Spiritual Poverty

I don’t know about you, but when I think of the phrase “spiritual poverty”, I have a mental image of the “unsaved masses”, the lost, the spiritually unawakened, of unbelievers, of “them” “out there”. What is more, I can find myself making a subtle mental distinction between myself and all of them. 

So why does Jesus’ opening line in the Sermon on the Mount turn this idea entirely on its head? Why does he say “Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the Kingdom of heaven”?

What Jesus is saying here is that WE are blessed if we recognise that WE are spiritually poor, that I am spiritually poor. We are blessed if we know that in ourselves we have absolutely nothing to offer God. This is the attitude that God finds beautiful. It’s an attitude of utter dependence on him, where we recognise that nothing in and of ourselves is any good at all. 

We might protest, and say hang on a minute, I have plenty of characteristics that are “not bad”. I’m sure we could also make a list of all the things we DO that aren’t bad, in themselves. Equally we could make a list of things we do that ARE bad, but as long as we attempt to justify ourselves we are missing the point entirely.

The point is that there is absolutely NOTHING you and I can do to justify ourselves, to make ourselves right with God, to become righteous. Only Jesus can make us righteous, and he only does it for those who recognise their own abject spiritual poverty. 

Jesus illustrates this message very powerfully in the parable of the pharisee and the tax collector in Luke 18:9-14. He was speaking to those who trusted in their own righteousness (and it’s so easy to fall into that trap). The Pharisee stood up and boastfully reminded God, and everyone standing within earshot, of how virtuous he was. In contrast, the tax collector stood in a corner with his head bowed. “He beat his chest and prayed “God, be merciful to me, a sinner”. Jesus’ comment was that it was the latter who went home made right with God. “For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”

In the Lord’s final letter to the seven Churches, which John records in Revelation 3, there is a terrifying warning to the Laodiceans:

“I know your works, you are neither hot nor cold. Would that you were either cold or hot! So because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth. For you say, I am rich, I have prospered, and I need nothing, not realising that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind and naked. I counsel you to buy from me gold refined by fire, so that you may be rich, and white garments so that you may clothe yourself and the shame of your nakedness may not be seen, and salve to anoint your eyes so you may see.” Revelation 3:15-18, 

This letter was written to a Church that disappeared without trace. Paul wrote to them too, but his letter also disappeared without trace. They were told to share it with the Colossians, but they did not. Perhaps they were unwilling to make public the strong words that the apostle spoke against them. They were unwilling to repent of their Godless ways, even though they claimed to be God’s people,

In many ways the western Church today is similar to the Church at Laodicea: comfortable, self satisfied, self preoccupied, and frighteningly blind to the approaching judgement. 

How do we avoid the same fate? The answer is so simple that the worldly-wise scorn it: we must recognise our own utter spiritual poverty. 

In times of crisis, or when stock markets look as though they will crash, those who have worldly wealth often try to buy gold. They hide it in cellars or under floorboards, trusting that when currencies lose their value, gold will hold its own. We are told to buy a different sort of gold, a gold refined by God’s fire, a treasure laid up for us in heaven. God, in the abundance of his grace, freely gives his gold, his spiritual riches, his salvation, to those who recognise their spiritual poverty, and who seek him with all their heart.

With love in him,

Sarah