how God works to promote a man to a place and sphere of large usefulness. David was content to be God's shepherd. We read later on where God says, I took thee from keeping the sheep and I have done this with thee.

33:20 David's success and final exaltation as king of Israel was not the result of his clever planning and scheming and politicking. David sought none of these things. God just sovereignly took his servant who was willing to walk with him and follow him and God exalted him. And now he's been brought out of the, sheepfold and herding sheep into the palace of Saul.

33:52 And while he's there, Saul says, well, I want to give you one of my daughters. Now he had a terrible mood. It says in a few verses preceding the one we want to look at that Saul hoped he wouldn't kill him himself, but he hoped to get him out there fighting with the Philistines and let the Philistines do the dirty work. But when Saul said, I'll give you one of my daughters, he wanted to keep him there with him.

34:13 Notice what David said in 1 Samuel 18. And David said unto Saul, who am I, and what is my life, or my father's family in Israel, that I should be son-in-law to the king? Now when Saul took the initiative to say, David, I want you to marry one of my daughters, the first reaction of David was not, well, Saul, you've got a pretty good deal here. I went out and killed Goliath for you, and the Lord helped me, and I've lived a pure life, and I've been diligent, and I've proved myself.

34:52 Well, no, no. His first reaction was, who am I? What is my father's house? What am I?

34:58 That I should be called son-in-law to the king? That I should be raised to this level of exaltation that when people think of Saul, they'll think of David, his son-in-law. Who am I that I should be given such a place of honor? You see the parallel?

35:17 When God takes us out of the dung heap and identifies us with his Son, and washes us in his precious blood, and we take upon ourselves the worthy name of Christ when we call ourselves Christians, who are we that we should be thus identified with our lovely Lord? Who are we? And then later on we see another illustration, almost the same words. In 2 Samuel chapter 7, we'll look at it just briefly, where David has served God and accomplished the purpose of God in warfare, and winning over those lands.

35:55 The lands of Canaan for the Israelites. And God comes to David and says in 2 Samuel 7 verse 18, well in the preceding verses God had given him the promise that he was going to establish a covenant with David, and he was going to promise David that there should not fail a king to sit upon his throne. And remember now, this is toward the end of a useful life, serving the Lord, being used mightily. Yet when God gives this promise, notice David's reading, David's reaction in 2 Samuel 7 verse 18, Then went King David in and sat before the Lord.

36:34 Remember now, this wasn't for the sake of the court there, it wasn't for the sake of the other Israelites, he was alone with God, and the king went in and sat before the Lord, and he said, Who am I, O Lord God, and what is my house that thou hast brought me hitherto? This was yet a small thing in thy sight, O Lord God, but thou hast spoken of thy servant Paul, for a great while to come, and is this the manner of man, O Lord God? And what can David say more unto thee? For thou, Lord God, knowest thy servant.

37:10 You see what happened to David? The sense that God would so honor him, not only in his lifetime, but give him a promise that after he died there would be kings to sit upon his throne, David said, O God, what can I say? I'm just awestruck, I'm just pressed down. Who am I?

37:29 Well, who are you? You're David, who slew the giants and brought Israel out of defeat into victory. You're the one who's led forth the armies of God and put beneath your feet these Canaanitess nations. You're David, the greatest king Israel ever had or ever will have.

37:47 That's who you are. But David says, Who am I? And all the accolades and praise that men would heap upon David, David realized as he stood before God, that he was nothing, he had nothing, and he could do nothing, and stood in need of all. See, that poverty of spirit illustrated in this man who was a man after God's own kind.

Paul and Christ: Ultimate Examples of Poverty of Spirit

38:16 Briefly, two New Testament illustrations of this same thing. We find a clear illustration in the New Testament in the life of Paul. As one servant of God has said, any man who has natural powers is usually aware of them, Saul was. Paul of Tarsus, Paul the Apostle, he says in Philippians 3, all his natural endowments, all of his attainments, the Pharisee, a Hebrew, touching the law, blameless, all of these things.

38:44 But as a mature Christian, he looked back on all of this and said, I do count it but none. In another place he said, We are not sufficient of ourselves to think anything but of ourselves. What a neat poem. Are you not sufficient?

39:03 With all that background and training you had and your knowledge of the Hebrew Scriptures, your knowledge of the way the Hebrew mind thinks, your visions and revelations and transports, your years in the wilderness with Jesus Christ, your years of experience as a missionary, your tremendous influence, you are not sufficient, Paul says. I am not sufficient to think anything is from myself. But my sufficiency is of God. This is the language of a man who is poor in spirit.

