Weeping Doesn’t Mean Joy is Gone Forever

“Joy (According to Researchers): 1) Joy is uncontrollable. It ranks lowest out of emotions in its ability to be yanked into your life by sheer force of will…. 6) Joy will make us hopeful. A joyful person will have the ability to see possibilities and grace and even the redemption of things that feel completely ruined…. 8) If we want to know if it’s joy we should look for feelings of (a) harmony, (b) aliveness, (c) transcendence, and (d) unselfconsciousness. 9) Joy can be easier and easier to experience. We just have to practice.” Bowler, Kate, Joyful, Anyway (p. 156-157). Random House Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

Psalm 30 captured exactly the kind of joy Bowler identified—not manufactured by willpower but bursting forth when God moved from absence to presence. The psalm reflected severe trouble that seemed to threaten life itself (verses 9-11). As one scholar noted, “The psalmist may have been healed from a life-threatening illness, but the language could be metaphorical.” * Whatever the specifics, the psalmist focused on how God had removed the source of fear and restored joy to life.

• Scholar Donald Williams wrote, “There has been weeping, the sense of God’s absence, and mourning. Now… the healing of God has turned sorrow into joy.” ** Even people of deep faith can experience times when God feels absent—remember Jesus quoting Psalm 22:1 on the cross. We may say “God showed up” to describe times of recovery and restoration. How does the sense that “God showed up” contribute to joy in times of restoration?
• Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. applied this psalm to the civil rights movement. After hearing that the Supreme Court had ruled bus segregation unconstitutional, he preached: “The dawn will come…. ‘Weeping may endure for a night,’ says the Psalmist, ‘but joy cometh in the morning.’ This faith adjourns the assemblies of hopelessness and brings new light into the dark chambers of pessimism.” *** When has “dawn” come in history—in your lifetime or in stories you know? What keeps you hoping for dawn when night feels endless?