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From Heaven With Love
Christ Disappointed the Hope of Worldly Greatness
In the Sermon on the Mount Christ sought to undo the work that
had been wrought by false education and to give His hearers a right
conception of His kingdom. Without combating their ideas of the
kingdom of God, He told them the conditions of entrance therein,
leaving them to draw their own conclusions as to its nature. Happy
are they, He said, who recognize their spiritual poverty and feel
their need of redemption. Not to the spiritually proud is the gospel
revealed, but to those who are humble and contrite.
The proud heart strives to earn salvation; but both our title to
heaven and our fitness for it are found in the righteousness of Christ.
The Lord can do nothing toward the recovery of man until he yields
himself to the control of God. Then he can receive the gift God
is waiting to bestow. From the soul that feels his need, nothing is
withheld. See
Isaiah 57:15
.
“Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted.”
The mourning of which He speaks does not consist in melancholy
and lamentation. We often sorrow because our evil deeds bring
unpleasant consequences, but real sorrow for sin is the result of the
working of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit brings us in contrition to
the foot of the cross. By every sin Jesus is wounded afresh; and
as we look on Him whom we have pierced, we mourn for sins
that have brought anguish on Him. Such mourning will lead to the
renunciation of sin. This sorrow binds the penitent to the Infinite
One. The tears of the penitent are the raindrops that precede the
sunshine of holiness, heralding a joy which will be a living fountain
in the soul. See
Jeremiah 3:12, 13
;
Isaiah 61:3
.
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For those also who mourn in trial and sorrow there is comfort.
Through affliction God reveals to us the plague spots in our char-
acters, that by His grace we may overcome. Unknown chapters in
regard to ourselves are opened to us, and the test comes, whether
we will accept the reproof and counsel of God. When in trial, we
should not rebel or worry ourselves out of the hand of Christ. The
ways of the Lord appear dark and joyless to our human nature. But
God’s ways are ways of mercy, and the end is salvation.
God’s word for the sorrowing is, “I will turn their mourning into
joy, and will comfort them.”
Jeremiah 31:13
.