Main Idea: Being simply Christian means caring enough to confront all of life seriously.

There are some messages where it is best to sort of ease you into the text. You know, give you something that orients your mind to what we are talking bout for the next twenty-five minutes. Then there are some that after you think of all the different ways to introduce a message, none of them seem to work and the only thing you know to do is to say, "Here is what we are going to talk about…." This is one of those mornings where I just say, "We are going to talk about Matthew 5:4 that says, "Blessed are they that mourn for they shall be comforted."

Last week we began talking about living simply Christian lives. Living in such a way that is guided by the words of Jesus and is stripped of the externals that we have layered on what it means to be Christian. To find that "simply Christian" path, we have gone to the Sermon on the Mount, the longest recorded message of Jesus, found in Matthew 5-7. In these revolutionary words we find direction and purpose for living life that reflects the character of a follower of Jesus.

The first eight statements of Jesus are called "the Beatitudes." Those statements particularly describe things that should mark or define a Christian’s lifestyle. We said last week that being simply Christian begins with a declaration of spiritual bankruptcy. Declaring spiritual bankruptcy is recognition within ourselves that we have nothing and are nothing without Jesus as the source of our lives. It is that admission of emptiness that opens the door to the fullness that God through Jesus Christ has to give us. Jesus said, "Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven."

The next attitude or characteristic of a person who is simply Christian is an ability to be willing to care enough about the life I live, the world I live in and the God I serve that it hurts. Because I care enough to hurt, Jesus says he can assure me that I will be comforted or consoled in the places where I hurt. He said, "Blessed are they that mourn for they shall be comforted."

Let’s start by asking the question, "What did Jesus mean when he said, "Blessed are they that mourn…."? The word that Jesus used for mourn is the strongest word in the Greek language for sorrow. It is a grief, sorrow or lament that pierces a person to the very core of their own lives and is expressed audibly. It is anguish, weeping and agony that so grips a person that they feel like they are going to die. The Hebrew equivalent is found in the Psalms and is used to describe a range of ugly, violent emotions such as anger, rage and wailing. This isn’t a few tears that come to your eyes when you watch a sad movie. This is harsh, strong, gut wrenching, frightening grief. There have been occasions where I have been in the presence of persons who have been told that one they have loved has died suddenly or tragically. The range of human emotions that come from that moment is without definition. It is not an experience I want to recall because once you have heard it you can’t forget it. As much as I might like to find some other way to define this word, I can’t because that is what it means.

So, if that is what the word means—a deep, piercing, emotional grief, then how or where is that response to be applied? I need you to understand that Jesus isn’t throwing out random statements that would look good on a greeting card. You can’t take this statement or any of these and apply them to just any individual. You must remember that these are words that Jesus spoke to his disciples and to those who followed him. So this word of God’s approval must first apply to those who are part of that group. It first applies to those who are identified as simply Christian.

So did Jesus mean that God’s approval is to be found in those, all those, who grieve over what has been lost? No, because there are persons who are not believers who never find comfort over what has been lost. People die, homes are destroyed, families are ruined from any number of causes and they will face eternity never knowing any sense of comfort in this life or the next over the sorrow they have lived with all their days. You will have to admit that there are some believers as well who have something happen to them that is so devastating and sorrowful that they are forever affected by that. They chose to go through the end of their days denying or rejecting the consolation or comfort that Jesus promises here. To say that every person who experiences deep, soul-wrenching grief is "blessed" simply isn’t true.

Another thing that isn’t true is that I don’t believe Jesus means that those who are blessed are those who are always grim about life. Someone who never smiles, never makes a joke or can take a joke. They are basically numb to anything that makes life enjoyable. Now my wife would say I just described myself. She says that I have the ability to make work out of anything. She’ll tell me before we go somewhere, "Now don’t talk about anything serious or sad." When I talk to her she’ll constantly tell me to "unfurrow" my brow. Some of you watch the NBC show The Office. There is a character on that show named "Angela," who works in accounting. She is the Christian on the show and virtually shows little, if any, emotion except when someone else is having a problem and then she enjoys their trouble. I don’t believe Jesus has in mind our being grim.

