As I've studied the Beatitudes in preparation for this sermon series through the Sermon on the Mount, what has captured my attention the most, particularly in these opening verses, is that Jesus is describing a spiritual condition. He's not describing something that we should obtain by our efforts and by our works. No, he's describing a spiritual condition, but it's not just any condition. He's describing the condition of his people. And that's important to keep in mind as we go through the Sermon on the Mount, that Jesus is essentially explaining to us who we are. in Christ, who we are, as we've been transformed by the Spirit. And last week, we began our study in the Beatitudes, the opening section of this Sermon on the Mount, and we focused on verse 3, which is the poor in spirit. And as a way of reminder, the poor in spirit is the person who understands that he or she is spiritually bankrupt before a holy and righteous God. and that he is totally dependent upon God's grace and mercy for forgiveness and for reconciliation. That's what it means to be spiritually poor. This is a heart posture. It's a posture we have before the Lord and before others. And it continues throughout the believer's life. And this particular beatitude, the poor in spirit, helps us understand the remaining beatitudes. I was thinking about the beatitudes this week. And they remind me, A little bit of what Paul says in Galatians when he refers to the fruit of the spirit in a way, the Beatitudes are Jesus's fruit of the spirit. This is what the spirit produces in God's people. Those who recognize they are spiritually bankrupt before the Lord. And so the Beatitudes are not random virtues that Jesus uses to describe his people. Rather, they are interconnected. You can't have one without the other. If one is true, they all are true of you. Now it doesn't mean that we live them out perfectly. We are sinners. Romans 7 is still real. Sin still remains. There's a war that's raging in our hearts. But this is the truth that God is producing by His Spirit in each one of His people. And so the poor in spirit sets the trajectory for the remaining beatitudes which are all true of us. And we see this in the next word that Jesus uses to describe his people in Matthew chapter five. Look at verse four. This is the second beatitude. And Jesus writes these words. Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. I want to follow the same kind of pattern that I used last week to help us think about this verse. I want to ask three questions this morning. What does it mean to be blessed? What does it mean to mourn? And what does it mean to be comforted? And we'll just take each one of those questions one at a time and I want to quickly review what it means to be blessed. Now this is, what I talked about last week is true for each one of these Beatitudes. The happy person, the blessed person is the one, for example in this case, who mourns. For he or she shall be comforted. But as a quick reminder, the person who is blessed is the person who is in a happy, content state of being. This is a position, this is a condition that God's people are in by the power of the Holy Spirit. This is not a momentary, emotional kind of flippant happiness. No, this is a state of being for God's people. And as Christians, our ultimate happiness we know is found in God. The blessed person's heart is satisfied with our ultimate good, God Himself. So the happy person is the person who knows the Lord, whose joy is in God. The happy person can say with the psalmist in Psalm 42, as a deer pants for flowing streams, So pants my soul for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. And that imagery there captures the happy heart, the blessed heart. Think about that imagery. A deer that's thirsty finds a running stream of water and goes down into Quinchet's thirst, takes a drink. He wants that drink more than anything. That's what the psalmist is saying about the happy person. the blessed person. We want God. More than anything, we want the Lord. But again, how does this person get happy in God? How do you this morning get happy in God? How is it that we are blessed people? Folks, the world is gonna tell you the opposite of what Jesus says in verse four. Verse four sounds like a paradox. Look at it again. Jesus says, blessed are those who mourn. So you're telling me, Jesus, if I wanna be happy, I need to cry. If I want to be happy, I need to grieve. If I want to be happy, my heart needs to ache. Is that what you're saying, Lord? We're going to develop that here in just a few moments. But the world says just the opposite. The world tells us to do everything that we possibly can to avoid mourning, to avoid grieving. We don't like death. So what do we do? Well, we do everything in our power to avoid death. We try to improve our physical fitness to avoid death. We pump ourselves full of medicine, which are God's common grace to us, but sometimes they become our God. And so we pump ourselves full of medicines to avoid death. Or we improve our physical appearance. Why? Because we want to avoid rejection. We don't like how it feels when people don't like the way we look. The world tells