Blessed are those who mourn

I just started reading the book Give them Grace. The authors begin the second chapter with an account of God creating this world and all its wonders and the devastating consequences of the fall. I've read about it a hundred times, talked about it, shared it with others, but for some reason it struck me tonight. Why? I want to shake Adam's shoulders and ask him this. Why did you give up a beautiful, unmarred world? Why did you reject a perfect relationship with God? How could you not be satisfied with walks in a garden of paradise with the Almighty who just last week created heaven and earth and bestowed their care to you? Why did you choose pride, doubt, suffering, chaos, separation from God, uncertainty, toil, and soul rending pain when you had been given joy, peace, love, a helpmeet, a friend in God, and a dream world? I mourn the loss of God's beautiful, untainted creation in all its glory. I mourn the loss of sinless humanity and hearts that naturally love God and desire communion with him and with others. Why? Because when faced with a choice of everything one could desire from God or to be a god, humanity chooses the latter. Adam did and in him we all did. Don't flatter yourself into thinking you would have been different, would have risen above temptation, scorned the serpent's slippery words. Adam represents everyone of us and none would have chosen differently. And so I mourn that I was born into a world of darkness, an enemy of God.

"Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted" (Matthew 5:4). Even as I mourn, I am comforted that God is the Healer of the broken, the twisted, the angry, and the mourners. This world with its evil still has so much beauty because even in our flawed state, you can see the Hand of God. Creation is his artwork and we are his image, still yearning to be loved by Him.  Our sin shows our desperate, crushing need for our Savior. The fall and the taint of sin are only the first chapter of the story and the next tells of God's amazing plan to send a Redeemer to bind our broken hearts and restore a right relationship with God. I am comforted because I know there is more than this earth and I know this earth is not my home. I'm here now to glorify God and to show the beauty of his grace to love a sinner who continually chooses suffering, toil, chaos, and pride over Him. One day, there will be a new earth that will be paradise. I find great peace in knowing that it is his design that we mourn so that we may know the loving comfort of his arms.