Sermon Tone Analysis

By Pastor Glenn Pease

The soloist asked the visiting preacher what his subject was.

She wanted to follow up with an appropriate message in song.

When he hesitated she told him to never mind, she would listen and select something appropriate.

When he concluded his sermon she sang, "Sometime, Somewhere, We'll Understand."

Many a sermon is hard to understand because it is over our heads, complicated, and far removed from our experience of life.

But one of the paradoxes of life is that a sermon can also be hard to understand just because it is too simple, and easy to grasp.

This is the case with the beatitudes.

Jesus uses no big words; nor does He get complicated, or off on areas of life removed from common experience.

On the contrary, He is so simple and clear in what He says that it becomes a problem.

Blessed are those who mourn is just too clear, and Luke makes it even more clear when he writes, "Blessed are you who weep now for you shall laugh."

This is so clear and obvious that it is hard to understand.

The simplicity of it must be complicated by distinctions and interpretations before it makes sense, for who ever heard of happy sadness?

Paradox always calls for careful interpretation.

If we take these words as an absolute statement without qualification we end up as universalists.

If all who mourn are to be comforted, then all shall be comforted, for all men mourn.

The aged poet reflects back on life and writes,

I've seen your weary winter-sun

Twice forty times return,

And every time has added proofs

That man was made to mourn.

Certainly, Jesus did not mean to convey the idea that mere mourning is the key to happiness.

That would turn hell into heaven, and give us salvation by sorrow.

What of the immoral mourning of Ahab because he could not have the vineyard of Naboth?

What of Jonah's mourning because of God's mercy on Ninevah?

What of Hamen's mourning over the advancement of Mordacai?

What of the mourning of Judas over his betrayal of Jesus, and the millions who mourn because the consequences of sin are misery and death?

The road to damnation is wet with the tears of those who mourn.

It is clear that the simple statement of Jesus cannot be taken as a absolute rule, for that would lead to the superficial conclusion that all evil men will be comforted rather than condemned.

Sin, suffering, and sorrow would be only illusions, and we will all be happy when the light of truth dissolves them.

This is an unbiblical view of evil, and certainly this is not what Jesus meant.

What then did Jesus mean by this statement?

Bill Graham asks, "How can one extract the perfume of gladness from the gall of sorrow?"

If not all sorrow leads to happiness, and not all mourning leads to comfort, then we need to distinguish between good and evil sorrow.

The best way to accomplish this is to look at the mourning of Christ.

What made Him weep and shed tears?

This will be the kind of mourning that we must do to be blessed.

We must study the attitudes of Christ which made Him mourn to see the meaning of this beatitude.

The first attitude of Jesus that led Him to mourn was His-

I. ATTITUDE ON SIN.

Jesus was a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, not just because of what sin was doing to Him through those who rejected Him, but because of what sin was doing to them.

Weep not for me, He said to those who felt sorry for Him, but weep for yourselves.

The consequences of sin are horrible, and those who do not find refuge in Christ must suffer the full force of God's wrath on sin.

This is why Jesus wept over Jerusalem, and there can be no doubt that He shed many tears of mourning as he prayed alone all night in secluded places.

This kind of mourning over sin is a key to happiness, because it leads one to oppose sin and its consequences.

This is to take a stand with God against Satan, and assures one of eternal victory and comfort.

This attitude is different from that of sorrow over sin because the consequences spoil your pleasure.

The worldly person mourns over sin in this way.

The one thief on the cross mourned because his sin led him to the death penalty.

He did not feel bad over his sin, but he felt terrible over getting caught, and having to pay the penalty.

The world's beatitude is, "Blessed are they that never get caught."

Bertha Buxton said, "After all, the eleventh commandment (thou shalt not be found out) is the only one that is vitally important to keep in these days."

This is no joke, but the sincere philosophy of masses of people.

To enjoy the pleasures of sin and escape the penalty is the goal of life for many.

This leads to being insensitive to sin, and a careless and carefree attitude which is just the opposite of what Jesus is saying.

When we cease to be sensitive to sin, and, therefore, cease to mourn over what it is doing to God, others, and to ourselves, we cut ourselves off from the hope of anything but the most superficial happiness.

Newman said, "Our best remedy against sin is to be shocked at it."

The tragedy is that sin is so common that we tend to take it for granted.

We adjust to it and consider our comfort and ease in its presence a sign of strength.

As a college student, John McFarland spent a summer in the slums of Chicago.

When he returned to school, and to the country parish where he served, he told of his shock at what he saw.

After the service, a member of the congregation, who had been on the board of a large corporation in Chicago, came up to him and said, "Don't worry about it John-you'll get to the place where that sort of thing won't bother you any more."

He was right, of course, but what he failed to realize is that when we adjust to sin, and are no longer bothered and disturbed enough to mourn, we drop down to zero on God's objective standard of happiness.

By escaping the sorrow that comes with being disturbed by sin, we place ourselves in a neutral position in the battle of good and evil.

This is the lukewarm position that is distasteful to God, and makes you of no value in His plan to push back the forces of darkness.

Happiness for the Christian is dependent upon being sorrowful over sin, and what it does to people's lives.

Those who do not mourn over sin do not repent, and so they do not receive God's forgiveness, and so cannot be ultimately happy.

He that lacks time to mourn lacks time to mend.

Eternity mourns that.

'Tis and ill cure

For life's worst ills to have no time to feel them.

Had the Prodigal Son never come to the place of mourning over his folly, he never would have experienced the happiness of a father's forgiveness, and a joyous welcome home.

His mourning was the key to his happiness, and so it is for millions who mourn over their sin, and flee back to God in repentance.

God's love runneth faster than our feet,

to meet us stealing back to Him and peace,

and kisses dumb our shame; nay, and puts on

the best robe, bidding angels bring it forth.

The angels of heaven rejoiced over the repentant returning sinner.

God is happy as well, and so is the one who has mourned over his sin.

In no other kind of sorrow can so much happiness be found.

Who is happier than the one who has just lost his heavy burden at the cross.

It is important that we see this is to be continuous, and not just a once for all mourning at the time of conversion.

It is not, blessed are those who have mourned, but, those who do mourn.

Sensitivity to sin must characterize the Christian at all times.

This leads to immediate sorrow when we sin, and to confession and cleansing.

Paul wrote in II Cor.

2:10, "For Godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation and brings no regrets, but worldly grief produces death."

There is a clear distinction between sorrow that leads to death, and that which leads to the life of happiness.

Happiness comes only from the sorrow that is honest and realistic about sin.

Pascal said, "There is no comfort in anything except the truth."

And the truth is, says L. P. Jacks, "We are all stockholders in human misery and degradation."

The poor in spirit recognized this, and those who mourn do something about it, for they repent and receive God's solution to their sin through Christ.

In a very literal sense, no man will ever be truly happy who has not mourned because of his sin, and that of others.

Jesus wept over what sin did to others, and this leads us to the consideration of the second kind of mourning Jesus had in mind.

It is that mourning which comes from-

II.

ATTITUDE OF SYMPATHY.

Thomas Jefferson said, "Sensibility of mind is indeed the parent of every virtue, but it is the parent of much misery too."

Jesus could have lived a much more peaceful and undisturbed life had He not been so sensitive to people's needs.

He had compassion on the multitudes over and over again, and this meant a heart constantly bearing the burdens of others.