Jesus and the Poor

Poverty takes many forms, spiritual as well as material. Jesus reached out to those in any kind of poverty.

From an Africa Study Bible application note titled “Poverty of Spirit”:

Many poor people gathered to hear Jesus preach on the mountain. They knew they needed daily help in order to live. Jesus had their attention and promised them the Kingdom of God, which represented joy, healing, and God’s full blessing. To receive it they had to recognize their need for him. Jesus used the poor to illustrate everyone’s need to approach God after knowing their own poverty. 

Physically deprived people often have low morale and little motivation to do anything. They feel discouraged and may find no reason to go on living. Even worse, such people feel they cannot place their hope in any political or social system. The world and its injustices have broken their spirit through poverty. In those moments of despair, only the Kingdom of God provides hope for restoration. 

The Kingdom of God is not for the poor or the rich, but for everyone who realizes their need for him. If we are poor, we should not despise our first-hand knowledge of poverty when it allows us to understand how much we truly need God. It is that understanding of our own need that allows us to inherit the Kingdom of Heaven as our own.

Reflect or Discuss

In what ways have you experienced poverty or injustice in your life? How have these experiences affected your life and the way you live?

Why is it significant that the Kingdom of God is not just for the rich, or for people with advantages in life?

How can the injustices of this world and conditions of poverty help us realize that we need God?

In what ways are Jesus’s words good news to those of us who face injustice?