FROM TEARS TO JOY

They who SOW in TEARS shall REAP IN JOY – Psalm 126:5

This is God’s Will for His children: that we rise from TEARS to JOY: “They who SOW in TEARS shall REAP IN JOY” (Psa.126:5). Wherever and in whatever aspect of life we have sown in tears, this is our season to reap in Joy – the Season of Joyful Harvest! Psalm 126 is a song that looks back to when the Jewish captives returned to Jerusalem following their long exile in Babylon. They had suffered extremely, and now they suddenly found themselves back in their homeland – in Jerusalem, the beloved city of God. Just like that, God had delivered them. This is a much needed reminder of how God brings us from tears to joy.

Psalm 126 basically has two stanzas with two main ideas. The first stanza encourages us to marvel at how God has helped us in the past (vv.1-3). The second stanza encourages us to trust God to do it again (vv.4-6). When you experience God’s grand deliverance, it can feel like you’re in a dream: “When the Lord brought back the captives to Zion, we were like men who dreamed” (v.1). The Jews had been exiled to Babylon seventy years earlier. Some of them had been born in exile. It was all they knew. Then suddenly, the new king Cyrus, made a proclamation allowing all the Jews to go home (Ezra 1:1-4). In a moment, God turned things around. They were in shock. It was too good to be true: “Is this reality? We must be dreaming! It couldn’t have happened”! Yet it did! They were now back in the holy city of Jerusalem, back in Zion, where God dwells with His people, and it all felt like a dream!

When one is in the thick of trials, it seems like it will never end. It may really be hard to discern the way forward. Hope wanes and strength drains. Doubt assails: “Is this all that God has for me? Will I ever smile or laugh again?” In such seasons, Psalm 126 would be a strong medicine for the soul. It carries a powerful message of hope: times of trouble and trials do not last, but shall “come to pass”! It assures us that God will turn whatever sorrow is assailing us to joy and our tears to laughter. Beloved, whatever is the challenge you are going through right now, things will get better; the tide will turn for your good. God will transform your tears to joy.

Job might have felt the same kinds of joyful emotions when God restored him after his season of suffering: “And the Lord restored Job’s losses when he prayed for his friends. Indeed the Lord gave Job twice as much as he had before” (Job 42:10). Job went through far more than you or I ever will. He must have wondered if God was through with him, whether there was any joy left on the other side. And then God did it. He restored Job and made him fulfilled again. When God rescued Peter from jail, it felt like a dream to him. In fact, he actually thought it was a dream: “So he went out and followed him, and did not know that what was done by the angel was real, but thought he was seeing a vision … And when Peter had come to himself, he said, “Now I know for certain that the Lord has sent His angel, and has delivered me...” (Acts 12: 9-11).

God sees and responds to authentic, prayerful tears that gush from the depth of the soul. The Lord turned the ugliness of the cross into a spectacle of eternal beauty. He who specialises in wiping away tears will change every pain into gain and every pressure into pleasure for us. You’ve sown enough of tears; it’s time to reap in Joy: “Refrain your voice from weeping, and your eyes from tears; for your work shall be rewarded…There is HOPE in your future,” says the LORD…” (Jer. 31:16-17a). Wherever you have sown in tears, may you begin to reap in Joy, in Jesus name!