Go a little deeper
This message continues a series called A Blessed Life, working through the Beatitudes at the start of the Sermon on the Mount. After last week's focus on being poor in spirit, Pastor Keith Kirkpatrick turns to Matthew 5:4, the blessing on those who mourn and the promise that they will be comforted. He argues that Jesus' words are counter-cultural and counter to the flesh, and that the blessedness Jesus describes is not the same as circumstantial happiness but a state of being favored and receiving God's goodness.
Pastor Keith frames the Beatitudes as a progression: first coming to God empty and recognizing the need for him, then being broken over what has separated us from him. He illustrates this from Paul's opening to 2 Corinthians, where God is named as the God of all comfort who comforts his people in affliction so that they can comfort others, and he connects the promised comfort to the Holy Spirit as the paraclete, the helper and comforter promised in John 14.
The message insists that grief is not something God is uncomfortable with. Drawing on the Lazarus story of John 11, Pastor Keith notes that Jesus wept and did not scold the mourners, and he holds that tears do not drive God away. He distinguishes godly grief that runs to God from worldly grief that runs elsewhere, speaks directly to men about the belief that crying is weakness, and closes with an invitation to faith and a prayer of response.
Take this with you
Blessed is not the same as happy
Pastor Keith distinguishes the Greek word behind "blessed" in Matthew 5 from our usual word for happiness. Happiness, in his framing, is what happens on the outside; blessed is what happens on the inside. He also stresses that Jesus did not tell his followers to pretend everything is fine or to perform a polished life. That distinction is what makes it possible to hear Jesus call mourners blessed.
Mourning names what separates us from God
In this reading of Matthew 5:4, mourning is more than grief over loss. It is being broken over the chasm between us and God. Pastor Keith presents the Beatitudes as a progression: first acknowledging our need, then grieving the brokenness that caused separation. He says you can come as you are before God, but you cannot stay the same.
The comfort promised is a person
The sermon ties the comfort promised in Matthew 5:4 to the Holy Spirit as the paraclete, the one who comes alongside as helper, advocate, counselor, and comforter. Pastor Keith leans on John 14 to argue that Jesus called it good to go because the Father would send this helper to be with his people forever, and he returns to the beatitude by asking why the mourner is blessed: because God himself is the promised comfort.
Jesus enters grief rather than dismissing it
In John 11, at Lazarus's tomb, Jesus did not tell the mourners to stop crying or to have more faith. He was troubled in spirit and wept. Pastor Keith draws the conclusion that tears are not uncomfortable to God and that pain does not drive him away, citing Psalm 34 on the Lord being near to the brokenhearted.
Godly grief runs to God; worldly grief runs elsewhere
Using 2 Corinthians 7, Pastor Keith contrasts grief that produces repentance and leads to salvation with grief that produces death. He describes conviction as the Spirit's invitation to run to God, distinct from condemnation, and connects that to Psalm 23, where the presence of God himself is the comfort in the valley.
The conversation,
in their words.
Transcript from the recording’s captions. Select any timestamp to hear the original audio.
This is the Word of God. He wants to speak to you today. This Word can change your life forever if you would just let it. So if you brought your Bible, hold it in the air like you care. Get into this book more than just Sundays. Get into it every single day. All of us can participate. Just shout Word on the count of three. Here we go. One, two, three. Word! We're getting into God's Word. So God's Word gets into us. Last week we started a series, A Blessed Life. a blessed life because all of us deep down inside want a blessed life. Jesus tells us we can have a blessed life. In fact, Jesus wants you to have a blessed life. We're looking at a series of blessings at the start of what's known as the Sermon on the Mount. It's known as the Beatitudes coming from the Latin
word Beatus. Beatus just meaning blessing. Beatitudes meaning the blessings and Jesus starts off this sermon saying you can be blessed. It's not a matter of some people are blessed and some people aren't. Jesus says it's a choice. You choose if you want a blessed life but a blessed life may not be the way you would expect a blessed life to be. Jesus doesn't say a blessed life is a life of wealth and health and success and having life figured out. Jesus instead says something startling. He starts off this entire sermon. He starts off these blessings in Matthew 5 verse 3 and he says this, Bless are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Bless are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. The kingdom is yours, not one day, not some day, but you can have the kingdom now. Now, you can be blessed now if you recognize that it's not about you. We learned three things last week. We learned blessed means more than happy because happiness is based on what happens to you but the blessed life Jesus is speaking of is a blessed life that you can have when you're hurting, it's a blessed life you can have when you're sad, it's a blessed life you can have when you're doing well. Jesus wants you to know that that blessing of a blessed life is yours. The second thing we learned is a blessed life starts with poor in spirit.
We're going to see a progression through these beatitudes, each one building upon the other. And if you want a blessed life, it's yours, but it starts with being poor in spirit. That word poor in the original Greek is a complete poverty, meaning you have nothing. You're bankrupt. You have nothing to offer. This is not a poverty of finances. It's a poverty of spirit. It's simply stating you have nothing to offer God, but God has everything to offer you, and He gives it to you if you acknowledge your need for Him. So if you have a dependence on God, if you have a need for God, He will meet you in that space, in that place, and there's no room for some of your spirit and some of the Holy Spirit. God wants you to be poor in spirit to fill you with the Spirit.
