The Blessedness of the Mourner
P.C. Barker Matthew 5:4 Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted. Blessed are they that mourn, etc. Perhaps this Beatitude may be counted as the one that most amazed ears and minds, which were not a little amazed by each one in turn. How little real cheerfulness possessed the heart of the people among whom Jesus lived! There was a maddened, frivolous excitement on the one hand; on the other, a tamed-down and habitual dispiritedness. The heritage of the nation at this time was the misery and sense of degradation that came of many of the grossest forms of bodily disease, of the heart of religion eaten out, and of an oppressed and down-trodden political condition. And both - the ever-memorable, ever-dear invitation, "Come to me, all ye that are weary and heavy laden," and this Beatitude, "Blessed are they that mourn" - betray and bespeak in utter harmony with one another the prevailing tone and genius of the saddened nation. Nay, unless what Jesus now pronounces can be thoroughly maintained and made good, so suited is the word to the most patent aspects of the people's heart, that it; might run the risk of seeming the refinement of a mocking flattery. But, whatever the people of the time thought and believed, or believed not, about this saying, nineteen centuries have fortified and still fortify its position. Even "the natural history" of the mourner, much more his spiritual history, passed in simplest review, will show that the saying of Jesus is not to take rank with the strained, unreal, arbitrary sayings of philosopher or quack, either optimist or pessimist, but is the saying of deep, abiding truth. I. MOURNING EXPRESSES AT THE LOWEST ESTIMATE A HOPEFUL SUSCEPTIBILITY. Where tears are, there is some susceptibility, at all events. Fatal fever does not rage, and is not doing its irremediable worst. Pitiless heat, shut-up heavens, unyielding drought, have not scorched up irrecoverably the verdure of the heart. One tear in the eye tells of at least one spring in the heart, though it lie ever so concealed. Esau's deluge of tears testified that, though his birthright was irrecoverably lost, yet he himself was not so. The woman who washed the feet of Jesus with her tears had lost more, and more irrecoverably, than Esau lost, yet she herself was saved, and Jesus guaranteed it: "Thy faith hath saved thee: go in peace." Peter, at the fire of the judgment-hall. renounced his faith, his Lord, his hope; and was not his conscience seared and his soul branded for a lost soul? No, for he "went out and wept bitterly." But there was another who also denied Jesus. He was close by, and he too "went out," but not to weep; we read not of one tear. So, even so, on the lowest showing, the mourner is blessed. II. THE TRUE THING MOURNING SPEAKS OF THE PROBATION OF EARTH. Violent grief, wailing, gnashing of teeth, are indeed revealed as characteristic of the place or state of future woe. But the true spirit of mourning, unknown in heaven, ungiven to hell, marks "the day of grace" that belongs to earth. It is one of the chiefest signs of earth's trial and education, and one of the chiefest symptoms of earth's hope. It subserves highest and most intrinsic uses - uses not the sequel of God's displeasure only, but the arguments of his most gracious love, till such time as "the former things have passed away, and God wipe away all tears from the eye." What mercy lies ambushed in mourning! III. MOURNING IN ITS VARIOUS KINDS HAS ABSOLUTE AND VALUABLE USES. 1. There is the mourning of sympathy. The reaction of sympathy is of Divinest use. Whatever it gives, it takes inevitably more. It opens the whole fulness of the spiritual eye, enlarges the heart, gives liberty and free action to each faculty for love, and each limb for service. 2. There is the mourning of pain. Pain presses it forth, and it expresses pain. That very expression is relief. Even physical pain is a power in and throughout the whole world. It has a widely pervading usefulness, a deeply penetrating service, in this world's stages- of spiritual growth and spiritual immaturity. The mourning of pain, for infancy, childhood, youth, strong age. and old age, we cannot tell what it has not been the means, directly or indirectly, of sparing to flesh, blood, mind; what fever of body and soul it has not averted, adding endurance to patience, vigour to energy, length of days to life itself. 