Blessed are...

Paradox

“Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.” Matthew 5:4

There are two, startling paradoxes in this brief text. First, there is the paradox that we are to find blessing in sorrow. Surely, this cannot be true? How can our grief become an opportunity to find joy? Mourning over our loss, as a natural human experience, is only therapeutic when it enables us to exorcise the pain that is caused by parting. If there is something cathartic about mourning, it can only be that tears help us to express buried emotions that could, otherwise, cause us harm. No-one goes looking for a reason to mourn, so how can mourning be valued as a source of blessing?

The answer to the problem is that we need to broaden our understanding of what it means to mourn. When we read this Beatitude we tend to associate Jesus’ words with mourning following bereavement. In fact the words are often used in this way, and rightfully so, because the comfort of the Gospel is a source of blessing at a time of loss. However, Jesus is not really speaking of sorrow over parting, but of sorrow over sin. The first Beatitude reminds Christians that there is value in a proper assessment of our spiritual poverty, in that we are driven to God as the only source of salvation. The second Beatitude speaks to the blessings that can be ours when we learn to grieve over our sinful nature. This is not perverse, but it is paradoxical. Yet the greatest, and second, paradox is this: that when we mourn over our offenses, repenting of them with tears, then we find comfort in the very One against whom we have offended. He is the One who turns our weeping into joy.





Lord Christ,
When I have ignored Your claim upon my life, forgive me.
When I have stood, aloof, from Your expectations, forgive me.
When I have pretended not to be entangled in the snares and sins of this world,
save me from myself.
In repentance and faith may I find Your true salvation.
For Your love’s sake.
Amen.