Spiritual Mourning By Paul Thompson

will you turn to our New Testament reading which is found in
Matthew chapter 3, we're going to read from verses 1 to 12
and then we're going to turn over if you will to Matthew chapter 4
and we'll read from verses 12
through to 5-12. Matthew chapter 3
reading from verse 1 through to verse 12
in those days John the Baptist came preaching in the desert of Judea
and saying repent for the kingdom of God is near
this is he who was spoken of through the prophet Isaiah
a voice of one calling in the desert prepare the way for the Lord
make straight paths for him. John's clothes were made of camels here
and he had a belt he had a leather belt around his waist
his food was locusts and wild honey people went out to him from Jerusalem
and all Judea and the whole region of Jordan confessing their sins they
were baptized by him in the river Jordan but when he saw
many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to where he was baptizing he said
to them you brood of vipers who warned you to
flee from the wrath to come produce fruit in keeping with repentance
and do not think you say to yourselves we have
Abraham as our father I tell you that out of these stones God
can raise up children for Abraham the axe is already at the root of the
trees and every tree that does not produce
good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire I baptize you
with water for repentance but after me will come one who's more
powerful than I whose sandals I'm not fit to carry he will
baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire his winnowing fork is in
his hand and and he will clear his threshing floor
gathering his wheat into the barn and burning up the chaff
with unquenchable fire and then turning over to Matthew chapter 4
and reading from verse 12 through to 5 15
Matthew chapter 4 from verse 12 Jesus heard that John had been put in
prison and he returned to Galilee leaving
Nazareth he went out and lived in Capernaum
which was by the lake in the area of Zebulun
and Naphtali to fulfill what was said through the prophet Isaiah
the land of Zebulun the land of Naphtali the way to the sea along the
Jordan Galilee of the Gentiles the people
living in darkness have seen a great light
on those living in the land of the shadow of death
a light has dawned from that time on Jesus began to preach
repent for the kingdom of God is near as he was walking beside the sea of
Galilee he saw two brothers Simon called Peter and his brother
Andrew they were casting a net into the lake
for they were fishermen come follow me Jesus said and I'll make
you fishes of men for once they left their nets and
followed him going from there he saw two brothers
James son of Zebedee and his brother John
they were in a boat with their father father Zebedee preparing their nets
Jesus called them and immediately they left the boat
and their father and followed him Jesus went
throughout Galilee teaching in the synagogues preaching the good news of
the kingdom and healing every disease and sickness
among the people news about him spread all over Syria
and people brought to him all who are sick with various diseases
those suffering severe pain the demon possessed
those having those having seizures and the paralyzed and he healed them
large crowds from Galilee and the Decapolis Jerusalem Judea
and the region across Judah followed him
now when he saw the crowds he went up on a mountain side
and sat down his disciples came to him and he began to teach them saying
blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven
blessed are those who mourn for they shall be comforted
blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the earth
blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness
for they will be filled blessed are the merciful
for they shall be shown mercy blessed are the pure in heart
for they shall see God blessed are the peacemakers
for they will be called sons of God blessed are those
who who are persecuted because of righteousness for theirs is the kingdom
of heaven blessed are you and people insult you
persecuted and falsely say all kinds of evil
against you because of me rejoice and be glad
because great is your reward in heaven for in the same way
they persecuted the prophets who were before you
may god bless the reading of his word let's come before god in
in prayer well our subject this evening is spiritual
mourning and this is maybe something that you're
constantly engaged in or maybe this is something
that's that's rather new well if it is you
should be like the Bereans and you should go away from here and examine the
scriptures to see that what is being said is true
our text this evening is taken from the beatitudes
and it's the second beatitude blessed are those who mourn
for they shall be comforted blessed are those who mourn
for they shall be comforted
now my first reason for looking at this subject of spiritual mourning was as
many as as many as you know of you know my
father died last year
and i went through typically a time of mourning mourning
for having lost a loved one and in seeking to get help and comfort
