Most of you know that I like to have
fun. I like to laugh. I believe in the old saying that laughter is
the best medicine. That actually comes from the Bible, you know. Proverbs
17:22 says a cheerful heart is good medicine. Proverbs 15:15 says a
cheerful heart has a continual feast. There are lots of Bible verses that
say that laughter and cheerfulness are good for us.
That brings us to the part of the
third chapter of Ecclesiastes we’re going to look at today. It says that
there is a time to weep and a time to laugh. And, as we’ve said every
week of this sermon series, it says that God has made each of these things
beautiful in its time.
Now, as I said, I have no problem
with there being a time to laugh. But, at the same time, we all recognize
that there are times not to laugh. And we also have to make sure that our
laughter is not hurtful. I’ve had times when people were laughing at me.
I’ll bet you have, too. That’s not fun at all. That hurts.
It hurts a lot. When our laughter is hurtful, it is most definitely
not the time to laugh.
But why is there a time to weep?
How is weeping beautiful?
As we answer that question, we need
to think about what weeping is. It’s not the same as crying.
There’s a reason the author says “a time to weep” rather than “a time to
cry”. Crying can be joyful. We can shed tears of joy. There’s
no sense in which weeping is joyful. Weeping means to be so overpowered
by grief or sorrow or some similar emotion that shedding tears is the only
thing we can do.
When we think about that, we first
tend to think of the people we’ve lost in the communities of this parish in the
last month or so. And things like that are certainly a time to weep.
But there are other things that cause us to feel grief and sorrow, too.
A relationship that falls apart. Seeing someone we care about
making bad choices and going down the wrong path, and knowing there’s nothing
we can do about it. There are all kinds of things that can cause us to
feel grief and sorrow, and sometimes that grief and sorrow can overwhelm us.
Sometimes we wish God would keep us
from feeling those things. But they’re part of being human. And
since God allows them to happen, we assume there must be a purpose for them,
even when we cannot see what it is. And again, Ecclesiastes tells us they
can be beautiful, even when we cannot see how.
We read a story today from the
seventh chapter of Luke. It’s the story of Jesus going to a Pharisee’s
house for dinner. A woman finds out that Jesus is there, so she goes
there, too.
Now, all Luke tells us about this
woman is that she has lived a sinful life. We’re allowed to make any
assumptions we want about exactly what they may mean. But whatever her
sins were, apparently everyone in town knew about them. This woman was
not well thought-of. She was not well-respected. People looked down
on her, and they thought they had good reasons to do so.
We also don’t know what this woman
knew about Jesus. But she knew enough. She knew, somehow, that this
was a man of God. And she knew, somehow, that she needed to see him.
And when she saw him, she was
immediately began weeping. She was weeping so much that she was able to
wash Jesus’ feet with her tears. We’re not told why she felt this grief
and sorrow, but we can guess. Again, while we don’t know what her sins
were, we’re told that she had lived a sinful life. And I’m sure she knew
she’d lived a sinful life.
But then, we’ve all lived sinful
lives, right? I mean, the Apostle Paul says that all of us have sinned,
that all of us have fallen short. So, we really should all be able to see
ourselves in the place of this woman. We’re all sinners who’ve lived
sinful lives.
But you know, we say that all the
time. And we mean it. I’m not saying that we don’t. But at
the same time, there are a lot of times we don’t let it bother us too much.
I’ve said this before, but if there’s one thing we human beings are good
at, it’s justifying our own behavior. We can justify darn near anything
to ourselves. Our reasoning may not justify our behavior to others, but
we can justify it to ourselves.
And please don’t think I’m pointing a finger here. I’m just
as good at this as anyone, and probably better than a lot of you. I can
find all kinds of wonderful ways to justify doing what I want to do and to
justify not doing what I don’t want to do.
And I’m sure this woman was good at it, too. She may have
known, deep down, that what she was doing was wrong, but she found a way to
justify it to herself. She found a way to not let her sinful behavior
bother her too much.
And I suspect she did something else we all do, too. She
looked at herself, and she said, you know, I’m not all that bad. I’m
doing the best I can. After all, nobody’s perfect. I’m better than
some people. In fact, I’m better than a lot of people. Have you
ever done that? I have. I suspect this woman did, too.
But then. Then, she came face to face with the divine Son of
God, Jesus Christ. And all of a sudden, the reality of who she was hit
her right between the eyes. For the first time in years, maybe in
forever, she saw herself as she truly was. All the ways she used to
justify her behavior fell apart. All of her thoughts about how she was
better than a lot of people fell by the wayside. Everything about her
life was suddenly in full view. It was right in front of her eyes.
There was no hiding from it. She was in the presence of perfection,
and she suddenly saw how imperfect, how sinful, she really was.
And when that reality hit her, there was only one thing she could
do. The only thing she could do was weep. She was so overpowered by
the grief and sorrow of what she’d done, of all the ways she had fallen short
of who God wanted her to be, who God had made her to be, that all she could do
was weep.
And I suspect that’s what you and I would do, too. If the
reality of who we really are hit us right between the eyes, if we saw ourselves
as we truly are, if we were stripped of all our justifications and all the ways
we use to make ourselves think we’re okay, if we could no longer hide from who
we are and were in the presence of the perfection that is God, I think you and
I would probably weep, too.
But look at the rest of the story. This woman washes Jesus’
feet with her tears. And Jesus tells her, “Your sins are forgiven.”
When this woman came into the
presence of Jesus, she was overpowered by grief and sorrow at the thought of
who she was. All she could do was weep. And to Jesus, her weeping
was beautiful. And Jesus forgave her for everything.
We’re not told what happened to the
woman after that. I assume she felt better. I also assume, though,
that her problems were not all magically solved. People probably still looked
down on her. She may have resolved to change her life, but we all know
that’s not an easy thing to do. And even if she succeeded and really did
change her life, it would’ve taken a long time for her to get people’s respect
and trust. Getting forgiveness from Jesus probably made her feel better,
but it did not change anything about her condition, at least not right away.
But Jesus did not just say “your
sins are forgiven”. Jesus said something else, too. He said, “Your
faith has saved you. Go in peace”.
Sometimes we hear a phrase like “go
in peace” the way we hear “have a nice day”. It’s just something people
say, without really thinking about it. But when Jesus said, “go in
peace”, I don’t think it was just something to say. I think Jesus meant
every word of it. And I think Jesus’ words have power. When Jesus
said “go in peace”, I think this woman actually felt a sense of peace.
And that, really, is one of the
greatest gifts we get from our faith in Jesus. The greatest gift of all,
of course, is salvation and eternal life. But while we’re on earth, one
of the greatest gifts we get from our faith in Jesus is to feel a sense of
peace. And we can feel that peace no matter what our circumstances are.
As I said, meeting Jesus did not
magically solve this woman’s problems. But when Jesus said “go in peace”,
she really did. She went in peace. She now knew that, no matter
what her problems were, she was not alone. She knew that the Lord was
with her. She knew that the Lord would always be with her, no matter what
happened. And she knew, because of that, that she could handle whatever
might happen to her.
This life on earth gives us many
reasons to weep. We don’t always understand why. But when we’re
overpowered by grief and sorrow, we need to do what this woman did. We
need to go to Jesus. And if we need to weep, it’s okay. Because
Jesus will see the beauty in our weeping. And Jesus will offer us
forgiveness and salvation.
And Jesus will tell us to go in peace.
That won’t solve our problems. But we’ll know we’re not alone.
We’ll know the Lord is with her and always will be, no matter what
happens. And we’ll know, because of that, that we can handle whatever
might happen to us
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