Good afternoon family! This second message is a powerful one where Agnes shares about allowing God to build His kingdom in us. Be blessed!
“Beatitudes”
Matthew 5
We call it Beatitudes because it shows us where we are and how we should be. I want you to turn to Matthew 5. Why does the book of Matthew say Kingdom of heaven instead of Kingdom of God? The book of Matthew was written to the Jews and the Jews do not use the word God; therefore they use the word heaven. You don’t find it any where else; because it is written to the Jew.
Matthew 5: 1 “And seeing the multitudes, he went up into a mountain and when he was set, his disciples came unto him:
2 “And he opened his mouth, and taught them, saying,
3 “Blessed [are] the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”
Blessed are the poor in spirit (humble or not pretending) for theirs is the kingdom of God. The kingdom of heaven is in heaven; the kingdom of God is within us. Since the book of Matthew is written to the Jew they used the word heaven because “God” was too holy a word to be used. This kingdom means Jesus Christ and His kingdom in us.
When He comes to us He takes away our sin and gives us His love and peace. We are humble because we’ve come to Jesus and He has forgiven our sins and He’s taken away all these things that are of the devil and the world. We are brought into the humility of Christ.
4 “Blessed [are] they that mourn: for they shall be comforted.”
Who is that comforter? Isaiah 53:4, 5 says: “Surely He has born our griefs and carried our sorrows…But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; with His stripes we are healed.”
He wants us to give it all to him and He will give us rest. He is saying, “Blessed [are] they that mourn:” if they enter into His rest He takes the mourning and the grieving from them and He gives them His rest.
In the natural world we never lose a loved one but there’s grief and sorrow for that’s the way God made us. We are connected to our families by a bond that is not of anyone else. If we are of the family of God we would mourn at the loss of them. He died on that cross and took those stripes in His body and by those stripes we are healed. By those stripes we can have His love and peace; He will take away the mourning and grief and sorrow.
He bore 39 stripes in His body and I’m not talking about little paddles. I’m talking about whips that had heavy medal in it that tore flesh and left it hanging off with the blood flowing everywhere. But He took this with His own body so that we don’t have to mourn and carry grief. He bore it in His body; He paid the price for us with His flesh being torn right off of His bones. He was so marred that He didn’t look like a human being. The pictures we see are not the way He looked; no one could recognize Him. He said, “Give it to me and I will give you my peace, rest and comfort.”
5 “Blessed [are] the meek: for they shall inherit the earth.”
Sometimes we forget to be gentle. You might not inherit the earth if you don’t come under the gentleness of Christ. What is He giving to us? He is giving His gentleness and kindness; but more important, His love. This love says we will inherit the earth.
What is happening in the world is very serious. People have forgotten to be gentle and kind. They have forgotten that human beings were made by God. They take them and kill them or beat them and starve them to death. They don’t think a thing about it.
He says that if we allow Him, He will put His kingdom in us; but His kingdom is not in us unless He is there. Are we giving Him a place in us that is full of love, gentleness and kindness? Do you understand the Beatitudes are for us today, not for heaven? If we are poor in spirit we are going to have a humble attitude. “Surely He hath born our grief and carried our sorrow.” He will take them and give us peace and faith, for He paid for them on the cross.
Sometimes we forget to be gentle but remember we might not inherit the earth if we don’t come under His gentleness. He’s given us His gentleness but more importantly, He’s given us His love and that love says we will inherit the earth.
6 “Blessed [are] they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.”
I believe we need to come humbly before God and He will fill us. We can hunger and thirst after we’ve given our life to Him. We can long after Him knowing His righteousness and His ways. And He said, “…they shall be filled.” God is saying to us that He is giving us something that we can have on this earth in our own lives. Moses we have learned about and we receive the commandments; but this hungering and thirsting becomes a part of us, inside.
He said if we allow Him to He will build His kingdom in us. But His kingdom is not in us unless He’s there. Are we giving Him a place in us and being filled with His love and gentleness and kindness? Or do we think we’re going to inherit the earth without these things? Do we hunger and thirst after righteousness that we might be filled?
Do you understand these Beatitudes are for us today and not just for when we get to heaven? If we do these what kind of attitudes do we have? If we are poor in our spirit we are going to have a humble attitude. I gave you that scripture that says, “Surely He hath born our grief and carried our sorrows” and He will take them if we will give them to Him. He took them on the cross.
God gives us faith through His righteousness. He says that if you thirst or hunger after righteousness He’ll give you His faith. The definition for faith is the evidence of things unseen; it’s not your faith or my faith. It’s God’s faith! We have His righteousness and we’re hungry and thirsty for more of His righteousness. God places His faith in us when we hunger and thirst after righteousness. His faith comes through His righteousness to us; then He gives us of His grace and peace multiplied. He’s multiplying His grace and His peace to us that we might be filled. He’s giving you everything that pertains to righteousness and God. He says, “I’m going to give it all to you so that you can see my faith.”