To get a better idea of what Jesus meant think about the life of Jesus himself. We have no record of Jesus ever laughing. We have remarks about him weeping, being angry or being sad but not laughing. That doesn’t mean he didn’t or that he was not pleasant to be around. If you recall, little children loved to be around him so there was something that draw them to him. Also, he was accused of being "a glutton and a drunkard," of really having too much fun at parties and being the "friend of sinners," who attended those parties. While we don’t have a record of Jesus telling a joke, it doesn’t mean that he was always a grim, joyless person.

What I think you see in the life of Jesus was that he knew what it was to look at the serious realities of life and accept them for what they were—distortions of God’s purpose. Because he confronted the serious realities of life, it caused him pain, inward pain, so much pain that more than anything else that caused Jesus’ physical death it was the pain of a world broken by human sin that had distorted God’s purpose. Jesus lived his life "mourning," "grieving," "sorrowing" over our human condition. He confronted life seriously.

I believe that a person who is simply Christian is a person who cares enough to confront life seriously and spiritually. They are a person who is genuinely full of joy but also is willing to be affected by what is breaking the heart of God. They are someone who loves to cut up but they know when to cut if off. They know what is funny and what is not. They know when to laugh with someone and when to cry with someone. They are someone who sees life through the eyes of hope yet looks at all of its reality and faces it seriously.

Notice I said that this starts with being a person who "cares enough" to confront life seriously. Don’t miss this! It means that we feel grief when something that mattered to us has been lost. It isn’t just feeling sad but it is caring deeply about something and wanting it to be different. We feel grief because we care about something that is important to us and ultimately is important to God. Jesus is saying, "Blessed are the believers who care enough to give a rip about something that matters!"

Far too often as believers we live lives that are totally insulated from things that should and could cause us pain, if we just faced them. We just don’t want to know what is going on because that is just too much to worry about. If we really allowed ourselves to see our own lives and our world as God sees them, that would be unpleasant and we just can’t have that. We think we need protection when what Jesus is offering us is connection, care, concern and confrontation over what should create grief, mourning or sorrow within us!

So what are the things as a follower of Jesus I should confront seriously? The first is a willingness to confront seriously our own personal sin and rebellion against God. This means seeing what you do and have done as God sees it. It is to take the position of David in Psalm 51:4, " Against you, and you alone, have I sinned; I have done what is evil in your sight." It is a refusal to justify, rationalize or compare myself or my sin with others. It is a refusal to pretend I am right when I know that I am wrong. Kent Hughes says, "The saddest thing in life is not a sorrowing heart but a heart that is incapable of grief over sin for it is without grace." (The Sermon on the Mount, p. 29). Max Lucado says without this sorrow a believer never knows "the exquisite sorrow of repentance." (The Applause of Heaven, p. 55). This type of serious confrontation isn’t done casually or quickly. It is done with a willingness to be open to the grief of seeing what my own personal sin has done to the heart of God and crying out to God as Paul did, "Oh, what a miserable person I am! Who will free me from this life that is dominated by sin?" (Romans 7:24)

Another thing that we should confront seriously is our own sense of personal loss. Whenever we lose something that mattered to us, we mourn or grieve. Whether it is a spouse, parent, child, sibling, job, marriage, health, relationship, a possession or a circumstance. When it has been lost there should be grief. More and more our western culture wants us to move quickly past the uncomfortable, awkward, ugly pain of grief to something more acceptable and accommodating. One of the questions people often ask me is, "How are they doing?" It is a normal question and sometimes my answer is they are normal for what they have lost. It is right and necessary for us to mourn things that we have lost in the past, the present or will be lost in the future. You grieve because you care about what you have lost. Being simply Christian is being willing to feel deeply and confront seriously the things that have been lost.