us to do everything we can to avoid mourning. So sometimes we try to increase our wealth because we don't want to know what it's like to be without. Sometimes, We hear the world telling us over and over and over again, just keep entertaining yourself to avoid sadness. Just numb your mind to the pain in this world. Just immerse yourself in content that will keep your mind occupied so you don't have to think about the reality of suffering and pain in this world. That's what the world is telling us to do all the time. All these things, do everything you can to avoid grief. to avoid mourning, to avoid aching in our hearts. And what's most perplexing to people who spend their days trying to avoid any kind of mourning is that all of these attempts only prove to be Band-Aids. They can only temporarily alleviate pain and suffering. Friends, death is unavoidable. Rejection happens to everyone. We will always want more, no matter how much money we have. And friends, sadness is around every corner. So what's the point? Mourning is unavoidable. All the world can offer are things that temporarily alleviate mourning. But here's the paradox of Matthew 5 verse 4 of Jesus' own words. Here's the paradox. Jesus actually tells us that it is those who mourn who are happy. Those who learn to mourn are those who are satisfied, those who are content. Now you may be thinking, how does that work? I can't understand that concept. That's what I want to develop for us this morning here in the Beatitudes, verse four. So we've got to think about the question, what kind of mourning is Jesus referring to? If you want to be the happy person, the blessed person, you've got to learn how to mourn. But what kind of mourning is Jesus referring to? Question number two, let's think about what it means to mourn. What does it mean to mourn? What does it mean to mourn? Verse four, Jesus says, blessed or happy are those who mourn. Now again, if the Beatitudes are interconnected, and I think they are, then those who mourn are also those who are poor in spirit. In the same way that the spirit produces the fruit of the spirit in you, all of it, he's working out the fruit of the spirit in each one of you, the spirit is working out each one of these beatitudes in all of us. So if you are poor in spirit, you are also the person who mourns. Now as a reminder, the poor in spirit is the person who understands who they are before a holy and righteous God. Again, like Isaiah says, woe is me. For I am lost. He goes on to say, I am a man of unclean lips. And so Isaiah envisions himself before this vision of God in the temple, this majestic vision of God in the temple. And Isaiah says, woe is me before you, a holy and righteous God. He's poor in spirit. He understands that he is spiritually bankrupt before God and totally dependent upon His grace and mercy for forgiveness and reconciliation. Now let's think about how the poor in spirit are also those who mourn. To recognize your position before God means that it will leave you to mourn. Now the word mourn means to grieve. We all understand what it means to grieve. There's different levels of grieving. Even unbelievers can grieve. We all grieve, for example, when we experience losing someone that we love to death. When you lose someone that you love, your heart grieves, it aches. You mourn the fact that they're no longer with you. But in the context of Jesus's sermon, he's using the word mourn to describe a spiritual condition. The same way he's describing the poor in spirit, the posture before God, those who are spiritually bankrupt, he's using this word mourn to describe a spiritual condition. So those who mourn are those who do so at least on two levels. And I want you to think about this with me. On the first level, we mourn over our personal sin. The spiritually bankrupt. We recognize who we are before God. But unlike the demons who just simply recognize that they are wicked and evil and tremble before the Lord, they don't grieve over their sin. They don't repent of their sin. Those who mourn are those who are broken over their sin. The person who mourns is the person who is grieved by his or her own sinfulness. There is a real brokenness that causes the heart to mourn over one's own guilt before a holy and righteous God. So it's not just this recognition that I am a sinner, it's this recognition that I'm a sinner and I hate it. Because it offends God. I am a wretch before a holy and righteous God. I wish it wasn't this way. That's the heart of the person who mourns. You know, if you go all the way back to the beginning when Adam sinned in the garden, we've thought about this quite a bit together over the last couple of years. As we've thought through Romans together and even in the Sermon on the Mount, I've addressed this to some degree. But when Adam sinned, two things were transferred to the human race. One is Adam's own guilt, his unrighteousness. Well, because Adam sinned, we all sinned in him, so we receive his unrighteousness. But I want to think about the second thing that was transferred to us. Not only are we guilty because Adam was guilty, we are sinners because we sin. The second thing that was transferred