In his wonderful book on the Resurrection, Hope in Times of Fear, Tim Keller doesn’t glorify our suffering and tears (the Bible makes it clear these are unnatural to his original plan for the world), but also tries to comfort us by telling us our tears are the water of our restoration.
The basis for this is Psalm 126:5-6 which should be underlined and, to me, really, is an astonishing joy that we have to hold onto into suffering:
“Those who sow with tears will reap with songs of joy. Those who go out weeping, carrying seed to sow, will return with songs of joy, carrying sheaves with them.”
Thank you, Lord.
There are similar passages, of course, particularly in Paul’s writings, but I love what Keller says about this particular Psalm.
“The imagery is striking. The seed being sewn consists of tears and weeping. They are planting their tears and receiving a harvest of joy.
This suggests that there is a way to weep and there is sorrow that bears fruit, fruit that includes deeper happiness.
It is inevitable in this world that we should weep — but do we sow our tears?
…. If a sower were to simply dump all his seed in one spot, there would be no harvest. So simple venting of grief may not produce fruit in our lives and those around us.”
Now a quick note to this — I believe we need to vent our grief.
We can’t just pretend it away, smile it away, dismiss it, or church it away with songs where we smile but feel absolutely stricken, because grief is a natural response to an unnatural event, and Jesus himself was called a man of sorrows.
And I believe that venting our grief is vital to renewal, and that doing so to God, and also to a loved, safe person or therapist is integral to healing.
But Keller reminds us that grief can either go bad or produce something good – as impossible as the latter might seem while we’re in the middle of it.
“The Psalter gives us numerous examples of people taking their pain and suffering to God, praying through it in his presence, and thereby avoiding anger, self-pity, and despair that can poison hearts and make us bitter and harder rather than wiser and better.”
Now another qualification I want to make, and then what I think Keller is getting at.
We cannot help but feel anger. The Bible itself tells us that. “Be angry and do not sin.”
Again, it’s a natural response. Job was certainly angry, but God never judges or accuses him for it. And we can despair. The Bible is full of of men and women of great faith, including Paul, who despaired to the point of death.
So the feeling isn’t the issue. Feelings never are.
Here’s what is: Do we let those feelings, as Keller asks, “poison” our hearts and “make us bitter and harder?”
That’s where the rubber meets the road for the Christian. For me.
Suffering is inevitable. Anger and despair and self-pity are natural responses.
Don’t be ashamed if you feel those things because God doesn’t rebuke his people as they pour out their anger in prayer, their despair in prayer, or sorrow for their suffering.
But where do all those intense emotions, all that suffering lead us, and who does that make us, and how does it affect those around us?
That’s the key.
And that is the enormously hard part, and as I go through my dark times, oh wow, it’s incredibly easy to descend from doubt to despair to bitter to hardened and poisoned. Like a ladder going down to the pit. Or Sheol, if you’re an Old Testament writer.
I have to watch my heart so closely these days. Suffering has a way of absolutely testing you that I often tritely compare to being a load of laundry that’s being spun around for hours in burning heat and you see the machine rumbling and shaking and it’s as though you’re in there, locked, and being hurled around, and when is the machine of chaos going to stop?
Will those socks make it through?
Again, a trite example 🙂
But if you’re reading this blog, there’s a pretty good sense you know exactly what I’m talking about.
You know exactly the feelings, you know exactly the temptations. Jesus did too.
The only thing we can do — in addition to talking to a therapist and doctors about medication or the mercies of counseling — is just keep praying and remember that, if — by God’s infinite grace — we keep in our mind this thought that he sees and numbers are tears and we are sowing them, that they are not empty, that they are the watering ground for restoration — then we can see something other than pointless suffering.
I don’t do affiliate links, so this is completely from my heart, and one of the cheapest and best and most helpful books I’ve read on this is Jacques Philippe’s Trusting God in the Present. You can read my post on the book here, but the thing I’ve had to remind this hard, easily bitter and brittle heart of mine is that, in suffering, instead of asking why, instead of despairing each day, ask myself this.
In the words of Philippe: “What does God want of me here? What is the right way to live through this? Which part of the Gospel am I called by this situation to put into practice now? What acts of faith and hope, what progress in love, am I being asked to make today.”
SO HARD. (That’s caps-lock, btw).
This week, I’ve been slowly, then suddenly turning from sorrow and grief to, the past few days, straight up bitterness about various things (“letting the sun go down on your anger” is a real bad idea). Bitterness that’s kept me from prayer, that’s kept me from wanting to pray. Bitterness that produces more. Quite the fruitful tree.
And then I did the thing this morning of opening, for some reason through that bitterness, Keller’s book and it landed on that particular passage, and it was as though the sun had broken out even though no clouds have objectively left.
If you’re a Christian you’ll understand that. You’ll know those feelings, that struggle, and that hope.
And if we sow our seeds — with faith that God will use the tears, the grief — for a greater weight of glory and restoration — both in our lives and for those around us and for eternal life, then with God’s grace, we’ll get through whatever we’re going through and, again, by God’s grace and to his glory, find ourselves one day sharing his inheritance and hopefully being an example for those around us. A witness to his Gospel.
May the Lord bless you — one who struggles. Maybe you’ve got this figured out better than I. But if you don’t, may the Lord bless you, and even if you do, may he bless you too. Our cups run dry and run over and who can say how the Lord pours and when he does.
Only that, one day, we will never have to wonder again. We can only wander in wonder in Immanuel’s land. We’ll see his smiling face! And, at last, we’ll know the last of pain.
If you struggle with depression, anxiety, or any other such disorders — for readers in the United States…
Find a psychiatrist here.
Find a therapist here.
For readers, internationally, seek help from a local resource.
For salvation, Christ and Christ alone.