from the scriptures i came to this verse blessed are those who mourn for they
shall be comforted and
my second reason for looking at this verse is that
i heard a series of tape messages recently by Andrew Young given at the
Stanmore Baptist Church where he was preaching on the subject
of the church's welfare and war and warfare
and the third message he gave was concerning
reforming grace and any of you who are at the
conference or have heard the messages since will remember that he
looked at the book of Nehemiah and he considered this
whole subject in this third message of spiritual mourning
and if you haven't had an opportunity to listen to those tapes let me encourage
you now to get hold of them and to listen to them because they are
most helpful and in particular as it relates to our
subject this evening of spiritual mourning
the third type the third reason why i wanted to consider this subject this
morning was when i came back to this text
following these first two reasons it took on new meaning
i had been mistaken i was wrong in how i'd thought what i'd thought the
verse meant i thought that it applied to those who
were mourning for someone who had lost a loved one
they were grieving because of a death in the family but
in my in my preparation and having listened to andrew young this
verse took on a new relevance and it struck me too how relevant
it might be to us as a church seeking to bring about true reformation in
our own lives and in the life of the church
if as we have constantly been challenged from psalm 119 and verse
59 to be considering our ways and turning our steps
to god's statue and this is of course the very essence of personal reformation
well then we can pray this evening that the holy spirit will
make these words relevant to us and i pray that as we proceed through
the message it will become obvious why this
passage is relevant to us this evening now let me suggest that the purpose of
the passage is to teach us that we might
know what true happiness is and a true happiness
one of the one of the ways in which we can be truly happy
consists in by mourning or grieving or having a deep sorrow over our sins
and jesus of course promises us comfort when we do and of course there are other
ways in which we can be blessed as we see from the beatitude
these beatitudes before us we can be blessed or happy
when we're poor in spirit when we're meek
when we hunger and thirst after righteousness
when we're merciful when we're peacemakers
when we're persecuted and when others insult us now who's jesus
speaking to here speaking to here well he's speaking to his disciples he says
that in verse one of chapter five his
disciples came to him and it's been suggested that as he was
up on the mountain the disciples came and formed a closed
circle around jesus and then the large crowd were an air
shot and if you know something about
public speaking you'll know that if a person is
sitting down it's a lot harder or difficult to project your voice
a long way so the disciples were seated in a circle around jesus and then
the crowd was further back obvious to pick
obviously be able to pick up some words that were said and
let me suggest too that he as jesus is addressing his
disciples he's talking to christians
all these beatitudes cannot possibly be fulfilled
by a person who's not a christian the man who is blessed as we are told
in psalm chapter one is the one who doesn't walk in the
council of the ungodly or sit in the seat of scoffers
or is in the place of mockers but he's that blessed man
he's that christian man and so the lord comes
and he speaks to his disciples and of course we are told that he
teaches them we see that in verse three he teaches them
so the purpose here is that the lord might teach us
now what does this word mourn mean in the original well it's the strongest
of the greek words and it means it's used of one who is grieving a man
who's grieving to such an extent that he shows it on his face
there is a deep sorrow of heart and out of that deep sorrow of heart
which is used for grieving for the dead
we can see this expression on his face and if we look at other words which we
will as we go through the message and if we
put these together they will hopefully make a picture of us
of what true spiritual mourning is and there's an important set of words
which we'll refer to and of course we've only got to look at the whole context to
see that this is talking about something
that's spiritual and about spiritual mourning and
jesus takes a picture from everyday life and he puts spiritual
content within it in the same way as you grieve
over a loved one so one of the dominant characteristics of
your life is to mourn to have a deep sorrow to
grieve over your sins and
if we turn now to john chapter 16 and we look at verse
17 through to
22 john chapter 16 reading from verses 17
through to 22 we see the normal meaning of the word
john 16 from 17 some of his disciples said to one another
what what does he mean by saying in a little while you will see me no more
and then after a little while you will see me
and because and because i'm going to the father
