WEBVTT
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Grace to you in peace from God, our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
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Amen.
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Dear friends in Christ, the challenge for the preacher assigned a text
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like today's is to not so diminish the beauty and power of the text in
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his opening sentence that the congregation wishes he would simply have
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remained silent.
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And alas, I have just done that.
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What words can match the beauty of blessed are the poor in spirit?
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Franzman wrote he stands before his disciples as the giver.
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He is the messianic giver.
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Powerful, yes, but I don't think Hallmark will be borrowing that
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anytime soon.
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Luther began this is a fine, sweet and friendly beginning for his
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instruction and preaching.
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He does not come like Moses or a teacher of the law with demands,
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threats and terrors, but in a very friendly way, with enticements
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allurements and pleasant promises.
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I wouldn't disagree with a word, but I think even Luther proves my
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point. When it comes right down to it
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which of us wouldn't rather just hear again the enticing, alluring
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pleasing, fine, sweet, friendly promises of our Lord?
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What, though, is the challenge for the hearer this morning?
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Hopefully, we too, like the preacher, are immediately struck by the
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power and the beauty of these words, of blessing and promise.
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This poetry is divine.
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It is beautiful in a way that transcends our earthly verses, our human
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cleverness, our fallen and often bitter wit.
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These are words that invite us to sit, words that quiet our hearts,
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calm our minds, restore hope, birth peace.
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But if you're at all like me, your second impression may be that these
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are words that are beautifully irrelevant.
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Recall why this is the text for today
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in the first place. We've just celebrated the fourth Sunday after the
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epiphany of our Lord. In the Gospels
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we've heard since Christmas, Jesus has been revealed to sages and
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hunted by a king.
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He's been baptized by a prophet and acclaimed by the Heavenly Father.
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He has carried out with the words of that baptizing prophet.
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And like
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John gathered followers around himself.
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Strange things have been happening, but it has always been others who
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have interpreted these wonders for us.
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Now it's time for Jesus to tell us Himself who he is.
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What is he all about?
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Why has he come?
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He sits down and he opens his mouth and he speaks.
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And the words are beautiful.
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But what does anything he says have to do with me?
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I run through the list.
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Poor in spirit mournful me.
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Hungry and thirsty for righteousness, merciful, pure, peacemaking and
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persecuted.
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I run through this list and find not one single blessing that seems to
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be pronounced over me.
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And to be honest, I only half regret it.
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I can't say that I often really want to be any of these things. That I
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find them enticing or luring, even given the promise of blessing that
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is attached.
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These blessings, in fact, remind me of the dinner table blessings my
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mother used to speak all those years ago.
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Happy is the boy who eats all his lima beans, for he will get to have
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dessert. At that cost
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I figured I could do without dessert for a night.
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So here, too, I'd rather be rich in spirit, happy and bold, and
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feasting on righteousness.
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I'll leave the blessings for others who need them.
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I covet not one of them.
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Even the one that sounds closest, the one that ought to speak to me
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directly, just doesn't speak in a way that I can understand.
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Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.
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My wife and I have both lost both parents already, and we miss them
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still. We have loved ones for whom death is the guy next door.
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I don't need to wait for Ash Wednesday
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and it's cruciform smear.
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The ash and gray of my daily reflection in the morning mirror whispers
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memento, old man, dust.
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Dust and ashes.
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But here again, what the Lord says and does
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not say. He does not say, Blessed are you who were mourning, because I
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have comforted you.
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He does not say, although you are mourning now, you will be blessed
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one day because I will comfort you.
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He says, you are blessed right now, you who are mourning, and one day
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you will be comforted.
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I just can't make sense of it.
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And if I have no way to make sense of it, how can he be speaking these
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words to me?
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In my experience, it is almost always the case that those portions of
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scripture that seem to make no sense whatsoever to me are the very
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passages of Scripture that I need the most.
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That is to say, they are the passages that have their work cut out for
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them in me.
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It's not so much a question of me making sense of them, but of them
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making sense out of me.
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A matter of these words of God working in my life to transform the way
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I understand them my world, myself, my God.
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So let's look again.
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Blessed is who?
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There is nothing inherently blessed about poverty, lowliness grief, or
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persecution.