The very God that created you wants you to know your identity and is found in him. Then finally last week we learned that the blessed life is found in his kingdom. Notice this, that all of these promises there's an assurance of things to come. But we see here in the first beatitude the kingdom can be yours right now. Not some day, not another day, the kingdom of heaven is yours if you would just recognize not only hear the teachings of Jesus but put them in the practice. The Bible tells us, don't just be hearers of the word, but be doers of the word. And it's not because you earn this. It's not because, well, you're better than somebody's because God loves you so much. God loves you so, so, so, so much.
Today, Jesus is going to say something equally as startling as we continue on to the second beatitude, the second blessing here. The title of today's sermon is this. Comfort is coming. Comfort is coming, say it with me. Comfort is coming. It is yours if you want it, and we're gonna find it in today's beatitude. Matthew chapter five is where we are. I hope you turn there in your Bible. Matthew chapter five, we're gonna be looking at one verse today. Matthew chapter five, looking at verse four. Matthew five, verse four. If you're able to today, would you stand for the reading of God's word? Let's read Matthew chapter five, verse four. Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. Let us all read it out loud together like you mean it, like you believe it. Let's say it together.
Blessed are those who mourn for they shall be comforted. Stay standing. Lord, I pray a blessing upon your word today. Holy Spirit, will you speak to us and give us a spirit of wisdom and revelation. God, I know this is something every one of us needs. So I ask in the name of Jesus, you'd speak to every heart that we would leave here transformed by the power of who you are in our lives. So I just welcome you, Lord, speak to us. Lord, I believe in revival and I believe it's gonna start when we take you so seriously, we are forever changed. So would you change some of our hearts today to be so radical for you? We don't care about anything else but you, Jesus, ask in your name, so be it and amen, amen. Well, this is the word of the Lord, you can be seated. For those that were listening to this sermon
for the first time, this would not have been natural. This would not have been just something right away that as the preacher was preaching on this mountainside, sitting down, opening up his mouth, blessed are those who are important spirit, for theirs is the kingdom, blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. I imagine Jesus was preaching like to a Baptist crowd. It was like, no, Amen's, right? I mean, it was just like, that wasn't fair of me. I would just say that as Jesus is saying this, he's saying something so significant that it was hard for the first century here and it's still hard for us today. There's nothing natural, there's nothing normal about what he's saying. In fact, it's counter-cultural, it's counter-the-flesh. That is the natural thing that you want to do. But Jesus said, if you'd be so willing
as to surrender your life to him, follow him, meaning you become a disciple. You're disciplined to the point of giving up the world and going after God, you will have a blessed life. That word blessed in the original language is a Greek word, makarios. Macarios is a happiness, but it's not the happiness in the context of our word, because it has a deeper meaning than what happens to you. Macarios actually means you're favored. It means you're flourishing. It's actually receiving the goodness of God, not just knowing that God is good, but you are experiencing it. See, happiness is what happens on the outside, whereas blessed is what happens on the inside.
Jesus is showing us something more to life, that life is more than just material things. Life is more than just what happens to you, but a kingdom life is something that happens inside of you. Today, I'm not going to give you three points as we might ordinarily see in a sermon. Today, I want this to be more like a crock-pot. I want us just to marinate on this one verse so that we can truly allow God's word to get into our heart. What I'm saying is I want to just spend some time on this and I want this to simmer inside of us. Have you ever noticed the power of a crock pot? You put all these ingredients in, you put the chicken in, you put the salt and the pepper and you put the onions in and they're pretty bland or bad on their own,
but if you put it in the crock pot and it just sits in there for a good six hours, now it starts to smell good. Now it starts to like, the flavors start to get in with each other and now there's no way that you're ever gonna be able to separate it because it's been sitting together for a little bit. And I wanna just do that with this verse. I wanna just simmer here. I wanna just let it ruminate inside of our hearts that we really understand this because if you read over this one verse too quickly, you will miss the power and the authority of what Jesus, God in the flesh, is trying to teach you today. He's trying to teach you something so important. He opened up the whole sermon, letting you know in Matthew five, verse three, You need God.
The greatest lie of the enemy is that somehow you could live life apart from God. God created us and He created us for the purpose of a right relationship with Him. But the worst thing you could do is try to live life apart from God. But once you know that you have a need for God, you've got to understand the brokenness that caused that separation, that chasm, the hurt, the heartache. Matthew 5 for says, and I am broken over everything that has separated me from God. See in these beatitudes we find this progression where we're gonna see that as each one builds upon the other God's going to demonstrate for us what happens when we believe in him. See you can come as you are before God you just can't stay the same. So if I come before God empty he's not like well
You're gonna be empty the rest of your life He wants to fill you if I come before God grieving and mourning and hurting He's not like well, that's the state you're always gonna stay in He says no, I'm here to help you There's a recognition here that if you want from God, you've got to recognize your need from God if you want healing in your life, you've got to acknowledge that you're sick if If you want to be saved from your sins, you've got to confess your sins. And Jesus is going to teach us a principle today. There is a blessing in your brokenness. We could put it this way. There's a blessing on the other side of your tears. The Bible teaches us that God sees your tears.
