The Day They Were Told to Stop Crying

Picture a crowd of thousands standing in a city square. A man is reading aloud from a book, and they listen from early morning until lunchtime. Then the whole crowd starts to cry.

Now picture their leaders standing up and saying: Stop crying. Go home and have a feast.

That really happened, and it is in the Bible, the book Christians read as God's word. The leaders' reason is a famous line: "the joy of the LORD is your strength." People print it on mugs, usually to mean "stay cheerful." In its own place, it means something much better.

The story is told in the book of Nehemiah. It happens in Jerusalem, the Jewish people's capital city. Over a hundred years earlier, the empire of Babylon had burned the city and carried many of its people away. Later a new empire, Persia, let some of them go home. But the city walls still lay in ruins.

Nehemiah was a Jewish man who served the king of Persia his wine (Nehemiah 1:11). He got permission to go and rebuild the walls, and the people finished them in fifty-two days (Nehemiah 6:15).

Soon afterwards, everyone gathered in an open square to hear Ezra read. Ezra was a priest, someone who led worship, and a scribe, someone who copied and taught God's written law. That law was the instructions God gave his people through Moses, a leader from long before.

It was a special day on their calendar, set apart for rest and the blowing of trumpets (Nehemiah 8:2; Leviticus 23:24).

1. God's word showed them the truth, and it hurt

Ezra had helpers called Levites, men from the family line that served in God's worship. They explained the law to the crowd (Nehemiah 8:7).

They read from the book, from the Law of God, clearly, and they gave the sense, so that the people understood the reading.

Nehemiah 8:8

"Gave the sense" means they explained it. The goal was not just to hear the law but to understand it. And once the people understood, they reacted.

For all the people wept as they heard the words of the Law.

Nehemiah 8:9

The verse does not say exactly why. But later these same people admit the wrongs they and their families had done (Nehemiah 9:2). The law seems to have shown them how far they had drifted from God, like a test handed back covered in red marks.

It had happened before. Nearly two hundred years earlier, during repairs to the temple, the building where Israel worshipped God, the chief priest found an old copy of God's law. It was read to King Josiah (2 Kings 22:8-10).

When the king heard the words of the Book of the Law, he tore his clothes.

2 Kings 22:11

Tearing your clothes was how people then showed terrible sorrow. Josiah saw that his nation had ignored God's law for a long time (2 Kings 22:13). Different king, same result: God's word showed people the truth about themselves, and it hurt.

Paul, an early leader among Christians, the people who follow Jesus, explains what God's law does.

Through the law comes knowledge of sin.

Romans 3:20

Sin means doing wrong against God. Paul was writing to Christians in Rome. His point is that God's law works like a mirror. A mirror shows the dirt on your face, but it cannot wash it off. The law could show the crowd what was wrong. It could not fix it. A few lines later, Paul says the fix is Jesus, who makes people right with God as a free gift (Romans 3:24).

2. God's joy was a strong place to stand in

Then the leaders spoke. Nehemiah, now the governor in charge of the area, joined Ezra and the Levites in telling the crowd, "This day is holy to the LORD your God; do not mourn or weep" (Nehemiah 8:9). Then came the instructions:

Go your way. Eat the fat and drink sweet wine and send portions to anyone who has nothing ready, for this day is holy to our Lord. And do not be grieved, for the joy of the LORD is your strength.

Nehemiah 8:10

"Holy" means set apart for God. "The LORD" in capital letters is how many Bibles print God's own name. To mourn or be grieved is to be deeply sad. "Eat the fat" means eat the richest food, and "send portions" means share it with people who have none.

So the leaders were not saying, "Your wrongs do not matter." They were saying, "Today is God's feast day, and he has invited you. Come and eat."

Now look at the reason they gave. In Hebrew, the language this part of the Bible was written in, "strength" is ma'oz. It usually means a stronghold: a walled place you run into for safety, like a castle. The same word appears in the Psalms, the Bible's book of songs and prayers:

The LORD is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The LORD is the stronghold of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?

Psalm 27:1

Salvation means rescue. The singer pictures an army camped around him (Psalm 27:3), yet he is not afraid. God himself is his safe place, his ma'oz.

So this line does not mean, "Cheer up and you will feel strong." It means the joy of the LORD is a stronghold around you. You do not build a stronghold by feeling happy. You run into one that is already built.

Whose joy is it? The words can mean the joy people have in God. They can also mean God's own gladness over his people. Jesus showed what that gladness looks like. Some religious leaders grumbled that he ate meals with people known for doing wrong (Luke 15:1-2). So he told a story about a shepherd who lost one sheep and searched until he found it. Then Jesus said:

Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.

Luke 15:7

A sinner is someone who does wrong against God. To repent means to turn around and come back to God, not just to feel bad. Jesus was telling the grumblers that when one lost person comes home, heaven celebrates.

And Jesus is the shepherd in his own story. He went on to die on a cross, a Roman way of putting people to death, to bring people back to God. A letter to early Christians says he did it "for the joy that was set before him" (Hebrews 12:2). He looked past the pain to the joy on the other side. That joy carried Jesus through the cross, and it is strong enough to hold you.

But do not stretch this too far. Jesus also said:

Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.

Matthew 5:4

To be blessed is to have God's kindness resting on you. Jesus said this to a crowd at the start of his most famous teaching. So sorrow over doing wrong is not bad. Later in this same story, the people set aside a whole day to go without food and admit their sins (Nehemiah 9:1-2).

So which is it: mourn, or do not mourn? Both, in their place. Jesus promised mourners comfort, so being sorry is meant to lead somewhere. The leaders were not telling the crowd to stop caring about their wrongs. They were saying the comfort had come, and it was time to eat.

3. Real joy shares its food

And all the people went their way to eat and drink and to send portions and to make great rejoicing, because they had understood the words that were declared to them.

Nehemiah 8:12

Their joy was something they did with their hands: cooking, eating, carrying food to neighbours. And they rejoiced "because they had understood." The same words that made them cry now made them glad.

The leaders also thought about people with no food. Sending portions "to anyone who has nothing ready" meant nobody would miss God's feast.

The next day, the leaders found in God's law a week-long autumn feast, when families lived in shelters made of branches (Nehemiah 8:13-17). Another part of the law describes that feast:

You shall rejoice in your feast, you and your son and your daughter, your male servant and your female servant, the Levite, the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow who are within your towns.

Deuteronomy 16:14

A sojourner is a foreigner living among them, and the fatherless are children with no father to provide for them. A widow's husband has died. These were the people most likely to go hungry, and God named every one of them. A party that left them outside was not the party God wanted.

Jesus said the same at a dinner in an important religious leader's home. He told the host not to invite only people who could invite him back (Luke 14:12). Instead:

But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you.

Luke 14:13-14

"Crippled" and "lame" mean people who could not walk well. Many of them could not work and had to beg. Real kindness gives to people who cannot pay you back, because that is what God does for us. We come to his table with nothing ready, and he feeds us anyway.

What to do this week

When the Bible shows you a wrong, say sorry and then come to the table. Tell God plainly what you did, in a sentence or two. Then read Luke 15:1-7 and thank him that he is glad you came back. Do not spend the rest of the day punishing yourself.

Send a portion. This week, give food to someone who has nothing ready: an extra snack for the classmate who often has no lunch, a meal for a neighbour who lives alone, or a gift to a food bank.

On a weak day, run to the stronghold. Do not wait to feel happy. Read Psalm 27:1 out loud. God's joy is a stronghold, and it does not depend on your mood.

The crowd that cried that morning feasted that same day. The law had not changed. They had come to understand the God who gave it.