One of the most difficult experiences of life that we have to face, one which all of us face somewhere along the way, is the experience of mourning.
        If you have gone through it, you know that it is terribly draining. It sucks you of physical strength, mental energy; even spiritual vitality disappears.

        Think, for example, what happens when you experience the death of a loved one - ripped away from you, sometimes unexpected, sometimes not, but always difficult. There is a large hole in your life. You think about that person again and again. You miss them. You cry for them. Your heart aches.

        Or think of what it is like to lose a job. The desperate sinking feeling when the news is first broken. The sense of being without direction, without meaning and purpose for life - just drifting. Feeling dead useless, non-productive. Frustrated. Dreaming about the years spent on the job and the sense of satisfaction from it.

        This the world of mourning, a difficult, demanding world.
        And it is about mourning that we hear words from the lips of Jesus.
        Listen to them with me as they come within the setting of Jesus’ hope-filled, good news gospel message - the "Sermon On The Mount."

Blessed are those who mourn.....
        At its most basic level, to mourn is to feel the weight of the loss of something that was important, close, valuable.
        As great as the pain of losing, say, an arm is, so great is the emotional and mental pain of loss of significant portions of life - be it the loss of loved ones through death or separation, or the loss of important elements in life like valued work or pleasure, or the loss of a part of your body.
        Mourning -- dealing with deep, heart-level pain as a result of major loss.

How can there possibly be blessing when we are maimed, pain-filled, at the end of our rope?
        How can you possibly find new hope and life when you’ve been abandoned by your spouse?
        Or when you lose your career because of corporate resizing, and - while they won’t say it outright - you know that your age is working against you?
        Or when your parent dies.... or your child?
        Or when you struggle with the loss of health and well being?
        Or a friend moves?
        Or you go bankrupt?
        Or you look in the mirror with the realization that the horrible thing you just witnessed, the dark event, the immoral activity...... was done by you; and you feel the loss of holy innocence and godly purity?

Blessing aside – how do you come to grips with this stuff?
How do you begin to deal with it?

Some people would tell you - "Oh, it’s not so bad. You don’t need to get so worked up over it." They try to shrug it off. And you feel like plowing them right in the chops. Which perhaps you should. Because, sometimes, it IS that bad. What you have lost WAS valuable — very valuable! And to say, "it’s not so bad" is to cheapen the value, to slap watery whitewash on it. Which is wrong.

At other times we face the temptation to distract ourselves. And so people marry on the rebound once widowed or divorced. They retire and quickly fill their lives to overflowing with all kinds of different projects in order to plug the hole. Or they move away; or quit the community or group where the loss occurred. They avoid the issue.
        Which can work..... for a while. After which, stuff like that has this bad habit of showing up again somewhere along the way if we don’t deal properly with it the first time round. Sometimes with extra vengeance. No blessing.

        And then there are the eternal optomists. A few of them in every crowd. Suggesting that what you’re facing is not a tragedy or a loss, but merely an opportunity for a new beginning. They’re always trying to find the bright spot in the world around us, and in your own life.
        Which is fine - except that in the world around us, sometimes we have to admit to and reckon with the slaughter in Rwanda, the horrors of Kosovo, continued sectarian aggression at Drumcrie, a family murder in Kitchener, child poverty and hunger in Ottawa-Carleton. What optimism can be found there?
        Or in one’s own life – losing a fine job, the abrupt shortening of a fulfilling career just plain hurts. Losing sexual innocence because of abuse is horrible – no restrictions. And when your best friend and partner for life dies...... who dares to speak of new opportunities? How foolish!!

        Finally, there are those who counsel revenge. Get even. If they’ve caused you pain, cause it back – more preferably. So families in certain American states are given the opportunity to watch a murderer die. Hutu and Tutsi, Kosovar and Serb, Palestinian and Jew...... round after round of revenge for centuries.
        In our own lives – when someone else gets the promotion we were expecting, we try to trip up their career. The slob who walked out on the marriage leaving you and the kids – just wait! The teacher who treated you wrongly. The kid in the class who made you look like a fool......
        The folks at the Stanford Forgiveness Project are documenting scientific evidence which shows that harboring resentment; nursing a grudge; plotting to get even is generally bad for your health – blood pressure, strokes, stomach ailments, heart conditions, skin disorders, depression..... the list goes on. You can read about their work on the net.
        No - Trying to get revenge, as a way to deal with loss, can be deadly.
        There is no blessing in it.

"Blessed are those who mourn.... for they will be comforted." says Jesus.
        Jesus is NOT saying that it is a blessed thing to be maimed in life, to have a gaping hole, to have something or someone important snatched away.
        Rather - when we carry these wounds to Him, there is comfort available that runs deeper, richer, and far more lasting than anything we can find by trying to bandage the pain with minimizing or distraction or optomism or revenge or whatever other coping technique we develop.

Remember the context within which Jesus preaches the Sermon on the Mount.
Go back and look again at what he was doing just before he began preaching.
        The doing was the illustration. The preaching is the explanation.

