What Even is “Poor in Spirit?” | Matthew 5:3
September 16, 2023
What does “Blessed are the poor in spirit” really mean?
I studied Psalm 25 four years ago. Like exactly to the date. The notes I took were going to be my starting off point this time, too. But as I read a different theme jumped out at me. I knew this group of psalms (25,27,28,86) would follow the 23rd well. There are so many mentions of the right paths. David repeatedly asks for God to guide him to the right path, to guide him in and to truth. So, it becomes a lot about prayer as well. That is what I focused on June 5-9, 2019. My notes on prayer are good if I do say so myself. And I really wanted to make it about prayer. The more I read the more it became about something else. See! You can read the same thing, study it, and get something totally new every single time. Here’s where Holy Spirit led me this time.
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[5:26]
To you, O LORD, I lift up my soul (I come to you in prayer NET), in you I trust, O my God.
There is prayer right off the bat in verse 1.
Show me your ways, O LORD, teach me your paths (paths of righteousness like Psalm 23); guide me in your truth (trustworthy and accurate expression of the divine will NET) and teach me, for you are God my Savior, and my hope is in you all day long. (emphasis mine) verses 4-5
David is praying and is asking for the path of righteousness like we discussed last week. The paths of righteousness remember are the ways God wants you to move, the way he would move. It’s the moral path with the moral character. David is asking for that while in this attitude of prayer. He is submitting to God. In the very next verse, he is asking for God to remember his mercy and love and to forget his sins. David is asking God to work in the pattern that he has established from old.
[14:04]
Good and upright is the LORD, therefore he instructs sinners in his ways.
He guides the humble in what is right and teaches them his way. Verses 8-9
NET notes on verse 9 say this, “usually this means oppressed, but in this context, when the psalmist confesses his sin and asks for moral guidance, it apparently refers to sinners who humble themselves before God and seek deliverance from their sinful condition.” That is the attitude David has in this psalm. He is praying for guidance and saying he has made mistakes and asks the Lord to forget them and then asks for him to teach him his way.
By the way, if something is repeated, it is important, and you should take note. I can’t believe I haven’t told y’all this before. That’s why even though the psalms seem somewhat redundant…that’s exactly why they are worth studying and digging into. Even the laments.
[14:31]
Now we are to verse 10 and this is where Holy Spirit grabbed me and wouldn’t let me pass by…
All the ways of the LORD are loving and faithful
for those who keep the demands of his covenant.
Faithful can also be translated as reliable.
This verse says that if you are keeping what God commands and following him, probably in those ways of his that are true and upright, that he is loving and reliable. You can rely on God. I very much needed this reminder in this season. I have friends and family that are having to navigate some paths that have not turned out the way they had hoped or planned. But God is loving and reliable. He has that pattern that David mentioned earlier. If we love and believe the Lord, if we think he is sovereign then we have to accept it even when the path gets hard. We can’t just love him and rely on him when that path is smooth and easy and straightforward.
15 My eyes are ever on the Lord, for only he will release my feet from the snare.
20 Guard my life and rescue me; let me not be put to shame, for I take refuge in you.
21 May integrity and uprightness protect me, because my hope is in you.
[22:46] Goodness! I spent a lot of time on 25! Let me just show you how 27,28 and 86 affirm what 25 says.
27:1 The LORD is my light and my salvation (my deliverance/divine guidance)
David speaks of wanting to dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of his life. That just means that he wants to live in the presence of the Lord. The Passion translation puts it this way, “I want to live my life so close to him that he takes pleasure in my every prayer.”
David claims protection is verse 5 saying “he will keep me safe in his dwelling; he will hide me in the shelter of his tabernacle”. I love that he will. Why does David say that? How can he be so bold to assume that the Lord is going to do that? Because David has learned to rely on the Lord. God is loving and reliable. See?!?!
Look how 27 ends:
I am still confident of this: I will the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. (Where would I be if I did not believe I would experience the Lord’s favor? NET) Wait for the LORD; be strong and take heart and wait for the LORD. (RELY ON THE LORD.) The emphasis is mine.
[26:49]
Psalm 28:1 To you I call, O LORD my rock (protector)
7 The LORD is my strength and my shield; my heart trusts in him, and I am helped. (When I fully trust in you, help is on the way. Passion) My heart leaps for joy and I will give thanks to him in song.
8 The LORD is the strength of his people, a fortress of salvation for his anointed one.
9 Save your people and bless your inheritance; be their shepherd and carry them forever. (Hello best friend, Psalm 23)
[31:54] Ya’ll just going to have to read Psalm 86. Make it your prayer. Look it up in the Passion Translation. I am giving you homework for the first time! Just do it. I am going to close with Psalm 86: 11 from the Passion Translation:
Teach me more about you, how you work and how you move, so that I can walk onward in your truth until everything within me brings honor to your name.
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