But there was one other thing that He was doing. The promise in II Peter goes down to one little word, love. With His faith He is changing us so that we will be filled with the righteousness of God; for righteousness only comes from God. We can’t bring it to ourselves; He brings it to us as we get hungry and thirsty when we have already tasted of His love and provision. We want more of God and He wants to give us more until we possess temperance, patience and godliness. He says after patience comes Godliness; after Godliness brotherly kindness.
Why does it take all of these verses to bring brotherly kindness? Because He has to use this entire process in our lives to take out everything that’s not of Him so that He can put His love in there. Faith will not work by works; faith works by love. Faith without works is dead!
Something has to happen to us beyond that line. I hear people preaching faith; but what are they going to do with it? It does not work except by love. Most of them do not understand how important God’s love is in every one of our lives. He’s giving something to us, something very wonderful. He’s giving us the way that He wants us to live as we walk on this earth.
We are going to hunger and thirst after righteousness and as we hunger and thirst after righteousness we’re going to be merciful with a pure heart, filled with His love and glory.
7 “Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy.
8 “Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.
9 “Blessed [are] the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God.”
Now here we are in the world of sin and darkness. Jesus came to give us His Kingdom and is laying out the principles of our daily walk with Him. He’s giving to us the attitudes to have in this kingdom that we can bring others into it. The kingdom of God is in us. We can say we are Christians and we can scream it all over the world, but unless we walk it, it’s of non-affect.
When we allow Him to bring us into Him and realize that it’s God and Jesus in us that are the kingdom of God. How can He bring us into His kingdom if we have the wrong attitudes? He says you be this attitude, be like this and you will be a member of the kingdom of God. If we aren’t we can’t say we are a member of God’s kingdom. We can’t say it unless Jesus is in charge of us.
These Beatitudes are the things that God gives to us everyday as we fellowship one with another. It’s very important for us to realize this; because God is preparing us for the lives we’re to live and the attitudes for His kingdom to be perfected in us. If we don’t allow Him to deal with the attitudes of our life, we can’t be filled with His righteousness. We hinder it from happening by not letting God change us the way He wants us to be with His attitudes and His humble spirit.
He’s taking the grief and giving us His comfort, His gentleness and hunger to know Him more and more. He revels Himself to us in a way that no one on earth could. He died for us! We desire to be like Him; but He has to change our attitudes. He has to bring us into a relationship with Him first, so His love must have full place in us. Otherwise we only pretend we are humble and we won’t receive what He wants to give us.
God is saying to us: “Let your light so shine before men that they will see your good works and glorify your father which is in heaven.” These are the right attitudes that God has given us.
We live here as one big family. God is making us filled with His love; but we’re not all completely filled with it yet. What happens is that wrong attitudes arise, not God’s, but ours. So we have to talk to God about it. One thing we have to do is forgive one another. We expect a lot out of other people; but if others expect a lot out of us, we don’t like it too well.
I’ve had people say, “Everybody has to love me the way I am.” No we don’t have to love you the way you are! We want to love you as Jesus wants us to love you. Sometimes it isn’t so gentle or easy for God’s love to take that place; for we get offended. Remember you are the light of the world; but what if your candle is burning out? You better do something quick.
You children sing about “…This little light of mine, let it shine;” but your lives don’t show it. The same is true with all us adults, we can talk it but only with the true humility of Christ will we show it.
With His meekness, we’ll have His gentleness. He died for us that we might have His perfect love. Another scripture says, “Be ye perfect even as your Father in heaven is perfect.” You might say, “I have friends and I love them but I hate my enemies.” Jesus said to love them. If you salute your brother only what do you do more than others. Did not the publicans do that; for if you only love them that love you what reward have you?
Matt. 5:45 “That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.”
Nobody knows how they treat me; none of you know what I’ve been through. Does it matter? No! We have to love our enemies! If we want to make it into heaven we’re going to have to love and forgive them or we won’t be with the Father. If you forgive one another the Father forgives you. If you love one another, the love of the Father is in you. If you don’t love your enemies what’s going to happen? The love of the Father is not there so where are you going? We can’t go to heaven and can’t get in the pearly gates if you didn’t forgive your enemies and you didn’t love one another. There is a scripture in Ephesians 4 that says, “Let not the sun go down upon your wrath.” Who knows if you’ll be living the next day? We don’t know! We don’t go over night or 5 minutes that we don’t forgive. The main reason we can do this is that He does the processing that He’s talking about right here in Matthew 5. He’s going to have to fill you with His love, mercy and righteousness. He’s going to give you a pure heart that you would love your enemies and would not say the wrong words and hurt them. We as adults need to work with the children gently and give them the right attitude so they can develop the right attitudes. We have the ten-commandments; but these were given for the Jew and they are more severe.
Matthew 5:11 “Blessed are ye, when [men] shall revile you, and persecute [you], and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake.
12 “Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great [is] your reward in heaven: for so
persecuted they the prophets which were before you.