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Any of us who has ever been forced to live without the very things
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that are needed for life, even briefly.
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Any of us who has ever found him or herself helpless in the face of
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wrong or evil.
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Any of us who have lost a loved one or been suddenly overwhelmed by
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the lostness of our whole world.
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Any of us who has become the object of the world's hatred or cruelty
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simply because she or he follows
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Christ knows this.
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And it can be almost cruel to try to force these statements of
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blessing to mean that. Of course, you are not happy that you have to
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bear the burden of being a peacemaker.
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Devoting all your time and energy to maintaining a fragile and
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volatile peace at home or at the office, in your church, or in your
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world.
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To pretend otherwise turns these blessings into mockery.
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These beatitudes of Jesus are not simple declarations like, tall
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people sure have it nice, nor are they the kind of offers we're used
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to from marketing departments.
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Happy is the man who drives our car.
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The woman who wears this dress will be a favorite of God and man.
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Blessed is the man or woman who thirsts
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after our beer, for they shall be quenched.
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Nor are they lima bean blessings.
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If you do this are this, feel this, then you get this.
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You'd be happier if you were a lot more humble.
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Go out and make peace and you'll see what a blessing that is.
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The poorer you make yourself now, the richer I'll will make you in the
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future.
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No, the kind of blessing that Jesus is speaking about, the kind of
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blessing that he speaks, is something very different.
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Someone has defined blessing in the context of the Old Testament in
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this way.
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In the biblical context, blessing is the sharing in the life of God,
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which begins with creation and the power to pass on that life by
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virtue of the blessing of creation.
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Perhaps in the case of the Beatitudes, we could paraphrase that
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definition like this. To be blessed is to share in the life of our Lord
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Jesus, which is made manifest in the redemption, and to be given the
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power to pass on that life by virtue of the blessing of redemption.
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The blessings of our Lord are more than isolated statements applying
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to various groups of people. More even than statements that apply to
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us when we feel poor or meek or mournful.
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The beatitudes don't come to us where we are and tell us everything is
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good.
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They call us into the sharing of the life of Christ, where alone we
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can find blessing, they allure entice invite.
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They call us to a life of Christ likeness.
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For who is perfectly poor in spirit? Who is truly meek?
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The one who mourns not for himself, but for our lost world.
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The one who makes peace between the most serious of enemies by the
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shedding of his own blood. Being drawn into that life that He is
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moulding our lives to conform to His being imitators of Christ in
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poverty, gentleness, compassion and peace.
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That is the definition of the life to which Christ calls us and upon
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which he pronounces his blessing.
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Following that path, we do share in the life of our Lord and attract
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others to share in it, too.
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Dietrich Bonhaffer once wrote, whenever Christ Christ calls us, his
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call leads us into death.
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This is the first blessing that Jesus pronounces.
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This is how the love and mercy and power of God are made manifest in
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his Son.
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Come and die.
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Blessed are the poor in spirit.
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Blessed are those who truly know how little they have in the face of
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how much they owe. Who know that they neither possess nor have access
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to any resource whatsoever that can make up for the loss of a right
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relationship with the one who made them.
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Who know they have no collateral for a loan. Who have lost their very
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selves. Who know that before God, apart from God, they are dead.
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Blessed are those who take up their cross and follow Him.
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But following, though it includes dying, is not being dead.
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Obedience is not an end, but a beginning.
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His is a calling to life through death and dying.
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For in Him is life.
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He is life.
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And blessed are they who believe in Him, for they shall never die.
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Following Him, sharing in the life of Him who is our only hope of
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blessing.
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We walk in His poverty of spirit, in His meekness, with our divinely
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sorrowing hearts mourning as He mourns step by step along the way that
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He leads, the way that He Himself is. The way to perfect
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blessedness that blessedness that we will enjoy when we are finally
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and completely one with Him and in Him, one with our Father.
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Blessed is who? Blessed are you when you hear these words spoken to
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you. The words of your Lord and Savior, who speaks words of revelation
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and words of calling and words of blessing. The revelation of the way
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to true blessing in Him. A call to come and follow and share and live.
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A blessing that foreshadows, a blessing still to come. Come
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O blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the
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foundation of the world.
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In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
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Amen.
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We rise for the canticle.