Sermon Tone Analysis

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A Time to Weep And a Time to Laugh

Anyone who loves great hymns will know of the compositions of Anne Steele.

As a child, she had an accident that made her an invalid for life.

In her late teens, when she seemed to have partially conquered her physical problems, she was introduced to Mr. Ellscourt, and they soon fell in love.

Her cup of joy overflowed when he asked her to be his wife.

But on the wedding day, as she eagerly awaited his arrival, a messenger came with the tragic news that he had drowned.

Stunned with grief, she retired to her room to weep and seek comfort from God's Word.

Recovering her strength, she wrote a hymn that has brought healing to many a wounded spirit:

Father, whate'er of earthly bliss

Thy sovereign will denies,

Accepted at Thy throne of grace

Let this petition rise:

Give me a calm and thankful heart,

From every murmur free,

The blessings of Thy grace impart,

And let me live to Thee.

Miss Steele wrote the lyrics for 144 other sacred songs, even though she spent the last nine years of her life as a shut-in (Bosch 1976).

To study her life is to know what it is to reflect and radiate the Spirit of the indwelling Christ, for it is clear that Jesus had this capacity to weep and to laugh.

We read that there were times when He "rejoiced in the Spirit" (Luke 10:21).

People saw the merry twinkle in His eyes and heard the laughter in His voice.

Then at other times He was truly the "Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief (Isa 53:3).

As we shall see presently, He wept at the graveside of a dear friend; He wept as He surveyed a shepherdless multitude; He wept over a city that had lost its soul.

So there is a time to weep, just as there is a time to laugh.

Reverently, we need to examine these God-given capacities.

!! The Capacity for Tearfulness

There is a popular notion that tears are associated /only/ with having a fallen nature and living a life of sin, but the teaching of Scripture does not bear this out.

Our Lord and Savior was neither fallen in His nature or sinful in His living, yet He wept.

In His humanity, God had given Him a capacity for tearfulness, and so in this sense there is a place for holy tears.

And, of course, the converse is just as true.

Because of our sin, fallen man can shed and must shed tears of remorse, of bitterness, and even of hardened rebellion.

Hell is described as a place of "weeping and gnashing of teeth" (Matt.

8:12).

In our consideration of this capacity for tearfulness, however, we are restricting ourselves to the two positive aspects of weeping.

First of all, there is the shedding of /natural tears./

Because we are human, there are times in life when we can do nothing other than shed tears.

For example, there is the sorrow of parting, such as Timothy felt when Paul was arrested and taken away from him.

Writing later to his son in the faith, Paul could say, "[I] greatly [desire] to see you, being mindful of your tears, that I may be filled with joy" (2 Tim.

1:4).

We recall how the Ephesian elders wept as they bade the apostle farewell for the last time (Acts 20:37).

There is also the sorrow of bereavement, as when Jesus cried at the graveside of Lazarus (John 11:35).

Then, of course, there is the sorrow of our mortality, when we sense the frailty of our bodies and groan and long to be delivered (Rom.

8:22; 2 Cor.

5:2).

This sense of our creatureliness finds expression in many forms throughout the pilgrimage of life.

It was this kind of experience that made the Psalmist pray, "Put my tears into Your bottle" (Ps.

56:8).

As a minister, I have shed natural tears many times because of the suffering and bereavement of my people.

Not to be able to weep on occasions like this is to be insensitive, abnormal, and lacking in the God-given capacity for tearfulness.

But with natural tears, there are also the /spiritual tears./

In an article entitled "When Should a Christian Weep?" John R. W. Stott (1969, 107-108) reminds us that there are some salutary things that need special attention in this superficial age in which we live.

He says: "Evangelism has been debased into the simple invitation to 'come to Jesus and be happy.'

The signature tune of the Christian Church has been 'I am /Happy./'

Christians are to appear hearty, ebullient and boisterous."

He continues: "In a Christian magazine I receive, every Christian's picture (and there are many) shows him with a grin from ear to ear.

Some Christians," he maintains, "would defend this attitude by quoting such [a] Scripture as 'Rejoice in the Lord always.'"

But this is not "the true biblical image of the Christian."

Our pattern is Jesus "who went about saying, 'Be of cheer ... Go in peace,' yet was called 'the Man of sorrows.'