to us was Adam's sinful nature. So we all come into this world as sinners and therefore we all sin, we all inherit the sinful nature of Adam. I think one of the most clear explanations of this reality is found in Mark chapter seven. In Mark chapter seven, Jesus is going to explain to us what it actually is that defiles a person. What makes a person evil? What makes them unclean? And his argument is not that it's something from without that comes to us that makes us unclean, such as our circumstances that we grow up in. Some of you maybe have grew up in really difficult circumstances. And it didn't make your life easy. And maybe the tendency is to say, well, I am the way I am because of the circumstances that I grew up in. Or if you just understood the work environment that I'm in, you would understand why I am the way I am. And Jesus is going to argue against that. He's not gonna say the reason we are the way we are is because of our environment or our external circumstances. No, he's going to say something different. In Mark 7 verse 14. He called the people to him again and said to them, hear me all of you and understand. There is nothing outside a person that by going into him can defile him. But the things that come out of a person are what defile him. Now he's talking about eating clean and unclean foods here. He's dealing with Jewish traditions. And he's saying the foods that you eat that come into your body are not what make you unclean. Verse 17, and when he had entered the house and left the people, his disciples asked him about the parable. And he said to them, and are you also without understanding? Do you not see whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile him since it enters not his heart but his stomach and is expelled? Thus he declared all foods clean. Now notice verse 20. He said to them, what comes out of a person is what defiles him. What's he getting at? What's the problem with humanity? What is it that all of us experience as descendants of Adam? For from within, Jesus says, from within, out of the heart of man come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, Sensuality, envy, slander, pride, foolishness, all these evil things come from within and they defile a person. So what's Jesus' point in the Beatitudes? You see, the person, the blessed person, is the one who understands his or her own sinful nature. I'm the problem. The world is looking at you every day saying, you're not the problem. The Bible is saying, you're the problem. I'm the problem. Sin is in here, folks. We can't eradicate it from our lives. It corrupts us to the core. And the blessed person is the person who sees this and it grieves our hearts. We understand how broken we are. You see, as Christians, We understand that our biggest problem is within us. Sin has polluted our entire being, meaning sin touches every faculty of our being. Our minds, our emotions, our physical bodies, our hearts, our relationship to God, our relationship to other people. Sin affects everything. And the blessed person is the one who can identify with Jesus' words in Mark 2.17 when He said this, Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners. Friends, you can't get well if you don't know that you're sick. Spiritually, you can't be comforted if you don't believe that you're a sinner. One of the most significant problems in the church at large today, and I'm speaking specifically to the American church context, is that we don't mourn over our sin. We're full of pride. We don't like to admit that we're weak and broken and needy people and that we've offended a holy and righteous God. And the reason we don't mourn is because we likely don't think our sin is that big of a deal. Does it really matter that I told a lie? Does it really matter that I had anger in my heart toward another person? Do these things really matter? Did I covet what other people have and I want them, even if it means they may suffer because I get it? Like, is it really bad? I'm not even telling that to people. I just feel it. Is that really that big of a deal? And Jesus is teaching us here in the Beatitudes that yes, it is. It is. And those who mourn are those whose personal sin causes them to grieve. As Christians, we know that our sin is ultimately against God. And with David, we say to the Lord, against you, you only have I sinned and does what is evil in your sight. Does this describe you? I think that's the question that verse four wants all of us to ask ourselves. Do I mourn over my sin in this way? Does it grieve my heart that my sin is against a holy God and that my sin, my personal sin, hurts other people? Does that grieve your heart? Does your personal sin cause you to mourn? But not only do we mourn over personal sin, as Christians, we mourn over sin in general. The sin that we see permeating this world. And so we mourn over sin in general. This is the second way that we mourn. We mourn over the sinfulness of the world in which we live. It grieves our hearts to see the effects of sin in the world. When Adam sinned, it not only affected humanity, the effects of his sin reached the entire earth. Not only were humans cursed, but the earth and