He keeps your tears. He knows every teardrop that comes from your eyes, and this is available from you, but But you've got to stop running from your grief and start running towards God. Jesus says, bless are those who mourn. How can Jesus say you're blessed if you mourn? Well the answer is in the promise. Why would you be blessed if you mourn? Because you shall be comforted. It's better to have God meet your needs than you pretend like you don't have those needs. I don't know about you, but when I read the Bible, it's easy for me to separate the emotions and the story of those that I read about. You know, you could read a verse really quickly
or you could read through a chapter or a book of the Bible and you read about the things that God did in the days of old and it's hard to immerse yourself in that story, but these are real people. They got hungry just like you. They got angry just like you. Many of them were hangry, just like you get sometimes. Some of them had bad night's sleep. Some of them had bad relationships. Some of them struggled with trying to understand who God is. Some of them were wondering, why did God allow them to go through the difficult days that they went through? There's a man in the Bible named Paul. It would be easy to just read about Paul as this hero in history that helped change the world when it comes to the church.
He was against the church, then he encountered Jesus, and then he started so many churches, and he traveled all over the world, and he wrote more books in the New Testament than any other author. It would be easy to read his story and be like, well, look at how God had his hand on this man, but this guy went through some stuff. And he says to the Corinthian church, and in his second letter, many argue it's his third letter to the Corinthian church, he says in 2 Corinthians chapter one, I wanna read you a large chunk of scripture because this is how he starts off the letter. This is the opening of the letter. Normally he opens up with thanksgiving and praise and I mean he's a preacher. He's a pastor. He's a church planter, but He just has to get real for just a moment Which I appreciate because it's a core value of Journey Church to be relentlessly real
So this is how he starts off this letter 2nd Corinthians chapter 1 a letter to the church He says blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ the Father of mercies and God of all comfort Let's just stop there for just a moment The author is acknowledging one God in three persons Blessed be God the Father the Lord Jesus Christ the Son and then he describes the Holy Spirit as the God of all comfort One God in three persons So there's the start of this letter pointing the church of all the things I could start off and tell you about Let me tell you about my God. He's a father. He's a Lord and he's a God of comfort He goes on to say in verse 4, who comforts us in all, somebody shall all, all our affliction.
Not some people, not sometimes, but we have a God that wants to meet you in all our afflictions so that we, here's the purpose of your life, it's not just about you. So that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. We're gonna keep reading, but let me just tell you, if we as the church take God's word seriously, and if you would let God minister to you today, you will go out as a minister, and you will help shape and change the world that we live in. When we say Central Oregon shall be saved, we're not inviting people into a church service,
We're inviting them into a living relationship with Jesus, a God who meets us in our need. And when he meets you in your need, how could you not say if he healed me, he could heal you? If he helped me, he could help you. If he saved me, he could save you. And so now this guy's saying, listen, bless be God who comforts us so we can comfort us, look at verse five. For as we share abundantly in Christ's sufferings, So through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too. So there's a direct correlation. The more problems you have, the more opportunities you have for God to work. The more suffering you have, the more opportunity you have for comfort. I
don't wish it upon you, but God's Word doesn't say blessed are the comfortable for they're the ones that just tell everybody else they can be comforted it says the more suffering the more comfort the more opportunity for God to work in you and through you and verse 6 if we are afflicted it is for your comfort and salvation and with we are comforted is for your comfort which you experience when you patiently endure the same sufferings that we suffer our hope somebody say our hope our hope for you is unshaken for we know that as you share in our sufferings you will also share in our comfort friends we are a church that
believes there's hope for everyone the world needs Jesus and if we don't come to Jesus we will try to find comfort in something else we'll say well our identity must be in the wrong place maybe I need to change gender maybe I need to change roles maybe I need to change spouses maybe I need to change churches maybe I need to just change who I am then I'll be happy but the problem is wherever you go there you are you can go ahead and move to whatever other city you think will make you happier but the way to be blessed is in Jesus. A blessed life is not in the space and place that you live. You could travel to Africa
and go to a remote village and meet someone who has nothing, and they have more joy than any American with everything. Because a blessed knife is not contingent on what you have, but it's what's in you. And when you recognize the need for a Holy Spirit, it changes everything. Jesus really wants us to know this right before he went to the cross. John chapter 14, he's He's just hours away from dying on the cross for your sins. So He shares His last teachings to make sure that we get this. That it's good that He goes because He's going to die on the cross. He's going to be buried in the tomb. He rose from the grave and He's going to send into heaven where He sits at the right hand of God. And He says, it's good that I go. And it would be confusing if you've been spending time with the Son of God, why it would be good if He goes. And He says, here's why. John 14 verse 16, and I will ask the Father, so Jesus the Son is going to ask the Father
and he will give you another helper there once again is the Trinity don't ever let a cult like the Jehovah's Witness or any other false religion tell you that the Trinity is not in the Bible it's everywhere in the Bible from Genesis 1 to the end of the Bible and Revelation we have one God and three persons I'll ask the Father Jesus says and he will give you another helper to be with you forever I want to pause for just a moment because Jesus says it's good that I go because God's gonna give you himself that is the Spirit of Jesus the helper this is the Holy Spirit one God three persons Jesus says I'm gonna ask the father the father's gonna give you the helper I really need you to understand what Jesus is saying about the Holy Spirit here because that word helper is different in the King James version we're studying today from the
English standard version that's what I preach from the English standard version it's very literal translation but in the old English it uses a different word than helper let me read it to you and I will pray the father in the King James version I will pray the father Jesus says and he will give you another comforter so instead of the word helper here the old English is comforter that he may abide with you forever now why is it different in the English standard version versus versus the King James version well it's just the translation of the original Greek the original Greek here for helper or comforter is paracletus Pericletus is a word that is it could be translated in many different words in the English And this is the word Jesus describes for the Holy Spirit. The Father's gonna send you Pericletus. What's Pericletus?
