Finding My Tears Again
By Carolyn Boin
As I begin this article, let me first confess that I have carried the pride of – so to speak – “emotional stability”. I have scoffed at people under the age of 30 that, to my perception, seemed to not yet arrive at the place of inner security, and most importantly, life and emotional stability. I look at most 20-year-olds and proudly tell them that entering into your 30s is glorious and peaceful, unlike the turbulent phase of their insecure youthful days.
Yet, as a woman in my 30s, I realized that I have lost the gift of tears.
The Father who created me calls it for what it is: an impairment; a disability.
As I tried to trace back my steps to figure out how I lost it, I found that, due to my past failure in guarding my heart, I have allowed the voices of other people to tell me that I was too emotional and weak, and that to be accepted as strong and worthy, I needed to put my big girl pants on, suck it up, and do the hard things. Perhaps, mentally, I have vowed to never be an emotional person again, and my spirit took it to heart.
I thought of myself in the past – the 25-year-old Carolyn – who wept in her room at night because she felt lonely. I thought of her who cried because someone was unjust towards her. I thought of her who teared up because she was angry and frustrated.
This 32-year-old Carolyn doesn't do that anymore. Her emotions are often stuck in her chest, and she couldn't find the key to unlock it. The internal pain felt like the pounding of raging waves in her chest, wounding her within. If only she could let it out. The tears that she had despised so much in the past seemed like a wonderful gift now. Only, she had lost it somewhere along her journey in life.
The Father who created me calls it for what it is: an impairment; a disability. While the world lies to me and tells me that strength is displayed in grit and emotional toughness, He tells me that I have missed the mark. I am nothing like His Son.
"Jesus wept,"
as it says in the shortest verse in the Bible. And He was not ashamed of it. In fact, He lived true to His title: the Man of Sorrows.
He taught that mourning is a blessedness; the only route to true comfort. He never apologized for offending the masses by declaring the Beatitudes, because He would be the honest embodiment of His own proclamation. He became poor, He mourned, He was meek, He was hungry and thirsty, He was persecuted. And in this, He, too, became our mercy, our pure and spotless Lamb, and our great peacemaker.
The Bible is a book flooded with emotions. It records real and emotional human interactions with the Godhead. It varies from the loud and boisterous complaints of Elijah to the unutterable prayers of Hannah who couldn’t say anything beyond deep gasps of sorrow at the temple. These saints had one thing in common: they embraced their genuine emotions and poured it all to no one else but God, and God answered their prayers.
That made me think: is the reason why I haven’t received breakthroughs in my prayers due to my inability to be genuine before the Lord? When I petition for my personal needs, am I real before the Lord in how much it pains me to not receive it yet? When I pray for my nation, am I trying to hide my anger at injustice as to appear more dignified before the Lord? When I pray for the suffering, am I honest before Him about how frustrated I am at my helplessness?
These saints had one thing in common: they embraced their genuine emotions and poured it all to no one else but God, and God answered their prayers.
The Lord is close to the brokenhearted, but all that I have done is push Him away by attempting to be okay when I am not. I have said before that many lack intimacy with Jesus because they refuse to suffer with Him. To add nuance to that: many also lack intimacy with Jesus because they refuse to let Him suffer with them.
I’ll be the first one to admit that I am most guilty of it.
I am still asking God to heal me of my impairment; for Him to unlock the gift of tears in me. For the past week or so, I have received minor breakthroughs in it when I was reminded of trauma from the past, cried with a friend and I said, “I’m sad. I really am.” It was then that I felt healing flowing into my broken heart. In searching for my tears, the Lord had put me in a safe place with people who tells me, with great love, those four words that all wounded hearts long to hear: just let it out.
I think of many like me out there, within and without the church, who have this impairment; who might not have loving family or friends to tell them those words. Perhaps, they instead hear words such as “suck it up” and “you’re too emotional”, therefore causing them to recluse and harden their hearts even more. So many people have been hindered from nearness with God because of these wounds. My heart goes out to those who have received this abuse by others, and I pray that they find safe places to just let it out.
In searching for my tears, the Lord had put me in a safe place with people who tells me, with great love, those four words that all wounded hearts long to hear: just let it out.
May we all be that safe place for the brokenhearted. May we be like God Himself, not despising tears, but treasures them in a bottle. May we embrace weeping unashamedly, while waiting expectantly for the day when every tear will be wiped away.
“Sorrow is better than laughter,
for by sadness of face the heart is made glad.”
- Ecclesiastes 7:3.