God Is Good! I love blessing!  And as a pastor, one of the greatest blessings that I can receive is the blessing of hearing about how good the people who I get to pastor are doing spiritually.  Last week, I was excited to receive phone calls, emails and text about the people in my congregation and the good way in which they were making choices to live their lives “out loud” for God.  Keep up the good work!

We are spending some extended time in Matthew 5:12 and we have picked up two of the eight Beatitudes and are working on our third. We have discovered that we need to live with an attitude of humility which realizes that “we can’t, but God can.”  The fact is:  I am nothing without Jesus!  We have also learned that we need to live with an attitude of sorrow.  We have messed up this life that God has given us and when we come to the place where we will admit that, then God is able to bring forgiveness, restoration and blessing into our lives.

The third attitude that we need to get a grasp on is the attitude of meekness or gentleness.  It’s is not that we don’t have the power.  It’s just that we have learned in submission to God and His will to control that power, so that we do not abuse it.  Jesus was our “Master Example” – He had the power, but not once did he abuse or misuse the power that was his.  God can’t and God won’t give you control of anything – if you can’t control yourself!  Emotion is a good and powerful thing, but it should never be your master!

Proverbs 16:32 says:  “He who is slow to anger is better than the mighty and he who rules his spirit than he who captures a city!” Tomorrow we will take a look at the steps that we need to take to grow gentleness in our lives.  Until then – “Take It Easy Baby!  Just be gentle!”

We want release, freedom and escape from the heaviness of life!  We don’t like for life to get heavy, but it does and the truth, like it or not, is:  We need for life to get heavy.  When life gets heavy, it forces me to look at things realistically.  I often think that the only way to happiness is for things to go my way and this is just not true.  Often, when things are not going my way, I stop and try to figure out why and in the process discover some ugly stuff that needs to be taken on and out of my life.  If the heaviness was not there, then I don’t know that I would ever take the time or make the effort to see the reality and deal with it.

We are all sinners! We do things that we should not do.  We do things that get in the way of our having a right relationship with our Creator and Sustainer. We fail to do things that we should do.  Our failure to do these things keep us from having the relationship of blessing that God desires for us to have with Him.  We know that we have a problem – the question is:  What are we going to do about it?

We Have Three Options! 1.  We can deny our condition and pretend that it does not exist.  2.  We can try and change our condition.  3.  We can admit, be sorry and experience freedom.  Let’s take a look at each of these.

We Can Deny Our Condition! Just pretend that you don’t have any sin or convince yourself that your sin does not really matter!  The problem with denial is that the problem just gets bigger and does greater destruction.  The problem of sin will never just go away.  You have to do your part and allow God to do His!

We Can Try And Change Our Condition!  Sometimes we will come to the place of realization that says yes “I am a sinner!” and then we decide that “we” ourselves are going to do something about it.  The problem is this:  We are not strong enough, smart enough or disciplined enough to deal with sin on our own.  It is going to take a power greater than our own.  The good news is that God never intended for you to do it by yourself!

We Can Admit, Be Sorry And Set Free! The first step to getting free is admission.  If you want to deal with a problem, you have to admit that you have a problem!  Admit to God, yourself and others that you are a sinner and that you can do nothing to save yourself!  The next step is to be sorry for your sin.  Sorrow is not really all that hard after admission.  To really be sorry for our sin, we need to see our sinfulness next to God’s Holiness.  Our happiness does not come through our sorrow, but through God’s response to our sorrow!  God wants to and will set you free!  Don’t waste God’s grace – open your heart and life and enjoy every bit of it!

I’m Sorry! I am not telling you that I’m sorry.  I am telling you that I’m sorry!  In others words I am not apologizing to you for something.  I am just telling you that when I look at God and then look at myself – I am sorry!  I am nothing without Him and I cannot do anything that amounts to anything without Him.  I need His forgiveness, grace, mercy, restoration and redemption.

We now have the first two “Beatitudes” in our arsenal! We learned last week that we are to be “poor in spirit”, which means that we are to live in and with the humble realization of our sinfulness and our inability to do anything about our sinfulness in and of ourselves.  When I live with this attitude, I can’t help but to look up to God.  God is my strength and source and I am nothing without Him!  I like to think of this character trait as HUMILITY!

This week we are working to incorporate the second attitude, which  is “Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted!” What does it mean to mourn?  The word mourn used in this passage is the strongest of nine Greek words that are used in our New Testament.  The word used here for mourning implies a deep inner agony.  It also is a present participle and so it indicates that this is a continuous action.  When we get humble and begin to truly see ourselves as we are, then we can’t help, but to look up to God.  When we see God in His holiness and perfection, then we can’t help but to see that we are sinners in need of a Savior.  This is a moment by moment, day by day occurence.  I like to think of this character trait as sorrow.  When I see God in His holiness and me in my sinfulness, then I can’t help but to be sorry and seek forgiveness and restoration.

A few reminders for the week! Read Matthew 5:1-12 everyday and try to memorize it!  Try to live these verses – let them challenge and change the way that you live your life.  Try to get each new attitude as soon as you begin to understand it – don’t wait!  God has some great things that He wants to accomplish in and through you – enjoy the journey!