Greg Laurie Daily Devotion for Thursday, 6 March 2014 "Poor in Spirit"

Greg Laurie Daily Devotion for Thursday, 6 March 2014 "Poor in Spirit"
He opened His mouth and taught them, saying: "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven."-—Matthew 5:2–3 
When Jesus said, "Blessed are the poor in spirit," the word poor that He used is a verb meaning "to shrink, cower, or cringe." It describes a destitute person or someone who is completely dependent on others for help.
But Jesus didn't just say, "Blessed are the poor." He said, "Blessed are the poor in spirit." Jesus was not addressing a person's economic situation but their spiritual condition. Let's not miss what this is saying: Blessed, or happy, is the person who recognizes his or her spiritual poverty apart from God. Happy is the man or woman who sees what they really are in God's sight: lost, hopeless, and helpless.
Apart from Jesus Christ, everyone is spiritually poor. Regardless of our education, accomplishments, or religious knowledge, we are all spiritually destitute. How often we will look at someone in prison or the down-and-outer or the drug addict and think, Now, there is someone who is spiritually destitute. Then we look at ourselves. Maybe we have lived a relatively refined life. Maybe we have a good education or have accomplished certain things. We say, "I am not as destitute as that person." In one sense, that may be true. But in another sense, it isn't true at all. Before God, all people are spiritually destitute and unable to help themselves.
Some people have a hard time admitting this. It's difficult for us to acknowledge that we need to reach out to God, that we need His forgiveness. But if we want to be forgiven, if we want to be happy, then we must humble ourselves and admit our need.
-------
Being "poor in spirit" has nothing to do with our economic situation. In fact, Jesus said "blessed are the poor in spirit." Here's why . . .
Today's Bible Reading:
Deuteronomy 3:1 Then we turned, and went up the way to Bashan. Og the king of Bashan came out against us, he and all his people, to battle at Edrei. 2 Yahweh said to me, “Don’t fear him; for I have delivered him, with all his people, and his land, into your hand. You shall do to him as you did to Sihon king of the Amorites, who lived at Heshbon.”
3 So Yahweh our God delivered into our hand Og also, the king of Bashan, and all his people. We struck him until no one was left to him remaining. 4 We took all his cities at that time. There was not a city which we didn’t take from them; sixty cities, all the region of Argob, the kingdom of Og in Bashan. 5 All these were cities fortified with high walls, gates, and bars; besides a great many towns without walls. 6 We utterly destroyed them, as we did to Sihon king of Heshbon, utterly destroying every inhabited city, with the women and the little ones. 7 But all the livestock, and the plunder of the cities, we took for plunder for ourselves. 8 We took the land at that time out of the hand of the two kings of the Amorites who were beyond the Jordan, from the valley of the Arnon to Mount Hermon. 9 (The Sidonians call Hermon Sirion, and the Amorites call it Senir.) 10 We took all the cities of the plain, and all Gilead, and all Bashan, to Salecah and Edrei, cities of the kingdom of Og in Bashan. 11 (For only Og king of Bashan remained of the remnant of the Rephaim. Behold, his bedstead was a bedstead of iron. Isn’t it in Rabbah of the children of Ammon? Nine cubits[a] was its length, and four cubits its width, after the cubit of a man.) 12 This land we took in possession at that time: from Aroer, which is by the valley of the Arnon, and half the hill country of Gilead, and its cities, gave I to the Reubenites and to the Gadites: 13 and the rest of Gilead, and all Bashan, the kingdom of Og, gave I to the half-tribe of Manasseh; all the region of Argob, even all Bashan. (The same is called the land of Rephaim. 14 Jair the son of Manasseh took all the region of Argob, to the border of the Geshurites and the Maacathites, and called them, even Bashan, after his own name, Havvoth Jair, to this day.) 15 I gave Gilead to Machir. 16 To the Reubenites and to the Gadites I gave from Gilead even to the valley of the Arnon, the middle of the valley, and its border, even to the river Jabbok, which is the border of the children of Ammon; 17 the Arabah also, and the Jordan and its border, from Chinnereth even to the sea of the Arabah, the Salt Sea, under the slopes of Pisgah eastward.
