Today we are probably all going to live out our lives according to some system of blessing. Maybe it's God's system, maybe it's the world's, or likely it's our own personal blend. At the outset of Jesus' teaching on his kingdom he established that real blessing is found as we come to him in a counter-cultural and counter-intuitive way. We must be empty in order that we may be filled. This is the main theme of Matthew 5:1-6. We are blessed as we come to Jesus emptied of our own self-importance, self-righteousness, and self-confidence and in turn receive his abudance, his righteousness and submit to his will.

By God's grace, we are to be poor in spirit, mourn over our sin, cultivate meekness and an appetite for righteousness. By that same grace we receive the kingdom, comfort, an eternal inheritance and we will be satisfied by God. Jesus says, this is blessing indeed!

I pray that Jesus' words about where he locates true blessing would resound in our hearts today. I pray that we would experience the blessing, not of coming to Jesus with our so-called abundance, but of coming in poverty of spirit to receive from his plenty. As Thomas Watson says,

"How poor are they that think themselves rich! How rich are they that see themselves to be poor!"

Welcome to the upside-down kingdom!