Joy in the Morning -- 2/15/09

Sunday, February 15, 2009

JOY COMES IN THE MORNING
Psalm 30:5

About a year and a half ago I preached a sermon entitled “Weeping for a Night.” It was based on the words found in Ps. 30:5, “Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.” In that sermon, I tried to awaken us to the need for weeping. Jeremiah cried out, “Oh that my head were waters, and mine eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people!” (Jer. 9:1). Our Lord Jesus wept over Jerusalem. Surely the lack of weeping explains much of the powerlessness we experience today.

This morning we must explore the other side of that verse. Yes, there is a great need for weeping, but I want to talk to you about the joy that comes in the morning. Yes, I know that we are studying Genesis. I committed myself to preaching on Genesis each Sunday morning until we finished. But ultimately surrender to the Lord must trump any and all man’s commitments. Yes, Lord willing, we will continue to Genesis, but not this morning. Today we must discover more of that joy that comes in the morning.

Why? I’m not sure I can fully answer that, but I am deeply convicted that this is where the Lord wants us this morning. I cheated a little bit and read ahead in our devotional booklet, noticing that yesterday’s thoughts are about rejoicing in the Lord. I also had a conversation with someone this week where this theme surfaced. Then I had the privilege of preaching the funeral for Paul McAfee on Thursday. It was my privilege to focus on John 14:3, “And if I go to prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you unto myself, that where I am, there ye may be also.” We talked about Jesus’ presence being the glory of heaven. We also talked about the fact that many (not a few, but many) will hear Jesus say in the last day, “I never knew you; depart from me, ye that work iniquity” (Matt. 7:23). Even as I talked about that ultimate tragedy, my heart was full of joy. What joy there was in finding at least a few who knew great joy in our Lord.

“Weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning.” Yes, we find it in our own experience. What weeping we experienced before the light dawned and we were reconciled to God. We experienced that godly sorrow that leads to repentance. If you didn’t experience that godly sorrow that leads to repentance, you have reason to question whether you are truly in Christ. Don’t misunderstand. I’m not talking about some emotional experience. The key isn’t outward tears, but inward sorrow that comes with the conviction of sin stirred by the Holy Spirit.

Yes, we have experienced the weeping that comes with difficult times in our own lives, when it seemed that God was far away. * Though we may not have been fully conscious of it, it was indeed a night of weeping. But then, because of the faithfulness and mercy of our Lord, joy came in the morning. Praise God!

I had been thinking about Ps. 30:5 all week, but I didn’t get a chance to actually sort out my thoughts and begin to write some things down until Friday morning. Actually, it was early Friday morning. I was in my office at 2:00. I was at this point in my thinking, when I noticed that I had an email. It was from a young man for whom I was greatly concerned and over whom I had wept. In his email, that young man shared how God was working in his life and how he had a renewed longing to know Him. For me, joy came in the morning, in the wee hours of the morning. That’s why these days I’m singing, “Before the rising of the sun til the going down of the same, the name of the Lord is to be praised!” I’m not changing the scripture; I’m just applying it to my life. Surely the reason the Psalmist wrote, “From the rising of the sun unto the going down of the same” was because that represented the primary waking hours of a person. Because they didn’t have electric lights, they made the most of the hours of sunlight. Those were the principal waking hours of the day, and the Lord’s name was to be praised during those waking hours. But if you wake before the rising of the sun, the Lord’s name is to be praised then too!

I. A Darker Night

Now please listen carefully to me. It is certainly true that we can recall plenty of times when we wept for a night and joy came in the morning. Sometimes that night was brief; sometimes it was longer. Perhaps you are going through a night of weeping even now. Know that if you belong to Him, the Lord will bring joy in the morning. Praise God for His faithfulness.