It's one who comes alongside you. You will never ever be alone with Pericletus It's a helper. You don't have to do life alone. You have a helper an advocate Someone who comes alongside and fights for you like an attorney a defender Someone who's going to speak on your behalf, a counselor. That's who the Holy Spirit is. It's going to give you counsel, wisdom when you need it at just the right time, a comforter. Jesus says, that's who you get in me. So when you believe in Jesus, according to Ephesians chapter 1, you are sealed with the Holy Spirit. Now you have access to paracletus, God inside of you.
Because so many in America stop short of Pericletus, we believe in Jesus, we get saved from our sins and then we just struggle, struggle, struggle, struggle, struggle and we're depressed and we try to numb all that depression with anything but Pericletus. And Jesus says, I'm giving you the solution, it's the helper, the comforter, the advocate, the one that comes alongside you, it's going to do it in you. So if we keep reading this text in John 14 verse 16 and I will ask the father he will give you another helper to be with you forever then verse 17 Jesus continues as even the spirit of truth this is paracletus God himself almighty God in you Holy Spirit whom the world
cannot receive because if you haven't believed in Jesus you don't have paracletus you are are not one with Christ because you don't have the Holy Spirit. So the world neither sees him nor knows him nor wants him but Jesus as you know him he said to his early disciples for he dwells with you and will be in you. Speaking of the promise of the Holy Spirit by believing in Jesus you now have the hope of the comforter the helper he dwells in you now without understanding if God is our comforter let's discuss why you're blessed when you mourn they shall be what comforted what's the promise God's
gonna be with you there's nothing according to Romans chapter 8 that can separate you from God nothing not your nakedness not even death itself you see when you have Jesus you had the comforter for that even if the devil himself comes against you even if everything in your life is a loss if you have Christ you could say I'm blessed but the Bible doesn't say you have to and act like you're happy you can mourn you can grieve you can have sorrow the Bible says that when you're in pain you have a living hope because here's the
truth we all are going to hurt it's like that 90s song from REM everybody hurts sometimes Jesus said it long before 1993 he said in Matthew 5 verse 4 blessed are those who mourn because what music often does in society is it taps into a felt need and Jesus is the one that's saying I know you're going to hurt and when you hurt I'm not asking you suppress it I'm not asking you to oppress it I'm not asking you to overlook it blessed are those who mourn for they
shall be comforted Jesus says the kingdom is for the poor in spirit and now if you have the kingdom he's not saying your life is gonna be free from problems the Christian life is an easy life that's not what he's saying here he's not saying if you have faith in me just pretend like it's okay get the sign from Hobby Lobby look good on your social media and just let all the world know that your family's got it together take that family picture look really good. Y'all ever met somebody that you really admired on social media only to realize their life was a disaster? You looked up to that marriage until they were divorced? No one's exempt to this. No one. No celebrity, no politician, no
athlete, and no pastor. There's no one exempt from this. Jesus says the blessed life starts with being poor in spirit and continues with grieving, not looking like the world, like we got it together. If I could just speak to the men for just a moment, because we live in such an independent, self-sufficient society that oftentimes our identity can start to be in the wrong places. We either mistook it from our father or we didn't have a father, so we came up with our own conclusion and just the machoism of what the world says a man might be or could be or maybe even what you've made up in your own mind, maybe even to just hold back that pain that you've experienced in your life,
but great men in the Bible mourn. In fact, I'm gonna take it a step further. If you're a real man, you actually cry. David, who's one of the greatest men in the scriptures that we read about described as a man after God's own heart. You go to Jerusalem today, the name of David is still celebrated, The very symbol of Judaism is the star of David. He was the second king of Israel. He was a man who was overlooked by his earthly father. His own brothers didn't believe in him, but he's a man that as you watch, and by the way, if you look at the life of David,
he was a soldier. I mean, he wasn't just like a navy seal. He wasn't just like an army ranger. I mean, this guy was a legend. He killed thousands on his own. I'm talking there's no one more manly than David, and you know what David did? He wept, he cried, he mourned over the loss of his child, over his own sin. Jeremiah, the prophet, lived in a very difficult day to be a prophet. People didn't wanna receive God's word. You opened up the church doors and nobody came. He was preaching and recording his sermons, just trying to get out the tapes to the world. God has a message to say, and nobody wanted to listen to Jeremiah, and many have described him as the weeping prophet.
