In this broken world we won’t get paradise now, but the empty tomb guarantees us that a new heaven and new earth are in our future.

Paradise is the constant hope of all of us. It is hardwired within us. We tend to look for it everywhere. Our vain search heaps piles of disappointment on us. Our dream is shattered again and again, sometimes by the same thing over again. We find it hard to be satisfied, and we are tempted to become bitter. We know we should have learned our lesson, but then we get up and start searching again. Somehow, in some way, every human being is searching for paradise. We look for it in the children we parent. We look for it in the houses we buy. We look for it in our friendships. We look for it in our jobs. We hope we’ll get it in our marriages. We hope a vacation will give us just a little bit of it. We envy people who we think have found it (although no one has). We think if we just have a little more power, we will find it. We hope another academic degree will be a pathway to it. We move to a new city hoping more of it will be there than in the last. We hop from church to church, hoping we’ll find it there. We’re emotionally exhausted, but we keep searching.

Paradise is the world as it was meant to be, everything in order, nothing threatening anything or anyone else, perfect harmony between God and humanity. No sickness or suffering, creation and Creator in perfect cooperation, all needs met, all desires balanced, hearts and minds not only pure but content. We were created for such a world, but like a beautifully designed piece of pottery that’s been knocked to the floor, paradise has been shattered to smithereens. Between the “already” and the “not yet,” we won’t get, in any situation, location, or relationship, anything remotely close to the stunningly perfect beauty of paradise.

So you have a choice. You can give yourself to a constant chorus of situational and relational complaints, making sure you let God and the people around you know that you are not happy at all with the way things are. You can be critical, judgmental, and demanding, making your relationships toxic and you unbearable to be around. Or you can stay committed to the delusion that somehow you will find or create paradise. You will try to control what you cannot control and require what will never be delivered. You can be on the constant move, regularly leaving situations, locations, and relationships because they did not measure up and invest in the new place, with new people, hoping that it will deliver. You’ll end up lonely, disappointed, and alienated, but you’ll probably keep looking.

Now, none of these options will produce spiritual, emotional, or relational health in you, and they surely won’t leave you with the restful joy of contentment. There is a third option, which the Lenten season can stimulate. How about mourning paradise lost? Jesus says something rather shocking in his Sermon on the Mount: “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted” (Matt. 5:4). We would tend to think just the opposite: “Blessed are those who have no reason whatsoever to mourn.” Jesus is speaking with a full and experiential knowledge of what sin has done to the world. He knows that the world he created is not operating as it was intended to operate. He knows that nothing right now will be like the paradise that once was. He knows the value of recognizing the damage and weeping. Imagine standing in front of your house that contained all your memories and all your possessions after it had been reduced to rubble by a tornado. Wouldn’t you stand there and weep?

Jesus is standing in front of the house that he built, a world filled with beautiful things that he made, now broken to pieces by sin, and he is saying to us, “Look around. How can you not weep?” Mourning is healthy because it forces you to consider the full weight of the tragedy of sin. Mourning is healthy because it forces you to let go of the delusion that you can turn the rubble into paradise. Mourning is healthy because it makes you cry out for a restorer. Mourning is healthy because it causes you to hold tightly to God’s promise of paradise to come. Mourning is healthy because it teaches you how to be content between the “already” and the “not yet.” Mourning is healthy because when you mourn in this way, the God of all comfort hears your cry and comes near with comfort that is profoundly more healing than a new situation, relationship, or location could ever be.

So this Lent, put your mourning into practice and words. Let your heart be crushed at what sin has done so your heart can be comforted by your Savior. And remember to mourn with hope because your Lord has promised that what now is will end, and what is to come is worthy to be called paradise.

Reflection Questions

1. What are your greatest disappointments in life, and what deeper desires do those things reveal?
   

2. How can you “mourn paradise lost”—what does that look like in real life?
   

3. How might mourning paradise lost enhance your relationship with Christ?

The best way to deal with the inevitable disappointment of life here on earth is to look with hope toward our eternal destination—the new heavens and the new earth. Read Revelation 21:1–7 and rejoice in your salvation.