Welcome to the Be-Attitudes Faith Blog Hop! Every month we choose a theme with which to honor Christ and become closer to Him. We then create a project to reflect that theme and boldly post it on our blogs so that the whole world sees that even our talents belong to Him! This month we have chosen the Beatitudes found on Mathew 5:3:12 and we invite you to hop through our blogs to see the Lord’s Glory manifested through the work of our hands and the stories He has written in our lives. If you arrived from www.mypapertreehouse.blogspot.com, you are in the right place. If you just happened to land here, make sure that you hop on over to www.mypapertreehouse.blogspot.com to begin the journey. Know that we have been praying for you and hope that the Lord would bring you just a bit closer to Himself…
In Matthew 5:3-12 we find the well known Beatitudes. This portion of Scripture is very peculiar because every statement begins with “Blessed are those…” and yet the attribute that is mentioned right after is NOT something desirable before the eyes of the world.
Look at the list of attributes along with the blessed reward:
Poor in spirit: Kingdom of Heaven
Mourn: comfort
Meek: inherit the earth
Hunger and thirst for righteousness: will be filled
Merciful: will be shown mercy to
Pure in heart: will see God
Peacemakers: called children of God
Persecuted because of righteousness: kingdom of heaven
“Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. 12 Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you
If we were to be honest, we would all say that none of us would like to be considered poor in spirit, or be caught in the midst of mourning. Meekness is considered a sign of weakness and in America Hunger and Thirst for righteousness is replaced by hunger and thirst for worldly acceptance. It is very difficult to be merciful and pure in heart for our hearts are always seeking to satisfy our own needs; and we are not willing to make peace if that peace requires that we would submit to someone else’s authority. We do not want to be made fun of, or persecuted, or bad mouthed… Yet all of these things the LORD calls blessed!
The reason why they are Blessed is because only when we have these attitudes can we truly see ourselves for who we are and God for who He is. Only when we see the depravity of our being and the sin that enslaves us, can we be set free by the only ONE that is Pure and Holy! May He grant us the privilege of being called BLESSED by Him because in us are found the Be-Attitudes.
With this in mind I can say that I have spent about three weeks experiencing all of these attitudes, not realizing that the Lord was trying to test to see whether I truly believed that experiencing difficulties on earth means I am blessed. May I say that for a very long time it did not feel like I was blessed! When I stopped and looked back at my life without Christ, and the thoughts and fears that overtook me then - I got to SEE how blessed I have really been since I met Jesus. There is a renewed gratefulness in my heart and a huge appreciation for what the Lord has done. He promises to give a sound mind, and indeed this He gave! I ask the Lord to keep that in the forefront of my life, so that I may never forget that the Hands that made me are truly FAITHFUL!
There is no greater gift than that of finding Christ, but we would like to bless a group of you with some Grand Prizes from the following sponsors:
Paper Tree House Studio: Digital Paper Set
Shabby Vanity: Blog Button and Banner makeover.
Tombow: Adhesive Package
Scrapbooks & Stuff: Cricut Cartridge
Scrapbooks Etc.: 1 year Subscription
To qualify, like Paper Tree House Studio in Facebook, become a follower of their blog, and leave a comment. Those that choose to participate by creating a project that follows the theme will have a greater chance of winning, so make sure that you create something or share your own story in your blog to then come back and share with us your creation and thoughts.
Hop on over to Kari’s blog to continue in this journey… May you be filled with the “Be-Attitudes” this week.
Love in Christ,
Nana
PS: Great things will be coming to this blog very soon, so stay tuned!
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