3. There is the mourning of a full heart, whether the heart that is full of sorrow or of joy. How often is it the safety of the heart surcharged with grief, or likely to be overbalanced with joy! So Hagar wept. So Joseph wept when he heard of his father, "the old man, yet alive." So wept the exile patriots "by the rivers of Babylon." So the overjoyed father, whose prayer had successfully wrestled, and who with tears cried out, "Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief." And so was Mary's mourning, as she stood "without at the sepulchre," transmuted into an ever-springing well of joy. 4. There is the mourning of bereavement. Of all the heart's mourning, irrespective of that toward God in penitence, there is none more deep, more keen, more pitifully bowed down. Even when we Sorrow as those with a good hope, the poet's verse is most true - "Oh! 'tis the pang severest That human hearts can know, To lay what we hold dearest, Thus, thus the dust below." Of this mourning, too, how truly it may be said, it is alike signally fruitless and fruitful - fruitless to reverse, or in the least to stay the unanswering and unanswerable will of God, but fruitful to bring heaven nearer! Of brother and child, of wife and sister, of friend and second self, once slipped from our touch, it only remains to be said, with dreadest conviction of the truth of it, "he" or "she shall not return to me." The most undoubting trust is demanded in the darkest conflict; the most unsuspecting love in the blankest heart. Clinging, unaltering attachment is wrapt in bleeding, writhing affection. But to no mourning has Jesus come more deliberately to assuage it, with none has he more touchingly sympathized, none in the days of his flesh which seemed more to stir him to his mightiest works. Yes, blessed is this mourner, for he is already "comforted," in that those he loves so well are, though vanished from his sight, where for the first time no mourning can affect them. No recall can disturb their secure bliss. 5. Beyond the natural history of mourning there is that spiritual history of it, that sacred service belonging to it, infinitely removed from all mere sentiment, unfeignedly acknowledged by the strongest man, the tenderest woman, the frailest child - the mourning of penitence. This has no meritorious worth. Nor does it derive any consecration from our being able to say it was shared by Jesus. But it was sanctioned by him, looked on with most gracious approval by him, commended by him, as surely as those very different shouts of triumph and loud hosannas that echoed to the skies when once he was journeying into the city of Jerusalem. Yet what a touching history belongs to the mourning of penitence! With what extraordinary experiences has it been allied! Upon what fears, darkness, struggles, anguish, has it at last followed with its infinite peace! What workings in the deepest unseen of the heart has it betrayed! And what irresistible energy has it argued in that majestic friend of silent persuasiveness - God's Holy Spirit! 6. Once more, there is the mourning which may be called specially that of Christ - the mourning over sinners, and because of sin. He who had no sin for which to reproach himself is he who wept most freely over the sins of others. "He beheld the city, and wept over it." "He groaned in the spirit, and was troubled, and wept." In proportion as any disciple of Christ attains resemblance to him, he will be marked by the same hatred of sin and its work, by the same grief over the sinner and his folly. Holy men of old, moved by God's Spirit, knew such grief. "I beheld the transgressors, and was grieved, because they kept not thy Word Rivers of waters run down mine eyes, because they keep not thy Law." Our genuine mourning over sin will bring us into some faint resemblance, at least, to him of whom we thus sing - "The Son of God in tears, Angels with wonder see. Be thou astonished, O my soul! He shed those tears for thee." IV. MOURNING HAS ITS PERIOD DIVINELY FIXED. There is this particular "comfort" attached to it - that, though painful at present, it is useful; and that when its main uses are gained, itself is lost in "comfort." To the believer in Christ mourning cannot be unalloyed, for he knows its present sacred advantages, and he believes its early termination. "Blessed are the mourners: for they shall be comforted." Comforted, indeed, now by many a sanctified use and fruit of affliction, and by many a sanctified suggestion, but most of all by the sanctified assurance that ere long, nay, right early, God shall abolish it, and shall "wipe away all tears from the eye." So it is no mere end to which mourning comes; it is not the mere extinction of nature; it is the doing of God's own kind hand, moved by his own kind heart. This Beatitude is good as a rainbow covenant between heaven and earth, for souls and their inner' skies. Whether any Christian sorrow more or less, he may now, with this Beatitude of sorrow, "rejoice with joy unspeakable, and full of glory." - B. Parallel Verses KJV: Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted. WEB: Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.