Jesus practiced mourning regularly. He said in Matthew 23:37, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not”. Jesus said in Matthew 5:4, “Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted”. And, James 4:9 tells us to, “Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep: let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to heaviness”. With sin so evident all around us, it is not time for living it up but rather a time for standing in the gap and making up the hedge so that people will turn from sin and eternal hell to full and free salvation and eternal life provided through our Lord Jesus Christ.
First Corinthians 5:1-2 causes us to think about how we are acting in response to sinful behavior coming from those naming the name of Christ. For, it says, “It is reported commonly that there is fornication among you, and such fornication as is not so much as named among the Gentiles, that one should have his father's wife. And ye are puffed up, and have not rather mourned, that he that hath done this deed might be taken away from among you”. The indictment against the body of Christ here is that “you are indifferent to the sin in your midst. You should be in mourning, or intercession, so that the one allowing the sinful behavior in their life would be taken from your fellowship”.
The Apostle Paul then describes the God-given result of mourning, intercession, and the discerning of the Spirit concerning this incident of incest taking place by one in the midst of the congregation by saying in First Corinthians 5:3-5, “For I verily, as absent in body, but present in spirit, have judged already, as though I were present, concerning him that hath so done this deed, In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when ye are gathered together, and my spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, To deliver such an one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus”.
Mourning in it’s truest sense in the scriptures means intercession, travail, and earnest supplication. We are seeing sin, heartbreak, devastation in people’s lives all around us. We are seeing it in individuals, families, churches, communities, cities, states, regions, and nations. Mourning means that we are seeing or perceiving people and situations through the eyes of the Lord rather than through the judgment of the flesh. True judgment from the Lord means that He is doing something about the work of the devil in the midst of an individual or group of people. When a person is truly mourning from the Biblical perspective, judgment from the Lord is being called for so that righteousness prevails and the glory of the Lord is seen. Amen.
