The Beatitudes - Thomas Watson
Motives to holy mourning
Let me exhort
Christians to holy mourning. I now persuade to such a mourning as will prepare
the soul for blessedness. Oh that our hearts were spiritual limbecs,
distilling the water of holy tears! Christ's doves weep. `They that escape
shall be like doves of the valleys, all of them mourning, every
one for his iniquity'. {Eze
7:16}
There are
several divine motives to holy mourning:
1. Tears
cannot be put to a better use. If you weep for outward losses, you lose your
tears. It is like a shower upon a rock, which does no good; but tears for sin
are blessed tears. `Blessed are they that mourn.' These poison our corruptions;
salt-water kills the worms. The brinish water of repenting tears will help to
kill that worm of sin which should gnaw the conscience.
Gospel-mourning
is an evidence of grace. `I will pour upon the house of David and the
inhabitants of Jerusalem, the Spirit of grace, and they shall mourn...'. {Zec 12:10} The Holy Ghost
descended on Christ like a dove. {Lu 3:22}
The dove is a weeping creature. Where there is a dove-like weeping, it is a
good sign the Spirit of God has descended there. Weeping for sin is a sign of
the new birth. As soon as the child is born, it weeps: `And behold the babe
wept'. {Ex 2:6} To weep kindly for sin is a
good sign we are born of God. Mourning shows a `heart of flesh'. {Eze 36:26} A stone will not
melt. When the heart is in a melting frame, it is a sign the heart of stone is
taken away.
3. The
preciousness of tears. Tears dropping from a mournful, penitent eye, are like
water dropping from the roses, very sweet and precious to God. A fountain in
the garden makes it pleasant. That heart is most delightful to God which has a
fountain of sorrow running in it. `Mary stood at Christ's feet weeping'. {Lu 7:38} Her tears were more fragrant
and odoriferous than her ointment. The incense, when it is broken, smells
sweetest. When the heart is broken for sin, then our services give forth their
sweetest perfume. `There is joy in heaven over one sinner that repenteth'. {Lu 15:7}
Whereupon St Bernard calls tears `the wine of angels'.
And sure, God delights much in tears, else he would not keep a bottle for them.
{Ps 56:8} One calls tears `a fat
sacrifice', which under the law was most acceptable. {Le
3:3} St Jerome calls mourning a plank after shipwreck. Chrysostom
calls tears a sponge to wipe off sin. Tears are powerful orators for mercy.
Eusebius says there was an altar at Athens, on which they poured no other
sacrifice but tears, as if the heathens thought there was no better way to
pacify their angry gods, than by weeping. Jacob wept end `had power over the
angel'. {Ho 12:4} Tears melt the heart of God.
When a malefactor comes weeping to the bar, this melts the judge's heart
towards him. When a man comes weeping in prayer and smites on his breast,
saying, `God be merciful to me a sinner', {Lu
18:13} this melts God's heart towards him. Prayer (says Jerome)
inclines God to shew mercy; tears compel him. God seals his pardons upon
melting hearts. Tears, though they are silent, yet have a voice. {Ps 6:8} Tears wash away sin. Rain melts
and washes away a ball of snow. Repenting tears wash away sin. That sin, says
Ambrose, which cannot be defended by argument, may be washed away by tears.
4. The
sweetness of tears. Mourning is the way to solid joy. `The sweetest wine is
that which comes out of the winepress of the eyes', says Chrysostom. The soul
is never more enlarged than when it can weep. Closet tears are better than
court music. When the heart is sad, weeping eases it by giving vent. The soul
of a Christian is most eased when it can vent itself by holy mourning.
Chrysostom observes that David who was the great mourner in Israel was the
sweet singer in Israel. `My tears were my meat'. {Ps
42:3} On which place Ambrose gives this gloss: `No meat so sweet as
tears.' `The tears of the penitent,' says Bernard, `are sweeter than all
worldly joy.' A Christian thinks himself sometimes in the suburbs of heaven
when he can weep. When Hannah had wept, she went away and was no more sad. Sugar when it melts is
sweetest. When a Christian melts in tears, now he has
the sweetest joy. When the daughter of Pharaoh descended into the river, she
found a babe there among the flags; so when we descend into the river of
repenting tears, we find the babe Jesus there who shall wipe away all tears
from our eyes. Well therefore might Chrysostom solemnly bless God for giving us
this laver of tears to wash in.
5. A mourner
for sin not only does good to himself but to others. He helps to keep off wrath
from a land. As when Abraham was going to strike the blow, the angel stayed his
hand, {Ge 22:12} so when God is going to
destroy a nation, the mourner stays his hand. Tears in the child's eye
sometimes move the angry father to spare the child. Penitential tears melt
God's heart and bind his hand. Jeremiah, who was a weeping prophet, was a great
intercessor. God says to him, `Pray not for this people', {Jer 7:16} as if the Lord had
said, Jeremiah, so powerful are your prayers and tears, that if you pray I cannot deny you. `This kind of labour
bears sway', as he said in Plautus.' Tears have a mighty influence upon God.
Surely God has some mourners in the land, or he had destroyed us before now.
6. Holy
mourning is preventing physic. Our mourning for sin here will prevent mourning
in hell. Hell is a place of weeping. {Mt
8:12} The damned mingle their drink with weeping. God is said to
hold his bottle for our tears. {Ps 56:8}
They who will not shed a bottle-full of tears shall hereafter shed rivers of
tears. `Woe to you that laugh now, for ye shall mourn and weep'. {Lu 6:25} You have sometimes seen
sugar lying in a damp place dissolve to water. All the sugared joys of the
wicked dissolve at last to the water of tears. Now tears will do us good. Now
it is seasonable weeping. It is like a shower in the spring. If we do not weep
now it will be too late. Could we hear the language of the damned, they are now
cursing themselves that they did not weep soon enough. Oh is it not better to
have our hell here, than hereafter? Is it not better
to shed repenting tears than despairing tears? He that weeps here is a blessed
mourner. He that weeps in hell is a cursed mourner. The physician by bleeding the
patient prevents death. By the opening a vein of godly sorrow, we prevent the
death of our souls.
