 |
 |
 |
||||||||
|
|
|
||||||||
|
 |
Dear Disciple,
As we continue to look at these pronouncements of blessings which the church has come to call the “beatitudes,” we come to a very odd and seemingly contradictory pronouncement indeed – “Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.”
I want to speak a word of encouragement today to you who are professed believers in and followers of Jesus Christ, to you who have responded to his invitation when he says “come to me all who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest” and yet who find that the life of the Christian is not sugar and spice and everything nice, and who find that you often mourn amidst a world, it seems, gone mad.. People wonder what’s wrong with you. Maybe you’re depressed. Maybe you need medication.
An odd reality about being a follower of Jesus who is the Truth and the Life is that it tunes you into truth about yourself and about the world that otherwise you might just try to avoid or overlook. This is truth about things as they really are, not as a fallen and rebellious world would make things out to be. And this truth is often hard, and overwhelmingly sad, and burdensome. It causes the spirit, sensitive to the way things were meant to be, and one day will be again, to mourn. So Jesus says “Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.” No, Christianity is not just for sad or melancholy people. But it is for people who see and experience the real world as it is. There is little room for phony baloney when it comes to Christian life.
But as to our own experiences of life, what is this mourning and how do we know God’s blessing through it. In reality the most central cause of inner mourning, even for those who may not know it or recognize it, is the loss of or absence of relationship with God which comes through our sin. Even if we are restored to God through Christ and have the Spirit of God within, we are still not yet what we will be, and we still see through a glass darkly. Given the purpose for our being, that is, to know and love God, this state of “seeing through a glass darkly” can be very difficult indeed. Not only that, but we are acutely aware of the ways in which our sin is displeasing to our father in heaven. We are upset by our own failure to live as we want to live as Jesus’ disciples. We hurt and disappoint others; we disappoint ourselves. So we seek forgiveness with sorrow and contrition. Blessed are those who mourn.
One the most common reasons for mourning would be that utter loss and desperate loneliness we feel when a loved one dies, especially one who has been a part of out lives a very long time, and who has been very close to us. This loss and loneliness of such a loss puts us in touch with the terrible reality of death, a reality not originally intended for God’s world or for our experience. Mourning such loss puts us in touch with the fundamental sorrow if creation itself, and with the truth that all creation groans, longing for the coming again of the son of God.
Another common kind of mourning has to do with loss of relationships due to conflict, abandonment, or migration/mobility. Just when you get close to a person, they move away, or they walk away. Life can throw very tough curve balls. Brokenness is everywhere. It was not meant to be so.
We mourn the loss of proper functioning of our bodies, whether through blindness, paralysis, deafness, muscle disease, or uncontrollable pain. We weren’t intended to experience this. It is the result of an abnormality that has invaded God’s world, the abnormality of sin and death.
We mourn as we face the horrible reality of sin and injustice all around us. It hurts us deeply to see our fellow human beings suffer. It hurts us deeply to see God mocked and dishonored. Some of us suffer the consequences of injustice and evil and mourn the unjust and horrible things that have been done to us in our pasts, and which we can’t just “forget” even if we can forgive. These things have impacted us deeply.
Some of us mourn as we stand face to face with environmental loss and the disfigurement of creation. It makes us mad and sad. We were supposed to take care of God’s world, not make it ugly!
We mourn also as we bear the sorrows of others who themselves are suffering. We are called to do this. It is right to do this. But as God makes us empathetic and sensitive to others, their suffering weighs upon us almost as our own.
There are godly and ungodly responses to all of these kinds of mourning. To those in their morning who would by God’s grace see their lack and their need and who would look to Jesus for their comfort, and who in their meekness would look to the promise of God’s comfort, and to His redoing of a world in desperate need of healing, to these the blessing of the kingdom is promised and given.
And so blessing is announced. Why are those who mourn blessed? How is it that they rest in God’s favor? Because they will be comforted. Because God Himself will comfort them.
When we think of having "every spiritual blessing in Christ," the first of these blessings is of course simply being included in the kingdom – “theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” But there are particular blessings that go with being in the kingdom. And one of these blessings is that we will be comforted as children by a loving father. We are blessed when we mourn because we know that we will be comforted by the God of all comforts. But how is it that we will be comforted?
First, we come to know that Jesus, the man of sorrows, has born our sin. He has restored us to God and ended our separation from Him. That is a great comfort. But Jesus the man of sorrows has also born our sorrows. That is, he has in some way carried upon Himself all the hurts and brokenness of a world gone mad. He can “relate” to anything we have gone through. He has carried the sorrows of the world. He has been known the deepest darkness ever known. It comforts us to know that he knows what it feels like to be sorrowful.
Second, we are comforted by the presence of the Holy Spirit, whom Jesus calls the Comforter, the one whom inwardly comforts and encourages us. He has come alongside to minister to and help us. He ministers to us in ways we are not even aware of. He translates our deepest groanings back to the Father when we just don’t what to pray. He is the presence of Christ to us, and He restores our souls.
Third, we are comforted by other people sent to bear our burdens and share our sorrows. How could we ever get through this world alone?
Fourth, we are comforted by God’s certain promise of future comfort. We know that one day Jesus will come back, and that death will end, and suffering and sickness will end, and there will be no more tears, and no more sorrow, and that all that is not right will be made right. The certainty of such future comfort is a present comfort.
So, dear disciples do not be ashamed that you mourn within. Look to Jesus in faith, and you will be comforted. This makes you blessed indeed. |
 |
|
 |
|
||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
||||