Nevertheless, that is not the main thing I want to talk with you about this morning. I want to remind you of a much darker night than anything you have ever experienced. It occurred some 2,000 years ago and it began in a garden on the edge of Jerusalem. The primary character was Jesus of Nazareth. He had lived on this earth for some 33 years, but He had lived forever and ever. (John 1:1-5,14)
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2. The same was in the beginning with God. 3. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. 4. In him was life; and the life was the light of men. 5. And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not… 14. And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.

Phil 2:5-7… "Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: 6. Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: 7. But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men…

For those 33 years Jesus lived a life that pleased His Father in every respect. “And ye know that he was manifested to take away our sin; and in him was no sin” (I Jn. 3:5). His whole life was wrapped up in pleasing His heavenly Father. He could say, “My meat is to do the will of him that sent me and to finish his work” (John 4:34). Though men tried to make life miserable for Him, He continued to obey His Father and to love even the most despised of society.

There He was in the Garden of Gethsemane. Earlier that evening, Jesus had arranged for Him and His disciples to share the Passover meal together. It was there that He stooped down and washed their feet, even the feet of Judas Iscariot, who would betray Him. He then announced that one of those twelve would betray Him. When they asked who it might be, He told them it was the one to whom He would give the sop, when He had dipped it. Then He gave it to Judas. At that point Satan entered into Judas. We read in John 13:30, "He then having received the sop went immediately out: and it was night." Don’t miss those words – “and it was night.” Not only was this a physical phenomenon, but it was also a spiritual reality. The diabolical plan of Satan himself had been put into action. There was no turning back, a fact confirmed by Jesus’ words to Judas, “What you do, do quickly” (John 13:37).

II. The Prayer and the Cup

It was there in the Garden that Jesus prayed. What a sacred hour it was. Jesus left all His apostles, asking them to pray while He went on a little farther. He did take three of them with Him – Peter, James, and John. After walking a short distance, He then said to those three: “My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death; tarry ye here, and watch with me. And he went a little farther, and fell on his face, and prayed, saying, O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt" (Matt. 26:38-39). Weigh those words carefully. “My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death.” Remember that this is the Son of God. This is the One who had known all the glories of heaven. He was there at the creation and all things were made through Him. Forever and ever He had enjoyed the love and fellowship of His Father. No man on this earth can fully comprehend what that glory was like. But now His sorrow is so deep and crushing that He says it is unto death. How could the very Son of God be so burdened? How could it be possible? How could the Light of the world descend into such a deep shadow of night?

Now His prayer: “Oh my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me…” Now I ask you to remember an earlier scene. Jesus’ good friend Lazarus was lying in a tomb, where he had been for four days. Jesus had arrived at the tomb, accompanied by Mary and Martha and others who were mourning with them. Jesus told them to roll the stone away from the tomb’s entrance, and then He spoke these words: “Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me.
And I knew that thou hearest me always: but because of the people which stand by I said it, that they may believe that thou hast sent me” (John 11:41-42). Jesus thanked His Father that He always heard Him. When Jesus used those words “hear me,” He is saying more than the fact that His Father heard the audible sounds from His lips. Jesus is saying that the Father always answered His prayers. And then He immediately proved it by saying, “Lazarus, come forth.” Now one and all would find out whether or not the Father always answered His prayers, because He had just commanded a man who had been dead for four days to stand up and walk out of that tomb. Listen to me. We’re not talking about some fairy tale. Jesus of Nazareth commanded a dead man, having assured everyone present that His Father would bring it to pass. You know what happened – Lazarus came out of that tomb, grave clothes and all.

This is the Jesus who prayed, “O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me…” But what was the cup? A cup is something from which you drink. Symbolically, it speaks of something a person experiences fully. For example, we read in Ps. 116:13, "I will take the cup of salvation, and call upon the name of the LORD." Or Ps. 11:6, "Upon the wicked he shall rain snares, fire and brimstone, and an horrible tempest: this shall be the portion of their cup." In other words, this is what they will experience. Jesus was speaking of some experience that He dreaded in the worst way. There was something He wanted to avoid. What was it? It was the cross.

