The Blessed Mourner

I want to read from the scripture today from Psalm 38, if you want to turn to Psalm 38. Our text for the sermon is Matthew chapter 5 and verse 4, blessed are they that mourn. But this one, this chapter of scripture and others in the Psalms very closely follow that and help us to understand it. Psalm 38. This is a Psalm of David. It says so just before the first verse, and those are inspired words. And it says, a Psalm of David to bring to remembrance. The remembrance is elucidated here in the Psalm.

And I want you to remember that in the New Testament, the Lord himself, Jesus, expounded from the law and the prophets and the Psalms in all the scriptures concerning himself. And he also said in Hebrews chapter 10, he said in the volume of the book, it is written of me to do thy will, O God. So the Psalms as 1 Peter chapter one, verses 10 and 11 say, are the prophecies by the Spirit of God and the prophets, speaking of the sufferings of Christ and the glory that should follow. So when we read this Psalm, realize that even though David is writing, and he's writing probably out of his own personal experience, yet his words are far beyond David and his experience. And they're speaking of his greater son, the Lord Jesus Christ. So when we read this, I want you to consider that. and consider these words because they reveal a mystery.

It says in verse one of Psalm 38, O Lord, rebuke me not in thy wrath, neither chasten me in thy hot displeasure, for thine arrows stick fast in me, and thy hand presseth me sore. There is no soundness in my flesh because of thine anger, Neither is there any rest in my bones because of my sin, for mine iniquities are gone over mine head.

As an heavy burden, they are too heavy for me. My wounds stink and are corrupt because of my foolishness. I am troubled. I am bowed down greatly. I go mourning all the day long. For my loins are filled with a loathsome disease, and there is no soundness in my flesh. I am feeble and sore broken. I have roared by reason of the disquietness of my heart. Lord, all my desire is before Thee, and my groaning is not hid from Thee. My heart panteth, my strength faileth me.

As for the light of mine eyes, it is also gone from me. My lovers and my friends stand aloof from my sore, and my kinsmen stand afar off. They also that seek after my life lay snares for me, and they that seek my hurt speak mischievous things, and imagine deceits all the day long. But I as a deaf man heard not, and I was as a dumb man that openeth not his mouth, Thus I was as a man that heareth not, and in whose mouth are no reproofs.

For in thee, O Lord, do I hope. Thou wilt hear, O Lord my God. For I said, hear me, lest otherwise they should rejoice over me when my foot slippeth. They magnify themselves against me. for I am ready to halt, and my sorrow is continually before me, for I will declare mine iniquity. I will be sorry for my sin, but mine enemies are lively, and they are strong, and they that hate me wrongfully are multiplied. They also that render evil for good are mine adversaries, because I follow the thing that good is. Forsake me not, O Lord, O my God. Be not far from me. Make haste to help me, O Lord, my salvation.

I want you to keep that section of scripture in your thoughts as we look at Matthew chapter five today. And I pray the Lord would be with us as we consider these words in Matthew chapter five. I'll read them to you. He says in verse four, this is a sermon Jesus gave called the Sermon on the Mount, and these words in Matthew five are often called the Beatitudes, and I wanna address verse four.

He says, blessed, in verse three, blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted. All right, let's consider these words as God would give us grace. First of all, notice in these very words here, blessed are. Blessed are the poor.

This is a blessing they already have. They have already been made poor. They don't do something in order to get something. This is not a mark of Christianity that we strive for. This is a grace given to us by God. It's very important that we understand this. This is not a condition we meet. This is a favor bestowed upon us by God.

But what strikes us here is that it seems paradoxical or even upside down logic to say that those who are poor in spirit are blessed, or those who mourn shall be comforted. How is it that those who are poor in spirit, who have nothing spiritually, and those who mourn can be comforted?

The word blessed here and all these blessings, and there are nine of them, are called the beatitudes because the word beatitude means utmost bliss. Utmost bliss. You can see our granddaughter is having utmost bliss right now. She's with grandma. But when the Lord gave these words here, he's talking to his people. He's describing God's work in them.

And I know that we're always tempted to look into ourselves introspectively, to consider, have we experienced what's described? Do these marks given as characteristics of God's favor towards his people, are those evident in us? But I want you to see that the meaning of these words actually still is directing us away from ourselves, not to ourselves. First of all, to God who is so graciously given these blessings, these blessednesses, these, oh, the blessednesses of the ones poor in spirit, those who mourn and therefore are comforted. And since God has given them, they're not cause for us to produce. They're not something that we produce in order to gain from God, not conditions to be met, not traits to be obtained by our striving. But these are gifts from God, the blessings of the favor of His grace.

