What Is a “Real” Christian?
“Follow
me.”
It was the first and last word
Jesus spoke to Peter, his beloved disciple (Mark 1:17; John 21:22). When Jesus
saw Simon Peter casting a net into the lake, his first word was, “Come, follow
me.” After Jesus was raised from the dead, he appeared to Peter, reinstating
him and saying, “Follow me!” A whole life of Jesus’ disciples lies between
these two calls. The name Christian literally means “follower of Christ.”
How can we then follow Jesus? Where can we find a map to follow in the footsteps of Jesus? One of the best ways to do is to listen to his own word directly. The Sermon on the Mount, particularly the Beatitudes, is considered the essence of Jesus’ teachings. There we can find what it means to be a real Christian. There we can find Jesus himself. Two things are important as we come to listen to the Beatitudes. First, the Beatitudes are not eight separate qualities of distinct groups of disciples. Some of them are meek, while others are merciful. No! Rather, they are eight qualities of the same group who at the same time are meek and merciful, poor in spirit and pure in heart, mourning and hungry, peacemakers and persecuted.[1] All Christians, we are meant to manifest all of these eight qualities together and at the same time. Second, the Beatitudes are Jesus’ own description of what every Christian ought to be, not just for some exceptional Christians. All these eight qualities are to characterize and shape all his followers. The message of the Beatitudes is for you and me. The aim of the Beatitudes is to become more like Christ. By this, we follow Christ.
The Poor in Spirit
The first of the Beatitudes is
this:
“Blessed are the poor in spirit,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”
So what does it mean to ‘be poor in spirit’? To be poor in spirit means to acknowledge our spiritual poverty, to be fully aware of our spiritual bankruptcy, before God. Eugene Peterson’s Message Bible interprets this verse as follows: “You’re blessed when you’re at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God and his rule.” We are blessed when we are aware of our spiritual poverty. We are blessed when we are humiliated and humbled; that’s the place where we can see God face to face. One day Jesus told this parable: two men went up to the Temple to pray, one a Pharisee, the other a tax collector. The Pharisee posed and prayed like this: “God, I thank you that I am not like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and tithe on all my income.” Meanwhile, the tax collector stood at a distance, not daring to look up, saying, “God, have mercy on me, a sinner” (Luke 18:13). In this story, who is the one poor in spirit? Yes, Jesus said, “I tell you that this tax collector, not the other (self-satisfied, self-sufficient) went home made right with God.”
We are blessed when we know our spiritual poverty. Jesus said to the church in Laodicea, “You say, 'I am rich. I have everything I want. I don't need a thing!' And you don't realize that you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked” (Rev 3:17, NLT). Sadly, Laodicean church did not know how wretched, how miserable, how poor they were. Many of our spiritual ancestors in the Bible acknowledged their spiritual bankruptcy. When Moses was called, he felt deeply unworthy of the task laid upon him. So he said, “O my Lord, please send someone else” (Ex 4:13). When Peter was called, he too felt unworthy and said, “Depart from me; for I am a sinful man, O Lord” (Luke 5:8). After I was called to ministry, I was first assigned to serve the young adult group at the church in Boston. Soon I realized no mater how hard I worked, I saw no fruits of ministry, no transformation in their lives. I felt so incapable of doing ministry. I still remember – one Sunday after the young adult group meeting, I was so discouraged. I went down to the basement of the church and got down on my knees and prayed: “God, I am sorry for doing such a poor job. I know your word is living and active, but when I preach, I feel so powerless and incapable. I can’t do this anymore.” That was when I heard the voice saying, “Don’t be afraid, keep on speaking… For I am with you… I have many students in this city” (cf. Acts 18:10).
Dependence on God
We may feel wretched, humiliated,
unworthy. But, that is a good place to be – to
be poor in spirit. In fact, to be poor in spirit is a necessary quality to enter the kingdom of God. Only when we are
poor in spirit, we can live in God’s reign. The poor in spirit are also
described as people with “humble dependence on God” – those who have no refuge
but God.
