For Day 1 of The Church of England’s 40 Day Lent Pilgrim Journey Read: Matthew 5:1-10
Matthew 5: 1-10, or as more popularly known - The Sermon on the Mount - represents Jesus thoughts on eight ideas for an uncommon life. Thanks to the CoE’s Lent Pilgrim journey for Lent this year, I’ll be reading along and making notes on here as I can.
For the (like me) unobservant, Lent is the six week period leading to Easter celebrated by Christians of a more traditional bent, with the focus being a time of solemn reflection and preparation for marking the death and resurrection of Jesus at Easter.
Today’s focus is the first beatitude: Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven. From my Strong’s dictionary, in addition to its regular meanings, the Greek word translated ‘poor’ also means one who is ‘helpless and powerless to accomplish an end’. I suspect that is the more germane meaning here - it is the one who recognises a deep and unending need for God’s help in matters of the spirit who inherits the kingdom of heaven.