And so the Things that are described here are great blessings, but they seem to not be connected at all to the blessing because they're the opposite of what we would consider as a blessing. Poverty, that doesn't seem like a blessing. Mourning, that doesn't seem like a blessing. So we wanna look today, we covered last week verse three, and I wanna try to cover verse four today.

So the first thing we want to understand here is what is mourning? M-O-U-R-N, mourning. And I think perhaps one of the best illustrations in scripture is the account of Martha and Mary and Lazarus. Remember, Lazarus, their brother, died, and they were beside themselves with grief. Death brings mourning. Why does it bring mourning?

Well, because the one we loved is lost and cannot be brought back. It's a permanent loss. It's devastating news to learn of a permanent loss of loved ones, isn't it? That's what mourning is. And so when the Lord says here, blessed are they that mourn, it seems completely opposite of what we would expect to be a blessing. But the revelation given to us here by the gospel is made to be the brightest comfort. And that's what we need to understand. We understand what it is to lose things.

For example, yesterday I was looking for my phone. I couldn't find it. I was, I can't believe it. What is wrong with me? I can't keep track of my phone. Somewhere it's black. The counter is black. I can't see it. Anyway, it took me 30 minutes to finally find it. I was glad that I found it, but that's insignificant. That's not a morning.

But if you're in a relationship, let's say you have a good friend, a faithful friend, one you love, or a spouse, your husband, your wife, and you have such a blessing in that relationship, and then something happens. A discovery is made of unfaithfulness as a friend or as a spouse.

And by your own perversity, the one you love discovers things about you that alienate you, that separate those former, remove what was formerly treasured and dear to you. And it's such a rend in your relationship that you It's permanent and you're hopeless. You can't recover it. You can't restore it because like feathers in a bag in the wind, they're gone and you can't get them back.

What you've said or what you've done has proven you to be a self-serving, self-ambitious, thinking of your own recognition and your own promotion instead of the needs and the concerns of others. and has proven you to be unworthy of the love of that other one.

Now, we know something about that, don't we? It creates such a disappointment in ourselves, doesn't it? To think that by my own dumb fault, I have broken, I have lost something that was precious. So precious, it makes me mourn as if I've lost a loved one. Well, that helps me at least understand what is meant here by the mourning. We know Lazarus died and Martha and Mary were beside themselves with grief and mourning and sorrow. They couldn't bring him back. And they felt like blaming someone, but they couldn't do anything about it. And if you remember, the Lord himself comforted them in that mourning, remember? And I think it's instructive to see how that overlaps with this and Psalm 38 and other texts of scripture, because it reveals to us where our comfort is, how the Lord has comforted us. And this is amazing grace. This is very great grace to us.

First of all, Understand that mourning is describing the devastating sense of loss because of the permanent loss of love, of a loved one and that love. And it's doubly painful to realize that it was because of me, something I did. And I've lost what was the only precious thing in all the world to me.

Because when God speaks of mourning here, he's talking about not of these relationships and what we've done there, because that certainly is something that's very tangible to us. But he's talking about our relationship to God himself. Because by our own sin, we have separated ourselves from God. By our own corruptions, by what's in us, by our nature, our thoughts, our intentions, our motives, our words, and our actions. All these things have created a rift. We have offended the God who created us, the one who gives us life, the one whose warmth we enjoy, especially the one whose life we depend upon as our life. whose favor we have to have, whose acceptance and approval we cannot live without.

But our sin brings with it a sense of the loss of God's own favor. And perhaps we understand that God doesn't change and his grace toward us doesn't change, but there's still the effects of sin that we can't control. The sense of guilt is the weightiest load, I think, that a human can bear.

And so when Jesus said, come unto me all you who labor and are heavy laden, I believe that's what he's talking about, the load of sin. So mourning comes, therefore, because of our sin, because it's our sin that is our fault, that has been the cause of all of our loss. and we've lost everything, and we're helpless to bring it back, and we're hopeless because it's irreparable loss, and we've lost everything. That's what this is speaking about, the loss that sin brings. And so when we read Psalm 38, as we just did here, let me remind you of those words there in Psalm 38. We see this sense of loss and the mourning that comes with it.

