February 1, 2026
Testimony, Prayers for Our Children & Worship Song:)
I love how the TV show “The Chosen” gives us a visual of the Sermon on the Mount. So many people gathered together (all various nationalities and social status’) following Jesus’ preaching!
Jesus starts saying things that seem very backwards to His followers in ancient times and even to us now, in modern times, as Believers.
“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven!”
We do not typically think of people who are poor in spirit as being blessed. We think of people with position, authority and money being blessed. Imagine praying for someone that they become poor in spirit so they are blessed? It just doesn’t seem right but Jesus said, “Blessed are they who are poor in spirit because theirs is the kingdom of heaven!” People who are poor in spirit (or as Paul says weak in some way) are blessed because “theirs is the kingdom of heaven” or because of the promise of heaven or their HOPE in heaven! Jesus is saying when we are poor in spirit we are blessed to focus on the promise of the Kingdom of Heaven or the Kingdom of God or the Kingdom of LOVE! The Kingdom of Heaven and the Kingdom of God are used interchangeably in the Bible. In 1 John 4:7 it says, “God is LOVE” so the Kingdom of Heaven/God can also be called the Kingdom of Love!
At Dodger’s Christian Day 2023, Chris Prat talked about how we can experience heaven on earth. I would say a resounding yes from what Jesus talks about in this famous sermon on the mount! Yes! We can experience slices of heaven or the Kingdom of Heaven/God/Love on earth but these experiences are just a slice of heaven and the real experience (or full loaf of bread) of heaven is gonna blow our minds and hearts one day!
The kingdom of love can exist on this earth if we are blessed to see it! It is not through our fleshy desires, worldly position, authority or money! Yes money can help you live your best life but sometimes the people with the most money are miserable because they are poor in spirit.
Oftentimes when we are poor in spirit (or have some other weakness that Jesus addresses in this sermon on the mount) we see God’s blessings the most because our perspective changes! For example when…..
-a loved one passes away
-ourselves or a loved one has an accident or gets diagnosed w/ an illness
– we lose our job or have financial problems
-we go through a divorce or watch our parents or friends go through a divorce
-we are emotionally, physically or sexually abused
These hard times (problems or trials) are oftentimes when we have a need for God or we see that we are blessed by God. Joyce Meyer was sexually abused by her father in her younger days but in her books and preaching she tells how God has blessed her so much, through daily surprises, from having to go through that experience in her younger years! God had and has great plans for all the trials and abuses His people have suffered! “Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of Heaven/God/Love!” Romans 8:28
Sometimes it’s not as serious, it’s just a change of perspective from a trial/difficult experience. It was a blessing before the experience but we took the blessing for granted!
When our daughter Sarah was born premature at 1 lb 14 ounces (and was in NICU for 49 days from August to October 2011) I would be staring out the window from Hoag Hospital in Newport Beach at all the people enjoying their life (& beautiful day) going to the beach. It’s not that I didn’t appreciate going to the beach before, but having a young premature baby in NICU seemed really hard. I would have rather been chasing after our three other kids at the beach like I did the summer before (when they were ages 2, 4 and 6) than the seriousness of caring for a premature baby. Of course I was very blessed to have had the miracle of caring for her and I would do it again but my perspective changed about days at the beach. Since that experience in NICU, I have never taken going to the beach for granted even when all the kids are bickering and at least one of them, doesn’t want to be there. I’m always thinking of how blessed I am to be enjoying a beautiful day at the beach! After writing this I should probably be praying for the people at the hospital that they get their fun beach day soon! “Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven!”
Another change of perspective example is when I was a new mom other moms would oftentimes complain about how hard being a new mom was. I would kinda have to change the subject or do something else because before I became a mom, I was a Social Pathologist, and worked with children with special needs in a preschool special day class. I worked 2 days per week when our oldest daughter was a baby! I never felt like complaining cause I was always in “awe” of how quickly our baby, Emily, picked up on language and concepts. It was like having a little doll I would take and show the world to! Then I would love watching how she would play and interact with the world because I knew she had caught on so quickly to everything I had exposed her to!
Of course I was exhausted from a baby who was super curious about her surroundings and only took 20 minute cat naps but I always knew I was very blessed that she was developing at an advanced rate and I was also able to spend so much time with her! This is not to make other moms feel bad for feeling overwhelmed as a new mom, or needing to vent, it’s just I felt blessed because of my perspective with children with special needs. Even if I did become overwhelmed as a new mom (on occasion) I always knew it could be much more difficult so I would just handle one thing at a time and try and enjoy our curious, non-napper, extremely healthy baby! “Blessed are the sleep deprived, theirs is the kingdom of love!”
Prayers for Our Children
Now as far as prayer for our children, I am always praying that our children chase the dreams that God is putting in their hearts! Psalm 20:4 says, “May He give you the desire of your heart and make all your plans succeed!”
Our children’s perspectives come from a place of being “rich in spirit” with financial provision! We have taken them to weekly church or had a family bible study their entire lives. They know my husband (their father) and I believe in Jesus and the promises of heaven! Our children have a lot of blessings that they can easily take for granted and don’t have as much need to focus on the kingdom of Heaven, the Kingdom of God or the Kingdom of Love. They have much of this kingdom of love already in their daily home life!
My Grandma who lived through the Great Depression said, “It’s good to want things.’ The championship tennis player John McEnroe said, “My children suffer from affluenza” which is when children don’t have a need to chase dreams or set out to reach goals because they have so much! But like I stated before, what parent would want to wish for their child to be poor in spirit? But this is the difficult way to the Kingdom of Heaven, Kingdom of God or Kingdom of Love! If children don’t have a need they don’t needs it, don’t wants it:( My husband had moments of poor in spirit through trying to achieve difficult goals in football and later in business and it has made him an amazing husband and father! Praying for our young adult children and teenage children that they set difficult to achieve goals (the one’s God is putting in their hearts) in freelance business, school, baseball and tennis. If they set high goals they will eventually feel poor in spirit but you will be living your best life because you will be living for God’s purposes (Romans 8:28) and you will see slices of the Kingdom of Love here on earth and eventually join us in the Kingdom of Heaven!
There is a Catholic Judeo-Christian song from this sermon on the mount called “Blessed are They!” The recorded version is not even close to listening to people at church singing it together! “It says, Re—–joi—–ce and be glad yours is the kingdom of God.” I cry every time because the words are so true in real life! The song brings joy and sorrow at the same time because our hardships here are nothing compared to what awaits us in heaven! I attached a recorded version but it is nothing like the song live in a church filled with Jesus’ followers having gone through what he was talking about, at the sermon on the mount, and now we are singing his words back to Him because they are so TRUE! Isaiah 55:11