“BLESSED are those who mourn for they will be comforted.” This is the second of the blessed sayings with which Christ begins this wonderful sermon to Christians, which we call the sermon on the mount. They are blessed sayings because they describe the true Christian experience which brings us into, and causes us to dwell, in the love and salvation of God through Christ. They are blessed because they describe the experience of those who are saved eternally and are heirs of everlasting life.

This one follows naturally and necessarily from the first concerning poverty of spirit. Let me say here that the two illustrations I gave in the previous meditation of the experience of becoming poor in spirit were illustrations of bible people whose experience was very severe. Not all, indeed most, do not have such a powerful experience. What is true is that we can not be a true Christian without knowing in a real way, in experience as well as understanding, this poverty of spirit.

If we have entered into the knowledge and experience of being poor in spirit, then we will have come to know and appreciate our sinfulness, and how far short we have fallen from the glory of God. This will cause us to mourn.

What is this mourning? It is good to ask such a question. When people think of mourning in ordinary life it is sorrow in bereavement. This is firstly mourning over the loss of a loved one who has died. We feel the loss deep in our hearts and this causes us to grieve and cry within, if not outwardly. We are crushed and miserable. Then we can mourn over the loss of a friend who, for some reason or other, has gone away, and we do not enjoy this friends company and support and love. We can mourn over the loss of an opportunity in life, or over the sin or failure of someone we love. We can even in some way mourn over the loss of a job or a house or something else in life.

The mourning which Jesus is talking about is not caused by any of these things in normal living. There is a common experience with these, and the mourning Jesus speaks about, in that when we mourn we have deep sorrow and pain, but that which causes this sorrow in the meaning of mourning which Jesus is speaking about is something deeper than simply from these ordinary and earthly human experiences.

The mourning which Jesus is speaking about is concerned with the spiritual realm and our relationship with God. If we have become poor in spirit because we have seen our sin and corruption of heart, and appreciated that we deserve only judgement and punishment from God, then we will mourn.

This mourning is because we see the rottenness of our inner being as fallen sinful creatures. The experience of being poor in spirit shows us the hatefulness of this corruption within, which brings so much actual sin into our lives, and we begin to feel the horridness of sin, and we mourn before God for what we are, and for what we have done. We begin to see this sin and corruption with the eyes of God, and see its filthiness. David saw this and expresses his mourning for sin in Psalm 51. He says, “For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me.” He says again, “Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.” Like Jeremiah we declare that any righteousness we supposed we had, we now see as being like filthy rags.

This mourning is not simply seeing the vileness of sin, but seeing what an offence it is before God, and how our sinfulness tarnishes and spoils the glory of God. We mourn because we see how offensive our sin is to God. We mourn because we are such an offence to God in our sinfulness. This is something the ordinary human being has no concept of, and if they see our mourning they think we are morbid and stupid.

We mourn because of what our sin means before God. So we cry like David in Psalm 51 for God to be merciful to us. But this mourning has another quality. It has the quality of desiring to be clean and desiring to be forgiven. So David prays from the heart “Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.” And again “Cleanse me with hyssop, and I shall be clean. Wash me and I shall be whiter than snow.” And again “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Do not cast me from your presence or take your Holy Spirit from me.”

This mourning is a deep sorrow for sin, and repentance from sin, and a desire to be free from sin and be cleansed from sin. This mourning is a desire that God should be merciful and forgive and not cast off and punish. It is a deep cry from the heart for salvation. However we do not cease to mourn for sin after we have been given the gift of faith to believe on Jesus for salvation, and we know we are forgiven. This mourning is a continual attitude before God, and a continual realisation that we are dependant on the merits of Christ alone, always and for ever. It is an expression of the fact that we owe everything to God’s mercy. We are debtors to mercy alone.

The promise Jesus assures to those who mourn is wonderful. He assures us that when we have genuine repentance expressed in this mourning over sin, then we shall be and are comforted. This is what Isaiah 61 expresses, which Jesus said was fulfilled in him. He came to comfort those who mourn in this way, and bind up our broken heartedness.

This comfort Christ won for those who mourn over their sin. He won this comfort by his life and his death, and this comfort is given freely. Jesus comforts us by saying - go in peace your sins are forgiven you. God forgives us for Christ’s sake. We are counted righteous in the sight of God for ever, and adopted as God’s children. Our guilt is take away. We are cleansed and feel the cleanness of soul such cleansing brings. We know there is no condemnation for us because we are in Christ Jesus. We have been assured that we are heirs with Christ of the riches of heaven.