Wasn't just men in the Old Testament, the greatest man of all time, Jesus wept. When you read the story of Lazarus found in John chapter 11. Lazarus was a friend of Jesus. Lazarus had two sisters, Mary and Martha. John chapter 11 verse three, Mary and Martha get word to Jesus. So the sisters sent to Jesus saying, Lord, he whom you love is ill, but by the time Jesus arrives, Lazarus is dead. He didn't just die that day. He had been dead for quite some time. The Bible tells us later in the same chapter, verse 33, when Jesus saw her weeping and the Jews who had come with her also weeping,
He was deeply moved in his spirit and greatly troubled. This is God in the flesh, and when he sees all of those weeping, including the sisters of Lazarus, he's troubled in his spirit. He's not just like happy-go-lucky, he's not the guy that walks in the room that's all chipper. He is troubled, he's deeply moved, and he said in verse 34, and Jesus says, where have you laid him? And they said to him, Lord, come and see. And then verse 35 is the shortest verse in the Bible we have in English. Just two words, Jesus wept, Jesus wept. Now, if you read this story, one could wonder why did Jesus weep?
I want you to know what Jesus didn't do. Jesus didn't walk in the room and say, come on guys, stop crying. Don't worry, I'm gonna fix this. Most men, we like to fix things. Am I right? You got problems? Well let me tell you how to fix the problem. There's an issue, let me just tell you what you should do and everything's gonna be okay. Jesus didn't come in and fix it. He just sat in it and wept. Jesus didn't come in and say, guys don't worry, don't worry, I'm gonna, in just a moment Lazarus is gonna come out of it, so come on, like, just, I wish you had a little more faith. A little more faith would have fixed this one, but he didn't come in and say, boy, a little more faith and you wouldn't be sitting here in this grief. He didn't say cheer up.
Jesus entered the grief and he cried with him. That means tears are not uncomfortable to God. Your grief does not scare God. Your pain does not drive him away. The Bible promises in Psalm 34, 18, the Lord is near. The Lord is near to the broken hearted and saves the crushed in spirit. God does not distance himself from you when you're broken. He does not say go deal with this on your own when you're hurting. Too many times we think that God is closest when things are good. And then we in America play this game because we've taken the lies of a Middle Eastern thinking, thinking that somehow bad things should only happen to bad people. We call that karma. So when
bad things happen to us, we say, God, that's not fair. We may not tell anybody that, but we distance ourselves from God, we distance ourselves from the church, and we're bitter towards God because we're going through bad things and bad things should happen to bad people. And good shit things should happen to people who believe in Jesus. But that's not what the Bible teaches us. And in fact, if God was fair, and God did give you what you deserve, just from those toddler years, maybe those teenager years, those early years of your marriage, if God
was fair towards us, we would receive wrath. Instead, God gives us the free gift of grace, and He never promised that you would have an easy life. promised to be with you during your dark difficult days James says in the opening of his letter he says count count this is addition here count out all joy my brothers when you meet trials of various kinds stop there for just a moment he's saying go ahead and start adding up all those bad things that happened in your life just start counting them up and you should start having joy the more you have the more joy you should have why because verse Verse 3 says, for you know, you know this is true,
that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness and let steadfastness have its full effect that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. The times I've grown most in my life were in the most hard, difficult days of my life. God didn't grow me in the easy, comfortable days when it felt good. So I can count it as joy to say, Everything that I've been through is not wasted with God. It's an opportunity for me to grow in the comfort of God. So I can know comfort is coming. My first ever funeral I ever did, my first celebration of life was for a teenager.
