A Time to Laugh and a Time to Cry
9/21/1995
But anyway getting back to the thing that brought this thing to my mind is just consider the Christian life from that passage and consider any good thing as a gift. Somehow or other we grow up in this culture with the idea of what the ideal is, and what the ideal is, is determined by what we see in movies and what we see in advertisements and the perfect life of what it’s meant to be like and then we become disciples and it’s just being happy, it’s having all the things you want. Those kinds of things. And that’s what determines what we think is good, and things are going well IF these things are in place. But we’ve got to reprogram our thinking, we just have to. We should view it as “we walk by faith not by sight.” And we don’t know what tomorrow brings, we don’t know what the next hour brings, and if we’ve received anything good it’s only by His grace. And we didn’t deserve it in the first place. And I don’t have to have an attitude that says, “I’m a Christian, I should be happy and joyful all the time” without ever allowing for the sufferings of Christ to flow over into our lives and we feel that inside. And that’s a very real and tangible thing. We have to make room for these things in our lives. A time to laugh and a time to weep. They’re both okay. They’re both ways that God deepens us. Jesus was the complete person. He leapt for joy in the Holy Spirit. Ok, He was very happy. Right? And He sweat drops of blood that appeared, that actually came out of His skin. That’s an actual condition; a doctor talked about this one time. There’s like less than a dozen or two dozen or less then a hundred cases are reported of it every year, but people who go through such emotional turmoil and stress that actually happens to them. Ok? That is the kind of turmoil that He went through and that’s the kind of condition that can happen. And so it’s a completely different way to view the life that we’ve been given to live. Today God has brought happiness and peace and life and “the joy of the Lord is my strength, and I’m going to sing a new song. God is so good.” And there is another way that God can somehow…the sufferings of Christ can flow over into our lives. And there can be some suffering, there can be some difficulties, there can be some things that are just plain hard. That doesn’t mean we become morose and gloomy. That means we can deal with those things patiently and endure them and try to learn the lessons that are from them, but not try to put a false face on it, but then to be like, to try to be like Job: “The Lord giveth, the Lord taketh away, blessed be the name of the Lord.” God be praised no matter what. “Though He slay me, yet will I worship Him.” Have that kind of a heart and to view life as, “This is an adventure and God needs to deepen me and God needs to make me like Him.”
And in some ways it’s kind of like we are on a board game. Roll the dice, go four spaces and you find yourself in a difficult situation that He shows you your sin or He shows you, “I didn’t know I really loved that, but I guess I did and now that I don’t have it, this is hard.” Or maybe just for some unknown reason, “I’m just really depressed right now.” Who knows what it might be. This is the life we have been called to. It’s not random. It’s not random. There’s a time to laugh, there’s a time to weep. There’s a time to build, there’s a time to plant. There’s a time to uproot, and there’s a time for all these things. A time to mourn, and blessed are those who mourn.
It’s just a different way of viewing things. And so what God gives me, I endure patiently. I receive it from His hand and I love Him for it, and I want to live my life this day with whatever emotions I have that go up and down, with whatever difficulties I have, with whatever tasks are before me with a view of God that these things are for a reason. These things are not random. I don’t want to just get this over with so that I can get back to the fun stuff, but I want to endure patiently and I want to see Him in this and I want to somehow find the heart of Jesus in all this. And I tell you what, it is possible. And sometimes when I feel like, when you feel like you capture some glimpses of where you think, “I’ve taken a couple steps down this ten-mile-long path that Jesus walked down,” and there will be those times of knowing a little bit of what Jesus knew very well. A little bit of what it means to have problems of your own and care about someone else more than your own self. See what I mean? Then suddenly the scriptures make a little more sense. Then you can understand in a deeper way what it is that Jesus did. Then different passages of scripture start to lighten up, and God is revealing His mind and His heart to us. But somehow we couldn’t have done that if we were happy all the time – “Everything’s going my way. What a beautiful feeling, everything is going my way.”
Anyhow, it’s obvious. I don’t think it’s anything that none of us didn’t already know, but it’s just been fresh to me recently that if we endure these things patiently, if we give thanks for the good things, and God is a good Father and there is joy in the journey. And anytime we focus on one thing, we can lose sight of everything else. Right? That’s the danger of any teaching. There is no way to be completely comprehensive without ever ending. So if you talk about the sufferings of Christ, you can lose sight of “joy inexpressible with glory.” But, tell you what, to know the depths of joy inexpressible and the glory, I think you have to share in the fellowship of His sufferings, too. It’s just the way it is. It’s a double-edged sword, but it’s the life He has given us. It’s a privilege, it’s a high honor. It’s a glorious life and this is how He does His business, focusing on one aspect of it.
And if you follow Him and you are serious about wanting your life to be conformed to His image, He will bring you through some seasons of suffering. And it’s okay. And it will go best if we endure patiently. That’s what He’s looking for – patient endurance. And the good things to accept them as gifts and be grateful for them and not to complain. Just like Jesus, when He was in heaven, did not look at that as something to be grasped, but He made himself nothing. So, I don’t have to have this forever, I don’t have to have all my needs met and be happy and be emotionally hugged for the rest of my life. Otherwise, I feel like I have been cheated somehow.
By the way, just look around at the people you know, the people you’ve read about in history. Those people who have had a walk with God that is deep, more tangible more real, are those people where this element of suffering or this element of difficulty and so on, it’s been a prominent part of their lives. There’s no getting around it. You can’t somehow skirt the issue. You can’t take a shortcut or the easy way to greater depth and greater knowledge of God. There’s no shortcuts. That’s a good thing, too. He’s not a respecter of person. Nobody has a leg up, it’s even.
It’s a good life. It’s a complete life, though, too. And if you’re currently experiencing some of the…I mean, because it’s like you take a snapshot, right? You just took a snapshot, right? And we’ve got different people in different places, right, there may be one theme that God is doing with His people, so there’s going to be an element of that, perhaps, in each of us, right? But, ya know, if we were to go around and find out where each of us is in, some of us might be in the time to laugh and some might be in the time to weep. Ok? And you don’t have to feel guilty about being in one or the other. Ok? Accept it, hold onto it, gently. If God’s given a gift, then be very, very grateful for it, but don’t view it as something to be grasped.
Jesus’ joy was His Father in heaven. He didn’t cling onto, “I ain’t leaving.” He made Himself nothing. He took on the very nature of a slave. He was willing to do that, we need to be willing to do that, too. Give thanks and be grateful for the things that come each day and for the things that are difficult, endure it patiently. I guess the thing is don’t expect a homogeneous life.
I was thinking, too, as you were talking – if you’re staying close to Jesus, you’re not going to be deciding ahead of time whether you’re going to be going through suffering or going through joy…the key is to stay close to God. You don’t decide you’re going to be somebody who suffers a lot, so you change. Stay close to Him and whatever He’s doing. If you’re resting in Him, the seasons come and go.
