Day 10: “No Time for Tears”

Day 10:

Faith in the Midst of a Pandemic
A series of daily reflections for people of faith
by Rev. Robert Bayley, Interim Pastor
WEEK TWO: TUESDAY 24 MARCH 2020
“No Time for Tears”

“There are so many patients there is no time for tears.” - Doctor in northern Italy on the overcrowded hospital conditions there.

They called it “Nunahi-Duna-Dlo-Hilu-I” in a language my grandfather spoke and in which my ancestors worshipped as Christians. “The Trail of Tears” in English, it marked the forced removal of 15,000 Cherokee walking from the southeastern part of the country to Oklahoma, a trail along which some 4,000 of them died, a trail they walked while singing Christian hymns. White settlers recorded hearing not only their singing but their crying. It was a time for tears.

When the wise men did not report back to Herod that they had found the newborn king, he ordered the slaughter of all baby boys two years old and under, fulfilling a prophecy in Jeremiah recorded in the nativity narratives in Matthew’s gospel:  “A voice is heard in Ramah, weeping and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted, because they are no more.” Matthew 2:18. It was a time for tears.

Both of these historical incidents involve the loss of loved ones and a time for tears. But what must it be like this very day to be a health care professional in an overcrowded hospital full of sick and dying people? Is it possible to be so overwhelmed with grief that one can be beyond tears? It involves a numbing of emotions in order to be able to function.

God’s Word reminds us in verses often read at memorial services, that “There is a time for everything…a time to weep…” Ecclesiastes 3:1,3. As we travel on what is at times a surreal journey there will be times of ‘no time for tears’ as well as “…a time to weep…” May the Lord who created us and gave us the gift of tears enable us to discern which times are which, and to learn from those times when we weep that all tears are temporary. For there is coming a time…  

Reflective scripture: Revelation 21:1-4:“Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed  away,… I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God,…And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Now the dwelling of God is with people, and he will live with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes.”  

Reflective hymn: My Savior First of All (#768)

Thro’ the gates to the city in a robe of spotless white, 

He will lead where no tears will ever fall;

In the glad song of ages I will mingle with delight, 

but I long to see my Savior first of all.

Reflective prayer: Write your own.

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