Tears Are Seeds of Hope
This sermon, based on Psalm 126, portrays tears as "seeds of hope." It suggests that mourning acknowledges the world's imperfections and expresses a desire for divine intervention. These tears are not merely sadness but also point towards God's promise of restoration through Jesus Christ. The sermon emphasizes God's promise to rectify all things, transforming desolate places into flourishing gardens. It encourages listeners to find hope in God's promises and to have faith in His plan for a renewed world.
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
Psalm 126 is a short, poignant, and beautiful psalm that gives us hope. It's a psalm of ascents, which some scholars believe were sung by people on their way up to the Jerusalem temple as part of their worship liturgy. This psalm teaches us about having a worshipful life. Verse 5 provides a beautiful image of the Christian life: "Those who sow in tears shall reap with shouts of joy." Tears are seeds of hope.
It might seem odd that mourning or sowing tears is considered worshipful. Tears acknowledge that the world is not as it should be. We know this instinctively, like when attending the funeral of a loved one, when our bodies are sick, or when we see brokenness around us. There is cause for tears everywhere: poverty, wastefulness, corrupt governments, wars, a society indifferent to God, broken family relationships, personal struggles like anger, loss of loved ones, infertility, physical ailments, and our own sin.
Tears acknowledge that our world, our lives, and ourselves are not as they should be. The psalm uses the imagery of the Negeb, a dry, arid wasteland south of Israel where life couldn't thrive. Our world can sometimes feel like this wasteland, not sustaining life as God intended. Everything eventually dies because nothing is as it should be, which is cause for mourning. This feeling is often compounded because there's so little we can change about our lives or the world's problems. We can't stop death or sin on our own.
Therefore, mourning and sowing tears are acts of worship. If we don't mourn the state of the world, we deny God's design for it. Crying about the brokenness of God's creation is appropriate. Not mourning can be a form of indulgence, accepting the world as "good enough," which scripture refers to as giving in to the flesh. Instead, mourning cultivates the ground for the seed of hope.
What makes tears seeds of hope? It's the hope embedded in God's promises. Tears point to what needs God's restoration, yearn for His intervention, and depend on His work in Christ. God plans on fixing the things that cause our tears through Jesus. That's why tears are seeds of hope: we can't fix these things, but God promises to make all things right through Jesus.
Jesus Christ is the ultimate seed, sown in death and raised by God to eternal, resurrection life – unlike Lazarus, who died again. The God who raised Jesus can bring streams to the Negeb, turning wasteland into a flourishing garden. We sow tears because we're unsatisfied with this life, because death robs us, and because we are sinners. We sow tears believing God promises a better world.
Through our tears, we sow our souls in the gospel, trusting that God's word, baptism, and Jesus' body and blood will grow us into something beautiful. Sowing our souls in the gospel is our only hope, as only Jesus can change us. This act of sowing tears and souls in the gospel is called worship. The Israelites likely thought this as they sang this psalm ascending to the temple: mourning this world and placing hope only in God's promises. Worship involves remembering God's past acts and trusting His future promises. If God raised Jesus, He will raise us.
The harvest we anticipate is the same resurrection life Jesus now has. He rose as the new Adam to immortal human life, bringing divinity into our humanity. We too will rise to human life like His. Psalm 126:1-2 describes this future: "When the Lord restored the fortunes of Zion, we were like those who dream. Then our mouth was filled with laughter and our tongue with shouts of joy...The Lord has done great things for them."
Life will be so good it will feel like a dream come true, yet it will be real – more real than this current life, which is merely a shadow. C.S. Lewis compared this life to reading only the cover and copyright page of a book, or the false start of a race. St. Augustine noted that if seeing each other in mortal flesh brings joy, imagine the joy of seeing each other where there is no fear. When we know loved ones in their perfected state in the next life, our joy will be immense.
What is coming is more real than what we live now. This life is the seed; the flower is coming. In that life, laughter will be pure, not cynical or sad. Even those suffering most now will have real joy. Our tears are seeds of hope. What we mourn will be restored: the dead raised, sins forgiven, the world made new.
So, in this life, sow your tears, because Christ is bringing the harvest. In Jesus' name.