The Joy of Crying

“Those who sow with tears
    will reap with songs of joy.”

 Psalm 126:5 NIV

Have you ever gone through a season of tears? 

Where your heart cries out to God for relief? 

When you don’t see an end in sight, but you know you have to keep going?

Have you ever felt like the verses you usually refer to in hard times just aren’t enough and so you’re searching the Scriptures for a nugget of hope to see you through?

As you may know, I’m a mom. And I can tell you absolutely NOTHING in life has brought me more joy or more tears.

My kids are such a blessing. I cherish each moment I have with them.

But being a mom brings with it a HUGE responsibility. 

Not only am I responsible for making sure my kids are fed, clothed, healthy and learning their ABC”s, it falls on my shoulders (and my husband’s) to train them up in the ways of God (Proverbs 22:6), and to discipline them in love (Eph 6:4, Col 3:21, Proverbs 3:12) so that they will one day be productive members of society and servants in the Body of Christ (2 Tim 3:15, Deu 4:6).

Those are BIG responsibilities! 

So many seeds to be sown into their little lives. 

Even realizing that God is helping me doesn’t lessen some of my own tears.

Example:

Teaching my baby that I can’t walk with him ALL night long so he can sleep brought many tears to both our eyes. 

He began life with reflux issues…and so the habit of walking with him for hours and hours formed.

Thank God, he is healed of the reflux issue…but God didn’t erase his memory of the months of being held. 

He still wanted to be held.

Weeks went by of my husband and me trying to get him to sleep in his crib...it was torture.

I wondered why I was doing this to all of us. Maybe I didn’t really need sleep? Maybe I could continue walking with him throughout the night…he’d eventually outgrow it, right? (My sleep deprived mind actually thought those were pretty good arguments)

As the MONTHS continued  my heart begged God for relief. 

Daily I’d ask, “Why, Lord, why won’t my baby sleep?”

My old standby verse “My Grace is sufficient for you…” (2 Cor 12:9) did little to alleviate the pain. WHY WAS THIS HAPPENING? Other babies slept through the night by now and mine slept worse than a newborn.

And then I came across Psalm 126:5, “Those who sow with tears  will reap with songs of joy.”

Sowing with tears.

That’s what I was doing.

His little tears and my big ones. 

 

So as I continued to pat my screaming son’s back as he lay in his crib I thought about the seeds I was sowing: independence from me, learning to comfort himself, better sleep for everyone and a well rested mommy so I could do all the other things a mommy needs to do on a daily basis but with a song of joy in my heart instead of despair and blood shot eyes.

Sometimes trials are long and hard, but we have to remember the lessons of sowing.

Seeds sown are broken open in order to grow.

Besides joy, it produces other wonderful fruit (Gal 5:22-23)

And if you’re still having a hard time finding hope in sowing in tears, let me remind you of the ultimate JOYOUS TEARS…Jesus going to the cross—“…For the JOY set before Him He endured the cross…” ( Heb 12:2, emphasis mine)