The Sweetness of Tears

 Sometimes Christians forget the sweetness that can exist along with the bitterness of tears.  Because we live in a culture that focuses on entertainment, instant amusement, glamor, fame, and popularity, it is easy for us to jump on the bandwagon by doing our best to avoid tears, pain, and sorrow.  Everyone is searching for happiness and trying to get rid of tears.  So we turn to pills, personal trainers, makeovers, religion, sex, drink, and drugs (the list goes on) to try to attain happiness.  Of course there is a longing in every human heart for happiness because sin (in us and “out there”) has left humans an unhappy bunch.  What about tears?  Should we avoid them at all costs?  Why did Jesus say, Blessed are those who mourn and Blessed are you who weep now?  Below are some points made by Thomas Watson in The Beatitudes, as he discussed Matthew 5.4.

“1) Sin must have tears.  While we carry the fire of sin about us, we must carry the water of tears to quench it (Ezek. 7.16).  We have in  our hearts the seed of the unpardonable sin.  And shall we not mourn?  He that does not mourn has surely lost the use of his reason.

2) Gospel-mourning [the weeping of repentance] is spontaneous and free (it is not forced).  It is spiritual, that is, we mourn for sin more than suffering. 

3) Gospel-mourning sends the soul to God.  Evangelical mourning is a spur to prayer.  Gospel tears must drop from the eye of faith.  Our disease must make us mourn, but when we look up to our Physician, who has made a plaister of his own blood, we must not mourn without hope.  Believing tears are precious.  When the clouds of sorrow have over-cast the soul, some sunshine of faith must break forth.  Though our tears drop to the earth, our faith must reach heaven.

4) Gospel-mourning is joined with self-loathing.  The sinner admires himself.  The penitent lathes himself (Ezek. 20:43).  Gospel-mourning must be purifying.  We must not only mourn but turn.  ‘Turn to Me with weeping’ (Joel 2.12).  We must not only abstain from sin and weep over it, we must also abhor it.

5) Tears cannot be put to a better use.  The brinish water of repenting tears will help to kil that worm of sin which should gnaw the conscience.  Gospel-mourning is an evidence of grace.  Weeping for sin is a sign of the new birth.

6) Repentant tears are precious.  Tears dropping from a mournful, penitent eye, are like water dropping from the roses, very sweet and precious to God.  That heart is most delightful to God which has a fountain of sorrow running in it.  ‘Mary stood at Christ’s feet weeping’ (Lk 7.38).  Her tears were more fragrant than her ointment.  God delights much in tears, else he would not keep a bottle and a book for them (Ps 56.8).  Tears, though they are silent, yet have a voice (Ps 6.8).  David who was the greatest mourner in Israel was the sweet swinger in Israel.  My tears were my food (Ps 42.3).  Ambrose gives this gloss: ‘No food so sweet as tears!’  Bernard says ‘The tears of the repentant are sweeter than all worldly joy.’

7) Tears line the road to the New Jerusalem.  Perhaps a man may think, ‘If I cannot mourn for sin, I will get to heaven some other way.  I will go to church, I will give alms, I will lead a civil life.’  No, but I tell you there is but one way to blessedness, and that is through the Valley of Tears.  ‘I tell you, except you repent, you shall all likewise perish’ (Lk 13.3).

8) Christian tears will eventually end.  It is only a while that we shall weep.  After a few showers fall from our eyes, we shall have perpetual sunshine.  God shall wipe away all tears (Rev. 7.17).  When sin shall cease, tears shall cease.  ‘Weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning’ (Ps. 30.5).”

There are other reasons why Christians weep, to be sure.  I appreciate Watson’s perspective here because he gives us a good biblical way to view tears of repentance.  They don’t save us nor do they wash away our sins, but they do have a place in our pilgrimage.  So Christian weeping truly is bittersweet: bitter because it has to do with sin and sweet because it has to do with faith in Jesus the Savior.

The above quotes are slightly edited and abbreviated.  You can find the full discussion in chapters 6-10 of Thomas Watson’s The Beatitudes.

shane lems

Affliction: The Christian’s Great Teacher

 Though affliction, trials, suffering, and sorrow are difficult to bear in this life, they are not meaningless for the Christian.  In fact, as Paul says, God can uses affliction for our good (Rom 8).  Thomas Watson, in All Things for Good, lists several ways how affliction works for the good of God’s people.  I’ve slightly edited them here.