He tells the Lord in his prayer, O Lord, rebuke me not in thy wrath, neither chasten me in thy hot displeasure. The wrath of God, according to Moses in Psalm 90, who knows the wrath of God, the fire, the fury of God, all-consuming wrath. And here he's saying, don't rebuke me in your wrath. Don't chase in me in your hot displeasure, for your arrows stick fast in me, and your hand presses me sore. There's no soundness in my flesh because of thine anger. Neither is there any rest in my bones because of my sin.

You see that? Now, as I said earlier, these words are prophetic. Certainly they apply to David out of the experience of a sinner. But the comfort comes And here, this is important, the comfort comes because these words apply to the Lord Jesus Christ.

The Lord Jesus didn't do any sin. He never confessed something that He did as a sinner. But he took our sins. He bore our griefs and our sorrows. He was wounded for our transgressions. His soul was made an offering for sin. He was amazed. He was heavily burdened. He was a man of sorrows. And he cried out of the grief of his sorrows.

And that's what this is speaking about. the sin-bearing surety, the substitute for his people, who lifted their sins and confessed their sins as his own as the high priest laid his hands on the head of the scapegoat and placed upon the head of that goat all the sins of all the Israelites. and then drove that goat out of the way by the hand of a fit man. So the high priest who confessed it and the goat both are a picture of Christ as our high priest confessing our sins upon his own head. And then he himself taking those sins out in a land of forgetfulness. This is what the Lord is saying here.

My sins. The anger, the weight of God's wrath that he feels, the lack of any health in his bones, this lack of soundness is because of my sin. He took our sins. It was no longer ours. He took it. He bore it. It was his. He called it mine. Mine iniquities, verse four, have gone over my head. As a heavy burden, they are too heavy for me. My wounds, the wounds that God gave him, the chastisement, the beating that we deserve came upon our Savior. It is by his stripes that we are healed. My wounds stink and are corrupt because of my foolishness, the foolishness of my sin. That realization, that painful realization that it's me. I'm the problem and I can't deliver myself. I'm troubled, I'm bowed down greatly. Notice, I go mourning all the day long.

Now, consider also what it says in Isaiah 53 again, because this is a very important. He says in verse four of Isaiah 53, surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows, not just the sense of sorrow, but the root cause of the sorrow and the grief. Yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. That's what Psalm 38 was just talking about. He was stricken of God. He was afflicted of God.

And we would think, as humans, look, and bring all sorts of judgment. Look at this person over here. He's blind from birth. He must have done something. Or maybe his parents. Or here's a man who can't walk. What did he do? I didn't do that. I'm not that bad. He's twisted and deformed. It must be something he did.

And so we, in our human sinful judgment, we look upon the Lord Jesus Christ as suffering on the cross as those around him did, and they say, he must have done some horrible thing that God would allow him to be taken and beaten and mocked and spit upon and his flesh laid bare and his bones stick out and then nailed to the tree, and maybe even carry his own cross. What did he do?

And the next verse tells us, ah, but he was wounded for our transgressions. Those wounds, that beating, the reproach, the shame, the guilt, the burden that was too heavy for him is my sin. In Zechariah 12, verse 10, it says, they shall look upon him whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him as one who mourns for his only son.

And that's what he's talking about here. This is the mourning that Christ endured because He carried our sins before God and God poured out that sense of His, the wrath, the true wrath of God, the compensation due to God came upon Him and therefore the grace of God in judgment on Him is brought to us. Mercy and grace flow because of that judgment upon Him. Look at also at 1 Peter, one more text along these lines, 1 Peter and chapter two.

Because it's important that we always keep these things ever present in our mind. This morning came, the morning of woe and grief and sorrow and devastating loss and irreparable damage and permanency and helplessness and hopelessness because of our sin. came upon Christ. In 1 Peter 2, verse 24, he says, notice how the Lord stacks these pronouns up to emphasize, because that's the literary tool here that's used, who his own self. Remember what he told his disciples when he stood before them in Luke chapter 24 after he was raised? And see, it is I, myself.

And here is who his own self bear our sins in his own body on the tree that we, and here's the substitution, here's the effects of him and his surety ship standing before God and answering with himself for our release that we might be brought as the many sons to glory. The surety who his own self, bear our sins in his own body on the tree that we, being dead to sins in his death, should live unto righteousness, his righteousness, by whose stripes we were healed.

