Jesus Wiping Away a Weeping Mother's TearsBible World
5:4Matthew 5:4
Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted.
Blessed mourning is deep sorrow for sin that leads to repentance and a new life, and those who so mourn will be comforted with forgiveness, peace and lasting joy. This sorrow comes from seeing how human wrongdoing crucified the Lord of glory and wounded a compassionate Saviour, leaving a wide gulf between the sinner and God. It is not mere gloom, outward pretense, selfish grief over hardship, or regret only because sin brought painful results, as with Esau grieving his lost birthright and Pharaoh regretting only under judgment. The comfort is found at the foot of the cross, where the penitent is forgiven, set free, covered from shame, filled with the Holy Spirit, and given hope of immortal life and glory in God's kingdom. This is a principle of Christ's kingdom of grace rather than earthly glory, marking the character of His true subjects, and it also reaches with compassion those bowed down by affliction, sickness and bereavement to turn their eyes heavenward.
Sermon Setting and Audience
Blessed are they that mourn was spoken by Christ in His Sermon on the Mount, when seeing the multitudes He went up into a mountain and when He was set His disciples came to Him and He opened His mouth and taught them. It was given especially to the disciples, with the disciples in the inner circle, but spoken within hearing of the assembled multitude gathered from many regions to hear Him and to be healed. That multitude included Jews and Gentiles, people in ignorance and error, the ignorant, the sick, and those seeking healing, for as Teacher and Medical Missionary Worker He set forth the need of heart-reformation to them all. It was spoken together with the blessings on the poor in spirit, the meek, those who hunger and thirst after righteousness, the merciful, and those persecuted for righteousness. Its words were plain and simple enough for the poor and unlearned to understand, yet spoken with authority as words of eternal life.
The sermon was given in the open air on a mountainside near the Sea of Galilee, in fields and groves He loved as temples and treated as sacred retreats. The crowds were too large for a synagogue, though that was not the only reason He chose these settings. It was given first to the disciples and is for people of every age, valuable to be read in the family and practiced in daily life, explaining what God values and what brings true happiness.
The sermon restated the principles given through Moses and set out duties to God and to one another with greater clarity and in much stronger lines, because through disobedience men had become confused in regard to God's claims. It does not present a lower standard than the Old Testament, but sets forth the very principles spoken to Moses to give to the children of Israel, to be searched as bread for the soul and received in heart-purity and love, leaving footprints to follow wherever man is placed. It strips from the law the covering of rubbish, the Thou shalt and Thou shalt not of priests and rulers, and lets God's words in His great moral standard of righteousness appear in their true light, teaching truth and righteousness. It magnifies and makes honorable the law Christ Himself proclaimed from Mount Sinai, correcting the Jewish misinterpretation that had robbed it of spirituality and made it burdensome with many exactions. In it He explained the law, showing what each precept comprehends and making manifest its spirituality as reaching to every phase of life, showing covetousness to be idolatry, lust to be adultery, and anger to be murder. Before the universe of heaven, before fallen angels, and before those He came to save, He lived the law by supreme obedience, exalting and enforcing it, and by purity, goodness, beneficence, devotion, zeal for the glory of God, and unsurpassed love for fellow men He made known its perfection and illustrated its excellence as representative of the love of the infinite God, with the law as the controlling power in His life and delight to do God's will with God's law within His heart as the language of His heart. It lays down principles applying to every condition of life and every duty God requires, teaching that keeping God's commandments means manifesting love for God and for fellow men in daily life with the love Christ feels for humanity, so that truth sown produces holiness and beauty of character whose holy influence sanctifies actions and exerts a purifying, far-reaching influence through time into eternity. Even if its lessons were the only lessons in God's Word, practiced they are light giving wisdom to shun false paths and to gain heaven, requiring hearers to accept nothing except what can be brought to the law and to the testimony and to reject as false any message of teachers not in accordance with God's words.
The sermon was spoken so simply that a child can study it without being misled, yet with clearness, power, fullness, and an authority exclusively His own. The mount of beatitudes is an emblem of the high elevation on which Christ ever stood, and every sentence He uttered came from God, for He is the Word and the Wisdom of God presenting truth with the authority of God. His words are spirit and life, and unlike a mass of tradition and literature by infidels and so-called wise men, they show the way to heaven and fit the learner to live in this life so as to obtain the higher immortal life. They were spoken by One equal with the Father to whom all power in heaven and in earth has been given, whose divine nature shone through His humanity from inexhaustible heavenly treasures. He is the Captain of the Lord's host revealed in the Old Testament Scriptures, the same Christ enshrouded in the pillar of cloud who gave His gospel to the children of Israel, and the verse reveals His glory and His character as an example of truth and purity and brings knowledge of His prerogatives and high authority. Together with the rest of His teaching from the mount it gives the human race the perfect standard of practice in purity, righteousness and love, and with that standard gives the bright prospect of immortal life in the paradise of God. His poverty and humility enabled Him to teach humility and to offer hope to the lowly, speaking truths that a king surrounded by pomp could not have presented in the same way. He taught important truths by instruction and education rather than modern-style sermonizing, giving what is received from God as the Spirit impresses it on the heart, so that knowing His Word and doing it is the way to abide in Christ, resist the enemy from every side, and stand when everything that can be shaken is shaken.