The apostle Paul expressed the same paradox [when he declared], 'as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing.' "

Spiritual tears are /tears of contrition./

We all know the story of the woman who stood behind Jesus weeping, and then began to wash His feet with her tears (Luke 7:38).

Those were tears of repentance for her sin and gratitude for her forgiveness.

Would to God we saw more "holy water" of this kind in our gospel meetings!

I once remember hearing Duncan Campbell say that he doubted the reality of any man's conversion who had not wept over his sins.

David Brainerd, that most saintly missionary to the Indians at the beginning of the eighteenth century, could write in his diary for Oct 18, 1740:

{{{"

In my morning devotions my soul was exceedingly melted, and I bitterly mourned over my great sinfulness and vileness.

I never before had felt so pungent and deep a sense of the odious nature of sin, as this time.

My soul was then unusually carried forth in love to God, and had a lively sense of God's love to me.

(Stott 1969, 108)

}}}

God give us more men and tears like this!

Spiritual tears are /tears of compassion./

It is recorded that when the Lord Jesus "saw the multitudes, He was moved with compassion for them, because they were weary and scattered, like sheep having no shepherd" (Matt.

9:36).

The sight of scattered sheep without a shepherd wrung His heart and He could not withhold His tears.

In like manner, He wept over a city, crying: "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing!

See!

Your house is left to you desolate" (Matt.

23:37-38).

The apostle Paul possessed this capacity for tearfulness.

He could write: "I tell the truth in Christ, I am not lying, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Spirit, that I have great sorrow and continual grief in my heart.

For I could wish that I myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my countrymen according to the flesh" (Rom.

9:1-3).

The burden of his unsaved Hebrew friends weighed so heavily upon him that day and night he shed prayerful tears for them.

Bishop J. C. Ryle once said of George Whitefield that the people "could not hate the man who wept so much over their souls."

Andrew Bonar wrote in his diary on his 49th birthday: "Felt in the evening most bitter grief over the apathy of the district.

They are perishing, they are perishing, and yet they will not consider.

I lay awake thinking over and crying to the Lord in broken groans."

We are told that that great theologian and preacher, Dr. R. W. Dale of Birmingham, was at first critical of D. L. Moody's preaching until he went to hear him.

Thereafter, he had the most profound respect for the evangelist because he said Moody "could never speak of a lost soul without tears in his eyes" (Stott 1969, 109).

Spiritual tears are /tears of concern./

Compassion and concern must not be confused.

Without doubt there is no true compassion without concern, but concern may not evoke compassion.

On the contrary, concern may lead to holy jealousy, righteous indignation, and social action.

The Psalmist could admit, "Rivers of water run down from my eyes, because men do not keep Your law" (Psalm 119:136).

And it was this kind of concern that led Paul to say to the Philippians that there were many whom he could only mention with tears because they were "the enemies of the cross of Christ" (Phil.

3:18).

Alas, we have become so immune to the challenge of social evils, that we can read headlines, listen to news reports, and watch gruesome pictures on the television screen without batting an eyelid.

I don't believe God will ever hear our prayers for the troubles of the world until we know how to weep.

Indeed, I don't believe God will ever intervene on behalf of our own country until the social evils that besmirch our land drive the church to her knees and to tears.

So there is a time to weep, and God has given all normal people capacity for tearfulness.

But to balance this truth we must consider also:

!! The Capacity for Cheerfulness

In the article by John Stott already referred to, he quotes Dr. W. E. Sangster's story of a very highbrow organist who pleaded with the drummer in the Salvation Army band not to hit the drum so hard.

The beaming bandsman replied, "Lor' bless you, sir, since I've been converted I'm so happy I could bust the bloomin' drum."

There is a time to laugh, and there are two aspects of such laughter.

There is /the natural cheerfulness./

Someone has pointed out that it takes a good laugh to exercise the entire complement of muscles that surround the face and throat of a normal person.

Dr. G. Campbell Morgan (1934, 51) says, "The power to laugh, to cease work, and frolic in forgetfulness of all the conflict, to make merry, is a divine bestowment upon man."

Natural cheerfulness is usually associated with /the happy Spirit./