Blessed Are The Empty
Matt. 5:3-12

A. The Sermon on the Mount is the best known of all the teachings of Jesus----it is also the least
understood and the least practiced. It begins in Matt 5:3-12, with the Beatitudes. The
Beatitudes describe the character of citizens of the kingdom of heaven, and affirm their
“blessedness.” They are a composite description of what every Christian ought to be. They are
paradoxes and assaults on conventional human wisdom. They illustrate the radical difference
between the kingdom of heaven and the kingdoms of men.
1. G.K. Chesterton said, “Nothing succeeds like failure.” The Beatitudes affirm that truth by contrasting the spiritual qualities of God’s Word with the historic concerns of men which are concerned with material wealth, social status, and self-serving worldly wisdom. Taken together, the Beatitudes make two basic statements about the kingdom of heaven. #1, is that the
kingdom is not made up of the “mighty” who obtain their desires by strength or wealth or
violence. God’s Kingdom is the sole realm of those people who yield their wants, and even
their rights, to the needs of others ? Matt. 5:5, 7, 9-10.
a. The Second, is that the kingdom is NOT OPEN to the self?righteous and the self?assured, but to the supplicant sinner who comes seeking God out of a sense of his own emptiness. Only those who are apparent failures in self sufficiency have any hope of blessedness. The kingdom of heaven belongs not to the full, but to the empty ? Matt. 5:3-4, 6, 8. Let’s first consider the Beatitudes that deal with the virtue of being “empty.”
(A) Matt. 5:3, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” Here
is the crux of kingdom character: a person’s attitude toward himself in the presence
of God. Some who profess righteousness have no shame in the presence of God for
their own failures, Lk. 18:9?14. Do you see the contrast?
(B) What is the relationship of material poverty to spiritual poverty? Spiritual poverty is the emptiness that comes from an absolute spiritual bankruptcy in which a person is compelled to plead for: That which he is powerless to obtain. That to which he has no right and that without which he cannot live. That’s the point of the parable of the
prodigal son in Lk. 15:18-19. The most pitiful person is the one who does not know
his need for God. The person whose heart is full of self?reliance, because there is
no place for the goodness of God’s rule. Compare that person to the blest who has
emptied themselves of pride, self?righteousness and self-sufficiency.
(1) Vs. 4, “Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.” Ps. 119: 67, 71, “Before I was afflicted I went astray, but now I obey your word.....It was good for me to be afflicted so that I might learn your decrees.” There is a beneficial effect that comes from the tears of life.
(2) But, this sorrow from the beatitude is a sorrow that comes by choice. It is a “godly sorrow.” 2 Cor 7:10?11, Paul describes it as “Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret, not worldly sorrow that brings spiritual death.” Wretched are those who hide the shame of their sin behind a facade of false righteousness, because when their grief does come there will be no remedy. Blessed are those who embrace godly sorrow, rather than avoid it.
b. Vs. 6, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled.” Most of all we need God and His righteousness. We need both God’s forgiveness and a transformed life. We need both to feel right and to do right. Few

people will acknowledge the hunger of their spirit and the void that sin leaves inside.
That’s why they foolishly try to fill their spiritual needs with materialistic satisfactions. I
like the way Solomon said it in Eccl. 5:10, “Whoever loves money never has enough
money; whoever loves wealth is never satisfied with what he has.” Just having a
relationship with God is not enough, it must be more than an interest in life ---it must
become the reigning passion of our existence. The consuming hunger of life. Wretched
are those who waste life searching for the wrong thing. They are the ones who will spend
eternity desperate for what it is too late to have.
(A) Vs. 8, “Blessed are the pure in hart, for they shall see God.” Purity of heart does not just mean cleanness of mind, but single?mindedness of devotion. Jas. 4:8, hits the nail on the head when he says, “Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, stop being double minded.” People who want to see God with their whole heart don’t let anything stand in their way. People who are wretched are those who have mixed motives and only half a heart for God, because they will never be anything but distant from God.
The truly blessed are those who have totally made up their minds about wanting to
see God.
(B) The worldly path to “blessedness” exalts arrogance, pride, self -will, self-rule and self-sufficiency. For the Christian, the things that make life good are the things that draw us closer to God and make us more like Him. When you judge life by this criterion, the Beatitudes not only make sense, they are profoundly wise. Malcolm Muggeridge once said, “We forget that Jesus is the prophet of the losers’, not the victors’ of this world, the one who proclaims that the first will be last, the weak are the strong and the fools are the wise.”
(C) Acts 20:32.

Spur - 08/10/03 pm