He used familiar illustrations to bring the living principles of God's law home to His hearers' minds and consciences. The sermon was meant to be read in the family and practiced in daily life. It clearly defines the experience all may gain in the things of God, so that God expects great things of every believer, leaving no excuse for walking in the mist of uncertainty or for confusion and unbelief, while the work of the Spirit is to use this truth to bring the world in touch with Christ that through His power men and women may be continually won to the truth. Some who heard and believed that sermon were among the thousands converted after Jesus rose and returned to the Father. Christ was the foundation of the Jewish economy, and when type met antitype in His death the need for sacrificial offerings ceased, but the Mount of Blessing lessons did not cease and are still binding, for what God has set apart as sacred must ever be respected as sacred. God's people today have far greater light than ancient Israel, having both the increased light shining upon them and the instruction God gave to Moses for the people, and this verse belongs to that continuing obligation.
True and False Mourning
The mourning that is blessed is godly sorrow for sin worked by the Holy Spirit, a penitential and submissive grief over failures and errors because the Spirit of God is grieved. It leads to repentance and eternal life, binds the penitent to God, restores graces lost through hardness of heart and transgression, bears the peaceful fruits of righteousness, and shows a character able to recognize, confess, and correct its errors. Even while sorrowing, believers may rejoice in the privilege of being God's children, blessed in this life and to receive glory, honor, and immortality in God's kingdom. This sorrow is precious because it prepares the soul for holiness and joy, which follow like sunshine after rain and a harvest brought home with joy by those who sow with tears.
This mourning has no value in itself and does not itself remove the guilt of sin. It is not pretended humility, mere melancholy, outward pretense, bigotry, voluntary humility with gloomy looks and lamentation and crying, giving up social life, a life of gloom, selfish grief over hardship, complaining and murmuring with a sour downcast look, or regret merely because sin has brought painful consequences. Those who truly mourn keep a cheerful, social, sober spirit fitting sons and daughters of God so they can draw souls to Christ rather than repel them with gloom. God freely forgives those who are truly sorry for sins and ask pardon, turning their mourning into joy and making them rejoice over their sorrow.
Esau grieved over losing his birthright and Pharaoh regretted defiance when faced with plagues, but neither sorrow changed the heart or led to repentance. True conviction is altogether different, grieving over a life marked by ingratitude and rebellion, over having slighted, grieved, and wounded the compassionate Saviour, and over having wasted life and strength bought at infinite price. It comes when a person is drawn to Jesus lifted on the cross and discerns human sinfulness. He sees that sin scourged and crucified the Lord of glory, that while loved with unspeakable tenderness his life has been continual ingratitude and rebellion, that he has forsaken his best Friend and abused heaven's most precious gifts, that he has crucified the Son afresh and pierced anew that bleeding and stricken heart, and that he is separated from God by a gulf of sin broad and black and deep.
The mourning also embraces sorrow over wickedness defiling souls and evil done in the land, over one's own sins and hardness of heart and over the hardness of heart in others, leading to repentance and loving efforts to help them and to warn the wicked about breaking God's law. It is mourning because Christ is not appreciated, honored, respected, and glorified. The Son of God Himself so mourns over lost souls, grieving for millions yet unborn who will reject His appeals, persist in evil, and withhold the glory they could have given Him by receiving the divine nature.
The weight of teaching holds that this mourning is sorrow over sin and over Christ dishonored, not mourning over personal trials, which are to be expected. The Christian life is therefore to be filled with sunshine, pleasantness, and cheerfulness, without grumbling, complaining, faultfinding, or making difficulties in the church over supposed trials. Variance is to be healed by going directly to a brother, leaving the gift at the altar until reconciliation is made, confessing fault and forgiving without spreading the matter.
Those who hold the other teaching hold that the promise also comforts those bowed down by affliction, misery, sickness, despair, and the sorrows of bereavement. Affliction does not mean Christ is inattentive, for He observes sufferers with compassion. He welcomes their sorrowful condition as opportunity to meet them where they are and help those in great need, and trials permitted by God are for their good to teach holiness and turn eyes heavenward, so that suffering received in faith leads to seeking comfort in Jesus and refines character for a place in the heavenly temple.
Comfort Promised to Mourners
The comfort promised is part of the peace and joy like that of heaven which Christ longed to pour over the world. It is unity, harmony, love, peace, light and joy in the heart and in the church, received when every stumbling block and root of bitterness is taken out so it cannot spring up again to poison minds and turn the lame out of the way. It is not given to pretended humility, mere melancholy, a life of gloom, selfish grief, or regret merely because sin brought painful consequences. Esau grieved over losing his birthright and Pharaoh regretted defiance under plagues, yet neither sorrow changed the heart or led to repentance. True mourning is Spirit-given godly sorrow for sin that leads to repentance and eternal life, binds the penitent to God, restores graces lost through hardness and transgression, and bears the peaceful fruits of righteousness in a character able to recognize and correct its errors.