The sick, the damaged, the beat up people -they came to Jesus.
        And He healed them.
        Didn’t minimize what was going on.
        Didn’t chase them away.
        He filled up and restored their broken lives.
                So they were blessed.

The good news we hear tonight is that blessing is available to us, too.
        In some inexplicable way, strength to carry on.
        Hope and peace to face tomorrow.
        Sometimes the gift of healing.

Sometimes when we mourn, what we don’t need are quick fixes.
        What we don’t need are ready answers.
        What we DO need is a listening ear, a shoulder to cry on.

Blessed are those who mourn in Christ for they always have such an ear.
        As Psalm 139 reminds us – whether it be the middle of the night or high noon, whether it be in a crowded mall or on a country road – the Lord’s eye and ear are tuned right in.

We mourn, sometimes, because of huge holes torn into our lives.
Blessed are those who mourn in Christ, for His holy comfort fills those holes.
        How often doesn’t it happen that believers who lay the pain of a destroyed career before the Lord find that He opens totally unexpected new avenues of service in His Creation.
        Sometimes lonely people are blessed unexpectedly with beautiful Christian partners for life. Or new friendships.
        I’m sure you can think of people to whom such a thing has happened.
                Perhaps to you.

There are times that the holes are NOT filled. They, and the pain, remain.
Even then there is comfort.
A burden shared is half a burden, someone once said.
Jesus said,
        "Surely, I will be with you always, to the end of time." (Mt 28)
        "I will send you a Comforter, the Holy Spirit." (John 14)
Where others may be too busy or too stressed or too preoccupied with stuff to have time for your concerns;
        where others may consider you not worth the time of day;
        where others may consider the issue trivial
                or wish you would hurry up and get over it, for crying out loud,

Jesus Christ has all the time in eternity for you.
To listen.
To understand as one who has experienced the deepest pains of human life.
To simply, deeply, carefully – be there.
        "I will not leave you as orphans. I will come to you." (Jn 14.18)

Blessed are those who mourn.
        One thing about pain and trouble - when you can see the end, it’s amazing how much more a person can handle. When it seems like it will go on forever, out of control, we seem to collapse. Yes?
Those who mourn in Christ face the pain in hope.
        Many of us stood at a graveside this past Friday. There was much mourning. But no despair! It was mourning with hope. We spent time under the symbol of the cross - the death and the resurrection of Jesus. He conquered death. Meaning it doesn’t have the final word. The final word is the hope-filled word of eternal life with God.
        "Do not let your heart be troubled..... In my father’s house are many rooms... I go to prepare a place for you... and will come again to take you to be with me, that you may be where I am." (John 14)
        "Oh death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?" (1 Cor 15)

        Those of you who struggle to fight against poverty, environmental destruction, injustice — who see pictures of children enlisted into warfare, whole nations starving or being destroyed by AIDS, natural disasters ruining lives –
        you see that and are deeply pained by it
        you work to counter it and wonder what good it will do.......
                In it’s own way a type of mourning
For you come the words of Jesus from Matthew 25:
        that the smallest of deeds, that no one else can see, is seen by Him. And when done as a healing deed in the life of another and done out of faith, He treats it as a deed done directly to Him.

And to you come the words of Revelation 21 – that there will come a day when Jesus will return, and everything will be made new!
        No more tears, no more death, no more mourning, or crying or pain.
         All that will be wiped away.
                There WILL be an end.
                There IS hope.
                And that – even that – brings great comfort to those who mourn.

One more item.
"Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted" said Jesus.

        St.Paul picks up on that and says, "We give thanks to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the merciful Father, the god from whom all help comes! He helps us in all our troubles, so that we are able to help others who have all kinds of troubles, using the same help that we ourselves have received from God. Just as we have a share in Christ’s many sufferings, so also through Christ we share in God’s great help." [2 Cor 1.3-6]

"God does not comfort us to make us comfortable," someone said, "but to make us comforters." God uses our painful experiences not only to heal us, but to heal others through us. The people who best understand distress are those who have been distressed. The people who know how to walk with people in pain, are those who have been rattled by it themselves. The ones who realize how best to sit with grieving people, are those who have grieved, too.
        "Rejoice with those who rejoice. Weep with those who weep" says the Bible [Rom 12.15]

One woman, whose daughter was killed in an automobile accident, was given tremendous comfort and support by her church’s woman’s group. Her experience of comfort led her to write this song:
 
 

When I have been too worn to stand - You have been my strength.
When the world has been my enemy - You have been my friend.
When the hope I know has been obscured - You have helped me see.
When faith is tried by agony - I see you and believe.

You have shared my sorrow; you've made my tears your own.
What comfort 'midst the anguish, knowing I am not alone.
You've shared the burdens of my heart so I've had room for joy.
I pray that I can do the same when the pain is yours.

Christian friends, hear the word of God –
        Blessed are those who mourn, for in Christ, and through His Body, they will be comforted.