13 “Ye are the salt of the earth: but if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men.
14 “Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid.
15 “Neither do men light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth light unto all that are in the house.
16 “Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.
17 “Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil.
18 “For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.
19 “Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach [them], the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.
20 “For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed [the righteousness] of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.
21 “Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment:
22 “But I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment: and whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca,
shall be in danger of the council: but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire.
23 “Therefore if thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath ought against thee;
24 “Leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way; first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift.
25 “Agree with thine adversary quickly, whiles thou art in the way with him; lest at any time the adversary deliver thee to the judge, and the judge deliver thee to the officer, and thou be cast into prison.
26 “Verily I say unto thee, Thou shalt by no means come out thence, till thou hast paid the uttermost farthing.
27 “Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not commit adultery:
28 “But I say unto you, That whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart.
29 “And if thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast [it] from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not [that] thy whole body should be cast into hell.”
Turn to 1st John Chapter 4:13 “Hereby know we that we dwell in him, and he in us, because he hath given us of his Spirit.
14 “And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son [to be] the Saviour of the world.
15 “Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him, and he in God.
16 “And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him.
17 Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment: because as he is, so are we in this world.”
What does that mean to you? He is perfecting us in His love. He said I want to give you my kingdom attitude for I placed my kingdom inside of you. Our bad attitudes don’t go with the kingdom. We get left out of the kingdom if we don’t change our attitudes so that His love is in us and will love those that hate us as well as love those that love us. His love loves those who don’t have any love at all.
God is love and He that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God and God in Him. Herein is our love made perfect because God is love! We have to love one another with God’s attitude and with God’s love. We must allow Him to bring this love into us until we are painless, because the flesh is dead. We will have no hate, bitterness or hurts; because we will be free of pain for as He is so are we. When we stand before Him, we stand complete in His love. There will be no Agnes Numer or this one or that one for there will stand Jesus, complete in us and we will be complete in Him. This is the kingdom of God.
This is the kingdom that God is preparing to take to the nations: Jesus and His love. We’re the channel through which Jesus is going to move. Are we willing to let Him take everything else out and be filled with His love? We don’t have to fear; because as He is, so are we in this world.
One time I was talking to someone and they said you’re one of these people that believe in perfection and I smiled at them. I do! It’s the Christ in us with His love that perfects us, in His love. We love one another because His love is in us. We are privileged to give this love to one another. It doesn’t offend or get insulted because it’s not our human love. Our own attitudes are not there. You say, “I’m this way and everybody likes me the way I am.” No! Jesus’s love changes us and brings His attitudes; that is the best way. Not our attitudes!
Jesus said, “Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden and I get you rest. It is very mighty to me; because God brought my life back to me. It says, “The Lord thy God in the midst of me is mighty. He will save and rejoice over thee with joy; He will joy over thee with singing.” That’s the position God wants in our life. We’re going to have His attitude. We’re going to rejoice because He’s going to rejoice over us with joy and joy over us with singing. His singing is greater than anything we’ve ever heard. He’s saying to us, “Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden and I will give you my rest, my love and my kingdom. God is love and He that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God and God in Him. Herein is our love made perfect that we may have boldness in the “day of judgment” because as He is so are we in this world.
It’s His love that’s going to take us through. It’s His love that’s going give us forgiveness, one to another. He’s going to give it to us that we might share it with one another. He wants to make us perfect even as His Father in heaven is perfect and as Jesus is perfect. He’s saying come unto me and I will make you perfect. I will take your heavy loads and I will give you peace.
We are saying to Jesus, “Come and transform our lives so that we will know that God is love and He that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God and God in Him.” Our attitudes must be God’s attitudes and God’s love will produce them. They named it Beatitudes. Not be like you are, but be as He is. It’s His love in you and I that is going to change us so that we don’t have these other problems. We are going to love everyone and forgive everyone.
God is saying for us to come to Him and take His attitudes and forget our attitudes and let His attitudes become our attitudes. Let us be His attitude and do what He wants us to do with one another.
We believe that this word will go deep into our hearts. God is declaring it to us and that through Jesus we can have His attitudes instead of ours. Let’s purpose in our heart to watch these attitudes and let His attitude come that we might forgive. Let us not hold anything in our hearts except His love for one another.
Father, we thank you for the word. We thank you for the mighty greatness of your life. Jesus, we thank you that you obeyed the Father and came. And we thank you, God, that you so loved the world that you gave us Jesus. Jesus, you so loved us that you gave us yourself and now we ask you to let us love you and have your attitudes. Cause us to love one another and forgive one another as the Father has forgiven us. Jesus Christ our Lord, Savior, deliverer, Healer and our King.
Jesus, we pray for the children and ask that you drop these things in their hearts and cause them to know that you want them to love you, so that inside of them will be the very things we are talking about. We thank you for the adults, Jesus, make us as you are. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.
Rev. Agnes I. Numer
September 20, 2000
