In the beatitudes Jesus gives us a series of powerful statements that describe every true subject in His spiritual kingdom—that is, every true Christian. If you have repented of your sins and believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, then the beatitudes and the specific qualities that Jesus describes will characterize your life.

Jesus begins His most famous sermon by describing characteristics that are present in the life of every true follower of Jesus Christ. If you are saved and are in Christ’s spiritual kingdom, Jesus says that these characteristics, or beatitudes, are manifested in your life.

Jesus begins the Sermon on the Mount by saying that every true subject of His kingdom, that is, every true Christian, is characterized by being poor in spirit. At first glance, it seems that such an interesting expression is an odd way for Jesus to begin a sermon in front of a large crowd. But as we’ll discover together, the starting point for being part of Jesus’ kingdom is to come to Him like a spiritual beggar, depending only on God’s grace for salvation.

At the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus describes that in order to be in His kingdom you have to come to terms with your spiritual poverty—that only Christ can bring you out of spiritual bankruptcy.

As Jesus begins the Sermon on the Mount He describes several qualities that mark every true Christian. The second quality is that you must mourn over your own spiritual poverty. But what Jesus is saying is actually a paradox—He really means "Blessed are those who are unhappy." You see, every true subject of Jesus’ spiritual kingdom understands the daily battle of sin.

Do you profess to be a Christian? If so, then the qualities that Jesus describes at the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount in the beatitudes should characterize your life. One of those qualities is that every Christian genuinely mourns over their sin. This means they recognize their spiritual poverty and that their sin offends a holy God, and they plead for His grace and forgiveness.

As Jesus continues to describe the qualities of true Christians, He says that they are gentle people. This doesn’t mean that Christians are weak and severely lacking in courage. But rather, Jesus is teaching His people that they are to be both outwardly and inwardly gentle people. And this should be the consistent pattern of their lives towards God and other people.

In the Sermon on the Mount Jesus says that His true disciples are consistently characterized by meekness and gentleness. Because this quality is not inherent to human beings, you must be a follower of Jesus Christ and be under the power of the Holy Spirit to produce it. And if meekness is a reality in your life, Jesus says that you will partake in the new heaven and earth in the future.

At the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount, as Jesus describes the qualities of every true Christian, He says that God’s people will hunger and thirst for righteousness. In the same way that every person depends on food and water for life, every Christian must desire to live righteously before God, both positionally and morally and ethically, according to what has been written in God’s Word.