7. There is
no other way the Gospel prescribes to blessedness but this: `Blessed are they
that mourn'. This is the road that leads to the new Jerusalem. There may be
several ways leading to a city; some go one way, some another; but there is but
one way to heaven, and that is by the house of weeping. {Ac
26:20} Perhaps a man may think thus, If I cannot mourn for sin, I
will get to heaven some other way. I will go to church; I will give alms; I
will lead a civil life. Nay, but I tell you there is but one way to
blessedness, and that is, through the valley of tears. If you do not go this
way, you will miss of Paradise. `I tell you, except ye repent, ye shall all
likewise perish'. {Lu 13:3} There are many lines leading
to the centre, but the heavenly centre
has but one line leading to it, and that is a tear dropping from the eye of
faith. A man may have a disease in his body that twenty medicines will heal.
Sin is a disease of the soul which makes it sick unto death. Now there is but
one medicine will heal, and that is the medicine of repentance.
8. Consider
what need every Christian has to be conversant in holy
mourning. A man may take physic when he has no need of it. Many go to the Bath when
they have no need. It is rather out of curiosity than necessity. But O what
need is there for everyone to go into the weeping bath! Think what a sinner you
have been. You have filled God's book with your debts, and what need you have to fill his bottle with your tears! You have lived in
secret sin. God enjoins you this penance, `Mourn for sin'. But perhaps some may
say, I have no need of mourning, for I have lived a very civil life. Go home
and mourn because you are but civil. Many a man's civility, being rested upon,
has damned him. It is sad for men to be without repentance, but it is worse to
need no repentance. {Lu 15:7}
9. Tears are
but finite. It is but a while that we shall weep. After a few showers that fall
from our eyes, we shall have a perpetual sunshine. In heaven the bottle of
tears is stopped. `God shall wipe away all tears...'. {Re
7:17} When sin shall cease, tears shall cease. `Weeping may endure
for a night, but joy cometh in the morning'. {Ps 30:5} In the morning of the
ascension, then shall all tears be wiped away.
10. The
benefit of holy mourning. The best of our commodities come by water. Mourning
makes the soul fruitful in grace. When a shower falls, the herbs and plants
grow. `I will water thee with my tears, O Heshbon!'.
{Isa 16:9} I may allude to it; tears
water our graces and make them flourish. `He sends his springs into the
valleys'. {Ps 104:10} That is the reason the
valleys flourish with corn, because the springs run there. Where the springs of
sorrow run, there the heart bears a fruitful crop. Leah was tender-eyed; she
had a watery eye and was fruitful. The tender-eyed Christian usually brings
forth more of the fruits of the Spirit. A weeping eye is the water-pot to water
our graces.
Again,
mourning fences us against the devil's temptations. Temptations are called
`fiery darts', {Eph 6:16} because indeed they set the
soul on fire. Temptations enrage anger, inflame lust. Now the waters of holy
mourning quench these fiery darts. Wet powder will not soon take the fire. When
the heart is wetted and moistened with sorrow, it will not so easily take the
fire of temptation. Tears are the best engines and waterworks to quench the
devil's fire; and if there be so much profit and benefit in gospel-sorrow, then
let every Christian wash his face every morning in the laver of tears.
11. And
lastly, to have a melting frame of spirit is a great sign of God's presence
with us in an ordinance. It is a sign that the Sun of Righteousness has risen
upon us, when our frozen hearts thaw and melt for sin. It is a saying of
Bernard, `By this you may know whether you have met with God in a duty, when
you find yourselves in a melting and mourning frame'. We are apt to measure all
by comfort. We think we never have God's presence in an ordinance, unless we
have joy. Herein we are like Thomas. `Unless (says he) I shall see in his hands
the print of the nails, I will not believe'. {Joh
20:25} So are we apt to say that, unless we have incomes of comfort,
we will not believe that we have found God in a duty; but if our hearts can
melt kindly in tears of love, this is a real sign that God has been with us. As
Jacob said, `Surely the Lord is in this place, and I knew it not'. {Ge 28:16} So, Christian, when your
heart breaks for sin and dissolves into holy tears, God is in this duty, though
you do not know it.
Methinks all
that has been said should make us spiritual mourners. Perhaps we have tried to
mourn and cannot. But as a man that has dug so many fathoms deep for water and
can find none, at last digs till he finds a spring; so though we have been
digging for the water of tears and can find none, yet let us weigh all that has
been said and set our hearts again to work, and perhaps at last we may say, as
Isaac's servants said, `We have found water'. {Ge
26:32} When the herbs are pressed, the watery juice comes out. These
eleven serious motives may press out tears from the eye.
But some may
say, My constitution is such that I cannot weep. I may
as well go to squeeze a rock as think to get a tear.
I answer, but
if you cannot weep for sin, can you not grieve? Intellectual mourning is best.
There may be sorrow where there are no tears. The vessel may be full though it
wants vent. It is not so much the weeping eye God respects, as the broken
heart. Yet I would be loath to stop their tears who can weep. God stood looking
on Hezekiah's tears: `I have seen thy tears'. {Isa
38:5} David's tears made music in God's ears. `The Lord hath heard
the voice of my weeping'. {Ps 6:8}
It is a sight fit for angels to behold, tears as pearls dropping from a
penitent eye.