In September 2009, I wrote a devotion with this beginning: “The seasons are changing, and inside my house is a season of change as well. My daughter just started kindergarten, my ‘baby’ is about to turn 2, and my husband will start a new job this week. For someone who’s never been a big fan of change, it’s all been a little overwhelming.”

I had no idea at the time just how much change I was about to face. Within a couple of weeks, my mom would enter the ICU and be diagnosed with brain cancer.

Jesus said, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:3). 

I was 28, and nothing had shaken my world like Mom’s cancer. Never had I felt such shock and grief, and never had I been so disenchanted with life. Once a beautiful song, Louis Armstrong’s “What a Wonderful World” took on a bitter irony.

But I also found blessing in my poverty of spirit. God, in a miracle of grace, helped me see that being disenchanted with the world isn’t a bad thing, at least not for a Christian, because rather than leaving me with nothing but despair, that disenchantment left me with a more compelling hope for God’s kingdom. I could see more clearly the foolishness of building on life’s shifting sand and became more determined to build my hope on Christ.

I ended that September 2009 devotion with 2 Corinthians 4:8-18. That passage would become my anchor in the storm of change I faced. “Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal (v. 16-18).”

Your Turn: When have you felt blessed while poor in spirit?