Wednesday, October 19, 2011

Chapter 2: The Blessedness of Possessing Nothing

Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven -Matthew 5:3
"The way to deeper knowledge of God is through the lonely valleys of soul poverty and abnegation of all things.  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 Christ used it actually mean.  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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