This past week I meditated on the
story of David and Goliath. This time I noticed that “dependence on God” is
David’s most outstanding quality. When Israel was challenged by Goliath for 40
days, David volunteered to go and fight him. Saul said, “You can’t go. You’re
too young and inexperienced, and he’s been at this fighting business since
before you were born.” Now listen to David, “I’ve been a shepherd. Whenever a
lion or bear came and took a lamb from the flock, I’d go after it, strike it,
and rescue the lamb… And I’ll do the same to this Philistine. The Lord who rescued me from the paw of the
lion and the paw of the bear will rescue me from the hand of this Philistine.”
“Dependence on God.” When Goliath saw that David was little more than a boy, he
despised him, cursed him, threatened him. But David said to him, “You come
against me with sword and spear and javelin, but I come against you in the name
of the Lord Almighty… This day the Lord will deliver you into my hands, and
I’ll strike you down and cut off your head… and the whole world will know that
there is God in Israel. All those gathered here will know that it is not by
sword or spear that the Lord saves; for the battle is the Lord’s, and he will
give all of you into our hands.” “Dependence on God.” [*object lesson] This is a stone from the valley of Elah. As you
see, there’s nothing different about it. David’s victory is not from his stone,
not from his might, but from his humble
dependence on God.
Cultivating God-dependence
To be poor in spirit can be
identified with humble dependence on God.
This quality – “dependence on God” – doesn’t come naturally. It is not a
natural quality, but it’s supernaturally given to Christians by the Spirit.
Then, it also has to be cultivated over the time. David had to learn to depend
on God every time he faced a lion or a bear. Through those crises and
challenges, he learned to depend on God – more and more.
John Stott, in his final book The Radical Disciple (at the age of 88), describes eight qualities of Jesus’ followers. One of them is dependence. He shares with us how humiliation can lead us to humility and dependence on God. One Sunday morning he fell and broke his hip (when he was 85). It was an embarrassing and even humiliating experience for him. For a while, he had to be completely dependent on others. It was a painful but liberating experience. By this, he learned to depend on God.
For me personally, as I came down with COVID twice, though I had to admit it was not a pleasant experience, I realized how vulnerable, how frail I am. By this, I learned to depend on God. I always remember Michael Ramsey, Archbishop of Canterbury, saying at the ordination service:[2]
Be ready to accept humiliations. They can hurt terribly,
but they help you to be humble. There can be the trivial humiliations. Accept
them. There can be the bigger humiliations...All these can be so many chances
to be a little nearer to our humble and crucified Lord...
Humiliating experiences – whether it’s an illness, or ageing process – can be our guide to cultivating God-dependence. Nowadays, thanks to Joyce, I came to love poems, writing as well as reading them. There’s a particular poem/prayer that I love and revisit and savor again and again. The title is “Granddaughter” written by Missy Buchanan:[3]
Not so long ago I carried her in my
arms and read her favorite good-night story to her.
I held her small hand as ocean
waves lapped our bare feet, making us giggle with unbelievable joy.
But now she steadies my stooped
body as I move from bed to chair.
It’s so humbling to accept help,
especially from a granddaughter who once thought I would always be able to
chase after fireflies on a summer night.
God, where are you when the
generational tables are turned, when the young care for the old?
Is it your plan that we learn to
serve each other and accept being served?
Give me grace to surrender my
pride, to delight in my granddaughter’s compassion.
Let me teach her the truth about
faithfulness in the trenches of life.
In this curious season where old
and young intersect, may we look in each other’s eyes and see the eyes of
Christ peering back.
Ageing process, or any humiliations can be so many chances to learn to depend on God, to be poor in spirit.
Just as I am, poor, wretched, blind;
sight, riches, healing of the mind,
yea all I need in thee to find,
O Lamb of God, I come, I come.
This is the language of the poor in
spirit. How blessed you and I are when we are poor in spirit, because that’s
how we enter and live in God’s kingdom. Amen.
[1] John Stott, The Message of the Sermon on the Mount (The
Bible Speaks Today Series) (p. 31). InterVarsity Press. Kindle Edition.
[2] John Stott, The
Radical Disciple: Some Neglected Aspects of Our Calling. InterVarsity
Press. Kindle Edition. Location 893 of 1271.
[3] Missy Buchanan, Living
with Purpose in a Worn–Out Body (p. 12). Upper Room Books. Kindle Edition.
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