Wretched

Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.  Matthew 5:4

Keeping with the context and flow of this passage, this is not a mourning over loss or circumstances, but those who mourn for their sins.   Too often we brush by our broken state, sprinkling grace and forgiveness a bit too glibly.  It is one thing to admit our spiritual poverty; the next step is to grieve over it.  “Oh wretched man that I am, who will free me from this life that is dominated by sin and death.”

Unless we confess our sin with tears and heartbreak, the great gift of love from God is diminished.  But ah, the comfort: There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.  We do not have to live in our lonely hut of mourning.  Last night, Alan and I watched Get Low about a man who chose to live in wretchedness, an isolated hut with broken windows and Keep Out signs.  He had committed a great sin that resulted in the flaming death of the one love of his life.  A priest had told him the Truth, to confess his sin to God and man, and live in peace.  But he clung to mourning rather than God’s comfort.  Only after thirty bitter years did he accept the warm embrace of forgiveness.

The dinner conversation with Jack and Mary Anne drifted to another mourning that needs to take place, the American church’s need to repent.  How hard our heart has become- how profoundly we have disgraced the name of our LORD.  And this indeed is a corporate sin. 

Let not those who hope in you be put to shame through me, Lord GOD of hosts; let not those who seek you be disgraced because of me.  Psalm 69:7