18 I commanded you at that time, saying, “Yahweh your God has given you this land to possess it. You shall pass over armed before your brothers the children of Israel, all the men of valor. 19 But your wives, and your little ones, and your livestock, (I know that you have much livestock), shall live in your cities which I have given you, 20 until Yahweh gives rest to your brothers, as to you, and they also possess the land which Yahweh your God gives them beyond the Jordan. Then you shall each return to his own possession, which I have given you.”
21 I commanded Joshua at that time, saying, “Your eyes have seen all that Yahweh your God has done to these two kings. So shall Yahweh do to all the kingdoms where you go over. 22 You shall not fear them; for Yahweh your God himself fights for you.”
23 I begged Yahweh at that time, saying, 24 “Lord[b] Yahweh, you have begun to show your servant your greatness, and your strong hand. For what god is there in heaven or in earth that can do works like yours, and mighty acts like yours? 25 Please let me go over and see the good land that is beyond the Jordan, that fine mountain, and Lebanon.”
26 But Yahweh was angry with me for your sakes, and didn’t listen to me. Yahweh said to me, “Let this satisfy you. Speak no more to me of this matter. 27 Go up to the top of Pisgah, and lift up your eyes westward, and northward, and southward, and eastward, and see with your eyes; for you shall not go over this Jordan. 28 But commission Joshua, and encourage him, and strengthen him; for he shall go over before this people, and he shall cause them to inherit the land which you shall see.” 29 So we stayed in the valley near Beth Peor.
4:1 Now, Israel, listen to the statutes and to the ordinances, which I teach you, to do them; that you may live, and go in and possess the land which Yahweh, the God of your fathers, gives you. 2 You shall not add to the word which I command you, neither shall you take away from it, that you may keep the commandments of Yahweh your God which I command you. 3 Your eyes have seen what Yahweh did because of Baal Peor; for all the men who followed Baal Peor, Yahweh your God has destroyed them from among you. 4 But you who were faithful to Yahweh your God are all alive today. 5 Behold, I have taught you statutes and ordinances, even as Yahweh my God commanded me, that you should do so in the middle of the land where you go in to possess it. 6 Keep therefore and do them; for this is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the peoples, who shall hear all these statutes, and say, “Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.” 7 For what great nation is there, that has a god so near to them, as Yahweh our God is whenever we call on him? 8 What great nation is there, that has statutes and ordinances so righteous as all this law, which I set before you today?
9 Only be careful, and keep your soul diligently, lest you forget the things which your eyes saw, and lest they depart from your heart all the days of your life; but make them known to your children and your children’s children; 10 the day that you stood before Yahweh your God in Horeb, when Yahweh said to me, “Assemble the people to me, and I will make them hear my words, that they may learn to fear me all the days that they live on the earth, and that they may teach their children.” 11 You came near and stood under the mountain. The mountain burned with fire to the heart of the sky, with darkness, cloud, and thick darkness. 12 Yahweh spoke to you out of the middle of the fire: you heard the voice of words, but you saw no form; you only heard a voice. 13 He declared to you his covenant, which he commanded you to perform, even the ten commandments. He wrote them on two stone tablets. 14 Yahweh commanded me at that time to teach you statutes and ordinances, that you might do them in the land where you go over to possess it. 15 Be very careful, for you saw no kind of form on the day that Yahweh spoke to you in Horeb out of the middle of the fire, 16 lest you corrupt yourselves, and make yourself an engraved image in the form of any figure, the likeness of male or female, 17 the likeness of any animal that is on the earth, the likeness of any winged bird that flies in the sky, 18 the likeness of anything that creeps on the ground, the likeness of any fish that is in the water under the earth; 19 and lest you lift up your eyes to the sky, and when you see the sun and the moon and the stars, even all the army of the sky, you are drawn away and worship them, and serve them, which Yahweh your God has allotted to all the peoples under the whole sky. 20 But Yahweh has taken you, and brought you out of the iron furnace, out of Egypt, to be to him a people of inheritance, as it is today. 