Yes, it was the cross, but that doesn’t fully answer our question. What was it about the cross that Jesus dreaded? Was it the nails that they would drive into His hands and feet? Was it the crown of thorns they would place upon His head? Was it the beating they would give Him before they hung Him there? Was it the terrible insults that would be hurled upon Him by those who watched? Was it the agony He would experience, as He pushed His body up against those nails again and again in order to get enough air to breathe? Was it the shame and humiliation that came with being looked upon as a common criminal?

We certainly wouldn’t want to minimize any of those, but all of them put together cannot begin to fill the cup of which Jesus spoke. Bear in mind that other men have suffered all those things. Jesus’ followers have been drowned in rivers, burned at the stake, beaten to death, and killed in dozens of other ways. They have endured excruciating torture in the midst of shame and humiliation. Surely Jesus wasn’t pleading to avoid what His own followers would have to endure. No, the cup of which Jesus spoke was unique to Him. No one else had ever been asked to drink this cup, nor would anyone ever be asked such in the future. So what was the cup? It was none other than the wrath of God. God’s wrath is His settled disposition against sin. The Father hates sin. He has zero tolerance for sin. No sin can be admitted into His presence. But now the Son, who knew no sin, was being asked to become sin for us (II Cor. 5:21). “All we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned everyone to his own way, and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all” (Is. 53:6). When we read Is. 53:10, we begin to capture the idea of what Jesus was facing: “Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise (crush) him…” The Father was pleased to crush His Son Jesus on that cross. Why? To fulfill the eternal plan for the redemption of His own and the glory of His Son.

Remember what Jesus said from the cross: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matt. 27:46). There was no more fellowship because our sins were upon Jesus. Our sins separated between Him and His God, His Father (Is. 59:2). And what happened when the Father was cut off from the Son? In the previous verse we read these words: “Now from the sixth hour there was darkness over all the land unto the ninth hour” (27:45). For three hours Jesus endured hell, in the sense that He was separated from the Father with whom He had been intimate for thousands and millions and billions of years. Though it was only three hours, that was the longest night in all eternity.

III. The Anticipated Joy

How could Jesus do it? We begin to see the reason there in the Garden. “O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt” (Matt. 26:39). Jesus dreaded that cup; He shied away from it; He pleaded with the Father that He might not have to drink it… but finally He said, “Father, not what I want, but what you want.” Remember that His meat was to do the will of Him that sent Him and to finish His work, and that is exactly what He did. Though He would do almost anything to avoid it, the one thing He would not do was to compromise the will of the Father.

We find another aspect of His willingness to go to the cross, when we come to Heb. 12:2, "Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God." Jesus knew the words of Psalm 30:5, “Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.” But because of the joy set before Him, He endured the cross, counting the shame as nothing.

But what was this joy set before Him? John 17:4-5, "I have glorified thee on the earth: I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do. 5. And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was." No doubt, Jesus had in mind that glory which He had with the Father before coming to this earth, but that isn’t all. Let’s read from John 15:9-15…
As the Father hath loved me, so have I loved you: continue ye in my love. 10. If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father's commandments, and abide in his love. 11. These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full. 12. This is my commandment, That ye love one another, as I have loved you. 13. Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. 14. Ye are my friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you. 15. Henceforth I call you not servants; for the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth: but I have called you friends; for all things that I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you.

Notice verse 11, “These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full.” He is speaking about the love between Him and His Father and how that love is going to be a reality for His disciples. Earlier, in the first verses of this chapter, He speaks of them abiding in Him and He in them. Now Jesus announces that He is telling them these things in order that His joy might be in them and that the resulting joy might be full and complete. The joy set before Him can never be totally separated from the joy He would implant in those who would trust Him.

It is His joy to give us joy, but we must never forget for a moment how it was that He brought us this joy. It was through the cross. Jesus endured the darkest night that we might have joy in the morning. No matter how much sorrow and suffering we may endure, that will never bring joy. Joy comes as a result of the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. It isn’t the night that produces joy; it is the work of Him who endured the night of the cross.

