Read: Matthew 5:1–10

What does it mean to be blessed? To be blessed by God means that you have the favour of God. It means that you experience joy and peace in God. In these verses, Jesus tells us how we can be blessed, how we will be happy in the Lord. He’s not telling us how to become a Christian. We are already children of God. But he is telling us how we must live as Christians.

As God’s children, we should know that we are poor in spirit. A poor person has nothing: no money, no goods — nothing. Jesus uses this word ‘poor’ and tells us we must be poor in spirit. This means we know that we have nothing in our own hearts with which to serve God. From ourselves we can’t go about our day acting in a Christian way. If we know this, then we are blessed by God, because then we will ask God to help us serve him in this life, as we live in God’s kingdom.

But as children of God’s kingdom, we still sin all the time. Jesus tells us that we are blessed if we see these sins and if they really make us sad. We must hate the sins that we do every day. They must really upset us, knowing that we are sinning against God. If you say, “Ah, it doesn’t matter if I lie a bit, everyone else does,” or, “It doesn’t matter if I don’t work hard at school because the teachers won’t notice,” then you are not mourning over your sins, but you are making excuses. Or if you are more worried about being caught for the things you’ve done wrong, rather than thinking about how your sins anger God, then you are also not truly sorry for your sins. But Jesus says that when you truly mourn over your sins, then you will be blessed and comforted because then you will know that you are forgiven in Christ.

May you indeed know how wicked you are, repent of your sins and turn to God for forgiveness. Then you will be blessed.

Reflection with your child:

How must you live as a child of God?

Source: Sermon by Rev. I. Wildeboer