“Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.” (Matthew 5:4)
The Death of the Wife of the Biblical Prophet Ezekiel, by William Blake (c. 1785)
The prophet Ezekiel often asked to represent the state of the people. Here, he is doing so again, following the death of his wife, by going about his daily business as though nothing is wrong. But we see in Ezekiel’s actions a spiritual side.
- To Mourn is to acknowledge death.
- To mourning spiritually – recognising that one does not have spiritual life …
- “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 6:23)
- Thus it reflects REPENTANCE – To see the pain you cause yourself and to seek to change.
What is the benefit of spiritual mourning? “Blessing”? “Happy”?!
“For they shall be comforted” – the English doesn’t cut it!
Comforted – παρακαλέω parakaleó To call to or for, to exhort, to encourage “Call to one’s side”
SAME WORD IS THE ROOT OF …
John 14:15-31 – The Helper / comforter – παράκλητος paráklētos
“One who consoles, strengthens, helps, and councils, with such authority as a legal advocate has for his client.” (The New International Dictionary of the Bible, Advocate)
Legal council for the defence
WHO IS CALLING? WHO IS RESPONDING? In its truest sense, it needs to be a two way street
- Would you call a lawyer then ignore his advice?
- One cannot call for the Spirit of the Lord to be present without at the same time allowing His presence, removing anything that stands in the way of His entry.
- True comfort is to remove the blocks that prevent the Lord from flowing in.
- If these do not go together, then calling upon the Lord is nothing but an external show, put on for others to see, or to fool ourselves.
“God’s life is present in all its fullness not only in people who are good and religious but also in people who are evil and ungodly. That life is the same in angels of heaven as it is in spirits of hell. The difference is … that evil people block the road and shut the door to prevent God from coming down into the lower areas of their mind. Good people, on the other hand, smooth the road and open the door. They invite God to enter the lower areas of their mind since he already inhabits the highest areas of it. They change the state of their will so that love and goodwill may flow in, and change the state of their intellect so that wisdom and faith may flow in – they open themselves to God. Evil people block that inflow with various bodily cravings and spiritual garbage that they spread around to prevent access. Nevertheless, God with all his divine essence still dwells in the highest parts of evil people and gives them the ability to will what is good and understand what is true. This ability is something that all human beings have, although it would not be theirs at all if life from God were not present in their soul. Many experiences have taught me that even the evil have this ability.” (True Christianity, paragraph 366, section 2)
“It is these two kinds of so-called love (of self and of the material world), along with their cravings, that block the inflow of the Lord’s heavenly love. When they take control of our intermediate and outer selves and overrun us, they either reject or smother the inflow of heavenly love. They also corrupt and pollute it, because they are absolutely opposed to heavenly love. … The more they are set aside, on the other hand, the more the heavenly love that is flowing in from the Lord starts to grow visible and even to gleam in our intermediate self. To the same extent, we start to see that we are beset with evil and falsity, in fact that we harbour what is unclean and filthy, and finally that this is what our selfhood has been. People who are being reborn are the ones from whom these things are removed.” (Heavenly Secrets, paragraph 2041, section 2)
William Bruce’s Commentary on Matthew: “… being emptied of self, there is room for the Lord to enter, and to fill [a person] with His good.” (p. 92)
“No one, however, can truly mourn over the evils which he perceives in himself, but from something good interiorly received from the Lord. Whenever, therefore, there is real sorrow for sin – not merely alarm on account of its expected punishment – there, to a certainty, a principle of good, of mercy, or of grace, is present from the Lord, operating to affect a cure. That cure is effected, when the good present with [a person] from the Lord, has accomplished the removal of the evil opposed to it – when it has become paramount in the soul; and not only so, but when it fills the whole heart, mind, and life, so that, being consciously loved, it is attended with a corresponding sense of delight and happiness.” (p. 93)
Rumi: “Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.”
Recorded on Sunday 3 March 2024