The Bread of Tears: Refusing to be Comforted
The Bread of Tears: Refusing to be Comforted.
“Those who sow their tears as seeds will reap a harvest with joyful shouts of glee. They may weep as they go out carrying their seed to sow, but they will return with joyful laughter and shouting with gladness as they bring back armloads of blessing and a harvest overflowing!” (Psalm 126:5-6, TPT).
Holy Stubbornness. We often see a holy stubbornness in followers of God in the Hebrew Bible. Unexpectedly, we even see some who “refuse to be comforted.” Normally, continuous mourning without end isn’t considered a healthy way to grieve the loss of a loved one. Jewish tradition has always maintained that the maximum time allotted for mourning is one year, because grieving beyond that time means the mourner is trying to be “more compassionate than God Himself.” But there were at least four biblical cases in which continuous grief seemed not only healthy but heroic. Sometimes faithful Jews have extended times of mourning for very good reasons, including father Jacob, mother Rachel, the Babylonian exiles, and the distraught psalmist. So let’s briefly explore these passages when faithful Jews refused to be comforted.
(1.) “All of Jacob’s sons and daughters got up to comfort him, but he refused to be comforted, telling them, “I’ll go to my grave mourning for my son.” And Joseph’s father wept for him.” (Genesis 37:35).
Not So Fast! Here we find the tragic scene when the eleven brothers of Joseph hatefully sold their youngest brother Joseph to some slave traders. They tried to escape accountability for their dastardly act by dipping Joseph’s multi-colored coat in blood and showing it to father Jacob as proof that Joseph had died by being torn apart by a wild beast in the wilderness. Jacob, though, seemed to have his doubts about this wild story. He was no man’s fool, so he probably wondered to himself… if a wild animal tore Joseph apart, then why isn’t his coat torn to shreds as well? And why wouldn’t these sons of mine at least bring me some physical evidence, like Joseph’s body or even pieces of body? Besides that, Jacob is thinking, I know you all have hated Joseph and been deeply jealous of him since the day he was born, so this whole thing sounds a little too convenient! Jacob had to dismiss any official charges against his sons, because he couldn’t prove anything one way or the other. But father Jacob never gave up hope that his son Joseph was somehow, somewhere, alive. Jacob refuses to be comforted, because he wasn’t convinced that Joseph was dead, and he simply would not be convinced of this sordid story until he had some type of irrefutable proof of Joseph’s death. Jacob exclaimed that he would stubbornly continue to mourn for Joseph until his dying day if that’s what it takes. As we realize much later in the story, Jacob’s stubbornness proved valid as Joseph was discovered to be alive and well in Egypt, and was responsible for the survival of Jacob’s family, and therefore the entire Jewish line, leading right up to Jesus Messiah.
(2.) “A voice was heard in Ramah, sobbing and lamenting loudly. It was Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted, because they are no longer alive.” (Matthew 2:18; Jeremiah 31:15-17).
The Mother of Israel. The biblical story of Rachel reads like a romantic tragedy. She was the younger sister of Leah who thus had the duty of being the shepherdess out in the fields. She must have been hardworking, responsible and resourceful in her important role in the family business. Jacob wanted to marry Rachel, of course. She was noted as being particularly beautiful, according to Scripture. In this way Rachel was like her other matriarchs before her, Sarah and Rebekah, both of them noted for their beauty as well. Rabbinic tradition holds that Rachel went fourteen years childless. Finally, Rachel gave birth to a biblical hero, Joseph, which means, “May He Add.” Rachel’s first words after this first birth was, “God has taken away my disgrace.” And now the tragedy… Rachel became pregnant again, but she died in childbirth at the young age of 40. Through Rachel’s son Joseph and his son Ephraim, Rachel became known as the “mother” of Israel, the northern kingdom. Her grandson Ephraim, along with Manassa, were the two tribes that settled in the north, apart from Judah in the south. In Jeremiah 31:15-17, Rachel is pictured by the Lord to be weeping in her grave for the exiled children of Israel, destroyed by the Assyrians almost 150 years earlier. In her grief, the motherly heart of Rachel “refused to be comforted.” Rachel is symbolic of all the distraught mothers of Israel who mourn their children taken captive. Her weeping was considered by Jeremiah to be intercession, and her “liquid prayers” were answered by the Lord, “Stop your weeping, and dry your eyes. for your grief work will be rewarded. They will return from the enemy’s land. There is hope for your future. Your children will return to their own territory.” Her weeping for suffering children, and her being buried in Bethlehem, was prophetic and was quoted in Matthew 2:18, after the “slaughter of the innocents,” the horrific massacre of all the babies in Bethlehem by the insane king Herod as he tried to quell his fears about the new king born in Bethlehem. Rachel is embraced in Scripture as having the ultimate heart of the mother, and Jeremiah brought her compassion for children to the forefront in his prophecy. The slaughtered babies in Bethlehem became known as the Holy Innocents, and Rachel continues to be pictured as weeping from her grave for suffering children everywhere. To this day and since ancient times, Rachel’s tomb on the outskirts of Bethlehem is considered a vital holy site in Judaism, its 3rd holiest site, and continues to be visited daily by Jewish mothers who mourn for their children who have died.
