(Part 2 of a series
of 9 articles on the Beatitudes)
by Pastor Paul Wolff
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“Blessed are those who mourn”
Photo from a Mosaic in the
Saint Louis Cathedral in St. Louis, Missouri
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In the second
beatitude in Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus says, “Blessed are
those who mourn, for they will be comforted.” (Matthew 5:4)
Just like the other beatitudes, no one ever asks to mourn, yet it
happens all too often. In general, we mourn at any kind of a loss,
but mostly we associate mourning with the sadness we feel at the
death of a loved one – a relative or a friend. These are proper
occasions for mourning since those who die are lost to us who remain
here on earth. Death is certainly a great enemy, and the losses we
experience through death are the tragic result of sin. We also mourn
sin and all of its consequences, including death. We mourn when
others sin against us, but we also mourn when each of us recognizes
that our own sin hurts our neighbors, and we rightly feel guilt that
we have caused trouble to someone to whom we should have done good
works, and not evil. We realize that each one of us is part of the
problem, and that is a humbling thing to recognize, though often
difficult to accept.
The problem with
death which causes us to mourn is that it is permanent. There is no
coming back from death as far as it is in our power. Sometimes people
will say that they “died” when their heart stopped for a short
time, but whenever someone has been revived from that situation it is
clear that they weren’t dead, but they were dying. There comes a
point, however, when a person cannot be revived, and is lost to us in
this life. The comfort we have in Jesus is that He has overcome the
power of death for all people. Jesus said, “I am the
resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet
shall he live.” (John 11:25) He is the solution to death.
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The loving father mourned over his prodigal son,
but was comforted by his
repentance and return.
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In Jesus we receive
comfort in our mourning and rescue from death. Saint Paul wrote, “The
wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in
Christ Jesus our lord.” (Romans 6:23) Death comes as a
result of sin, and only Jesus can rescue us from sin and death. Jesus
is the holy and perfect Son of God in human flesh. When He offered
His life as an atoning sacrifice for the sins of the world, God the
Father accepted His death as payment for the sins of all people of
all time. Because of this, Jesus has conquered death for all people.
On the last day, when Jesus returns in Glory and Power, all the dead
will be raised never to die again. The believers will be raised in
eternal glory because they gladly received Christ’s forgiveness in
faith as a gift that was given to them. The unbelievers will be
raised to unending mourning and torment because they rejected
Christ’s gift of forgiveness and the guilt of their sin remains
with them forever.
This is why Jesus is
also saying in the Beatitudes that those who mourn over their sin are
blessed because they recognize the guilt of their sin and repent of
it and look to Him for forgiveness and salvation, and trust that He
will make everything right in the end. That is where we are
comforted. Jesus also taught, “I tell you,
there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than
over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.”
(Luke 15:7) That joy in heaven is not only the angels and the saints,
but God, Himself, has joy over the repentant sinner because God has
worked hard to win our salvation, and it gives Him joy that we
receive His salvation as the greatest gift that He gives us. Jesus
endured the wrath of God the Father for the sins of the world, so
that we might escape that wrath (which we deserve because of our
sinfulness), and receive full forgiveness through Jesus. We will also
be reunited with all believers in God’s heavenly kingdom through
the resurrection of all flesh and the glorification of all who, by
faith, belong to God and are adopted as His children. (see my
article: “Blessed are the Poor in Spirit”)
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We mourn at the graves of loved ones,
but we are comforted
in the hope of the resurrection.
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Saint
Paul writes, “For godly grief produces a
repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly
grief produces death.” (2 Corinthians 7:10) Saint Paul
reminds the Christians in Corinth that godly mourning over our sin
and its consequences leads to repentance. We should mourn over our
sin, lest we get too comfortable with it and enjoy it too much and
despise Christ’s salvation. “Godly grief” leads to repentance
which leads us to trust in Christ to forgive us and save us from our
sin. The opposite of that is worldly grief which does not lead to
repentance. The unbelievers in the world grieve when the consequences
of sin are manifest and they are stopped from the guilty pleasure
they take from wicked acts. This worldly grief leads to death because
they mourn the pleasures and profits of sin rather than look to Jesus
to save them from their sin.
