MORNING MUSING February 10, 2009

There were no tears in Eden, of this we can be sure, until sin entered in that is.  Adam and Eve did not know the pain of great sorrows; of a weeping heart they had no knowledge, at least at first. 

They knew God then and received of Him His goodness though hardly knew they did.  Unclouded joy was their experience, day after day, for as many as they lived, until that fateful day of their fall when the tempter came and they responded and so crying and tears soon began becoming the all too familiar part of human experience.  Sin is not native to mankind, it came in and it is not our normal state.  A sinner is an aberration. If, as Paul tells us (Rom 5v12), sin entered in, then it is an intruder breaking in to the creation, not meant to remain, it can surely be taken out again. 

 

Jesus came to accomplish this, and He did it.  A life free from all pain, sorrow and crying is man’s proper state.  Where there is sin it means that there will be agony, a price to be paid, sorrows to be experienced and sadness to be endured.  We live now in a time when pain has come, it is here, tears are universal, and all because of sin, personal sin, sins of others, cosmic sin, sin is everywhere.  And yet we do not live in a time when there is nothing but tears and sorrowing.  “Weeping may come for a night, but joy comes in the morning’ says a Psalm.  “When passing through the valley of weeping” says another. 

 

Passing through the valley, not living there. Now we have pain and sorrow but there are things that make us glad too.  The two are closely linked.  Think of that which makes us glad, perhaps the coming of love, or the birth of a child into the family, you will find that to lose that love or to be bereaved of that child will be a most smarting pain and sorrow.  There are times when the deep sorrows of humanity are brought piercingly near, when they strike right to the core of us, we are impaled and if not careful near to despair.  We are touched through the pains of others and it is right that we are, we must not harden up for we are partakers ourselves.  And all of this need not have been save for the self will of our forefather Adam and his wife, but it came, and it is here and we all have done that which has reinforced it, we are all the guilty ones. 

 

As I write of these things a memory assails me.  I was sleeping on the roof of a house in a village in India.  There was no electricity there, it was a quiet night and the silence of the slumbering village was shattered by the cries of a woman, she was probably being beaten, little ones soon awoke and screamed and somehow, in those moments something of the agony of the world and its great weeping sorrows went right through me.  There have been other times too, and ought to be. 

 

And we still suffer and the entire world also, thank God that we pass through the valley of tears though, they are not permanent. Psalm 84 quoted above tells us that those who know the Lord and are walking with Him in their journey, when they pass through such times of sorrow God has ways to comfort them and they are able to make it a pool and place of blessing.  That other Psalm (30) encourages us that weeping, though it continue it shall give way to joy, the sorrow will not be crowned king, though it seem to rule, it is only for a while. 

 

Yet, these states of mingled joy and pain are to give way to another time, one that shall never end.  It will be a time when all tears will have been wiped away and there shall be no more of them and no more crying.  The exact words are wonderful.  “…God is with man.  He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself will be with them as their God.  He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.” (Rev 21v3&4)  What a place and time that shall be, when these things are no more and all shall dwell in joyful unity, and this shall be eternal and shall never pass away.  Every troubling thing removed forever and ever. 

 

Ponder that deeply, savor it with your spiritual senses, God Himself shall accomplish this promised time, it will surely come.  And yet I also read of another place, it is entirely the opposite, it is not permanently tearless, painless and joy filled, it is eternally filled with pain and agony, with weeping, with regret and dread.  Jesus spoke of this place and described it as ‘outer darkness, there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’  Several times He said it, He knew the place existed, He knew the states of those there were real.  His words, like all language, had a metaphorical content but that must not blur the fact that this place has all the joy removed and only leaves the pain.  If it is God Who wipes away all tears, then it must be His absence that forms this dreadful place. 

 

Those dwelling there have no relief to their pain, it is unremitting and their weeping does not cease in a joy filled morning for there no morning comes for it is outer darkness far from God Who is Light.  And so I muse upon these things, having known despair and sorrow and knowing still pain and groaning as all us creatures do.  I share with my fellow- creature something of their sorrows, at least in part and yet there is light, joy, precious promises by which we may believe and be renewed.  So too we know His presence now and prove that He is the wiper away of tears, the One who comforts and enables us to turn the vale of tears into pools of blessing.  But look forward also, further on, to that place where sin and sorrow will be fully over, the old passed away because He has come and made all things new.  Yes, when He appears it shall come.  In light of all that God has done who could desire to be in a place of everlasting sorrow and eternal weeping where God is not?       

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