21 Furthermore Yahweh was angry with me for your sakes, and swore that I should not go over the Jordan, and that I should not go in to that good land, which Yahweh your God gives you for an inheritance; 22 but I must die in this land. I must not go over the Jordan; but you shall go over, and possess that good land. 23 Be careful, lest you forget the covenant of Yahweh your God, which he made with you, and make yourselves an engraved image in the form of anything which Yahweh your God has forbidden you. 24 For Yahweh your God is a devouring fire, a jealous God. 25 When you shall father children, and children’s children, and you shall have been long in the land, and shall corrupt yourselves, and make an engraved image in the form of anything, and shall do that which is evil in Yahweh your God’s sight, to provoke him to anger; 26 I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that you will soon utterly perish from off the land which you go over the Jordan to possess it. You will not prolong your days on it, but will utterly be destroyed. 27 Yahweh will scatter you among the peoples, and you will be left few in number among the nations, where Yahweh will lead you away. 28 There you shall serve gods, the work of men’s hands, wood and stone, which neither see, nor hear, nor eat, nor smell. 29 But from there you shall seek Yahweh your God, and you shall find him, when you search after him with all your heart and with all your soul. 30 When you are in oppression, and all these things have come on you, in the latter days you shall return to Yahweh your God, and listen to his voice. 31 For Yahweh your God is a merciful God. He will not fail you, neither destroy you, nor forget the covenant of your fathers which he swore to them. 32 For ask now of the days that are past, which were before you, since the day that God created man on the earth, and from the one end of the sky to the other, whether there has been anything as this great thing is, or has been heard like it? 33 Did a people ever hear the voice of God speaking out of the middle of the fire, as you have heard, and live? 34 Or has God tried to go and take a nation for himself from among another nation, by trials, by signs, by wonders, by war, by a mighty hand, by an outstretched arm, and by great terrors, according to all that Yahweh your God did for you in Egypt before your eyes? 35 It was shown to you so that you might know that Yahweh is God. There is no one else besides him. 36 Out of heaven he made you to hear his voice, that he might instruct you. On earth he made you to see his great fire; and you heard his words out of the middle of the fire. 37 Because he loved your fathers, therefore he chose their offspring[c] after them, and brought you out with his presence, with his great power, out of Egypt; 38 to drive out nations from before you greater and mightier than you, to bring you in, to give you their land for an inheritance, as it is today. 39 Know therefore today, and take it to heart, that Yahweh himself is God in heaven above and on the earth beneath. There is no one else. 40 You shall keep his statutes, and his commandments, which I command you today, that it may go well with you, and with your children after you, and that you may prolong your days in the land, which Yahweh your God gives you, forever. 41 Then Moses set apart three cities beyond the Jordan toward the sunrise; 42 that the man slayer might flee there, who kills his neighbor unawares, and didn’t hate him in time past; and that fleeing to one of these cities he might live: 43 Bezer in the wilderness, in the plain country, for the Reubenites; and Ramoth in Gilead, for the Gadites; and Golan in Bashan, for the Manassites. 44 This is the law which Moses set before the children of Israel. 45 These are the testimonies, and the statutes, and the ordinances, which Moses spoke to the children of Israel, when they came out of Egypt, 46 beyond the Jordan, in the valley over against Beth Peor, in the land of Sihon king of the Amorites, who lived at Heshbon, whom Moses and the children of Israel struck, when they came out of Egypt. 47 They took his land in possession, and the land of Og king of Bashan, the two kings of the Amorites, who were beyond the Jordan toward the sunrise; 48 from Aroer, which is on the edge of the valley of the Arnon, even to Mount Sion (also called Hermon), 49 and all the Arabah beyond the Jordan eastward, even to the sea of the Arabah, under the slopes of Pisgah.
Footnotes:
a. Deuteronomy 3:11 a cubit is the length from the tip of the middle finger to the elbow on a man's arm, or about 18 inches or 46 centimeters.
b. Deuteronomy 3:24 The word translated “Lord” is “Adonai.”
c. Deuteronomy 4:37 or, seed
Psalm 36: For the Chief Musician. By David, the servant of Yahweh.
1 An inner sanctuary is within my heart about the disobedience of the wicked:
    “There is no fear of God before his eyes.”
2 For he flatters himself in his own eyes,
    too much to detect and hate his sin.
3 The words of his mouth are iniquity and deceit.
    He has ceased to be wise and to do good.
4 He plots iniquity on his bed.
    He sets himself in a way that is not good.
    He doesn’t abhor evil.
5 Your loving kindness, Yahweh, is in the heavens.
    Your faithfulness reaches to the skies.
6 Your righteousness is like the mountains of God.
    Your judgments are like a great deep.
    Yahweh, you preserve man and animal.