And that's incredible, isn't it? Amazing grace, isn't it? that he was beaten, that we might be set free. He was chastised for our peace. His obedience in death is our righteousness. His sufferings, his sorrows, his griefs, his mourning is the result of removing the root cause of our griefs, our sorrows, our mourning.

It's taken away. And so when in Matthew chapter five and verse four, when he says, blessed are they that mourn, we have to understand this now preeminently. And first, it needs to be applied to the mourner, the Lord Jesus Christ. The poverty of spirit that he knew was something he took willingly and voluntarily You know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor.

You see, he took our burdens, our place, he took our place in poverty. He took our burdens and mourned for it before God for our sins in order that we might be comforted. And so when we read chapter five here, we're not only reading the words of the master, who firsthand experienced this, but we're reading the words of our Redeemer, who in His experience of it, was doing this in our place for us, to release us and to gain our liberty. And not just our liberty from the burden, but to obtain for us what was given to Him in comfort.

And what was that? Well, He came and he suffered to bring many sons to glory. So when he suffered, when God answered him, because it says in Hebrews chapter five, he was heard in that he feared. Though he were a son, he learned obedience by the things which he suffered. And he was heard in that he feared. When he suffered, the Lord answered him. And what did he give him? Everything he prayed for. I will, that they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am, that they may behold my glory, which thou hast given me. So the reward of his sufferings was what?

Not only the release from the debt, and of our crimes and the payment that debt required, not only released from the burden of the wrath and the forsaking, but the restoration that went way beyond what we lost. What we lost was we were living and we were under a conditional, provisional life based on our obedience or based on Adam's obedience. And as soon as Adam fell, we fell in him and lost that. But in the Lord Jesus Christ, by his obedience unto death, the offering he made of himself to God made us holy and perfected us forever.

And so that what we get, what we're given by God, we're given What he was given, which is not only life from the dead, but he was ascended, he was exalted, he was enthroned, he was given what? The kingdom? The king was put over the entire kingdom. And that's what he says here in Matthew 5. Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. What we're given is what Christ was given.

It says in Romans 8.32, he who spared not his own son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not also with him also freely give us all things? So what we see here then is not only the relationship of Christ to us as our surety and substitute bearing our sins, the cause of our poverty, the cause of our mourning, but we also see the Lord Jesus Christ as the representative head. So our representative head, so that what he did was credited to us and what he was given was given to him with us, for us.

And this is where the comfort comes from. Now, here's the amazing thing. The realization of these things is the result of God's work in us. The life that God gives is life that produces faith in Christ. The eye is to see the perception of God's truth that this is the way things are between me and God. The persuasion that what God has done in Christ is all that God required in the perfections of His nature, all that He delights in, all that glorifies and magnifies His name in honor to the onlooking universe, this is God revealed in His Son. The cross and His salvation of sinners to bring them to Himself by the death of His Son. Now, this realization that comes to us by the life of God through faith in Christ, this realization is the result of something.

And this is what is mind-boggling because of its incomprehensible grace, is that by union with Christ, an eternal union, His obedience and His blood was counted for our righteousness. And not only that, but because of that union, His righteousness was not only life to Him from the dead as the resurrection and the life, but also our resurrection and our life. His life, His resurrection is my resurrection and my life.

And that life is given to us when the gospel is preached, the spirit of God baptizes us. He immerses us in Christ. He places us in him spiritually then so that what he gives to us is a new heart, a new spirit. And in that new heart and with that new heart and in that new spirit, we're joined to the Lord so that his mind His truth, what he says in the gospel, becomes the very way that we think, the very persuasion of our heart, the way we come to God. And this is what we discover is the way God thinks. So there's a union between us and Christ in spirit.

And this union not only produces this faith and this is recognition that Christ is all, even though in my poverty, I'm nothing and I've lost everything and plunged myself into the depth of bankruptcy. And in my account, there's not only nothing, but there's a deficit. But by Christ's payment to God on the cross as the propitiation for my sins, he has not only paid that debt, but he's replenished the account with his own wealth in his righteousness. So that my poverty, which I thought I had something but lost, now is revealed to never have been anything at all. It was something to be repudiated.

So that the Spirit of God in joining me to Christ makes me realize that in union with Christ, I really was nothing and had nothing. But now in Christ, He is everything and I have all things in Him. And the same thing is true of mourning. His mourning then becomes not only the substitution for me before God to remove my sins, but his mourning fulfilled my mourning so that when I recognize my sinful corruptions and guilt have devastatingly lost everything in my relationship to God and broken and it's all my fault and I can't recover it. I'm helpless and hopeless. But in his mourning, he was comforted with all of the comfort of God. And that same comfort is given to us in him. His comfort from God was given by God to him and to us. so that what he received in comfort is the very comfort that God by His Spirit through faith brings to our hearts.