they kept asking what does he mean by a little while
why don't we understand what he is saying
jesus saw that they wanted to ask him about this so he said
are you asking one another what i mean when i say in a little while you will
see me no more and then after a little while you'll
see me i tell you the truth you will weep and
mourn while the world rejoices you will grieve
but your grief will be turned to joy a woman giving birth to a child has pain
because her time because her time has come but when her
baby is born she forgets the anguish because of her
joy that a child is born into the world
so with you now is your time of grief but i will see you again and you will
rejoice and no one will take your joy away
from you so this is the normal meaning that the
scriptures put upon this word
it refers to a loss a separation but here
the lord jesus christ uses it in a spiritual way and it means a
loss or a separation because of our sin
now our first heading this evening as we come to
look at our text is jesus expects you to mourn jesus
expects you to mourn for those of you who are
taking notes that's our first major heading
jesus makes a statement and there are many
examples in scripture and much teaching concerning this but we
want to look principally at four areas that hopefully will give
us some understanding into what jesus means by this text
now under this first heading jesus expects you to mourn
the first subheading is jesus expects you to mourn
because your sin offends god jesus expects you to mourn because your sin
offends god turn with me will you back to psalm 51
psalm 51 this is of course david's prayer of repentance
following
uh nathan's confrontation with him and
declaring to him that he is guilty of the adultery of basheba
and the murder of her husband arya arya david prays a prayer of repentance
and you remember the story david had time on his hands
he looked out his window and he saw basheba bathing he lusted after her he
committed adultery in his heart and he had a desire
for her he also arranged for uraya her husband to be stationed in the
front line of a battle and uraya was killed
sometime later it's been suggested almost 12 months later
nathan the prophet comes and confronts david with a riddle
and you remember david got most indignant
about this riddle until nathan pointed the finger
at him and with the error of these words they
pierced right into david's heart when he said thou art the man
david became painfully aware of his sins
the sins of adultery and of murder and in verse 3 of 51 if you look at it he
says for i know my transgressions he had
strayed off the narrow way he'd broken god's holy law
he became aware again that god had said you shall not murder
you shall not covet and he begins to mourn in this psalm
and he admits that he has broken god's holy law
he acknowledges his sin his own sin and i say to you this evening are you
prepared to acknowledge your sin are you prepared to own it to
confess it you can't mourn you can't begin to mourn
over your sins until you are prepared to admit them and then
what does he say in verse 3b
and my sin is always before me my sin is always before me
david had such a view of his sin his sin was constantly fixed in his mind
his mind was like it was hooked up to a tv
and all he could see constantly was the immorality with beshiba
uraya dying defenselessly in the front line
untrained unprepared every time he walked on the roof of his
house the thought came to mind
of the time that he'd had on his hands and how he'd looked at beshiba
he couldn't lie on his bed without thinking about the
adultery that he'd committed there he couldn't write a message
concerning the kingdom without remembering the message
the death warrant that he had sent for uraya her husband
to be sent to the front line and until your sin and my sin
becomes before us in such a way
that it's ever before us we won't be able to begin to mourn or to grieve
over our sin and then what does he say in verse
four against you you only have i sinned and done what is evil in your sight
remember the prodigal after he'd sinned he said i've sinned against god and
against heaven and david says i've sinned against you
only oh god oh yes he'd sinned against beshiba he'd sinned against uraya
but that was nothing compared to what he
that was nothing compared to the sin that he had committed
against the lord in all his direct opposition
in all in all his sinfulness he had directed his opposition in his sin
against the character and the nature of god he said i've hurt you
when you've saved me so you and i must mourn because our sins affect god
they wound and they hurt him and then we see in 4b and done what is
evil in your sight lord what what have i done
i have been seen by you how foolish david thought
that god wouldn't notice what he had done
but proverbs 5 and 21 tells us a man's ways are in full view of the lord
he examines all his paths nothing can escape
god's notice
now how many of us here have committed sin and not realize that
god notices it well he does and then he goes on and
says surely i was sorry
goes on to verse 11 and 12
concerning this whole subject of mourning