all that fills it was cursed. In Romans 8, Paul says, listen to this language, the creation. He's talking about all of it. The earth and all that you see, the stars that are hanging in the skies, the planets that are orbiting. The creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. Now, why does creation wait with eager longing for you and for me to be revealed as the sons of God. Why? Paul says, for the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it in hope that the creation, here it is, itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. The reason the actual creation is longing in this way is because it wants to be set free from the effects of sin. The sin that we see permeating this world. In fact, anyone can observe the world around us and see that something is not right. This world is broken. Doesn't work the way it's supposed to. Just look around and we see wars happening all the time. Nations are raging against each other. Why? Because one nation wants power over another. One nation wants land. One nation wants territory, even at the expense of human lives. We see it through sickness and death. This world is cursed as death and disease are spreading all around us. All of us have had friends or family members who have been affected by horrible diseases, things like cancer. All of us have felt that. You can look at the world and see that it's not right because of broken relationships. How many marriages fail? How many parent-child relationships aren't good as children grow up and don't speak to their parents? How many friendships end up broken? How many work relationships are under tension? We see it all around us. We see horrific things happening to people, whether they're intentional or accidental. because we live in a cursed world. You can look around and see that something isn't right because there are natural disasters happening all the time. Things like earthquakes and floods and wildfires and tornadoes and hurricanes and tsunamis. There's certain parts of the world that experience famine. Cities across the US are covered by pollution. livestock, get diseases, and die. Friends, this is just the reality of living in a fallen world. And for the Christian, it grieves us. That's the point. We mourn. The fallen world grieves our hearts as Christians. Now think about what Jesus is saying. We've thought together about how the person who mourns is the blessed person. So the person who mourns over their personal sin and the person who mourns over the effects of sin across the entire world. Think about what Jesus is saying. Blessed are those who mourn. Blessed, happy are those who grieve over sin. Now how is it that those who mourn, those who mourn, this sounds like a contradiction, it sounds like a paradox, are those who are happy? Aren't we not supposed to think about things that make us sad? Shouldn't we just kind of tuck that away in the corner and not deal with all of this brokenness? And yet Jesus is saying, blessed are those who mourn. So what does it mean then to be comforted? How is it that those who mourn have found the key to true happiness? Look at verse four. He writes, blessed are those who mourn excuse me, to mourn, for they shall be comforted. I love the word comforted. Kind of makes me think about the holidays. That time of year when you get to draw close to friends and family. There's a level of comfort that comes with that. It's not quite the word that Jesus is using here. In the original language, This word is parakaleo. Here's the reason I mention that to you. Because it's two words that come together to make one. The front end of that word or the prefix is para, which means close or near. The second part of this word is kaleo, which means to call. Now think about what Jesus is saying here. Blessed are those who mourn. For they shall be called near. You get that? They shall be comforted. They shall be called near to the heart of God. Now you might think that the person who understands how sinful they are and mourns over their sin, that God would look at that person and say, now you get it. Now you understand how evil and vile you are. And now you understand why you're going to get what you deserve. Like we think that's how God often wants to respond to us. You see how vile you are. You know you deserve what you think I'm gonna give you. That's how we think God is going to respond to us, but that's not what verse four says. Rather it says that those who mourn shall be comforted. God doesn't turn away those who are sinners. God calls them close. You see, God loves to call broken, contrite, repentant sinners to himself to comfort us, to bring us near to him, to find rest from our grief. I love the old theologian Jonathan Edwards says about God's work of exacting justice and God's work of showing mercy and grace. Edwards calls the justice of God his strange work. Meaning the Bible never talks about God exacting justice in a way that delights his heart. The point being, God does not delight in pouring out wrath on people. He does it because he is God, and he is righteous, and he is holy. So God very much pours out judgment on the unrepentant. But Edwards calls it his strange work