Luke 6:20 And he lifted up his eyes on his disciples, and said, Blessed be you poor: for yours is the kingdom of God. We cannot attain humility by directly striving to become so; it must be caught by guile, not taken by storm. It can be ours only by the power of faith. What is faith? It is the eye of spiritual sight by means of which we see God. This is what we need, is it not? We make a false estimate of life; we miscalculate ourselves and what we are; we weigh with false scales what we have; we measure with an imperfect standard what we do; we go on our way deceived as to the true value of all around us by the mists of the valley through which we are journeying; we neglect to climb, to try to get into the clearer atmosphere where God is; nay, we forget God, we leave Him out of our lives, we neglect to give Him His rightful claim; even in our acts of worship He is sometimes absent from our thoughts. And so it must be with us to the end of life, unless by God's help we attain to the spirit of recollectedness of God's presence, in the power of which David sang, "I have set God always before me; for He is on my right hand, therefore I shall not fall."... Remember, this faith is ours already. It is God's gift to each one of us in our baptism. But it needs to be exercised, developed, trained by use; left alone it will grow weak until it dies. (C. J. Ridgeway, M. A.) Parallel Verses KJV: And he lifted up his eyes on his disciples, and said, Blessed be ye poor: for yours is the kingdom of God. |
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