BRING US BACK (Joshua Aaron) // LIVE at the TOWER of DAVID, Jerusalem // David’s Citadel – YouTube
(3.) “By the rivers of Babylon, where we sat down, and there we wept when we remembered Zion. We hung up our harps on the willow trees. And our captors tormented us, saying, ‘Make music for us and sing your Zion songs!’ But how could we sing the songs of the Lord in this strange and foreign land? May my right hand weaken and never make music again if I ever forget you, O Jerusalem! May my tongue be incapable of ever singing again if I fail to honor Jerusalem above my highest joy?” (Psalm 137).
By the Waters of Babylon – Great Compline 3/6/2014
This famous psalm of lament was composed in the aftermath of the Babylonian exile of 586 BC and the subsequent return to the homeland 70 years later. This psalm was a remembrance of that tragic event when God allowed the Babylonian military to descend upon Jerusalem, laying a siege round it. They surrounded the capital city and had a stranglehold on everything in Jerusalem… no food, no transportation, no military help. After the siege rendered Israel helpless, the Babylonians destroyed all the homes of the Israelites, tore down and desecrated their beloved Temple, and carried away all the valuable, sacred articles used in the worship of the Lord. Finally, they forcefully carried most everyone off to Babylon in exile. This was God’s severe punishment after generations of rebellion, unfaithfulness and idolatry. It’s no wonder the exiles were weeping with grief when they reached Babylon and refused to sing their sacred songs from Temple worship. After all, look what was taken from them… their freedom, their homes and livelihoods, their ancestral land as the Chosen People, their loved ones who had died in the invasion, and their historical and religious identity contained in the Temple which contained the very presence of their God. Naturally they mourned, not only for their profound loss of everything dear to them, but also they grieved in shame, because they realized they had brought all this calamity upon themselves. They had no one to blame but themselves. So there they were, on the banks of the Euphrates River, guilty and helpless, and desperately homesick. They refused to sing their sacred songs for their mocking captors, and they refused to be comforted in their misery.
Stubborn Hopefulness. Rabbi Jonathan Sacks writes: “The Jews are the people who refused to be comforted because they never gave up hope. Jacob did eventually see Joseph again. Rachel’s children did return to the land. Jerusalem is once again the Jewish home. All the evidence may suggest otherwise: it may seem to signify irretrievable loss, a decree of history that cannot be overturned, a fate that must be accepted. Jews never believed the evidence because they had something else to set against it – a faith, a trust, an unbreakable hope that proved stronger than historical inevitability. It is not too much to say that Jewish survival was sustained in that hope. Where did it come from? From a simple — or perhaps not so simple — phrase in the life of Jacob. He refused to be comforted. And, while we live in a world still scarred by violence, poverty and injustice, so must we.” (Jonathon Sacks, “Refusing Comfort, Keeping Hope,” Covenant and Conversation).
(4.) “My voice to God – Let me cry out in distress; Yes, I shout, and He hears me. In the day of my distress, I sought the Master. My eye flows at night, it will not stop. All night long I prayed, with my hands lifted toward heaven. I refuse to be comforted. I remember God; I become distraught as I moan and sigh. When I ponder in prayer, my spirit faints. You hold my eyelids open; I am too distraught to speak, troubled beyond words” (Psalm 77:1-4).
From Anguished Questioning to Hopeful Remembering. This song was evidently composed by Asaph, one of David’s official chief musicians assigned for Temple worship. It appears to be a personal anguish that was composed so that it could become shared as a more communal lament when appropriate. Some have said that this psalm is reflecting the agonies of someone who is too distraught to fall asleep. Others have claimed that these are the words of someone who intends to pray and meditate, and is fighting sleep in order to do so. So this psalm might be a picture of a believer who is struggling to stay awake because he desperately wants to ponder things spiritual. The writer of the song doesn’t explain the occasion or the reason for his anguish. His distress causes him to honestly and openly ask questions that are part of the human condition in a fallen world. Notice he knows Who to ask, that he is approaching the right Person with his difficult doubts. “Will the Master forever abandon me? Will He never again look with favor? Is His kingdom gone for all time, His word done for time without end? Has God forgotten to show grace, has He closed off His compassion in anger?” (vs. 7-9). If we are being totally honest, questions like these can be spoken or unspoken deep in our heart during our own moments of anguish. For it’s obvious that, this side of the Pearly Gates, God is not necessarily in the business of protecting believers from suffering, or solving all our problems, or making our lives easier. There are no guarantees, no matter how hard we pray or how deeply we trust Him. However, we all have been graciously given glimpses of God at work in our lives, and it is to those times that we need to turn when our doubts assail us. We can remember God’s faithfulness and “withness,” His presence. Emmanuel, God is with us, and to that He is eternally committed. And this is what the psalmist succeeds in doing… He recalled God’s wonders, he pondered His miracles in the past when He proved His love and presence. “I call to mind the acts of God, when I recall your wonders of old. I recite all your works and meditate on them; Your acts I rehearse as I consider Your mighty deeds.” (vs. 11-12). In his anguish, Asaph drew confidence and faith through the discipline of remembrance. In this case, he recalls the Red Sea miracle of deliverance for his people, and he chose to creatively meditate on the Exodus and how God demonstrated His power. And, the psalmist concludes, if He was able to perform a miracle of that magnitude in the past, He certainly can do it again. He refused to be comforted in his distress because he knew in his heart that it would be foolish to give up hope in a miraculous God. From anguish, to doubt, to confidence, to thoughts like this… “Your way is in holiness. There is no greater god than Elohim, my God. For you are a God who does wonders; You have demonstrated your power among the peoples.” (vs. 13-14).