and he says do not cast me away from your presence
or take your holy spirit from me david mourned because he grieved god's holy
spirit as an unwelcome guest the holy spirit had
withdrawn and i ask you this evening do you mourn
when through your own sinfulness you know you've grieved god's holy spirit
you're not conscious of his presence this evening
when were you last aware of it you're not conscious of your present if
you're not conscious of his presence then you need to grieve
and mourn and confess it and then he says something very
interesting about this whole subject of spiritual mourning
look at verse 17 he says the sacrifices of god are a broken
spirit a broken and contrite spirit oh god you
will not despise david understands spiritual mourning
not in terms of a religious formalism or going through the routine as he says
in uh verse 16 you do not delight in sacrifice
or i would bring it you do not take pleasure in burnt
offerings no he understands it in terms
of pure motives in terms of this spiritual
mourning being a heart matter the heart is crushed noticed a broken
spirit a broken and a contrite heart sin had broken in upon his spirit and he
had such a sense of his spirit he had such a
sense of his sin that it breaks his heart
have you ever been broken by your own sins
it's not a pleasant experience but it's necessary
if you and i are going to be the mourners that jesus
talks about here
secondly under this subject of this first heading of jesus expects you
to mourn for your sins a second subheading is jesus expects you to
mourn because your sin helped crucify
your sin helped crucify him turn to zechariah chapter 12 will you it's one
of the last books of the bible a minor prophet
and after haggai zechariah chapter 12
zechariah chapter 12 and verse 10
and 11
just after haggai and i will pour out on the house of
david and the inhabitants of jerusalem a spirit of grace and supplication
they will look on me the one they have pierced
and they will mourn for him as one mourns for an only child
and grieve bitterly for him as one grieves
for the first for the firstborn son on that day the weeping in jerusalem will
be great like the weeping of hadded
rimon on the plane of megud
this is a prophecy concerning christ the prophet was writing after the old
testament church had been taken out of babylon where
they were of course in captivity and he's seeking to rebuke god's people
because they were the lethargic in rebuilding god's temple
and he's seeking to encourage them and motivate them to complete
the rebuilding of the temple and if we have a look
in chapter one and verse 12 we see that he calls them to repentance
in chapter one and verse two chapter one and verse two
he said uh we'll start at verse one in the eighth months of the second year of
darius the word of the law came to the prophet zechariah son of
berakiah the son of ido the lord was very angry with your
forefathers therefore tell the people this is what the lord almighty says
return to me declares the lord and i will return to you
says the lord almighty return to me the lord calls on god's people to repent
and
um we see here in chapter 12 and verse
10 and 11 uh following this prophecy concerning the rejection of the messiah
he gives this glorious prophecy concerning
the deliverance and the conversion of god's people
and it teaches us that repentance is not only commanded
but it's a gospel grace it's a gospel grace
and it's a gift of god and if we have a look
in our catechism in our confession of faith
we see we have a beautiful but simple definition
of repentance in the child's catechism the question 56 how do you repent
by changing my attitude being sorry for my sin hating and leaving
it behind being sorry for my sin
and then in our confession of faith in chapter 15 under the
heading of repentance under life and salvation
in in verse in uh paragraph chapter three
we have this interesting statement the repentance that leads on to salvation is
a gospel grace by means of which a person is caused by
the holy spirit to feel the manifold evils of his sin
of sin is also caused by faith in christ to humble himself
and on account of his sin this humiliation is characterized by
godly sorrow a detestation of the sin
and self-loathing this humiliation is characterized by godly sorrow
so that's what we're seeking to look at this evening and we
see from this passage in zechariah chapter 12
that this morning is something that god promises
to pour out on the house on the house and on the inhabitants of jerusalem
and to give them a spirit of grace and of supplication
and you remember that that was wonderfully fulfilled
on the day of pentecost when peter was preaching
to the three thousand if you turn to acts chapter two
we'll look at it acts chapter two
and jesus had been preaching a sermon and he says in verse 36 of acts
chapter two therefore let all israel be assured this day
god has made this jesus whom you crucified
both lord and christ when the people heard this they were cut to the heart
and said to peter and the other apostles brothers what shall we do peter replied
repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of jesus christ for the
forgiveness of your sins and you shall receive the gift
of the holy spirit so here we see
the fulfillment of this prophecy and jesus expects
you and i to mourn over our sins because our sins have helped crucify christ
he died for your sins past present and future the fact is that your
sins have helped crucify christ
your um and this has contributed to him being stabbed this word pierced
means literally stabbed through
um it's as though one takes a sword and thrusts or stabs it through
and that's what our sins uh constantly do when we sin against god
it's as though we take our sins as a sword
and we pierce them again through the heart of our lord and we should
mourn and we should grieve because our sins
do this and he says too in zachariah that we should grieve and we should mourn
as one who loses a first born
so jesus expects you to mourn because your sin has helped crucify him
now thirdly under our first major heading jesus expects you to mourn
because your sin because your sin denies you know him
turn to luke 22 will you luke chapter 22
and we'll want to look at peter's denial of jesus
luke chapter 2 from verse 54 down to verse 62 you remember that
jesus had prophesied to peter that he would deny him
three times
and we have the sorry account of peter's denial of jesus
notice peter's denial begins in verse 54 of luke chapter 22
then seizing him they led him away and took him into the house of the high
priest peter followed at a distance
and i ask you have you been following jesus at a distance this evening
recently or are you in constant fellowship with him
our denial of jesus will begin when we are following him at a distance and
we're not in close fellowship with him in order to understand
peter's mourning which we see in verse 62
we need to see the reason why he mourns why he meets how does his denial of
jesus come about well we see this in verse 57
he says woman i don't know i don't know him you remember that
peter had run away from our lord when he was arrested
he was despondent and depressed he
comes into this courtyard and he sits down and he seeks to warm himself by
this fire with other people and he is
confronted by this servant girl and she looks closely at him and she
says to him this man was with him but peter denies it he says woman
i don't know you what a thing to say yet don't we do this every day if not in
word in action when we sin against god
what happens next look at verse 58 you also are one of them
then he says man i'm not
people say it all the time don't don't they
or maybe people say to you don't you belong to that church that
strange one what do you say oh i'm not a member
there i'm not one of them why don't you speak
up when you should isn't it because of our
sins well then we should mourn over our sins
and then look at verse 59 of course jesus asked him
peter denies jesus three times he says in 59 about an hour later
another asserted certainly this man was with him
for he is a dalalian they recognize his
native tongue or his language and maybe people come to you and they say
aren't you a reformed christian don't you believe the doctrines of grace
and what do we reply man i don't know what you're talking about
how many people at work or at school know that you're a christian at least
if they were told would you expect them you'd expect them to reply i knew there
was something different about him or her yet
when we sin our sin so often causes us to deny that we know him
and so we should mourn because of this
next notice that the lord turns and looks
at peter we see this in verse 61
the lord turned and looked straight at peter
jesus didn't look at peter with his bodily eye
he looked at him with healing eyes peter looked into the white of jesus
eyes and he saw compassion he saw love not anger this was no ordinary look
it was an extraordinary look the look of god's grace
producing the secret working of the spirit of god which
penetrated deep into peter's heart and granted him repentance
have you recently been denying christ resisting that divine compulsion that
comes upon you that gentle urging that priding of the
spirit when the lord comes and says speak to
that person about me the lord will never turn and look
straight in the eye you you or i will never have the
opportunity to look into the eyes of our lord
this side of glory but we should be prepared to give an answer
to anyone who asks us for the reason we should be pray we should i'll begin
again we should be prepared to give an answer
to anyone who asks you to give the reason for the
hope that is within you
and we should do this of course in gentleness
and with respect having a clear conscience
and that is found in first peter three 15 and 16 with a clear conscience then
this is the key to being able to confess christ
finally notice the effect of this response of peter
notice the effect of this response if you have a look at
verse 61 again you'll see you'll see then peter remembered
the word of the lord and that he had spoken to him
before the rooster cries today you will disown me
three times