That holiness and joy follow sorrow like sunshine after rain and a harvest gathered with joy after sowing with tears. God reveals guilt so the sinner will flee to Christ, and in true contrition the mourner comes to the foot of the cross and leaves burdens there. There love runs to meet the returning one, covering shame and restoring with honor, setting free from the bondage of sin into the liberty of the sons of God. God freely forgives those truly sorry for sins who ask pardon, turning mourning into joy and making them rejoice over sorrow, not leaving them to complain, murmur, or wear a sour downcast look.
The comfort comes through receiving Christ as Saviour, Redeemer and Prince of life by His death as sacrifice for the world. With Him comes the greatest blessing God could bestow, the gift of the Holy Spirit breathed as life into fallen humanity. It is drawn from an inexhaustible store of the richest treasures of eternity committed by the Father to Christ without bound in their disposal. Greater joy than that found in Christ cannot be, so those who receive Him never hunger and never thirst. He acknowledges them before the heavenly host, before unfallen worlds and before the fallen world as His peculiar treasure.
Christ blesses the sorrowful, welcomes them into His refuge, and offers them rest. His blessing meets the needs of the poor, the ill-used meek, and those longing for righteousness, whose misery does not discourage Him because He sees them with compassion. It is hope and consolation in despondency, bringing hope where there is despair, pointing to new life, lifting the brokenhearted and comforting those who repent.
The comfort looks also to salvation and future destiny. Penitential, submissive mourning that grieves over failures and errors because the Spirit of God is grieved is blessed in this life and will receive glory, honor and immortality in God's kingdom. Those who bow at the foot of the cross will receive life that never ends and a crown of glory, even if persecuted and killed for Christ's sake. This sorrow over evil in the land and over one's own transgressions, with humility, repentance and warning to the wicked about breaking God's law, shows recovery of character lost through sin as the mourner draws nearer to Christ and sees sin in the light of His purity. Meekness and lowliness, unlike prideful claims of perfection, are conditions for strength and victory, so though mocked and severely tried, mourners await comfort and glory. Together with the rest of the teaching from the mount it sets the perfect standard of purity, righteousness and love and gives the bright prospect of immortal life in the paradise of God. That promise requires forming a faultless character before a pure and holy God by cooperating with Christ, wearing His yoke, learning His meekness and lowliness, doing God-given work, and being loved and ministered to by angels until judgment gives sentence according to deeds.
Kingdom Character and Blessing
The blessing states a principle governing Christ's kingdom of divine grace, not a promise of earthly glory or political deliverance. It was spoken to lay human ambition low in the dust, pronouncing blessing on a trait of character entirely opposite to the ambitions, earthly passions and high imaginings cherished by those expecting an earthly kingdom. It shows that names, positions and titles are nothing, while pure virtue and holy character with true sentiment is everything in heaven's sight and is the character of that kingdom, where human ambitions and earthly passions cannot find entrance. Together with the surrounding blessings it is an exposition of the law presenting the far-reaching claims of God's law, correcting false ideas of greatness.
The benediction publicly specifies who will be subjects of the heavenly kingdom, proclaiming His choice of subjects and assigning them their place in His service united with Himself. It sets forth a trait that must be possessed by the peculiar people who will compose the royal family in the kingdom of heaven, those who will become heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ and share with Him in blessing and glory and honor. It is one of the qualities God delights to see in people, in contrast to judging by wealth or possessions. It places those who mourn among the people Christ counts blessed as seekers of the righteousness He alone can give and as heirs of eternal rewards, in contrast to those whom the scribes and Pharisees would have called cursed, pointing to the rewards of the judgment. Those who mourn are among the blessed who will be comforted, and followers are urged to learn these blessings and live among those who receive them.
The principles of the Beatitudes apply to every age and class, describing people counted blessed because they form righteous characters, and their standard can be reached through faith in Christ the Life-giver. It is part of Christ's greeting of blessing to the whole human family, offering hope to the despairing and pointing to the possibility of a new life. The sermon is to be studied and its principles received humbly and practiced in obedience.
The blessing is full of deep meaning and value, yet many who claim to be Christians bring it only dimly into practical experience and seldom work it into life. Its truth is a golden treasure of instruction that must be incorporated into the life to give experimental knowledge and understanding of highest value, and messengers who see its real value understand their true position and, when proved and tried, work it out in their own lives. Its words are to be searched as bread for the soul to become acquainted with His life and works, leaving footprints to follow wherever placed, especially in heart-purity and love, setting forth not a lower standard than the Old Testament but the very principles spoken to Moses, delineating duties to God and fellow men in stronger lines because disobedience had confused God's claims. It is to be studied above all other knowledge to know the way to heaven, kept ready in mind and repeated as Scripture itself, not human words, to those in trial and perplexity, especially where many temperaments are met, so that it becomes a savor of life unto life, shields the mind from temptation, and furnishes reasons for faith that can be given without offense to glorify God. Its blessing belongs to those who accept and follow the teaching day by day and receive the word into good and honest hearts.
Mourning over sin belongs to an advancing Christian experience, in which those who recognize their need of Christ and mourn because of sin and affliction are prepared to learn meekness from Him under affliction with the divine Teacher. It is part of the promised blessings and character teachings given to those who are to show they are children of God, directing readers to study these blessings and follow His way. True happiness comes through the grace of the Spirit, which bears fruit in good and righteous actions, so that those who possess these qualities are truly blessed, unlike those who seek happiness in wealth, fame, or human praise. The blessing on those who mourn stands within teaching on true sanctification, in which Christ's holy life shows what followers are to become: crucified and buried with Him, made alive by His Spirit, and filled with His life. His promises bring comfort and joy, and sanctification received through belief in the truth brings comfort and quickening power to life.