In Matthew 11:16-19
Jesus points out the hypocrisy of the Pharisees who condemned John
the Baptist for being too ascetic and austere in his lifestyle, while
they condemned Jesus for being too free in His eating and drinking.
In this passage, Jesus makes a distinction between worldly people and
godly people. He compares worldly people to taunting children in the
marketplace who say, “We played the flute for you and you did
not dance. We sang a dirge and you did not mourn.”
(v.
17) (Note:
A dirge is a song of
sadness and mourning like one sung at a funeral.)
The world rejoices in sin and evil, but Christians cannot
join them in their celebrations over such things. The world holds
parades for sexual immorality and murder and theft and lies, and
makes a big show of giving awards to people who practice and approve
such things. They also condemn God’s people for not joining in with
their wicked celebrations. So we mourn over wickedness and evil when
the world celebrates. On the other hand, the world mourns when
justice is done and evil people get what is coming to them, and they
are prevented from continuing in their sin. In this case God’s
people rejoice in His justice and the rescue they enjoy from God’s
hand as their tormentors are punished and stopped from persecuting
good people.
The Pharisees wanted
the Christ to come and recognize their imagined righteousness and
lift them up as leaders and co-rulers with Him. When He called them
to repent (like all the other sinners) they resented it (thinking
they were already holy) and they hated Jesus and plotted to kill Him
(see John 11:53 and 12:10). The Pharisees did not mourn over their
sins, though they didn’t exactly rejoice over their sins like much
of the world does. Instead the Pharisees tried to cover up their sins
and hide them and pretended that they were holy in all that they did.
Jesus explained to
His disciples what was going to happen when He would be arrested and
crucified. He said, “Truly, truly, I say to you, you will
weep and lament, but the world will rejoice. You will be sorrowful,
but your sorrow will turn into joy. When a woman is giving birth, she
has sorrow because her hour has come, but when she has delivered the
baby, she no longer remembers the anguish, for joy that a human being
has been born into the world. So also you have sorrow now, but I will
see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take
your joy from you.”
(John
16:20-22)
This is exactly what happened when Jesus was arrested, convicted in a
prejudicial show trial, crucified, and rose from the dead. This
is also prophetic (in a typological sense) about Christians mourning
in anticipation of Christ’s return on the Last Day for judgment. We
weep and lament over
sin and death
in this life as we await the complete fulfillment of our salvation,
but when Jesus returns
in Glory
we will rejoice in unending praise for our God who has done so much
to save us.
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Jesus mourned with Mary and Martha
at the grave of Lazarus,
but Jesus brought comfort by
raising Lazarus back to life.
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Jesus mourns at
various times in His life. In Luke 13 Jesus mourns over Jerusalem.
Jesus says, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the
prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often would I have
gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her
wings, and you were not willing! Behold, your house is forsaken. And
I tell you, you will not see me until you say, ‘Blessed is he who
comes in the name of the Lord!’” (Luke 13:34-35) Jesus
doesn’t mourn only because they are going to kill Him and treat Him
shamefully, but mostly because they have largely rejected Him as
their savior and God and many will lose the salvation He goes there
to win for them. Jesus also mourns the death of a friend, Lazarus, in
John 11. Even though Jesus is planning on raising Lazarus back to
life, the death of a friend still makes Jesus weep for sorrow.