so we see here the effect of god's word the spirit and the word work together
like a vice on peter's conscience and within seconds the message
screeks as you were as it were across his conscience
you've denied him you've denied him and notice his response
he weeps he weeps he goes outside into a secret place
and he weep and he weeps now maybe some of you at this point are
saying that's all very well for peter he was a
very emotional emotional bloke i'm just not made that
way i just can't turn the tears on and off
or surely the principle here is this it doesn't matter ultimately whether you
and i weep or not are we prepared to mourn to grieve
to sorrow inwardly whenever we are whenever we become conscious
of our own sins and maybe and may we weep um
over our sins so jesus expects you to mourn
uh when you when your sin denies that you know him
now uh falsely forcefully under this uh the fourth subheading under our first
point jesus expects you to mourn because you can't repent without it
jesus expects you to mourn because you can't repent
without it and we've seen i trust the um indispensable link between
spiritual mourning and repentance as it was
as it's outlined to us in the child's catechism and in the confession of faith
now turn with me will you to first corinthians chapter five
first corinthians chapter five
and we want to look at verses one and two of first corinthians chapter five
it is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you
and of a kind that does not occur even among the pagans
a man has his father's wife and you are proud
shouldn't you rather have been filled with grief and then put
and have put out of your fellowship the man who did this the apostle
reproves the corinthians for their pride instead of their
humility instead of mourning they had failed to ex communicate
this offender from the amidst and jesus expects you and i to mourn
for the sinful behavior of particular church members
and we should do this because it will not only lead us to repentance
but it may lead them to repentance too now this whole
story of the excommunication of this
man who is involved in incest in incest is
carried on in the second letter to the corinthians paul
second letter to the corinthians and if you turn over to second corinthians
chapter seven you see where the story is continued
and what happens was that
paul had sent them a letter and if you turn to
second corinthians seven verse eight he says even if i caused you sorrow by
my letter i do not regret it though i excuse me
though i did regret it i see that my letter hurt you but only
for a little while yet now i'm happy because you were made
happy because your sorrow led you
to repentance the word of god this letter
so hurt the corinthians that they began to grieve and mourn
at their slackness in not exercising church discipline
and this sorrow lead led them to repentance and of
course that repentance was that they did exercise that discipline
upon this man who was involved in incest and he was put out of the church
for a time and he himself came to a godly sorrow
which led to his repentance now we see here that this word
godly sorrow although it's not the same word
as the word mourning it's very close to the word and it helps fill out this
picture of what jesus is saying in this beatitude
if you turn to first thessalonians 4 13
first thessalonians 4 13
we see that
it says brothers we do not want you to be ignorant about those who fall asleep
or to grieve like the rest of men who have no hope
this same word for sorrow which we're about to look at is the
word here in first thessalonians
uh 4 and 13 that is translated to grieve
and of course the idea is similar to that of mourn to be grieving
like the rest of men because they do not have
any hope
and then we see if you turn back to second corinthians chapter 7
and verse 9 yet now i'm happy not because you were made sorry
but because your sorrow led you to repentance
because your sorrow led you to repentance
well here we see something that's incredible don't we
this godly sorrow this morning produces a repentance
so when jesus is speaking to his disciples
it's interesting in the original because he
he says to them blessed are those who mourn
and this mourn is in the present continuous tense
and he says literally blessed are those who are continuing to mourn
and of course why are they continuing to mourn while they're continuing to mourn
because they have heard the preaching of repentance
from john the baptist and from jesus you remember as we read the first words
that jesus utters are those of repentance
and in the list of beatitudes the present continuous tense is used
only twice in our text of those who are presently
continuing to mourn and of those who are
hungering and thirsting after righteousness
jesus also says blessed are you who are presently continuing
to hunger and thirst after righteousness
so we see here that when we take the statement of jesus and the
teaching from the new testament and put the two together we see
that jesus is saying to his disciples blessed
are you who are presently continuing to mourn
because this will lead to your repentance