The verse reveals God as compassionate, merciful, and loving rather than a stern judge without compassion or a cold, hard despot. It opposed the self-righteous teachings of the scribes and Pharisees. It must be practiced to correct false representation of God and to reveal His true character of love, kindness, courtesy, justice, purity and righteousness, requiring converting power, doing right because it is right, and walking in all humility before God, for Christ lived every phase of the sermon before He gave it, and misunderstanding and disobeying it brings ruin as with the Jews unless there is speedy repentance. It applies to people burdened by misery and despair, including the poor, the ill-used meek, and those longing for righteousness; their hardship does not discourage Christ, for He sees them with compassion, and workers who feel pity are called to help relieve their woe and bring hope and encouragement where there is despair.
Obedience and Compassionate Living
The lesson of the mourners is to be learned, received with humility, obeyed and lived daily, for receiving these truths in humility brings conversion and removal of rebuke for past wrongs. It calls for Christlike character, unity, love and fellowship rather than accusation and fault-finding, and sets out practical principles for holy living and formation of right character. Keeping it requires the converting power of God, doing right because it is right, walking in all humility of mind before God, accepting the conditions laid down, and living godly principles every day, which also gives instruction for the trials of the last days. Practicing it corrects the false representation of God as a cold, hard despot and reveals His true character of love, kindness, courtesy, justice, purity and righteousness, for Christ lived every phase of the sermon before He gave it. Misunderstanding and disobeying it brings ruin as it did with the Jews, and the same history will repeat for present believers who pass over the same ground unless they speedily repent.
Keeping the verse means manifesting love for God and fellow men in daily life with the love Christ feels for humanity, in obedience to the requirements of God where Christ safely directs. It magnifies and makes honorable the law Christ Himself proclaimed from Sinai, laying down principles applying to every condition of life and every duty God requires, and the truth sown in it produces holiness and beauty of character. As followers obey the Sermon on the Mount and pursue perfection of Christian character, they become lights in the world through whom heavenly truth is made known to those who sit in darkness and do not know the way of life and salvation. They must exhibit the graces of Christ's Spirit in practical life in order to be the lights of the world, and exercising the best and noblest faculties of the soul gives a sound, healthful, happy experience that makes life pleasant and useful to others. Its holy influence of love sanctifies actions and exerts a purifying, far-reaching influence through time into eternity.
The verse lays down principles to be worked out in business life by everyone who takes Christ's yoke with full determination to obey God's word, guiding honest conduct and a life of obedience to God. Such obedience produces a healthy, symmetrical experience and the blessings of a life hidden with Christ in God. In business it means renouncing the bag of deceitful weights and despising fraud and tricks in trade, earning money not to hoard it but to put it in circulation. It means living with an abiding sense of being part of the heavenly firm and adopted into God's family, trading faithfully upon God-given talents, and acting toward all as Christ acted on earth.
Living the verse means helping and comforting the poor, afflicted, suffering and sick, with concern widened beyond human boundaries and territorial lines to sinful suffering humanity. Christ sees those burdened by misery, despair, sickness and bereavement with compassion, welcomes their sorrowful condition as an opportunity to meet them where they are, and calls workers who feel pity to relieve woe and bring encouragement. His work of lifting the brokenhearted and despairing and comforting those who repent shows this care in action and gives a pattern for speaking and acting in a Christlike way, bringing mercy not contempt. Such a lived example makes a deeper and more lasting impression than sermons from the pulpit, and those who do this comforting learn better than before how to approach God in and through faith in Christ.
Those who truly mourn keep a cheerful, social, sober spirit fitting sons and daughters of God so they can draw souls to Christ rather than repel them with gloom. It does not approve bigotry, pretense, voluntary humility, gloomy looks, crying and lamentation, or giving up social life, and personal trials, which are to be expected, are not the mourning blessed here. The Christian life is to be filled with sunshine, pleasantness and cheerfulness, with no grumbling, complaining, faultfinding, or making difficulties in the church over supposed trials. Christ Himself was social and not secluded, cheerful yet sober, did not conform to the world, sympathized with the sorrowful, rejoiced with the joyful, and spread light and blessing wherever He went. Variance is to be healed by going directly to a brother, leaving the gift at the altar until reconciliation is made, confessing fault and forgiving without spreading the matter before the church, and the comfort promised is unity, harmony, love, peace, light and joy in heart and church when every stumbling block, hindrance and root of bitterness is taken out by the roots.
Grief over one's own sins and hardness of heart, as well as sorrow over other people's hardness of heart and over evil done in the land, should lead to repentance and loving efforts to help them, including warning the wicked about breaking God's law. Such contrition grows as mourners draw nearer to Christ and see sin in the light of His purity, and this sorrow and humility show they are recovering the character lost through sin and regaining strength and nobility of character. Unlike prideful claims of perfection, meekness and lowliness of heart are the conditions for strength and victory. Though others mock them and their trials are severe, comfort, glory and a crown of glory await those who bow at the foot of the cross.
