But godliness with
contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into the world, and we
can take nothing out of it. 1 Timothy
6:6-7
Within
the human heart “things” have taken over. . . . There is within the human heart
a tough fibrous root of fallen life whose nature is to possess, always to
possess. It covets “things” with a deep and fierce passion. The pronouns “my”
and “mine” look innocent enough in print, but their constant and universal use
is significant. They express the real nature of the old Adamic man better than
a thousand volumes of theology could do. They are verbal symptoms of our deep
disease. The roots of our hearts have grown down into things, and we dare not
pull up one rootlet lest we die. Things have become necessary to us. . . God’s
gifts now take the place of God.
The
blessed ones who possess the Kingdom are they who have repudiated every
external thing and have rooted from their hearts all sense of possessing. These
are the “poor in spirit.” They have reached an inward state paralleling the
outward circumstances of the common beggar in the streets of Jerusalem. That is
what the word poor as used by Christ actually means. These blessed poor are no
longer slaves to the tyranny of things. They have broken the yoke of the
oppressor; and this they have done not by fighting but by surrendering. Though
free from all sense of possessing, they yet possess all things. ‘Theirs is the
kingdom of heaven.’
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