1) Affliction is our teacher.  Affliction teaches us to know ourselves.  In prosperity we are for the most part strangers to ourselves.  God makes us know affliction, that we may better know ourselves.  We see corruption in our hearts in the time of affliction, which we would not believe was there. 

2) Affliction draws the Christian away from the love of the world.  In prosperity the heart cleaves partly to the world, partly to God.  Then God takes away the world so that the heart may cleave more to him in sincerity.

3) Afflictions conform the Christian to Christ.  God’s chastening rod is a pencil to draw Christ’s image more lively upon us.  Was Christ’s head crowned with thorns, and do we think to be crowned with roses?

4) Affliction takes away the dross of sin.  Just like a doctor sometimes prescribes painful methods to get rid of tumors, so God uses afflictions as the painful medicine which heals many spiritual diseases.

5) Afflictions help loosen our grip on the world.  When you dig away the dirt from the root of a tree, it is to loosen the tree from the earth.  So God digs away our earthly comforts to loosen our hearts from the world.

6) Affliction is a sign of God’s fatherly love.  God disciplines those whom he loves.  Every stroke of the rod of affliction is a badge of sonship.

Watson lists a few more ways that affliction is one of the teachers God uses in the Christian’s life.  Again, though they are difficult to bear and bring tears, they are not useless.

The above quotes and paraphrases above are found in chapter two of All Things for Good.

shane lems

 

Jesus Keeps His Sheep

 In his commentary on the Lord’s Prayer, Thomas Watson has a great discussion of the preservation of the saints (a.k.a. the “P” in TULIP or the last part of the Canons of Dort).  He says “a saint’s perseverance is built upon three immutable pillars.”

1) Upon God’s eternal love.  We are inconstant in our love to God; but he is not so in his love to us.  ‘I have loved thee with an everlasting love;’ with a love of eternity (Jer. 31.3).  When once the sunshine of God’s electing love is risen upon the soul, it never sets finally.

2) Upon the covenant of grace.  It is a firm, impregnable covenant; as you read in [2 Sam. 23.5] ‘God hath made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure.’  This covenant is inviolable, it cannot be broken; indeed, sin may break the peace of the covenant, but it cannot break the bond of the covenant.

3) Upon the mystical union.  Believers are incorporated into Christ, they are knit to him as members of the head, by the nerve and ligament of faith, so that they cannot be broken off (Eph. 5.23).  As it is impossible to sever the yeast and the dough when they are once mingled, so it is impossible when Christ and believers are united to be separated, even by the power of death or hell .

Well said; reminds me of the answer of the Westminster Larger Catechism that has to do with the perseverance of the saints (Q/A 79).  I’ve put the numbers in the text to more clearly show the reasons saints are preserved:

“True believers, by reason of the 1) unchangeable love of God,
and 2) his decree
and 3) covenant to give them perseverance,
4) their inseparable union with Christ,
5) his continual intercession for them,
and 6) the Spirit and seed of God abiding in them,
can neither totally nor finally fall away from the state of grace,
but are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation.”

The above quotes by Thomas Watson, which I edited slightly, are found on pages 131-132 of The Lord’s Prayer.

shane lems

Kuyper and Kingdoms

 In his fine book that deals with the person and work of the Holy Spirit, Abraham Kuyper talks about prayer and the Holy Spirit’s role in it.  The section is quite good.  One thing that stuck out to me was how Kuyper explained intercessory prayer with regard to the phrase, “Thy kingdom come.”  He said this first of all has to do with our love towards God, and secondly towards our neighbor.  When it comes to praying for our neighbor, Kuyper says there is a “twofold intercession:” 1) prayer about matters that do not pertain to the church and 2) prayer about matters that do pertain to the church.  Here are his own words.

“Prayer for kings, and for all that are in authority, does not concern the things that pertain to the body of Christ; neither does the prayer for our enemies, nor that for the place of our habitation, for country, army, and navy, for a bountiful harvest, for deliverance from pestilence, for trade and commerce, etc.  All these pertain to the natural life, and to persons, whether saints or sinners, in their relation to the life of creation, and not to the Kingdom of Grace.”