i desire that this morning be a dominant characteristic of your
life because without this present
mourning and without you continuing to mourn
there can never be any repentance see what it says here will you in 2
7 uh verse 10 godly sorrow brings
repentance that leads to salvation
godly sorrow is the natural
repentance is the natural outworking of godly sorrow have you ever played
dominoes stood them all up they have
exhibitions of it and you knock over the first domino
and it sets all the rest off well that's what he's referring to here
spiritual mourning will be that domino that sets off in your life and mine
repentance yes we will still have to repent but it will begin with this
spiritual mourning we cannot we cannot repent without
this morning without this godly sorrow and notice what he says in verse 10 also
that that godly sorrow brings repentance
that leads to salvation and leaves no regret but worldly sorrow
brings death look also at what he says about this godly sorrow in verse 11
this godly see what this godly sorrow has produced in you
what earnestness what earnestness to clear yourselves
what in what indignation what alarm what longing what concern what readiness
to see that justice was done so this godly sorrow has a wonderful
effect in the corinthians lives of producing this repentance
and of seeing this matter of church discipline
taken care of now our time is uh has gone
and we're only halfway through the message
so what i'm going to do is i'm going to give you the
headings or the points that remain and
um
if you desire at a further time to get a copy of some of the
other points that fill in these headings well then i'll be happy to
to give you that now the third point remember our first point was god
expects you that jesus expects you to mourn because your sin offends god
our second uh heading is uh jesus
expects you to mourn uh because
um i'm putting myself confused here
is um the second heading should be jesus
declares you happy when you mourn so the first heading is
jesus says uh that you
uh jesus
jesus expects you to mourn jesus
declares you happy when you mourn and thirdly jesus promises comfort
when you mourn now let me just give you a brief outline
of what jesus means by this word blessed you remember a few weeks ago
our pastor
taught us concerning this fact of being blessed and the word
simply means to be happy
uh you and i will only experience true happiness or blessedness
uh when we involve involve ourselves in not only
mourning but in all these other beatitudes
and then let me give you the headings in conclusion
jesus promises comfort uh when you mourn so
the world may desire true happiness but you and i the christian can only be
truly happy we can only know god's smile when
we're involved in this morning when we mourn and when we
are careful to carry out these other beatitudes
and the headings are simply these the third point jesus promises comfort
when you mourn why will he
comfort you well i told in two corinthians two six and seven
uh that um jesus comforts comforts us so that we will
not be overcome with excessive sorrow and
uh he speaks there in reference to the man who's been disciplined by
the corinthian church and uh what is this comfort that jesus
promises you and i as we mourn uh well the word literally means to
to um to stand by to help someone uh not only
stands by but they come but they come and they help us
the idea is to call someone to help for you to call on someone to help you
and then how will you and i be comforted well we will be comforted by
jesus will comfort you by his word you remember that he comes to peter and he
comforts him uh with his word he reinstates them
jesus will comfort you with his pardon he promises to forgive us our sins if we
confess our sins he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us
from all unrighteousness jesus will thirdly comfort you with his
presence remember david said don't cast me away
from your presence or take your holy spirit from me and
jesus promises to come by his presence and the references there you can note
them if you wish isiah 61 1 2 3
john 14 15 to 21
in conclusion then where does this leave us
well we've been talking about reformation we began by talking about
reformation in our own lives and in the life of the church
the life of our church here is the key or here is a key to putting into
practice all that we've heard from god through his word this year
if reformation and repentance are inseparable
and they are then this morning the sorrow of sin
will lead to repentance and that repentance will bring about a true
reformation not only in our lives but in the life
of our church
and to those of you who are unbelievers this evening
while god calls you to repentance repentance is his gift as we saw but
it's also something that he commands you to do
and he says that if you don't perish if you don't repent
you'll perish so the word to you those of you who are not his disciples
is to repent and as you come and repent
may he be pleased to work in you this morning this spiritual morning
and may that in turn produce within you that godly sorrow
that leads to repentance amen