Blessed mourning is deep sorrow for sin that leads to repentance and a new life, and those who so mourn will be comforted with forgiveness, peace and lasting joy. This sorrow comes from seeing how human wrongdoing crucified the Lord of glory and wounded a compassionate Saviour, leaving a wide gulf between the sinner and God. It is not mere gloom, outward pretense, selfish grief over hardship, or regret only because sin brought painful results, as with Esau grieving his lost birthright and Pharaoh regretting only under judgment. The comfort is found at the foot of the cross, where the penitent is forgiven, set free, covered from shame, filled with the Holy Spirit, and given hope of immortal life and glory in God's kingdom. This is a principle of Christ's kingdom of grace rather than earthly glory, marking the character of His true subjects, and it also reaches with compassion those bowed down by affliction, sickness and bereavement to turn their eyes heavenward.
Sermon Setting and Audience
Blessed are they that mourn was spoken by Christ in His Sermon on the Mount, when seeing the multitudes He went up into a mountain and when He was set His disciples came to Him and He opened His mouth and taught them. It was given especially to the disciples, with the disciples in the inner circle, but spoken within hearing of the assembled multitude gathered from many regions to hear Him and to be healed. That multitude included Jews and Gentiles, people in ignorance and error, the ignorant, the sick, and those seeking healing, for as Teacher and Medical Missionary Worker He set forth the need of heart-reformation to them all. It was spoken together with the blessings on the poor in spirit, the meek, those who hunger and thirst after righteousness, the merciful, and those persecuted for righteousness. Its words were plain and simple enough for the poor and unlearned to understand, yet spoken with authority as words of eternal life.
The sermon was given in the open air on a mountainside near the Sea of Galilee, in fields and groves He loved as temples and treated as sacred retreats. The crowds were too large for a synagogue, though that was not the only reason He chose these settings. It was given first to the disciples and is for people of every age, valuable to be read in the family and practiced in daily life, explaining what God values and what brings true happiness.
The sermon restated the principles given through Moses and set out duties to God and to one another with greater clarity and in much stronger lines, because through disobedience men had become confused in regard to God's claims. It does not present a lower standard than the Old Testament, but sets forth the very principles spoken to Moses to give to the children of Israel, to be searched as bread for the soul and received in heart-purity and love, leaving footprints to follow wherever man is placed. It strips from the law the covering of rubbish, the Thou shalt and Thou shalt not of priests and rulers, and lets God's words in His great moral standard of righteousness appear in their true light, teaching truth and righteousness. It magnifies and makes honorable the law Christ Himself proclaimed from Mount Sinai, correcting the Jewish misinterpretation that had robbed it of spirituality and made it burdensome with many exactions. In it He explained the law, showing what each precept comprehends and making manifest its spirituality as reaching to every phase of life, showing covetousness to be idolatry, lust to be adultery, and anger to be murder. Before the universe of heaven, before fallen angels, and before those He came to save, He lived the law by supreme obedience, exalting and enforcing it, and by purity, goodness, beneficence, devotion, zeal for the glory of God, and unsurpassed love for fellow men He made known its perfection and illustrated its excellence as representative of the love of the infinite God, with the law as the controlling power in His life and delight to do God's will with God's law within His heart as the language of His heart. It lays down principles applying to every condition of life and every duty God requires, teaching that keeping God's commandments means manifesting love for God and for fellow men in daily life with the love Christ feels for humanity, so that truth sown produces holiness and beauty of character whose holy influence sanctifies actions and exerts a purifying, far-reaching influence through time into eternity. Even if its lessons were the only lessons in God's Word, practiced they are light giving wisdom to shun false paths and to gain heaven, requiring hearers to accept nothing except what can be brought to the law and to the testimony and to reject as false any message of teachers not in accordance with God's words.
The sermon was spoken so simply that a child can study it without being misled, yet with clearness, power, fullness, and an authority exclusively His own. The mount of beatitudes is an emblem of the high elevation on which Christ ever stood, and every sentence He uttered came from God, for He is the Word and the Wisdom of God presenting truth with the authority of God. His words are spirit and life, and unlike a mass of tradition and literature by infidels and so-called wise men, they show the way to heaven and fit the learner to live in this life so as to obtain the higher immortal life. They were spoken by One equal with the Father to whom all power in heaven and in earth has been given, whose divine nature shone through His humanity from inexhaustible heavenly treasures. He is the Captain of the Lord's host revealed in the Old Testament Scriptures, the same Christ enshrouded in the pillar of cloud who gave His gospel to the children of Israel, and the verse reveals His glory and His character as an example of truth and purity and brings knowledge of His prerogatives and high authority. Together with the rest of His teaching from the mount it gives the human race the perfect standard of practice in purity, righteousness and love, and with that standard gives the bright prospect of immortal life in the paradise of God. His poverty and humility enabled Him to teach humility and to offer hope to the lowly, speaking truths that a king surrounded by pomp could not have presented in the same way. He taught important truths by instruction and education rather than modern-style sermonizing, giving what is received from God as the Spirit impresses it on the heart, so that knowing His Word and doing it is the way to abide in Christ, resist the enemy from every side, and stand when everything that can be shaken is shaken.