Then he talks about prayers that do pertain to the Kingdom of Grace, which has to do with the church.

“But our prayer does concern the body of Christ, when we pray for the coming of the Lord, for a fresh anointing of the priests of God, for their being clothed upon with salvation, for success in the work of missions, for a baptism of the Holy Spirit, for strength in conflict, for forgiveness of sins, for the salvation of our loved ones, for the effectual conversion of the baptized seed of the Church.”

He then again distinguishes: “The first intercession [#1 above] has reference to the realm of nature, the second [#2 above] to the Kingdom of Grace.”  Kuyper also goes on to mention how our prayers for people from the realm of nature have to do with the fact that all men are humans created by the triune God – but our prayers for Christians/churches have to do with the Kingdom of Grace, the fact that these people are not only created but also redeemed by the triune God.

I’m not trying to argue too much here; I simply want to point out how Kuyper was working within the historic Reformed/Reformation tradition of distinguishing the Kingdom of Power and the Kingdom of Grace.  Thomas Watson, Wilhelmus a Brakel, and even Martin Luther used these same categories.  For more info, I recommend David VanDrunen’s book that deals with this – specifically chapter 7.

shane lems

sunnyside wa

Quotes On Listening

Studying James 1.19-25 this week led me to think long and hard about the virtue of good listening – specifically listening to God’s Word (v 22; cf Ecc. 5.1-2, Prov 10.19, etc).  It is so hard to be a good listener in our noisy and entertainment-driven culture of texting and images.  I enjoy movies and music, but I also try to enjoy these things in moderation because I know they slowly kill my skill of listening to the Word.  Here are a few great quotes I found on listening which I though our readers would appreciate.

“Today…much ‘church work’ makes congregants so busy that they have scant time and little capacity for listening.  …Loving God and other people depends on getting to know them intimately by listening to them ‘with the ear of the heart.’” (Schultz, 78-9).

An old monastery had these words carved into the stone wall: “Do not speak unless you can improve upon the silence.” (Schultz, 78)

“The Word comes not to the chatterer but to him who holds his tongue. … Silence is the simple stillness of the individual under the Word of God.  We are silent before hearing the Word because our thoughts are already directed to the Word, as a child is quiet when he enters his father’s room.” (Bonhoeffer, 79).

“The listener is not permitted to suppose that the preached words are for anyone other than himself or herself.” (Peterson, 11).

“Doubtless, no one can be a true disciple of God, except he hears him in silence…. He (James) would…have us to correct and restrain our forwardness, that we may not, as it commonly happens, unseasonably interrupt God, and that as long as he opens his sacred mouth, we may open to him our hearts and our ears, and not prevent him to speak.” (Calvin on James 1.19).

“When we have heard a sermon, we should look up to Christ and beg his blessing upon it that it may not return void, but accomplish the work for which it was sent and be powerful and efficacious for the good of our souls.” (Love, 147).

“When we come to the Word preached, we come to a matter of the highest importance; therefore we should stir up ourselves and hear with the greatest devotion. … The devil is not one who refuses to come to church; he attends, but not with any good intent; he takes away the Word from men,” so “regard” and “remember” the Word. (Watson, 16-17).

“Why are we such poor listeners?  Today one of the major reasons is that we are so busy.  Our busyness substitutes frenzy for conversation and wrecks our relationships.  It fills our calendars and empties our lives of the ability to listen to anything that turns us away from our little gods.” (Hughes, 64).

“As real hearers we are indeed taken prisoner by this Word.  We surrender to it.  Inevitably, therefore, the totality of our existence is evidence of what we have heard.” (Barth, CD II.2, p. 365).

“It is required of those that hear the word preached that they attend upon it with diligence, preparation, and prayer; examine what they hear by the scriptures, receive the truth with faith, love, meekness, and readiness of mind, as the word of God; meditate, and confer of it; hide it in their hearts, and bring forth the fruit of it in their lives.” (WLC 160).

Solae aures sunt organa Chistiani – “The ears alone are the organs of a Christian man, for he is justified and declared to be a Christian, not because of the works of any member but because of faith. (Luther, quoted in Webb, p. 144)

shane lems

sunnyside, wa