If you haven’t noticed by now, when Jesus teaches the Beatitudes in Matthew 5, He unveils them in such a way that they build upon one another. Blessed are the poor in spirit. That applies to any believer in God, where at the point of salvation, they realize they are so spiritually bankrupt that they could never save themselves. Thus, they are in need of Jesus to save them and pay that debt. Blessed are those who mourn. In other words, blessed are those who see their sin and realize how that sin has grieved God, and grieve over it themselves. They deeply understand just how badly their sin has separated them from the presence of God and find themselves in sorrow over how they’ve wronged God, and yet they find comfort from the Lord in that those sins are forgiven. And blessed are the meek?

Okay, so surely gentleness is a redundant fruit of kindness and goodness. If that’s what you’re thinking coming into this devotion, I’d like to challenge you with this idea: for the past 8 weeks, we’ve been unpacking different facets of God’s character that are leant to us through the Holy Spirit. As Christians, when we find God’s character within us, we can be assured that we have lived a life closely with Him, because it is impossible for God’s Spirit to dwell where practices of the flesh are allowed to flourish. Ergo, the more we commit ourselves to a life lived in sacrifice to our Savior and allow Him to take more and more control of our lives, the less we will see of the world within us.