He used familiar illustrations to bring the living principles of God's law home to His hearers' minds and consciences. The sermon was meant to be read in the family and practiced in daily life. It clearly defines the experience all may gain in the things of God, so that God expects great things of every believer, leaving no excuse for walking in the mist of uncertainty or for confusion and unbelief, while the work of the Spirit is to use this truth to bring the world in touch with Christ that through His power men and women may be continually won to the truth. Some who heard and believed that sermon were among the thousands converted after Jesus rose and returned to the Father. Christ was the foundation of the Jewish economy, and when type met antitype in His death the need for sacrificial offerings ceased, but the Mount of Blessing lessons did not cease and are still binding, for what God has set apart as sacred must ever be respected as sacred. God's people today have far greater light than ancient Israel, having both the increased light shining upon them and the instruction God gave to Moses for the people, and this verse belongs to that continuing obligation.
True and False Mourning
The mourning that is blessed is godly sorrow for sin worked by the Holy Spirit, a penitential and submissive grief over failures and errors because the Spirit of God is grieved. It leads to repentance and eternal life, binds the penitent to God, restores graces lost through hardness of heart and transgression, bears the peaceful fruits of righteousness, and shows a character able to recognize, confess, and correct its errors. Even while sorrowing, believers may rejoice in the privilege of being God's children, blessed in this life and to receive glory, honor, and immortality in God's kingdom. This sorrow is precious because it prepares the soul for holiness and joy, which follow like sunshine after rain and a harvest brought home with joy by those who sow with tears.
This mourning has no value in itself and does not itself remove the guilt of sin. It is not pretended humility, mere melancholy, outward pretense, bigotry, voluntary humility with gloomy looks and lamentation and crying, giving up social life, a life of gloom, selfish grief over hardship, complaining and murmuring with a sour downcast look, or regret merely because sin has brought painful consequences. Those who truly mourn keep a cheerful, social, sober spirit fitting sons and daughters of God so they can draw souls to Christ rather than repel them with gloom. God freely forgives those who are truly sorry for sins and ask pardon, turning their mourning into joy and making them rejoice over their sorrow.
Esau grieved over losing his birthright and Pharaoh regretted defiance when faced with plagues, but neither sorrow changed the heart or led to repentance. True conviction is altogether different, grieving over a life marked by ingratitude and rebellion, over having slighted, grieved, and wounded the compassionate Saviour, and over having wasted life and strength bought at infinite price. It comes when a person is drawn to Jesus lifted on the cross and discerns human sinfulness. He sees that sin scourged and crucified the Lord of glory, that while loved with unspeakable tenderness his life has been continual ingratitude and rebellion, that he has forsaken his best Friend and abused heaven's most precious gifts, that he has crucified the Son afresh and pierced anew that bleeding and stricken heart, and that he is separated from God by a gulf of sin broad and black and deep.
The mourning also embraces sorrow over wickedness defiling souls and evil done in the land, over one's own sins and hardness of heart and over the hardness of heart in others, leading to repentance and loving efforts to help them and to warn the wicked about breaking God's law. It is mourning because Christ is not appreciated, honored, respected, and glorified. The Son of God Himself so mourns over lost souls, grieving for millions yet unborn who will reject His appeals, persist in evil, and withhold the glory they could have given Him by receiving the divine nature.
The weight of teaching holds that this mourning is sorrow over sin and over Christ dishonored, not mourning over personal trials, which are to be expected. The Christian life is therefore to be filled with sunshine, pleasantness, and cheerfulness, without grumbling, complaining, faultfinding, or making difficulties in the church over supposed trials. Variance is to be healed by going directly to a brother, leaving the gift at the altar until reconciliation is made, confessing fault and forgiving without spreading the matter.
Those who hold the other teaching hold that the promise also comforts those bowed down by affliction, misery, sickness, despair, and the sorrows of bereavement. Affliction does not mean Christ is inattentive, for He observes sufferers with compassion. He welcomes their sorrowful condition as opportunity to meet them where they are and help those in great need, and trials permitted by God are for their good to teach holiness and turn eyes heavenward, so that suffering received in faith leads to seeking comfort in Jesus and refines character for a place in the heavenly temple.
Comfort Promised to Mourners
The comfort promised is part of the peace and joy like that of heaven which Christ longed to pour over the world. It is unity, harmony, love, peace, light and joy in the heart and in the church, received when every stumbling block and root of bitterness is taken out so it cannot spring up again to poison minds and turn the lame out of the way. It is not given to pretended humility, mere melancholy, a life of gloom, selfish grief, or regret merely because sin brought painful consequences. Esau grieved over losing his birthright and Pharaoh regretted defiance under plagues, yet neither sorrow changed the heart or led to repentance. True mourning is Spirit-given godly sorrow for sin that leads to repentance and eternal life, binds the penitent to God, restores graces lost through hardness and transgression, and bears the peaceful fruits of righteousness in a character able to recognize and correct its errors.
That holiness and joy follow sorrow like sunshine after rain and a harvest gathered with joy after sowing with tears. God reveals guilt so the sinner will flee to Christ, and in true contrition the mourner comes to the foot of the cross and leaves burdens there. There love runs to meet the returning one, covering shame and restoring with honor, setting free from the bondage of sin into the liberty of the sons of God. God freely forgives those truly sorry for sins who ask pardon, turning mourning into joy and making them rejoice over sorrow, not leaving them to complain, murmur, or wear a sour downcast look.