I was a youth pastor. It was one of the most difficult things I had done at that point in my life to look at the parents their only child is now dead and I have to go up and lead people in this I didn't sign up for that I'm a youth pastor I want to play games I want to sing songs I want to go to camp I didn't think I would have to grieve and mourn and sob as a young person with no kids at the time looking at the eyes of parents grieving the loss of their only child but little did I know God was
preparing me for so many other times I would have to do this not just for young but for old and everyone in between that what you go through listen listen Clearly God's word what you go through is not wasted with God. It never is That's why Jesus says blessed are those who mourn your life will be filled with pain You might be mourning a person a relationship a dream that didn't get fulfilled a season that ended You know professional athletes become the most depressed people Because their whole life their identity is what they do and the day they retire from whatever sport their end they don't know who they are so so we think well if I was only a professional
athlete do you know most people that win the lottery and when I say most it's almost a hundred percent become poor because if you can't handle money before you get money when you get it it's not gonna help anything and then you realize people just use you and they abuse you for money material things so all of a sudden when those things are gone when you lose all your money you lose your relationships your child wanders far from your home they're not speaking to you where do you go there is a morning that's not too hard for God and you start in Matthew 5 3 by simply saying I am spiritually poor I have a need for you God and then Matthew 5 4 says and now I am broken over that now I grieve over that and when you do that you've really entered into the
Christianity that we read about in the Bible we have such a casual Christianity in America. We need to repent of that Christianity because it's not the Christianity we find here in Matthew 5. There's nothing casual about this. This is a conviction that I don't care what anybody else thinks of me. Maybe we need a little more weeping in church that when someone's crying we actually know that God is doing a work. It's not so weird that when you come before the presence of God that you get real with God. That we would start to understand that the reason all of these things are happening in this world is because God actually is the one that provides the solution. And I told you that we're just gonna marinate on this. I wanna take it just one step further before we end our time here together. There is a grieving of sin because Genesis chapter three
tells us why these bad things happen in this world. It's not a God that created it. What God created was good. It was a rebellion against God that sin entered the story of humanity and that's where sickness came from. That's where disease came from. That's where death came from. That's where heartache came from, and God steps into our story and says, I give you a solution to that sin. I give you a solution to that sorrow. I give you a solution even to that death. And that solution is the person of Jesus Christ. So much so that when you have Jesus, it changes everything. Paul put it this way to the church in Corinth, when the imperishable, excuse me, when the perishable, that's you.
When the perishable, that's you, puts on the imperishable, that's Jesus. When the mortal, that's you, puts on immortality, that's Jesus. Then shall come to pass the saying that is written, death is swallowed up in victory. Oh death, where is your victory? Oh death, where is your sting? The sting of death is sin. So without Jesus, there's death, and the power of sin is the law. Who could keep every law? But, it says in verse 57, thanks be to God who gives us victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. You see, apart from Jesus, there's sorrow in this world.
But with Jesus, there's sorrow in this world. And there is a godly grief and there is a worldly grief. The Bible says in 2 Corinthians 7.10, for godly grief produces repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death. See, godly grief says I'm hurting and I go to Jesus. Worldly grief says I'm hurting so I go somewhere else. This just came to my mind so I'm praying it's the Holy Spirit. I saw a post on social media this week where a guy was celebrating his sobriety and also his celibacy. He's saying he hadn't had sex in more than one year, maybe it was closer to two years
and had been sober for about the same amount of time. And it was wild, the comments that were on that post. And I saw one particular post that really broke my heart and I wanted to engage with it. And then I realized like being a keyboard warrior isn't what Jesus has called us into. But the one post says, one bad night of decisions will take care of both of those things. And all I could think to myself is, Do you know what that will cause? Regrets. Will you forget about your problems for a few hours? Yes. Could it be fun for a few minutes? Yes. But when you wake up the next day, are you better because of it? No. You didn't create a legacy in your life. It's not a life that someone wants to read about
in 200 years. You are not the person God created you to be. Let me tell you, nothing is wrong with sobriety and celibacy, a life of no regrets. I'm not saying it's easy, I'm saying it's a choice to say I'm gonna do hard things because God is with me and on the other side of that morning I shall be comforted because I go to God. There's a big difference between conviction and condemnation. The church has been known for condemnation. You do wrong, you're a bad person. But I'll tell you the Holy Spirit does not give you condemnation because the Bible says in Romans 8.1, there is therefore now and no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. But when you know you shouldn't be doing something,
that's the Holy Spirit saying, don't run away from God, go to God. Stop that thing that's separating you from God. Stop that thing that you're trying to find comfort in. Stop that thing that's been perpetuated in your family from generation to generation. Repent, which means run to God, turn from your life of sin and remember the words of Jesus, Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. Even if, like David says, Psalm 23, even if I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, why? Because you're rotting your staff, what, comfort me. God, even if I need a little correction,
I'm gonna be comforted because you care for me. my friends the Holy Spirit is not merely a doctrine that we just affirm God is spirit that's not enough in the church the Holy Spirit needs the person that we depend on we rely on the Holy Spirit is God himself it's the presence of God in you so turn and trust in this God Romans 8 says this likewise the spirit the paraclete us helps us in our weakness for we do not know what to pray as we ought to but the spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words have you ever hurt so badly you didn't know what to pray that's where God meets you in that grief that's where God becomes real the enemy wants
to isolate you from everything else God just wants you to get relentlessly real with him I want to finish where we started with John 11 Jesus didn't just weep which he did by the way so when you hurt you can know this God hurts with you he knows this isn't the life that he destined and planned for you but Jesus didn't stay there Jesus walked towards the tomb verse 39 Jesus said take away the stone Martha said Lord by this time there'll be an odor he's been dead for four days some of you your dreams have been dead for more than four days some of you you've been divorced a long time you've been widowed a long for some of you have been single a long time, some of you have been hurting in your marriage a long time, some of you have been addicted for a long time. You say, can Jesus really change this?