Conclusion

So now let’s come back to where we started. How can we ever weep, if we have the joy that Christ brought through His death and resurrection? This is a joy that cannot be dampened by the deepest trials, as we read in I Pet. 1:3-9…
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, 4. To an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you, 5. Who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. 6. Wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations: 7. That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ: 8. Whom having not seen, ye love; in whom, though now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory: 9. Receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls.
It is a joy that is beyond expression and full of glory. Surely there is no more weeping for the child of God.

Do you see that this joy is deepest when understood against the background of Christ’s suffering? The joy that Christ gives is not some shallow happiness that is ours because life is nice and comfortable. Rather, it is a joy that was forged in the depths of Christ’s suffering and will sustain us through every trial of life. If we don’t glory in the cross of Jesus Christ, then we don’t understand this joy. It is this background of Christ’s suffering and death that brings joy to its fullness in His children.

In the same way, weeping will never have its full meaning in the life of the believer until it is set against the deep joy that is found in Christ. In other words, joy in Christ doesn’t do away with our weeping; it enables us to weep. That is why Paul can say, “Rejoice with them that do rejoice, and weep with them that weep” (Rom. 12:15). But I am commanded to rejoice in the Lord always. Understand that joy and weeping are not enemies; they are brothers. The more I rejoice in the Lord, the more effectively I will be able to weep with others. I will not be able to weep over the city with Jesus until I have drunk deeply of His joy.

I remind you that it was the Jesus who is the source of all joy who rebuked the Pharisees and scribes… Matt. 23:23-33 (NKJV)
23 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith. These you ought to have done, without leaving the others undone. 24 Blind guides, who strain out a gnat and swallow a camel! 25 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you cleanse the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of extortion and self-indulgence. 26 Blind Pharisee, first cleanse the inside of the cup and dish, that the outside of them may be clean also. 27 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs which indeed appear beautiful outwardly, but inside are full of dead men’s bones and all uncleanness. 28 Even so you also outwardly appear righteous to men, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness. 29 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! Because you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous, 30 and say, ‘If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.’ 31 “Therefore you are witnesses against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets. 32 Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers’ guilt. 33 Serpents, brood of vipers! How can you escape the condemnation of hell.

It is common for people in our world to think that joy is like ice cream, always soft and fluffy and immediately tasty. Therefore, the joyful person must always be positive and upbeat. That reveals a misunderstanding of the joy of Christ. Jesus, the source of joy, was a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. He spoke far more about hell than He did about heaven. In the last day He will say to many, “I never knew you; depart from me, ye that work iniquity” (Matt. 7:23). The apostle Paul could thunder about the wrath of God in Romans 2 and then say in Rom. 5:11, "And not only so, but we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the atonement."

As we met together to pray Friday morning, one of my brothers shared from II and III John. He noted there an emphasis both on God’s love and God’s truth. They are not mutually exclusive. As they were perfectly united in Jesus, so they will be in us who follow Him. It is the same with joy. As love does not exclude truth, neither does joy exclude weeping. It is the fullness of joy that leads us to weep for those who are without eternal joy. Amos sharply rebuked those who lived a life of luxury, boasting of a false joy, because they did not weep over the affliction of Joseph. They cared nothing that God’s people were being deceived and led astray by wicked religious leaders. They were empty of true joy, and they were unable to weep over the eternal issues of the soul.

No one can weep like the person who is full of the Lord’s joy. So it was with Jesus; so it was with Paul. The man who said, “Rejoice in the Lord always” was the person who could cry out in Rom. 9:1-3...
I say the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost, 2. That I have great heaviness and continual sorrow in my heart. 3. For I could wish that myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh:

Praise God for the joy we have in His Son. Praise Him just as much that we have the privilege of weeping over the things that grieve His heart.