7 How precious is your loving kindness, God!
    The children of men take refuge under the shadow of your wings.
8 They shall be abundantly satisfied with the abundance of your house.
    You will make them drink of the river of your pleasures.
9 For with you is the spring of life.
    In your light shall we see light.
10 Oh continue your loving kindness to those who know you,
    your righteousness to the upright in heart.
11 Don’t let the foot of pride come against me.
    Don’t let the hand of the wicked drive me away.
12 There the workers of iniquity are fallen.
    They are thrust down, and shall not be able to rise.
Mark 13:1 As he went out of the temple, one of his disciples said to him, “Teacher, see what kind of stones and what kind of buildings!”
2 Jesus said to him, “Do you see these great buildings? There will not be left here one stone on another, which will not be thrown down.”
3 As he sat on the Mount of Olives opposite the temple, Peter, James, John, and Andrew asked him privately, 4 “Tell us, when will these things be? What is the sign that these things are all about to be fulfilled?”
5 Jesus, answering, began to tell them, “Be careful that no one leads you astray. 6 For many will come in my name, saying, ‘I am he![a] ’ and will lead many astray.
7 “When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, don’t be troubled. For those must happen, but the end is not yet. 8 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be earthquakes in various places. There will be famines and troubles. These things are the beginning of birth pains. 9 But watch yourselves, for they will deliver you up to councils. You will be beaten in synagogues. You will stand before rulers and kings for my sake, for a testimony to them. 10 The Good News must first be preached to all the nations. 11 When they lead you away and deliver you up, don’t be anxious beforehand, or premeditate what you will say, but say whatever will be given you in that hour. For it is not you who speak, but the Holy Spirit.
12 “Brother will deliver up brother to death, and the father his child. Children will rise up against parents, and cause them to be put to death. 13 You will be hated by all men for my name’s sake, but he who endures to the end, the same will be saved. 14 But when you see the abomination of desolation,[b] spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing where it ought not (let the reader understand), then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains, 15 and let him who is on the housetop not go down, nor enter in, to take anything out of his house. 16 Let him who is in the field not return back to take his cloak. 17 But woe to those who are with child and to those who nurse babies in those days! 18 Pray that your flight won’t be in the winter. 19 For in those days there will be oppression, such as there has not been the like from the beginning of the creation which God created until now, and never will be. 20 Unless the Lord had shortened the days, no flesh would have been saved; but for the sake of the chosen ones, whom he picked out, he shortened the days. 21 Then if anyone tells you, ‘Look, here is the Christ!’ or, ‘Look, there!’ don’t believe it. 22 For there will arise false christs and false prophets, and will show signs and wonders, that they may lead astray, if possible, even the chosen ones. 23 But you watch.
“Behold, I have told you all things beforehand. 24 But in those days, after that oppression, the sun will be darkened, the moon will not give its light, 25 the stars will be falling from the sky, and the powers that are in the heavens will be shaken.[c] 26 Then they will see the Son of Man coming in clouds with great power and glory. 27 Then he will send out his angels, and will gather together his chosen ones from the four winds, from the ends of the earth to the ends of the sky.
28 “Now from the fig tree, learn this parable. When the branch has now become tender, and produces its leaves, you know that the summer is near; 29 even so you also, when you see these things coming to pass, know that it is near, at the doors. 30 Most certainly I say to you, this generation[d] will not pass away until all these things happen. 31 Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away. 32 But of that day or that hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. 33 Watch, keep alert, and pray; for you don’t know when the time is.
34 “It is like a man, traveling to another country, having left his house, and given authority to his servants, and to each one his work, and also commanded the doorkeeper to keep watch. 35 Watch therefore, for you don’t know when the lord of the house is coming, whether at evening, or at midnight, or when the rooster crows, or in the morning; 36 lest coming suddenly he might find you sleeping. 37 What I tell you, I tell all: Watch.”
Footnotes:
a. Mark 13:6 or, “I AM!”
b. Mark 13:14 Daniel 9:17; 11:31; 12:11
c. Mark 13:25 Isaiah 13:10; 34:4
d. Mark 13:30 The word translated “generation” (genea) could also be translated “race”, “family”, or “people”.
-------
Harvest Ministries with Greg Laurie 
P.O. Box 4000, Riverside, CA 92514-4000
Phone: 1(800)821-3300
-------