And then we realize, what was it that caused this devastating sense of loss? Wasn't it actually something we never wanted to have and hold? You see, before the light of the gospel comes to us, we have this sense that we have some approval, we have some hope of acceptance with God by what he finds in us, by what we can do, by some potential in us for someday becoming right, being able to turn from sin or recover ourselves and improve and eventually come up to some sense of well-being before God and a sense of pleasing and approval.

But all of that is, the reality of that is just an evidence of our poverty, because we were truly, in our true condition, actually dead in sins, spiritually dead. And the news of that comes to us as the worst loss. And we realize our death in sins is our fault. And it reflects the perversity of our nature. We can't fix it.

And yet the Lord himself says, Look to me. You see, all that you lack, all that is absent in you spiritually, find it in Christ. Find it in me, he says. Come unto me, all you who labor and are heavy laden. I will give you rest. And this is true of this is what the gospel does.

You see, when the gospel comes to us, it kills what we used to think was our life. And that's a painful, devastating loss. But then out of that sense of loss, we realized we had nothing. In fact, all we had was repugnant, revolting, something to be repudiated.

And we realized then the only one worthy, the only one good, the only one accepted, the only one approving to God is Christ. And He proved it by what He did in giving Himself for our sins and fulfilling all the righteousness, bringing to God all we could never bring, all that pleases God in His holy perfections, His eternal mind and His eternal will. And then bringing from God all the life of God, all that God is to us in Christ. And so we see then that just as we're joined to Christ in spirit, so the pattern of our life as believers echoes, it mirrors what Christ did.

He bore our sins and sorrows. What do we bear? We bear some sense of our poverty of spirit. We have nothing. Our loss because of our sins, and we mourn that loss of what we've destroyed between us and God and lost forever. And yet, we see him suffering that. And then we realize, out of that parallel experience, that echoing of the life of Christ in us, because this is what he underwent, then we've lost ourselves. The old man is crucified with him, and it's no loss at all. It's good riddance. and the sense of our walk now under this realization of our own wretchedness before God. And we say, who's gonna deliver me from this wretched man that I am? And then the comforts from glory come from Christ's throne to us and said, God, I thank God, it's through Jesus Christ, my Lord.

You see, everything that causes sorrow is something to be lost. And it's lost because it's plunged into, it's swallowed up in, it melts into Christ for me. Christ for me, he suffered my case, he fulfilled my obedience. He is my life and he has received the glory due to him and has given what's due to him to me.

And that comfort overwhelms us. That comfort overwhelms us because by the union of our spirits with Christ, by the grace of God, we're made to see we have nothing. Christ is everything. And that's what God has said. We deserve to mourn eternally and he repaired the rend and more than repaired it, he didn't just put a bandaid on it, he removed it so far that he has taken us to glory as the children of God, has set us in his presence, has given us all the son of God himself deserves in our nature, glory. Our relation to Adam was lost when Adam sinned. Our relation to Christ never ends because his life is endless. The gospel first kills us and then it makes us alive. Poverty and loss produce mourning, but the gospel brings the greatest loss we've ever known, which is the loss of our old man, the loss of our sins. And that is a blessing, that is a comfort because we lose all of ourself and we gain Christ. All that we have is only Christ. All that we are was buried, and all that we have was raised from the dead, was seated in glory.

It's the Lord Jesus Christ. We don't need to look to ourselves. These texts of scriptures are meant to empty us That's God's grace and enlighten us to Christ as the one who alone is worthy and is all of our salvation. What a blessed comfort this is to us. Let's pray. Father, thank you for your mercy, the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ that he would empty himself to bring us to himself, to present us to himself without blame, without fault, holy, in the presence of God, in all of his glory, washed in his blood, clothed in his righteousness, given his eternal life, life in him, his glory, his reward, his inheritance, he himself is ours as we are his. What amazing grace this is. We thank you and praise you for the sermons that he brought to us, the gospel he preached to us who have nothing and find our all in him. For the mourning condition we find ourselves in and the comfort we have because of the comfort given to him was not for him only, but for us in him. What grace, in Jesus' name we pray, amen.

The Blessed Mourner

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