You know, Americans complain a lot. We whine about the weather, jobs, and everything else. It really gets on my nerves. People are so annoying.
Anyhoo, I listened to an amazing sermon by John Macarthur recently on the beatitudes. It personally was providential because I’ve been complaining about SEVERAL things in my life recently.
The beatitudes are simply people Jesus says are blessed in Matthew chapter 5. The particular blessing that kicked me in the rear was the first one found in verse 3:
“Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”
The Greek word for poor in this case (“ptochoi)” means something more than just a lack of finances.
“Ptochoi” is a heartfelt, genuine acknowledgement that we are destitute of anything of value apart from God. Jesus is our everything because we know we are rebels that deserve the full punishment of the law.
So what does this have to do with complaining? Everything, really.
When we realize that we deserve nothing, we won’t gripe because we don’t even deserve what is annoying us! We’ll look around and thank God because our life isn’t Hell like it should be. The wages of sin is death (Romans 6:23), and we are alive and well (especially in America).
*The problem of monasticism and asceticism is that it stems from a “what can I do to repay/earn ––––?” mentality. Monks looked at “poor” and thought “physical destitution”, when it is about our heart.
Now, when our heart is humbled, we’ll devote our life to God in obedience. But the heart must change; our actions do not matter until that happens.
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