4 Restore our fortunes, Lord, like streams in the Negev.
5 Those who sow with tears will reap with songs of joy.
6 Those who go out weeping, carrying seed to sow,
will return with songs of joy, carrying sheaves with them. Psalm 126:4-6

In this life you’ll find three types of people:

(1) those who shed tears at weddings, funerals, births, anniversaries, parties, good news, bad news, and world events;

(2) those who have to be in great pain to cry even a bit (and even then when the door is closed and someone won’t be home for two weeks).

(3) Lastly, there is a third group of people that falls somewhere in the middle of those two extremes.

Based on what we read and hear everyday in the news, it’s a wonder all of us aren’t crying our eyes out at the blatant sin and degradation that so permeates our culture and headlines. Much of the cultural degradation is flaunted as “progress” but it’s anything far from it. Unfortunately, because there’s so much of it, it’s easy to become hardened to what is happening all around us.

In the mid-80s the Christian band Petra wrote a song that summarizes the problem and offers a solution:

Don’t let your heart be hardened.
Don’t let your love grow cold.

May it always stay so childlike.
May it never grow too old.

Don’t let your heart be hardened.
May you always know the cure.

Keep it broken before Jesus.
Keep it thankful, meek, and pure.

It’s quite easy to become hardened like person #2 in the introduction. Having a tender heart doesn’t at all mean being weak or cowardly. It just means we can be human again.

“Keep it broken before Jesus.
Keep it thankful, meek, and pure.”