The comfort comes through receiving Christ as Saviour, Redeemer and Prince of life by His death as sacrifice for the world. With Him comes the greatest blessing God could bestow, the gift of the Holy Spirit breathed as life into fallen humanity. It is drawn from an inexhaustible store of the richest treasures of eternity committed by the Father to Christ without bound in their disposal. Greater joy than that found in Christ cannot be, so those who receive Him never hunger and never thirst. He acknowledges them before the heavenly host, before unfallen worlds and before the fallen world as His peculiar treasure.
Christ blesses the sorrowful, welcomes them into His refuge, and offers them rest. His blessing meets the needs of the poor, the ill-used meek, and those longing for righteousness, whose misery does not discourage Him because He sees them with compassion. It is hope and consolation in despondency, bringing hope where there is despair, pointing to new life, lifting the brokenhearted and comforting those who repent.
The comfort looks also to salvation and future destiny. Penitential, submissive mourning that grieves over failures and errors because the Spirit of God is grieved is blessed in this life and will receive glory, honor and immortality in God's kingdom. Those who bow at the foot of the cross will receive life that never ends and a crown of glory, even if persecuted and killed for Christ's sake. This sorrow over evil in the land and over one's own transgressions, with humility, repentance and warning to the wicked about breaking God's law, shows recovery of character lost through sin as the mourner draws nearer to Christ and sees sin in the light of His purity. Meekness and lowliness, unlike prideful claims of perfection, are conditions for strength and victory, so though mocked and severely tried, mourners await comfort and glory. Together with the rest of the teaching from the mount it sets the perfect standard of purity, righteousness and love and gives the bright prospect of immortal life in the paradise of God. That promise requires forming a faultless character before a pure and holy God by cooperating with Christ, wearing His yoke, learning His meekness and lowliness, doing God-given work, and being loved and ministered to by angels until judgment gives sentence according to deeds.
Kingdom Character and Blessing
The blessing states a principle governing Christ's kingdom of divine grace, not a promise of earthly glory or political deliverance. It was spoken to lay human ambition low in the dust, pronouncing blessing on a trait of character entirely opposite to the ambitions, earthly passions and high imaginings cherished by those expecting an earthly kingdom. It shows that names, positions and titles are nothing, while pure virtue and holy character with true sentiment is everything in heaven's sight and is the character of that kingdom, where human ambitions and earthly passions cannot find entrance. Together with the surrounding blessings it is an exposition of the law presenting the far-reaching claims of God's law, correcting false ideas of greatness.
The benediction publicly specifies who will be subjects of the heavenly kingdom, proclaiming His choice of subjects and assigning them their place in His service united with Himself. It sets forth a trait that must be possessed by the peculiar people who will compose the royal family in the kingdom of heaven, those who will become heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ and share with Him in blessing and glory and honor. It is one of the qualities God delights to see in people, in contrast to judging by wealth or possessions. It places those who mourn among the people Christ counts blessed as seekers of the righteousness He alone can give and as heirs of eternal rewards, in contrast to those whom the scribes and Pharisees would have called cursed, pointing to the rewards of the judgment. Those who mourn are among the blessed who will be comforted, and followers are urged to learn these blessings and live among those who receive them.
The principles of the Beatitudes apply to every age and class, describing people counted blessed because they form righteous characters, and their standard can be reached through faith in Christ the Life-giver. It is part of Christ's greeting of blessing to the whole human family, offering hope to the despairing and pointing to the possibility of a new life. The sermon is to be studied and its principles received humbly and practiced in obedience.
The blessing is full of deep meaning and value, yet many who claim to be Christians bring it only dimly into practical experience and seldom work it into life. Its truth is a golden treasure of instruction that must be incorporated into the life to give experimental knowledge and understanding of highest value, and messengers who see its real value understand their true position and, when proved and tried, work it out in their own lives. Its words are to be searched as bread for the soul to become acquainted with His life and works, leaving footprints to follow wherever placed, especially in heart-purity and love, setting forth not a lower standard than the Old Testament but the very principles spoken to Moses, delineating duties to God and fellow men in stronger lines because disobedience had confused God's claims. It is to be studied above all other knowledge to know the way to heaven, kept ready in mind and repeated as Scripture itself, not human words, to those in trial and perplexity, especially where many temperaments are met, so that it becomes a savor of life unto life, shields the mind from temptation, and furnishes reasons for faith that can be given without offense to glorify God. Its blessing belongs to those who accept and follow the teaching day by day and receive the word into good and honest hearts.
Mourning over sin belongs to an advancing Christian experience, in which those who recognize their need of Christ and mourn because of sin and affliction are prepared to learn meekness from Him under affliction with the divine Teacher. It is part of the promised blessings and character teachings given to those who are to show they are children of God, directing readers to study these blessings and follow His way. True happiness comes through the grace of the Spirit, which bears fruit in good and righteous actions, so that those who possess these qualities are truly blessed, unlike those who seek happiness in wealth, fame, or human praise. The blessing on those who mourn stands within teaching on true sanctification, in which Christ's holy life shows what followers are to become: crucified and buried with Him, made alive by His Spirit, and filled with His life. His promises bring comfort and joy, and sanctification received through belief in the truth brings comfort and quickening power to life.
