“For everything there is a season, and a time for every purpose under heaven.” Ecclesiastes 3:1
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A solitary tear fell large, but with no commotion. It was bathed in the spillover light from the stage as it rolled slowly down the father’s cheek to be followed by others, one at a time, in their own quiet procession. The stage was filled with musicians and singers leading us in Sunday morning worship while these tears found their quiet release.
These tears caught my eye because they were unabashed. They were unaccompanied by the customary quick hiding wipe away generally seen when a man is shedding tears. For me, it was as though a spotlight was on these tears instead of the gentle stage spill over light. These tears had a story to tell and like all great stories God writes into the lives of His faithful, it seems there are always tears.
As I watched them, I stood in quiet amazement that I was 38 years old and this was the first time I had ever seen a grown man cry without wiping away his tears.
This man allowed his tears to travel their path, seemingly savoring this moment and all that had brought him to this point. There was no shame in these tears; they were offered in praise to His God. Perhaps each one was symbolic of prayers that had brought him to this point today?
These tears were spilled forth from a heart that was free to stand before God ‘Just As I Am’ and be found acceptable in His sight. No jumping through hoops to meet an unreachable standard. He bids us come and then lavishes a love, that when fully realized, leaves His children speechless and often in tears.
What a transformational spot to be in! Wiping these tears away it seemed would discount what was so precious and he was unwilling to rid himself of even the smallest piece of this moment.
I watched this father worshipping his God and beaming with joy at his adult daughter, now a mother herself, as she helped to lead him in worship. The devoted intensity in his gaze was nothing short of incredible. These tears seemed to be a reckoning.
These tears were what I imagined the prodigal son’s father shed as he ran to meet his son. These tears seemed to symbolize a man coming face to face with his God. How had he arrived at this next level of discovering the next level in his walk with his God? His daughter had helped to point out the path where this encounter would be found.
This daughter who he walked through the rebellious teen years with…whose head strong ways drove him to his knees on a regular basis… who challenged and rebelled against the legalistic approach to God that was all he had ever known… this daughter who wanted nothing to do with a small God whose chief ambition was to disciple rule followers….this was the daughter now leading him in worship.
How he beamed with love! I was taken aback to see such radiance from a father. In fact, I’m not sure that I’ll ever forget the expression on this father’s face. Bursting in my mind was the proclamation, ‘if this is how a human father can love---just imagine how much greater My love is Jennifer. Just imagine how I dance for joy when one who was lost hears My still small voice and comes. I celebrate My children and I love them aboundingly, wastefully and extravagantly!”
This moment spoke to me because personally I was just getting settled in the realization that my role was to disciple my boys to know our God, but that the decision to follow Him would be theirs alone. I hated that I had to let go of control of this and yet felt God was calling me to take the great gamble as He had done with each one of us. (“Gamblin’ Time”—Trust, Oct 2010 blog)
So of course one of my largest fears is that any of my boys would walk away from God with a ‘who needs Him’ attitude. At times, this feels a heavy burden of worry to carry. Yet today, God placed before me a man who quite probably shared the same fear, walked the journey with a daughter who questioned her own need of God and came out of all that questioning with a realization that He was to be her all in all.
She emerged from this rebellion not hardened against God or even indifferent, but to find Him in a love relationship that would rock her world. She would no longer see Him as the great small task master but the lover of her soul who longed to shape her more into His image daily as they shared this life.
The journey to get to this point was full of many roads that I’m sure both father and daughter wish they had not walked down. Perhaps this is what gave me the most hope. It encouraged me to see that regardless of how strained a relationship may be, how indifferent or in opposition to God a child may be, that there is always hope that God’s still small voice may break through those walls of defiance and apathy and shatter them to reveal Himself. Likely the shattering will not take the channels a parent would prefer or choose, but our Father God knows the paths that lead to Him and we can take confidence in that! Our Father God is in the business of redeeming His children, at all costs!
May your tears tell a story that points others to knowing the extravagant depths of our God!
