Sunday, May 27, 2012

Comfort For Those Mourning Loss: Beatitudes Part 2: Matthew 5 Cont'd

cloisters garden of light


Matthew 5 Cont'd

Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted”

Mourning is a part of life, as all things must eventually end. The kind of mourning being referred to here is godly sorrow that brings repentance (2 Corinthians 7:10). This is regularly occurs in the life of a believer. What usually happens is that a person thinks they have everything together God-wise but discover a habit that separates them from Him. This process of being perfected by the Holy Spirit is called sanctification, and its not all happy, as we've grown up to understand happy. We're letting go of things we've allowed to define us: relationships, attitudes, even things we thought were godly like “sanctified gossip.” This sorrow is not hurtful but relieving, a necessary surgery for the soul. With the loss comes a release of pressure, we only just became aware of. Tears may come, but they are the tears of life, for mourners shall be comforted.

The word for comfort here means to come close to or to summon. Our Comforter and his associate comforters are summoned to our side when things get difficult, and even before.

We are comforted by the very presence of God and His grace. The fact that God corrects and pulls us out of our mistakes, demonstrates His knowledge: that we will soon be perfect. We are also comforted by those empowered by the Holy Spirit to do so, as was Paul, by Titus in 2 Corinthians 7. In community we find the presence and comfort of God.

Christians are people that laugh and love deeply because they cry deeply. Christian community is to be a place in which this is an acceptable practice. So empty, will be our good moments on this earth, if that is all we seek. In order to be a stern-faced Stoic, one must obsess over the details of reality, to be a hedonist, one must divorce them completely, the follower of Christ does neither.

There should be no need to fake emotions in the company of believers.

Questions:

  1. Do you see emotional authenticity among the community of believers?
  2. How can we be better brothers and sisters to those in a season of mourning?
  3. Have you experienced godly sorrow? How did God comfort you (through His presence or other believers)?
     

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