39:35 For he recognizes as he stands before God that he is nothing, he has nothing, can do nothing, and stands in need of all things. And of course the greatest example in the New Testament is our Lord Himself.

39:56 Our Lord is the perfect example of what it means to be poor in spirit. A poverty of spirit that is not related to the matter of sinning against God. In this point it differs from ours. But a poverty of spirit that recognizes the utter dependence of the creature upon God.

40:18 For the Lord Jesus came not only as the Son of God but as the Son of Man. And He revealed what we could have been and should have been had we never sinned. What would you and I have been like if sin never entered in our relationship to God? Look at the life of Christ.

40:37 And there you will find what we would be like. What did Jesus say? Do you remember His words in John? I can do what?

40:45 Nothing of myself. Think of it. I can do nothing of myself. He said the words that I speak, the Father giveth them to me.

40:56 The works that I do, the Father doeth them in me. And our Lord Jesus is the perfect example of humanity. Of what you and I would have been had sin never entered and made us self-sufficient, self-governing creatures. For we find in the life of our Lord Jesus an utter abandonment to and dependence upon the will and strength of the Father.

41:22 His prayer life is the proof of that. Why did Jesus go out a great while before day to pray? He didn't have anything to confess. He didn't.

41:33 He didn't have any problems. Family problems, human relationship problems. He didn't have these things. What was He out there praying for?

41:45 Why do we find Him up in the mountain praying through the night and then toward morning coming walking on the water to His own disciples? Why do we find the Lord Jesus constantly moving out from the multitude into the secret place to pray? What? His prayer life was proof of His utter dependence upon the Father.

42:04 For it's in the place of prayer that He got direction. It's in the place of prayer that He got confidence. It's in the place of prayer that He kept the King's awareness of His destiny and His purpose. It was in the place of prayer that our Lord Jesus demonstrated true holiness.

42:23 What a revelation of pride our prayerlessness is. We strut out into the day saying, I can live this day without conscious dependence upon the Father. I can know what I ought to do and what I ought not to do without seeking the wisdom and the revelation of His will. Perhaps there's no greater revelation of our pride than our self-confidence.

Manifestations of Poverty of Spirit in the Believer's Life

42:59 For we've seen none of this. The Lord Jesus, the only one who had a right to be confident in Himself, displayed utter confidence and dependence upon the Father. Now I close this morning by trying to lay before your mind briefly what will the manifestations of this poverty of spirit be? We've looked at what the words themselves mean.

43:21 We've seen that this poverty of spirit will attend the entrance into the kingdom of God, illustrated, publican, prodigal. We've seen that it will characterize those of us who are in the kingdom. It will be an increasing manifestation of God's work in us, illustrated in David, illustrated in our Lord. Now we bring this all together and ask ourselves the question, what will the manifestations of this be in my own life?

43:48 Well, it will manifest itself, first of all, in the presence of God. When you and I draw aside to pray and we come before God, if we stop long enough and we shut our mouths long enough and hesitate before we pour out a niagra of words unto God, if we pause long enough to know who God is and what we are, poverty of spirit will always manifest itself by that deep inner awareness of my utter unworthiness to draw nigh to such a God. And that awareness will turn me again to plead before Him, no access but His Son, no grounds of approach but the great High Priest, no hope of mercy but His blood, so that when we pray this sense of utter unworthiness will press us out to glory again in our Lord Jesus Christ. I think this is what the Bible means when it says, Rejoice with trembling. I rejoice that I'm accepted before God in Christ, but I tremble because I'm accepted before God in Christ. See the difference?

45:09 It's God that I'm dealing with. It's God. God is the consuming fire. And knowing my own utter barrenness and poverty, I come before Him.

45:20 With this attitude. And then it will reveal itself not only in the presence of God when I pray, but in the practices of my Christian experience. There'll be increasingly the sense that I need to be a man or woman of prayer. If you are not growing in the awareness of your need to pray, you're not growing in grace.

45:43 I don't care how much knowledge you're packing into your cranes. If you're growing in grace, you're being more and more like the Lord Jesus. Is that what it means to grow in grace? To be more and more conformed to the Lord Jesus?

45:56 And part of that conformity will be likeness to Christ in His poverty of spirit. His utter dependence upon the Father expressed in a life of prayer. Are you increasingly becoming aware of your need of a life of Christ's prayer? If not, then you're not increasing in poverty of spirit.