Jesus said to her, did I not tell you if you believed you would see the glory of God? Then Jesus did two things that we can do as well. He prayed and then he shouted. They took away the stone and Jesus lifted up his eyes and said, Father, I thank you that you have heard me. You can start thanking God right now that he hears you, he knows you, he loves you. Father, I thank you that you're gonna turn things around. Father, I thank you that things are not gonna stay this way. Father, I thank you for what you're about to do. And then verse 43 says when he had said these things, he had prayed, he cried out with a loud voice. Lazarus, come out! So Jesus enters our grief, but he doesn't stop there.
He goes to the grave. He calls dead things to life. So you recognize why there's grief, you recognize what you're going through, you recognize what you're mourning, and then you surrender it to the power and the person of the Holy Spirit. And Jesus starts to speak the promises of who He is. He is the resurrection and the life and all who believe in Him. Even if you die, you don't die. You really start living. So you might as well start celebrating now that even if death is at your door, you don't get sad. You are are blessed because comfort is coming. You don't grieve as 1 Thessalonians 4.13 says, you don't grieve as those who do not have hope.
You've got the living hope, Jesus. Comfort is coming, comfort is coming, comfort is coming. I wanna just ask before we leave today, the greatest decision you could ever make is to believe in Jesus. But the greatest challenge is to continue to believe in Jesus every day. even when that thing in your life is dead. Even if Jesus comes and grieves with you, you don't stay in that grief. You accept the gift of God's grace today, his favor. He wants you to be blessed. Comfort is coming. For some of you today, you need to cross over from death to life for the first time. You just need to say, Jesus, I make you Lord. Jesus, forgive me of my sins. And the Bible says, when you say that,
you're forgiven of every sin. Not some, you don't have to earn that salvation. a free gift of grace through faith in Jesus. If you want that today, it's yours. I wanna ask in the seriousness of this moment, if you'd just close your eyes. I ask you to close your eyes to take this serious, but I wanna know who wants to make that decision today. The Bible says there's more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than 99 who would need no repentance. If you wanna repent today and make the best decision to follow Jesus from this day forward, to know you're saved to know you now have the Holy Spirit in you the hope of eternal life if that's you would you just raise your hand nice and high just keep your hand up we want to give you a booklet of the decision you're making praise be to God anyone else today praise be to God yes yes amen just keep
your hand up until we get you a booklet yes praise God yes he's changing families he's changing your life forever praise be to God yes praise God. He sees you, He knows you, He loves you. I want to make sure anyone who didn't raise their hand, but you really want to cross over into this eternal life, if that's you today, praise be to God, praise God. Let me tell you, you're never too young to do great things for God. You don't have to have it all figured out, but you do need to keep coming back to faith in Jesus. Don't do what the world does. Go after Jesus with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, with all your strength.
I'm so proud of you. Praise God. Now I wanna pray with you, those who raised their hands, you can put your hand down. I wanna ask that all those who believed in Jesus, could you join with them for prayer? Prayer is talking to God and you can talk to God all the time, anytime, when you're mourning, when you're celebrating, when you're sad and when you're happy. You might be weeping right now, but the Bible says weeping, Terry's in the night, but joy comes in, the morning. You could just know that God's not going to keep you there. It might seem like a long season, but God's going to get you out of this. He's going to get you through it. The comfort is coming. So pray with me these words, just out loud, right where you are. It's not the words that save you, it's believing in your heart. But now you're going to confess it. Say, Lord Jesus, I believe in you. You died on the cross.
You rose from the grave. I cannot save myself. but you can forgive me of my sins today i follow you fill me with your holy spirit in jesus dane amen and amen and amen and amen praise be to god
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When blessed does not mean happy
Pastor Keith opens by redefining the word blessed in Matthew 5, arguing that it describes an inward state of receiving God's goodness rather than an outward circumstance. He contrasts it with happiness that depends on what happens to you and says Jesus offers a blessed life even while hurting.
Matthew 5:3
- Where in your life have you quietly equated God's blessing with good circumstances, comfort, or success?
- Pastor Keith says a blessed life is possible while hurting, sad, or doing well. Which of those three states are you in right now?
- How does the distinction between blessedness and circumstantial happiness shape the way you read Jesus' words in the Beatitudes?
Mourning as recognizing separation
The heart of this section is the claim that mourning in Matthew 5:4 is not only grief over loss but grief over what has separated us from God. Pastor Keith frames the Beatitudes as building on one another, moving from admitting need to grieving the brokenness that caused it, and he insists you can come to God as you are but not stay the same.
Matthew 5:4
- What is the difference between mourning a loss and mourning your own distance from God, as Pastor Keith describes it?