There is one more thing that we should confront seriously and that is the sin, suffering and evil in others and in our world. Richard Rohr says, "In this beatitude, Jesus praises…those who can enter into solidarity with the pain of the world and not try to extract themselves from it." (Jesus’ Plan for a New World, p. 133). There are sins that people in our culture are committing that are destroying families, communities and ultimately the moral core of our culture. There is suffering that persons endure that is neither fair nor just, especially when it is the result of the weak being victimized by the powerful. There is evil in our world that continues to have the fingerprint of Satan’s hand that robs and destroys all that God would call good. There are people in this church who know what it is to confront these things seriously; whose voice and souls break because of what they know is out there. There needs to be more because there is no end to the pain that shackles hope in our world. Being simply Christian confronts seriously the things in others that break God’s heart and should break ours.

If that is what it means to "mourn," what dies it mean when Jesus said, "…For they shall be comforted"? It is interesting that Jesus only offers his comfort to those who have refused to push away that which brings sorrow and grief. In fact the Greek sentence means, "for they--and they only—shall be comforted." Jesus’ comfort is for those who have confronted life seriously. The word for comfort means one who is called alongside of to help or encourage." It is the same word for Holy Spirit that he used in John 14 when he called him the "Paraclete," the Comforter. Jesus says that those who have refused denial and risked the pain of grief are the ones who can be assured of his comfort.

How do we experience his comfort? There is immediate comfort when we repent of our sins that God in Jesus Christ forgives our sins fully and freely. I John 1:9 says, " But if we confess our sins to him, he is faithful and just to forgive us and to cleanse us from every wrong." When we feel the deep loss of something or someone that was loved, there is the promise of Christ’s comfort. Paul said he is "the source of every mercy and the God who comforts us. He comforts us in all our troubles…." (2 Cor. 1:2-3 NLT). When that which we see in our world creates grief for us we are promised that, "…What we suffer now is nothing compared to the glory he will give us later" (Rom. 8:18). As believers, we are assured of a time that will be ours when "God himself…will remove all of their sorrows, and there will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain. For the old world and its evils are gone forever." (Rev. 21:3-4)

The whole truth is that for every pain we feel because we confront life seriously there is a comfort God has shaped just for us. Peter Kreeft writes, "Every suffering can be blessed because it hollows out a place in us for God and his comfort, which is infinite joy." (Back to Virtue)

Max Lucado tells in his book The Applause of Heaven about his daughter Andrea waking him in the night needing a "fwashwight in my woom." He told her she didn’t need a flashlight because the lights were on, both her nightlight and the hall light. Then she said, "But Daddy, what if I open my eyes and can’t see anything?" His wife interrupted and said there was a power failure around midnight and Andrea must have awakened in the dark. He says, " Even the hardest of hearts would be touched by the thought of a child waking up in a darkness so black she couldn’t find her way out of her room. I climbed out of bed, picked Andrea up, got a flashlight out of the utility room, and carried her to her bed. All the while, I told her that Mom and Dad were here and that she didn’t need to be afraid. I tucked her in and gave her a kiss. (p. 64-65) Lucado says, "There is a Father who will hold me until I’m better, help me until I can live with the hurt, and who won’t go to sleep when I’m afraid of waking up and seeing the dark. Ever. And that’s enough." (The Applause of Heaven, p. 66).

You may say to me, "What a sappy way to end a message on such a serious word of Jesus about those who grieve being those who are blessed!" I end this message with that story because it reminds me that Jesus guaranteed comfort for those who confront life seriously. You cannot confront life seriously and survive without God’s comfort. I have asked myself this week, "Why won’t I let God be the God who comforts me like I have and would comfort my own children?" The miracle of God is that his comfort is so overwhelming that life can be even richer because I was willing to confront life seriously.

Today I plead with you to be willing to open yourself to what is ugly, painful and hard about life. Join Jesus and those who would follow him and confront life seriously. Being a person who is simply Christian knows when to laugh but more than anyone else they know when to cry. Because they know when to cry, they know the comfort, the deep abiding comfort of God. "Blessed are they that mourn for they shall be comforted."

Sunday, April 13, 2008

Dr. Bruce Tippit, Pastor

First Baptist Church

Jonesboro, Arkansas

btippit@fbcjonesboro.org