Are you poor in spirit, mourning over sin everywhere you find it, gentle and approachable in your relationships, hungering and thirsting for righteousness, merciful to others, pure and unmixed in your devotion to Christ? Are you a peacemaker? Are you sometimes persecuted in subtle or even striking ways for your distinctiveness as you live out life from a changed heart?
If not, you should have no assurance that the kingdom of heaven is yours, that you will receive comfort from God now or in the other world, that you will inherit the earth, or be fully satisfied in a world of future righteousness, or receive mercy from the One you’ve offended, or see God, or that you can rightfully be called a son of God. (See Mt. 5:3-12)