because he doesn't delight in doing that. But his work of mercy, the Lord loves to do. He loves to call sinners to come close to him so that he can shower them with grace. He loves to bring us near to Him to find rest from our mourning over our sin and our mourning of living in a broken world. Any good parent understands this. And when I say good parent, I mean a parent who loves his or her kids. But any parent whose kid does something that is wrong, and then comes to them sad and broken over what they've done, that parent is not going to say to that child, I can't believe what you've done. Get away from me. It's not what a good parent does. It's not what a loving parent does. No, that parent is going to say, come here. Just come. Let me embrace you. I want to bring you close to me. You recognize you've done something wrong. It grieves your heart, and it grieves my heart, but it will not separate you from my love. That's the heart of the Father. Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be called near. They shall be comforted. John Bunyan, many of you know him for his, what is now the most famous work of his, Pilgrim's Progress, has written many other works, and one of the other works that he's written is entitled Come and Welcome to Jesus. And it's based on John 6, verse 37. And that verse says, whoever comes to me, I will never cast out. In his book Gentle and Lowly, Dane Ortland writes about this truth that Bunyan communicates in this work, Come and Welcome to Jesus. And he talks about how we as Christians, even we as Christians, those who mourn, those who have been comforted, we have trouble. believing this truth that God will never cast us out. And so John Bunyan writes these words, and this comes from Ortland's book. They that are coming to Jesus Christ are oftentimes heartily afraid that Jesus will not receive them. This observation is implied in the text. I gather it from the largeness and openness of the promise, I will in no wise cast out. For had there not been a proneness in us to fear casting out, Christ needed not to have waylaid our fear as He does by this great and strange expression, in no wise. There needed not, as I may say, such a promise to be invented by the wisdom of heaven and worded at such a rate as it were on purpose to dash in pieces at one blow all the objections coming from sinners if they were not prone to admit of such objections to the discouraging of their own souls. Bunyan goes on to write for this word in no wise. cuts the throat of all objections. And it was dropped by the Lord Jesus for that very end and to help the faith that is mixed with unbelief. And it is, as it were, the sum of all promises. Neither can any objection be made upon the unworthiness that you find in yourself that this promise will not assail. And Bunyan goes on to say, or to list some excuses, and I just want you to hear these, because I suspect that they're in your own mind and heart. Bunyan writes, but I'm a great sinner, you say. Jesus says, I will in no wise cast out. But I'm an old sinner, you say. I will in no wise cast out. But I'm a hard-hearted sinner, you say. I will in no wise cast out, says Christ. But I'm a backsliding sinner. I will in no wise cast out, says Christ. But I have served Satan all my days, you say. I will in no wise cast out. But I've sinned against light, you say. But I will in no wise cast out, says Christ. But I've sinned against mercy, you say. I will in no wise cast out, says Christ. But I have no good thing to bring with me, say you. I will in no wise cast out, says Christ. This promise was provided to answer all objections, and it does answer them. Friends, that's the truth of Matthew 5 verse 4. Blaster those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. They shall be called near. The Lord loves to comfort those who are broken over their sin. Friends, he doesn't deal with us the way that we actually deserve. Instead, he shows us mercy. Let me close with this reading from Psalm 103, verses eight through 10. The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love. He will not always chide, nor will he keep his anger forever. He does not deal with us according to our sins, nor does he repay us according to our iniquities. Does your sin grieve you this morning? Are you broken over it? Jesus says, come to me. I will never cast you out. Let's pray. Our Father, we confess to you that that promise just sounds too good to be true. God, you know everything about us. And Father, we know enough about us to recognize that we don't deserve your comfort. But Father, you are a God of grace and mercy and compassion. And you love to show sinners mercy. Whether we're already in Christ or whether we are outside of Christ, you love to show mercy and to comfort those who mourn over their sin. So Father, I pray this morning that you would work in our midst. That you would help us to see our sinfulness. And to just give it to you. and to fall into your goodness, because that's our only hope. So Father, I pray your people this morning would hear you say to them, come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. I pray these things in Christ's name and for his glory.