The Beattitudes - A Prescription of Tears: Blessed are those Who Mourn...

“Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.” (Matthew 5:4, ESV)


Mournful is the emotional counterpart to poverty of spirit. The world likes to laugh. Giggles and chuckles are dispensed from Pez like pleasure dispensers for a good time and a quick buck. People do not like being around mourners. Yet, Jesus said that the type of mourner He was talking about was blessed.


So, what is this mourning that is blessed?—this prescription of tears? It is a personal grief over sin. This happens when a person who faced 5:3 recognizes the darkness over his soul the more he is exposed to the light of the purity of God. It is the cry of one who was given a rare vision of Deity, who was caught up in the very throne room of God where even the angels covered their faces and cried in solemn worship, “Holy! Holy! Holy!” Isaiah’s reaction was not flippant familiarity but tears of utter undoing, “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!”


A.W. Pink said “the Christian has much to mourn over. The sins which he now commits—both of omission and commission—are a sense of daily grief to him, or should be, and will be, if his conscience is kept tender. An ever-deepening discovery of the depravity of his nature, the plague of his heart, the sea of corruption within—ever polluting all that he does—deeply exercises him. Consciousness of the surgings of unbelief, the swellings of pride, the coldness of his love, and his paucity of fruit, make him cry.”


But these gracious mourners amazingly and incomprehensibly have a heart of serious joy, and secret satisfaction. They are blessed. They will be comforted! What would you give in exchange for or what can compare to the comfort that God offers to those who mourn?


Look at the words from Psalm 56:8, “You have kept count of my tossings; put my tears in your bottle.” It is for certain that one day we will be face-to-face with Jesus our Savior. I imagine a scene where Jesus calls out your name and invites you to go on a short walk with Him. You arrive at a spectacular waterfall with plush greens and vibrant colors of the fauna all around. You sit next to Him on a large rock at the stream’s edge. It’s just the two of you. He pulls out from under His robe a bottle. It has your name on it. He removes the cap and tells you that the bottle contains your tears. He saved every one of them. He slowly tilts the bottle and let’s one drop at a time fall into the stream. And with each drop He explains to you exactly what that tear of pain or joy was from. He fills you in on all the details surrounding that one tear, speaking to you lovingly about purpose and outcome. And when He’s done the tears are gone.



Matthew 5:3 naturally leads to 5:4; the beauty of bankruptcy to the prescription of tears. But know this that we cannot stay neutral to this waiting for some time in an unknown distant future to respond as we know we should and must. We cannot stay neutral to the reality of God. Trying to stay neutral will always end in the Lord’s rebuke: “So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to vomit you out of my mouth.”


The fact is the closer you live to God, the more you will mourn over all that dishonors Him. And, the more you mourn over all that dishonors Him the closer you will live to God. The blessedness comes in the comfort. The comfort too is a continual comforting. Its source is the piercing wounds of Christ on the cross whose blood is purging and healing. The comforting is done not through the gifts of God, but the gift of God himself though the Holy Spirit.


I ask you the same question asked of Adam, “Where are you right now?” Are you allowing the Father to fill the prescription of tears given to you? Will you not mourn? Will you not allow Him to comfort you? Will you not surrender your life to Him?—not just as Savior, but as Lord.

The Beatitudes - The Beauty of Bankruptcy: The Poor in Spirit

Notice in Matthew 5:1-2 the place of the Sermon on the Mount. While the religious leaders had their wooden platforms and stone temple to preach from Christ used the rocks of the mountain as His pulpit. The last time God was on a mountain it was the holy mountain of Zion. Now Christ uses a common mountain. The last time God came down to a mountain He spoke in thunder and lightning to give the law. Now Christ goes up the mountain and speaks in a still small voice to give the gospel. Then, the people were terrified and dared not approach the mountain. Now, the people clamor to get as close to Christ as they can. Then, God spoke much through His prophets. Now, He himself would speak.

With purpose He sees the crowd. With intention He climbs the mountain. With wisdom He picks the right spot to sit. With discernment He understands His audience. With patience he waits for the people to sit and listen. With love He opens His mouth. With power He teaches.

Often Christ would teach without speaking, but here He opens His mouth. The people that surround Him are like sheep without a shepherd having no sense of direction as to where to turn. They live as it were perpetually in the dark moments before dawn hearing no songs of hope, seeing no near or far light pointing the way, believing not that the dawn is coming, barely dreaming a dream of rescue that now seems so farfetched and distant. The complexities of life are too overwhelming. Then, Jesus opens His mouth, He speaks, and they listen. And, when He was done speaking they were stunned to silence. A melody of hope had returned. A few words of a chorus were scribbled in the dirt. What did He teach them?—truth, three chapters of truth.

The kingdom of heaven is Matthew’s humble way of capturing in a narrow sense that “exercise of God’s sovereignty which bears directly on Christ’s saving purpose” (D.A.Carson). Poverty of spirit is your personal acknowledgment that you are spiritually bankrupt. It does not mean that you are ontologically insignificant, or personally without value because that would be untrue. In other words, it does not mean the ‘what’ or ‘who’ of you is worthless. Rather it is a confession that you are sinful and rebellious and utterly without virtue adequate enough to commend yourself to God. From that truth the bankrupt spirit humbly confesses its need for God.

Your growth in Christian graces, the blossoming of the fruit of the spirit, your satisfaction with who you are in Christ, your sense of significance and purpose in this journey starts from the ground up. Those who would build high must begin low. Those who would grow must start with poverty, with the beauty of bankruptcy—“the poor in spirit”.