- He says if you want healing you have to acknowledge you are sick. Where is that acknowledgment hardest for you?
- How might treating the Beatitudes as a progression, rather than a list, change the way you read them?
The God of all comfort and the paraclete
Pastor Keith turns to 2 Corinthians 1, where Paul opens his letter by naming God as the God of all comfort who comforts us in all affliction so that we can comfort others. He then connects that comfort to John 14 and the promise of the Holy Spirit as helper and comforter, arguing that the comfort Jesus promises is a person rather than a circumstance.
2 Corinthians 1:3-4 · John 14:16-17 · Ephesians 1
- Paul links being comforted to comforting others. Who has God used to comfort you, and what did they actually do?
- Pastor Keith lists the paraclete as helper, advocate, counselor, and comforter. Which of those words do you most need to hear right now?
- He suggests many people stop short of depending on the Holy Spirit and try to numb pain with other things. What do you tend to reach for when you are hurting?
Jesus enters grief instead of dismissing it
This section examines the Lazarus story in John 11. Pastor Keith emphasizes that Jesus did not tell the mourners to stop crying, did not scold their faith, and did not cheer them up; he was deeply troubled and wept. He also addresses men directly, arguing that crying is not weakness, and cites Psalm 34 on the Lord being near to the brokenhearted.
John 11:3, 33-35 · Psalm 34:18
- What do you usually do when someone near you is grieving: fix, advise, distract, or sit with them?
- Pastor Keith says your grief does not scare God. Where do you find it hard to believe that?
- He claims that if you are a real man you actually cry. How has your family or culture shaped what you believe about grieving?
Godly grief, worldly grief, and the call to come out
The final movement distinguishes godly grief that leads to repentance from worldly grief that leads to death, drawing on 2 Corinthians 7. Pastor Keith describes conviction as the Spirit's invitation to run to God rather than condemnation, cites Romans 8 on no condemnation and on the Spirit interceding in our weakness, and returns to Lazarus being called out of the tomb as a picture of Jesus calling dead things to life.
2 Corinthians 7:10 · Romans 8:1 · Romans 8 · Psalm 23 · John 11:39-43
- Pastor Keith says conviction moves you toward God while condemnation drives you away. When have you experienced that difference?
- What is something in your life that feels like it has been dead a long time?
- What does Pastor Keith's explanation of the Spirit's intercession say about depending on God in weakness?
Answers from this recording
Start a conversation.
How is Jesus defining "mourn" in Matthew 5:4?+
Pastor Keith argues that mourning in this beatitude is broader than grief over a loss. Because the Beatitudes build on one another, mourning follows the admission of being poor in spirit: it is being broken over everything that has separated you from God, including the brokenness, hurt, and heartache behind the chasm. He also applies it to ordinary losses, saying mourning may involve a person, a relationship, a dream that went unfulfilled, or a season that ended. In both cases, the person comes to God rather than running from the grief.
Pastor Keith contrasts grief that runs to God with grief that runs somewhere else. Where do you tend to run when you are hurting?
What does the sermon mean by "comfort is coming"?+
The comfort promised is not first a better circumstance but a person. Pastor Keith connects Jesus' promise to John 14, where Jesus says he will ask the Father to send another helper to be with his disciples forever, and he notes that older English translations render that word comforter. In his reading, Jesus called it good to go because the Father would send the Holy Spirit, one who comes alongside as helper, advocate, counselor, and comforter to remain with his people.
What would it look like to treat the Spirit's presence, rather than a change of situation, as the comfort you are waiting for?
Why does Pastor Keith say tears are not a problem for God?+
The sermon turns to the Lazarus story, where Jesus arrives after his friend has died. Pastor Keith emphasizes what Jesus did not do: he did not tell the sisters to stop crying, he did not say more faith would have prevented it, and he did not simply announce a fix. Instead Jesus was deeply troubled in spirit and wept. Pastor Keith draws the conclusion that grief does not drive God away, and he cites Psalm 34 on the Lord being near to the brokenhearted as support.
Where have you absorbed the idea that strong faith and grief are opposites?
What is the difference between godly grief and worldly grief here?+
Pastor Keith uses 2 Corinthians 7 to distinguish two responses to pain. Godly grief says I am hurting and goes to Jesus; worldly grief says I am hurting and goes somewhere else for relief. He describes the Spirit's conviction as an invitation to run to God and turn from what is separating you from him, and he deliberately separates that from condemnation, saying the church has often been known for condemnation rather than conviction. The goal is not to suppress the grief but to bring it to God.
When you are hurting, where do you actually go first, and how honest are you willing to be about that?
How does James 1 change the way we should read trials?+
Pastor Keith points to the opening of James, where believers are urged to regard trials of various kinds with joy. In his explanation, the reason is that the testing of faith produces steadfastness, and steadfastness is to have its full effect so that a person is complete and lacking nothing. Pastor Keith applies this by saying that what you go through is not wasted with God, which is why the mourner can still be called blessed.
Where is it hardest for you to believe that a trial is not wasted with God?
