"Not the One about Crying Over Spilt Milk" (True Celebrities Part II)

The Beginning: Follow by reading part I HERE: "When Things Go Beyond the Spirit."...Part II continues...

Fiction:

Never had I felt at such a loss as I did tonight. More so, watching the clouds fade softly into the brewing night was not helping...it only seemed sort of cliché- like something out of a newspaper...

Daily News Headline:
"Sad woman sits under the moonlight trying to undo her sorry futile state,
and just when she thinks she succeeds, she slips into a state of mortal depression."

I was sitting on the mahogany brown-toned cushioned armless chair on the veranda reading Beauty for Ashes, a novel written by Dorothy Clark. I couldn't help it; I became deeply engrossed in the nerve-wracking emotions of the character, Elizabeth Fraizer, and how she married a good-for-nothing wealthy man who believed "love" was a myth just because she felt 'safety' was more to be esteemed than 'love.' My phone rang and I sprung back into reality. My own issue had come to find me. Chinedu was the one calling after waiting for his call for eleven days. I picked up my blackberry.

"Hello Chinedu," It did not help that I was shaking in my knees.
"Temisan...we need to talk."
"I have been waiting...for eleven days, and now you need to talk?"
"I'm sorry if I made you wait."

After his apology the silence on the phone became deafening. I started hearing other sounds like crickets chirping in the nearby bush.

"I've found another woman," he blurted.

It took a while for me to absorb that statement. Oh no...my greatest fear had finally found me. I hung the phone up on him and sank to my knees. And I began to mourn over the death of our relationship...

* * * * * *

In this world, we will cry for so many different reasons. It could be for something as little as a broken dinner ware, or something as large as the death of a family member. And the tears will flow like a stream that has no end.

Today's category of true celebrities is "those who mourn:"

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

Something New:

I learned something new and it may not be what you think. I read a document from a Church in Martinsville, and they expatiated on this verse. The word "mourn" used here in Matthew 5:4 was derived from the Greek word "Penthountes." It was the word that Greeks used when they cried over the death of a loved one, the same word they used to express Jesus weeping over Lazarus. It is sorrow deeply expressed- a desperate helpless sorrow. Note that it is used 'when someone dies.'

Something Mundane (not):

As I got into the grind of things I realized that every word Jesus used to represent these celebrities (Beatitudes) indirectly pointed back to God. When He said, "those who mourn," he was not referring to crying about the mundane things in life, like Temisan breaking up with her boyfriend for instance. This one is not about crying over spilt milk. Neither was Jesus referring to the tears that fall over broken glass or shattered dinner ware. NO! He was referring to "mourning/weeping for the DEATH of things of God...or the death of relationships between God and man." Not that God will ever die, change or fade away, it's just that we keep killing the things He has given life to...and we keep nailing His son to the cross over and over again (the Easter message). And this deserves our mourning. It is similar to the death of someone we love.


Something Deeper:

To me, "those who mourn" represent the category of people whose hearts cry because the things of God are dying and people just don't understand. Those who look at the world and try to rescue it with their tears. And yes, God has given the nations to us to recover, and some are successfully taking them back. I'm thinking of a "Mother Theresa" type of attitude here. A broken heart & a shattered spirit. The tears that fall before the action of rescue. When Jesus wept over the death of Lazarus, it was not because He did not know He would raise him from the dead...it was because of something much deeper than that. His heart was bleeding because those who wept did not know three things: He was God, He loved Lazarus passionately, and He could raise Lazarus from the dead.

Do you mourn when you see the death of the things of God? Does your heart bleed when you see the things that were once alive, but now are dead; the things that were once found, but now are lost? Then you may be one of "those who mourn," and you are blessed; you will be comforted.

Photo by Jernvotten (Flickr)

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