Blessed Are Those Who Mourn Series

Blessed are those who mourn

Matthew 5:4 - Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.

Slide

Intro

Don’t worry be happy.

Put on a happy face.

Turn that frown upside down

Don’t be so sad.

Choose happy.

Hope your day is a happy one.

Those are sayings you have probably heard many times throughout the years.

We want people to be happy.

How many times have you heard,

Don’t worry, Be sad

Put on a sad face

Hope you have a really sorrowful day today

Choose to be grief filled.

There aren’t too many sayings, if any, that direct us to be sad.

That is, other than what Jesus said in the beatitude we are going to be discussing today.

We began a series in the beatitudes last week and we talked about the first one,

“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for they shall inherit the kingdom of God” (Matthew 5:3).

This morning we are going to talk about the next thing Jesus said as He began the Sermon on the Mount.

In Matthew 5:4, Jesus says,

“Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.”

Slide

Blessed are those who mourn? Really? That is so opposite of anything we would think.

We think

blessed are those who are happy.

Blessed are those who are healthy.

But Blessed are those who mourn? That doesn’t sound like being blessed to me.

What in the world does Jesus mean by this statement?

We are going to examine this a bit closer today so we can

better understand what He means and

experience the comfort that He talks about

To start, I want us to understand the meaning of the terms and then ask some questions when we can expect to find comfort in mourning and when we can’t

We need to remember from last week how we defined blessed.

Blessed, in this context, we defined as “having and experiencing God’s approval.”

Definitions:

Blessed = Having and Experiencing God’s Approval

Slide

Experiencing God’s approval is a great blessing and it is a great feeling.

We looked at it like getting your parents approval for something you have done, just a great feeling inside.

The next word we need to define is Mourn.

Mourn = to express Grief, Sorrow or Regret

Slide

Now we understand mourning normally in the context of someone dying, but we can mourn, or express grief, sorrow, or regret over many things besides just the death of someone.

We can grieve that we did not get a promotion at work

We can regret and mourn an action we have taken that has consequences we do not want.

We do not only mourn due to death, but a loss or feeling of loss of any kind.

So, using the definitions we have established, the phrase would read

Slide

“Having and experiencing God’s approval are those that express Grief, sorrow or regret, for they shall be comforted.”

Question

Now the question that comes to my mind is “Will anyone who is mourning for any reason, experience God’s approval by receiving His comfort?”

I would argue that

to find God’s comfort depends on what and how we are mourning

Disclaimer

Now before we begin, I believe that true comfort in our mourning can really only be had by those who are in a relationship with the Lord. Without Christ, I believe we just end up medicating ourselves in some fashion to alleviate the pain we experience from loss.

I believe that there is a definite order to the beatitudes.

Jesus started out saying blessed are those who are poor in spirit for they will inherit the kingdom of heaven.

When we recognize our spiritual poverty and come to the Lord for salvation recognizing it is all from Him and nothing from us, and we receive that salvation from Him, we enter into that relationship that He offers.

It is only in the midst of that relationship with the living God, that there will be any comfort in our mourning.

Now that being said, I believe that there are times, even for those in relationship with the Lord, that we only find comfort when we mourn with proper perspective.

For example, I believe that

Comfort is found as we

Recognize God’s Provision as we mourn our Loss

Slide

When David’s son Absalom, who sought to kill and overthrow David was killed, David at first began to mourn the death of Absalom without recognizing how God had protected David and his family and ultimately the nation of Israel.

We read that as the men returned, from this victory for David and Israel, David was off grieving.

Slide

2 Samuel 19:1 - Joab was told, "The king is weeping and mourning for Absalom." 2 And for the whole army the victory that day was turned into mourning, because on that day the troops heard it said, "The king is grieving for his son."