My First Project, Draft #2

Pestilence has invaded my home tonight so this will be brief.  Here is the 2nd draft of the devotional that I posted yesterday:

Blessed are the Poor in Spirit…

When Jesus saw the crowds, he went up the mountain; and after he sat down, his disciples came to him.  Then he began to speak, and taught them, saying:  “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

                                                                                -Matthew 5:1-3

There is a hole in my living room wall.  It is a dent, really, but I’ve never fixed it.  Never considered covering it up or replacing that section of drywall.  The hole is the size of my fist, which is what I used to hit the wall late one night when I had come to the end of my rope.

The first few years with my son were hard, really hard.  Specifically, he would not sleep.  Three hours on, three hours off for months at a time.  There were some seasons where he would not sleep before 4am.  When he got sick, he slept less instead of more.  I was working two jobs but my wife was exhausted so I would take some late night shifts in an attempt to walk the boy to sleep while he screamed.  Sometimes I could get him to pass out in a half an hour.  Sometimes it was closer to two hours or not at all and I would stagger back into our room, defeated and feeling so guilty that I had to give a screaming child back to my overwhelmed wife.

This particular night the crying was especially loud and the walking was especially ineffective. By the second hour I was so tired and so angry…and I had no one that I could be angry at…so I punched the wall.  It was at that moment that I realized how insufficient I was for what I had been given in this life.  I did not have the skills…I did not have the character to be the father that my son needed.

This is being poor in spirit.  The awareness that we are too broken and insufficient for the lives that we have been given.  It is not a fear to run from, it is the reality of existence.  We were created to be not enough so that we would seek out the One who completes us.  Jesus is the one who gives strength and hope and patience to get through those sleepless nights.  He is the one who builds character and pours resources into our lives to handle the children he has gifted to us.

Recognizing your poverty of spirit is not a cause for despair; Jesus calls you Blessed because you know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that you need Him.  His Eternal Kingdom is reserved for you and for me…and I would not have known this truth if it were not for my kiddo yelling at me all through the night.