Author: Gary Witcher

Beatitudes (Part Two)

	In the previous study, we began looking at the group of verses commonly called the "Beatitudes."  We saw how the kingdom of heaven, the church, is made up of those who are poor in spirit.   Let’s look, now, at the second beatitude.
	"Blessed are those who mourn," Jesus teaches in Matthew 5:4,  "for they shall be comforted."
	The Greek word used here for "mourn" is the strongest one for this sadness.  It is the word used in the Septuagint, the Greek version of the Old Testament, when Jacob thought his son Joseph had been killed by a wild beast.
	So the Lord is talking about real sorrow, and not just about our reaction to the problems we face in day-to-day living.
	More than anyone else, Jesus knew what it meant to experience sorrow.
	"He was despised and forsaken of men," Isaiah writes of the coming Messiah in Isaiah 53:3, "a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief; and like one from whom men hide their face.  He was despised, and we did not esteem Him."
	1 Peter 2:21-24 describes some of the suffering that Jesus experienced for us.		
	"For you have been called for this purpose," Peter writes in this passage, "since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in His steps, who committed no sin, nor was any deceit found in His mouth, and while being reviled, He did not revile in return; while suffering, He uttered no threats, but kept entrusting Himself to Him who Judges righteously; and He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness; for by His wounds you  were healed."
	The seventeenth chapter of the Gospel of John gives us insight into the mental anguish that the Savior suffered prior to His death, the same anguish that caused Him to experience sweat like drops of blood in Gethsemane, as we read about in Luke 22:44.
	"I ask on their behalf," the Son petitions the Father regarding His disciples in John 17:9-11, "I do not ask on behalf of the world, but of those whom Thou hast given Me; for they are Thine; and all things that are Mine are Thine, and Thine are Mine, and I have been glorified in them.
	"And I am no more in the world; and yet they themselves are in the world, and I come to Thee.
	"Holy Father, keep them in Thy name, the name which Thou hast given Me, that they may be one, even as We are."
	Jesus knew what was awaiting His followers, and this caused Him great sorrow.
	This beatitude can be taken in one of three ways.
	First, we can view this mourning as literal, as mourning in general for the things that we experience here on the earth.
	"I walked a mile with pleasure,” Robert Browning Hamilton wrote. "She chattered all the way.  But she didn't leave me any wiser, in spite of all she had to say.  I walked a mile with mourning, and not a word said she.  But, oh, the things I learned while mourning walked with me."
But is Jesus basing this teaching entirely on physical suffering?
	"For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison," Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 4:17-18, "while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal."
	What kind of affliction is Paul labeling as "momentary" and "light?"
	"But we have this treasure in earthen vessels," Paul notes in verses 7-11 of the same chapter, "that the surpassing greatness of the power may be of God and not from ourselves; we are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not despairing; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body.
	"For we who live are constantly being delivered over to death for Jesus' sake, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh."
	So Jesus must be referring to something more than just physical suffering.

	A second kind of mourning involves sorrow for the suffering of those around us.
	"So, then, while we have opportunity, let us do good to all men," Paul writes in Galatians 6:l0, "and especially to those who are of the household of faith."
	We are certainly admonished, then, to be sensitive to the needs and feelings of those around us.
	Jesus "went about doing good," according to Peter’s description in Acts 10:38.
Luke 4:16-21 tells us that Isaiah 61:1,2 is written in reference to Jesus.
	"The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me" the Old Testament passage reads, "because the Lord has anointed me to bring good news to the afflicted; He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to captives, and freedom to prisoners; to proclaim the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn."
	"Weep with those who weep," we are admonished in Romans 12:15.
	"Bear one another's burdens," Galatians 6:2 instructs us.
	God is described in 2 Corinthians 1:3-7 as the "God of all comfort."
“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort,” this passage expresses, “who comforts us in all our affliction so that we will be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.  For just as the sufferings of Christ are ours in abundance, so also our comfort is abundant through Christ.  But if we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation; or if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which is effective in the patient enduring of the same sufferings which we also suffer; and our hope for you is firmly grounded, knowing that as you are sharers of our sufferings, so also you are sharers of our comfort.
	Although this second area of mourning... sorrow for the suffering of those around us... is true about physical things, it is even more true about their spiritual situation.
	"O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to Her!" Jesus says in Matthew 23:37 of the spiritual status of the city.
	"How often I wanted to gather your children together, the way a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were unwilling."
	But there is a third kind of mourning.  It revolves around the sorrow we feel for our own sins, and the understanding of our own unworthiness.
	The first recorded word preached by John the Baptist was  "Repent!" (Matthew 3:2)
	The first recorded word preached by Jesus was  "Repent!"  (Matthew 4:17)
	The first word of Peter's reply to the crowd on the day of Pentecost was "Repent!" (Acts 2:38)
	Christianity starts with the reality of sin.  The most beautiful life was ended on the cross.  The "why" of the cross is to open our eyes and make us see the indescribable horror of sin.  We cannot become Christians if we don't feel with broken heart what sin has done to God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit and ourselves.
	Mourning in general is not always beneficial, since it may not lead us to the proper reaction.
	"For the sorrow that is according to the will of God produces a repentance without regret, leading to salvation,” Paul explains in 2 Corinthians 7:10, "but the sorrow of the world produces death,"
	Just how are those who mourn with Godly sorrow comforted?  Of course, they find comfort in Jesus and His ability to eliminate the punishment for the sin that causes the mourning.
	"Fixing our eyes on Jesus the author and perfecter of faith," Hebrews 12:2,3 states, "who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
	"For consider him who has endured such hostility by sinners against Himself, so that you may not grow weary and loose heart."
	"Surely our griefs He Himself bore," Isaiah 53:4-6 says of the future Savior.  "And our sorrows He carried; yet we ourselves esteemed Him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.
	"But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, and by His scourging we were healed.
	"All of us like sheep have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; but the Lord has caused the iniquity of us all to fall on Him."
	Those who mourn because of the things they are experiencing in the world can find no greater comfort than that found in Jesus.   And it is certainly a Christian trait to mourn for the situation of those around us, especially for their spiritual condition.  But, most importantly, those who mourn their own sins and their state of bondage to those sins have the opportunity to be comforted through Jesus and His cleansing blood.
	If we mourn because of the sin that binds us, how can we be comforted?  All we have to do is know the truth and obey it, and it will make us free.

Unless otherwise noted, "Scripture taken from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE(R), (C) Copyright The Lockman Foundation 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977. Used by permission."