Who is Blessed, and Why? The Beatitudes of Jesus

By JR Miller

Another book from JR Miller, one of White Tree Publishing’s most popular non-fiction authors. He writes that it is well for us to study carefully the Beatitudes that fell from our Lord’s lips while He was here. We are struck at once with their unworldliness. They are altogether different from the world’s beatitudes. They run directly counter to the attitudes which rule in human society and give impulse to human ambitions. They are teachings which are intended to be against nature and to revolutionize nature. The Bible is a book of blessings. Wherever we see Jesus in the Gospel story He is giving out blessings. Now it was on the children’s heads, now on the leper, now on the blind eyes, now on the sick, now on the dead that He laid those gracious hands, and always He left some rich gift with His touch.
One day those gentle hands were drawn out and nailed on the cross, yet even then it was in blessing that they were extended, for it was for our sins that they were thus transfixed on the wood. In the very last glimpse we have of Jesus in this world, He was in the attitude of imparting a blessing. It was on the mount of ascension. He had been talking with His disciples, and then He lifted up His hands and blessed them.

• Language: English
• Publisher: White Tree Publishing
• Release date: Apr 8, 2021
• ISBN: 9781913950262

Book preview

About the Book

Another book from JR Miller, one of White Tree Publishing’s most popular non-fiction authors. He writes that it is well for us to study carefully the Beatitudes that fell from our Lord’s lips while He was here. We are struck at once with their unworldliness. They are altogether different from the world’s beatitudes. They run directly counter to the attitudes which rule in human society and give impulse to human ambitions. They are teachings which are intended to be against nature and to revolutionize nature. The Bible is a book of blessings. Wherever we see Jesus in the Gospel story He is giving out blessings. Now it was on the children’s heads, now on the leper, now on the blind eyes, now on the sick, now on the dead that He laid those gracious hands, and always He left some rich gift with His touch.

One day those gentle hands were drawn out and nailed on the cross, yet even then it was in blessing that they were extended, for it was for our sins that they were thus transfixed on the wood. In the very last glimpse we have of Jesus in this world, He was in the attitude of imparting a blessing. It was on the mount of ascension. He had been talking with His disciples, and then He lifted up His hands and blessed them.

Who is Blessed, and Why?

The Beatitudes of Jesus

JR Miller

(1840-1912)

eBook ISBN: 978-1-913950-26-2

Published by

White Tree Publishing

Bristol

UNITED KINGDOM

More books on www.whitetreepublishing.com

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All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the copyright owner of this revised edition.

Contents

Cover

About the Book

About the Author

White Tree Publishing Introduction

Author’s Introduction

The Poor in Spirit

The Mourner

Meekness

Hunger

The Merciful

Purity

The Peacemakers

The Persecuted

About White Tree Publishing

More Books by JR Miller

Author Biography

James Russell Miller was an amazingly prolific Christian author. In addition to having the post of Editorial Superintendent of the Presbyterian Board of Publication, he was the pastor of several Presbyterian churches in Pennsylvania and Illinois during his working life. He was born on March 20, 1840 near Frankfort Springs, Pennsylvania. His parents had a total of ten children, but his older sister died before he was born. When James was about fourteen years old, his father moved to a farm near Calcutta, Ohio. In the new home James was as popular among his schoolmates as he had been in his Pennsylvania home.

We can see when reading about James Miller’s early family life, how it is that he was able to write with great understanding and sympathy about the needs of individual Christians. His biographer, John T. Faris, (The Life of Dr. J. R. Miller: Jesus and I Are Friends 1912) tells us that, The young people of the neighborhood delighted to gather at the Miller [James’s parents] fireside to enjoy one of the evenings of good fellowship for which the household was noted.

Faris also tells us that family prayers in Miller’s family home, when he was young, were given absolute priority over everything else. There was to be no reading of a single Bible verse and a brief prayer!

Miller married Louise King in 1870. They had three children. He died in Philadelphia at the age of seventy-two in July 1912, having been used by God to bring a great blessing to many thousands through his various pastorates, and to countless readers through more than thirty Christian periodicals, and through the sale of more than two million copies of his books in his lifetime.

White Tree Publishing is publishing several eBook editions of Miller’s titles, as seen at the end of this book. Please also see our website for updates.

White Tree Publishing Introduction

J R Miller is one of our most popular authors. His books give helpful and challenging thoughts for living a Christian life of genuine, unforced gladness and power. Some words have been updated where they have either fallen out of use today, or changed their meaning. In all his books, Miller uses the name Christ far more often than he uses that of Jesus. Readers nowadays generally prefer to think of God’s Son as Jesus rather than by the more formal title of Christ, which means the Messiah or Anointed One. While sometimes keeping the name Christ in this book, we have made changes to that of Jesus, helping to make God’s Son more personal and immediate to us today. Miller’s teaching and doctrine are unchanged.

As always with our Christian non-fiction books, we have inserted references to Bible quotes in brackets where these are missing in the original. It may be that many authors thought they were writing to readers who were so familiar with the Bible that references were unnecessary, but we believe it is important for all readers to be able to check the words and context in their own Bibles. The version used here by Miller is the American Standard Version (ASV) which in the Beatitudes is practically identical to the KJV and the majority of modern translations.

Author’s Original Introduction

And seeing the multitudes, he went up into the mountain: and when he had sat down, his disciples came unto him: and he opened his mouth and taught them, saying,

Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted.

Blessed are the meek: for