46:23 For if you were, your emptiness would drive you to Christ to seek His fullness. Your helplessness would drive you to Him to seek help. Your ignorance would drive you to Him to seek wisdom. This is just sheer, hard, cold logic that strikes us and brings us up short.

46:44 All the pride of a prayerless life. And then it will manifest itself in true brokenness as we confess our sin to God. The most holy men and women have been the men and women who've been most conscious of their failure in sin. And things that once could be done without any concern, now the very thought of them makes us blush in the presence of God.

47:15 We'll be more and more occupied with Christ. That's the wonder of this. That's why Jesus said, Bless for the poor in spirit, for every new revelation of my poverty drives me out to seek His riches. And then there will be evidence, too, not only in the presence of God, in the practice of what we call our religious exercises, but there'll be evidences of poverty of spirit as we move amongst men.

47:40 There'll be a blessed absence of the struck and cockiness of the flesh. I marvel every time I read 1 Corinthians chapter 2. Paul said, I was among you Corinthians, in wisdom, and in fear, and in much tremor. Think of it.

48:00 This experienced apostle who'd had visions and revelations of the glorified Christ, who'd been used of God to plant churches throughout the Roman Empire. He says, You people will remember that when I came to preach among you, I was with you in fear, and weakness, and trembling. What's the matter, Paul? Were you having an nervous breakdown?

48:25 No. He just realized what he was, and who God was, and what his path was. And when he stood before men, he knew that the issues of eternity were at stake. He didn't trust in his experience, his background, his training, and any of this.

48:43 He stood conscious. He had nothing. He was nothing. He could do nothing.

48:51 He stood in need of all things.

48:55 That's poverty of spirit in our relationships to men. What a blessed thing when it graces the servants of God. It'll reveal itself in the presence of men by a glad willingness to acknowledge any good in me is what he's worth in me. We don't have to go around saying, Well, I'm nothing.

49:15 I'm nothing. No, Paul said, I'm something. But I am what I am if it's worth anything by the what? By the grace of God.

49:23 Poverty of spirit in relationship to men will be glad. Whenever anyone notices anything good in us, we will gladly say, Look. Don't look for the root of that thing here. The root of it's up there at the right hand of the Father.

49:37 And if they commend you for something that's godly and Christ-like in your life or in your home, you'll gladly say, I am what I am if it's worth anything. See? This is the way poverty of spirit will work. It doesn't reach out like a magnet and try to draw the praise of men.

49:59 See? And when the praise of men comes unsolicited, it acts like a mirror and says, No, you're looking at the wrong place. Look up. It wants to reflect it off that glory to the right hand of the majesty on high where sits our lovely Lord.

How to Obtain and Maintain Poverty of Spirit

50:18 Blessed are the poor in spirit. How are you going to get a thing like this? Well, dear friend who's never truly repented and been born of the spirit of God, if you have enough poverty of spirit this morning to know that you can't save yourself and that Christ alone is your hope, that's all God requires. All the fitness He requires is to see your need and to see your faith.

50:46 That's the words of the Spirit. Do you see that you have no riches apart from Christ's Spirit? You have no worth? Then that's all the poverty of spirit you require any day to come.

51:01 But if you're not saved, you're not a child of God, and you don't see yourself in that light, then I pray that you'll pray that God will discover to you your poverty now before the day of judgment and the day of judgment. Dear child of God, how can we increase and maintain the spirit of poverty or the poverty of spirit only one way? Don't look at yourself. Look at Him.

51:36 For Job said, I heard of thee by the hearing of the ear, but now mine eye seeth thee, and I abhor myself. That's seeing Him. I abhor myself. Blessed are the poor in spirit.

51:51 Blessed are the poor in spirit. Are you a God-blessed man this morning? Are you a God-blessed woman? Are you?

52:01 If you're a stranger to poverty of spirit, then the blessing of Jesus is not pronounced on you. But if you are, His blessing, His benediction is upon your head when you go out of here this morning as God-blessed man and woman. Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Let us stand to be dismissed from here. Our Father, we thank Thee for the words of our Lord Jesus. We thank Thee for the illustrations of those words embodied in the pages of this Thy Holy Word. And we pray that this characteristic, this basic characteristic of the members of Thy kingdom may be the crowning characteristic of Thy people's youth.

53:18 Father, we want Thy blessing. But we know it will not come in the way of pride and self-sufficiency, but in the way of poverty of spirit. Speak and seal this word through our hearts. And as we leave this place, may it be with a consciousness that we may know that You are God.