The blessing that
Christians receive for their mourning over sin is that they will be
comforted. We are first comforted through the forgiveness of our sins
that we receive from Jesus. Jesus sends us His Holy Spirit to bring
His forgiveness to us through God’s Word and Sacraments. This
comforts us because we know that the guilt of our sins have been paid
for by Jesus, and we are freed from the punishment that is due to us
because of our disobedience. Jesus has reconciled us with God by
paying for our sins Himself through His death on the cross. God, the
Father poured out His anger over our sins on Jesus when He was dying
on the cross. Jesus remained faithful and endured God’s wrath, and
died in our place. We are comforted that God has no more anger left
for us because of what Jesus did for us.
Saint
Paul writes of Christ’s comfort in his second letter to the
Corinthians, “Blessed be the God and Father of
our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort,
who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to
comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which
we ourselves are comforted by God. For as we share abundantly in
Christ’s sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in
comfort too.” (2 Corinthians 1:3-5) The comfort that we
receive from Christ in the forgiveness of our sins, and the promise
of eternal life in God’s Paradise, gives us empathy for the
suffering of others in this world. As we have been comforted, so we
can turn people to Jesus so that they, too, may receive God’s
comfort, forgiveness, and assurance of eternal salvation.
We are further
comforted when we mourn the loss of loved ones because we know that
Jesus has defeated the sting of death by dying for our sins. The
resurrection of Jesus is just the first of many. When Jesus comes
again to judge the living and the dead He will raise all the dead,
and all believers in Jesus will live forever in comfort with an
“uncountable” number of fellow children of God (see Revelation
7:9) who have received God’s salvation through faith in Jesus.
Christ’s salvation is free, and available to all through faith, but
those who reject Jesus have rejected their salvation and do not
receive the blessings and comfort that is given to them through Jesus
Christ. Yet, we are comforted to be reunited with fellow believers to
live forever in God’s heavenly kingdom.
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Because Jesus has conquered sin and death
He comforts us and tells us that, for the Christian,
death is no worse than sleeping.
Jesus will come and awaken us from
the sleep of death, and give us eternal life.
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Saint Paul gives the
Thessalonian Christians the reason for hope when they grieve those
who have died. He writes, “We do
not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep,
that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we
believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God
will bring with him those who have fallen asleep.” (1
Thessalonians 4:13-14) Our comfort in times of mourning is in the
resurrection of all flesh. Jesus will return on the last day and
raise all the dead, and we will be reunited with our brothers and
sisters in the faith, and united with Christ forever. This is our
ultimate hope, and our comfort in this life when we mourn those who
are lost to us here.
Saint James reminds
us that there is a time for mourning and a time for joy. He writes,
“Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your
hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Be
wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning
and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will
exalt you.” (James 4:8-10) Here we see again, that our
comfort is something that comes from God, just like everything else
in life. We mourn the losses we experience in this sinful life, but
trust in God for comfort and restoration, just as we trust in God for
forgiveness, life, and daily bread.
Though we have
comfort in this life in the hope of the resurrection, the fulfillment
of our comfort must wait until the last day when Christ returns to
fulfill all He has promised. Saint John saw a vision of this in the
Revelation that Christ gave him. “He will wipe away every
tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there
be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have
passed away.” (Revelation 21:4) Our hope lies in the
complete destruction of death and the restoration of God’s people
as He wants us to be – holy and immortal in God’s heavenly
kingdom.
“… the
Lord
has anointed me to bring good news to the poor; he has sent me to
bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and
the opening of the prison to those who are bound; to proclaim the
year of the Lord’s
favor, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn;
to grant to those who mourn in Zion— to give them a beautiful
headdress instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning,
the garment of praise instead of a faint spirit; that they may be
called oaks of righteousness, the planting of the Lord,
that he may be glorified.”
(Isaiah
61:1-3)
Other articles in this series:
Blessed are the Poor in Spirit
Blessed are the Meek, for They Shall Inherit the Earth
Blessed are Those Who Hunger and Thirst for Righteousness, for They Shall be Satisfied
Blessed are the Merciful, for They Shall Receive Mercy
Blessed are the Pure in Heart, for They Shall See God
Coming soon:
Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