The verse reveals God as compassionate, merciful, and loving rather than a stern judge without compassion or a cold, hard despot. It opposed the self-righteous teachings of the scribes and Pharisees. It must be practiced to correct false representation of God and to reveal His true character of love, kindness, courtesy, justice, purity and righteousness, requiring converting power, doing right because it is right, and walking in all humility before God, for Christ lived every phase of the sermon before He gave it, and misunderstanding and disobeying it brings ruin as with the Jews unless there is speedy repentance. It applies to people burdened by misery and despair, including the poor, the ill-used meek, and those longing for righteousness; their hardship does not discourage Christ, for He sees them with compassion, and workers who feel pity are called to help relieve their woe and bring hope and encouragement where there is despair.
Obedience and Compassionate Living
The lesson of the mourners is to be learned, received with humility, obeyed and lived daily, for receiving these truths in humility brings conversion and removal of rebuke for past wrongs. It calls for Christlike character, unity, love and fellowship rather than accusation and fault-finding, and sets out practical principles for holy living and formation of right character. Keeping it requires the converting power of God, doing right because it is right, walking in all humility of mind before God, accepting the conditions laid down, and living godly principles every day, which also gives instruction for the trials of the last days. Practicing it corrects the false representation of God as a cold, hard despot and reveals His true character of love, kindness, courtesy, justice, purity and righteousness, for Christ lived every phase of the sermon before He gave it. Misunderstanding and disobeying it brings ruin as it did with the Jews, and the same history will repeat for present believers who pass over the same ground unless they speedily repent.
Keeping the verse means manifesting love for God and fellow men in daily life with the love Christ feels for humanity, in obedience to the requirements of God where Christ safely directs. It magnifies and makes honorable the law Christ Himself proclaimed from Sinai, laying down principles applying to every condition of life and every duty God requires, and the truth sown in it produces holiness and beauty of character. As followers obey the Sermon on the Mount and pursue perfection of Christian character, they become lights in the world through whom heavenly truth is made known to those who sit in darkness and do not know the way of life and salvation. They must exhibit the graces of Christ's Spirit in practical life in order to be the lights of the world, and exercising the best and noblest faculties of the soul gives a sound, healthful, happy experience that makes life pleasant and useful to others. Its holy influence of love sanctifies actions and exerts a purifying, far-reaching influence through time into eternity.
The verse lays down principles to be worked out in business life by everyone who takes Christ's yoke with full determination to obey God's word, guiding honest conduct and a life of obedience to God. Such obedience produces a healthy, symmetrical experience and the blessings of a life hidden with Christ in God. In business it means renouncing the bag of deceitful weights and despising fraud and tricks in trade, earning money not to hoard it but to put it in circulation. It means living with an abiding sense of being part of the heavenly firm and adopted into God's family, trading faithfully upon God-given talents, and acting toward all as Christ acted on earth.
Living the verse means helping and comforting the poor, afflicted, suffering and sick, with concern widened beyond human boundaries and territorial lines to sinful suffering humanity. Christ sees those burdened by misery, despair, sickness and bereavement with compassion, welcomes their sorrowful condition as an opportunity to meet them where they are, and calls workers who feel pity to relieve woe and bring encouragement. His work of lifting the brokenhearted and despairing and comforting those who repent shows this care in action and gives a pattern for speaking and acting in a Christlike way, bringing mercy not contempt. Such a lived example makes a deeper and more lasting impression than sermons from the pulpit, and those who do this comforting learn better than before how to approach God in and through faith in Christ.
Those who truly mourn keep a cheerful, social, sober spirit fitting sons and daughters of God so they can draw souls to Christ rather than repel them with gloom. It does not approve bigotry, pretense, voluntary humility, gloomy looks, crying and lamentation, or giving up social life, and personal trials, which are to be expected, are not the mourning blessed here. The Christian life is to be filled with sunshine, pleasantness and cheerfulness, with no grumbling, complaining, faultfinding, or making difficulties in the church over supposed trials. Christ Himself was social and not secluded, cheerful yet sober, did not conform to the world, sympathized with the sorrowful, rejoiced with the joyful, and spread light and blessing wherever He went. Variance is to be healed by going directly to a brother, leaving the gift at the altar until reconciliation is made, confessing fault and forgiving without spreading the matter before the church, and the comfort promised is unity, harmony, love, peace, light and joy in heart and church when every stumbling block, hindrance and root of bitterness is taken out by the roots.
Grief over one's own sins and hardness of heart, as well as sorrow over other people's hardness of heart and over evil done in the land, should lead to repentance and loving efforts to help them, including warning the wicked about breaking God's law. Such contrition grows as mourners draw nearer to Christ and see sin in the light of His purity, and this sorrow and humility show they are recovering the character lost through sin and regaining strength and nobility of character. Unlike prideful claims of perfection, meekness and lowliness of heart are the conditions for strength and victory. Though others mock them and their trials are severe, comfort, glory and a crown of glory await those who bow at the foot of the cross.