“You Yourself have recorded my wanderings. Put my tears in Your bottle. Are they not in Your records? Then my enemies will retreat on the day when I call. This I know: God is for me.” ~ Psalm 56:8-9
“‘For nine months – in which you’ve shown no sign of waking – you’ve carried this lovely son in your belly, and today you’ve given birth to him! But I don’t know who his father is.’ When the girl heard her aunt’s words and saw the child she was astounded; but she sensed it was probably true and began to weep, unaware that any man had had dealings with her body” ~ Zellandine’s aunt speaking to Zellandine upon her awakening[1]
Zephir forces Troylus to leave Zellandine when her father and aunt come to check on her. Her aunt continues to care for the sleeping Zellandine as she grows great with child, and in due time Zellandine gives birth to a son. As the babe is searching for milk, he begins to suck on her little finger – the finger with the splinter of flax.
Out comes the flax, and the curse is lifted…
…And Zellandine weeps.
As if that were not enough, a half-woman, half-bird creature swoops in and takes the child away. Historically speaking, a child born under such circumstances would have been taken away as soon as possible…but that is not a consolation for Zellandine.
Zellandine awakes to a living death with little hope. Her entire world has changed in the blink of an eye. She has every right to weep.
We’ve all wept tears of bitter despair. Don’t deny it. We live in a fallen, broken, pain-filled world. Our tears are very real.
And God keeps them – every single one. Why?
I think it’s the same reason why mothers keep their children’s baby teeth, or their child’s first curly lock of hair. It marks what was, and what will be. It’s a reminder of the past, all the while looking forward to the future. A mother knows it won’t always be this way; so she keeps these memory markers to remind her of what was. Are they useless? To us, certainly. But to a mother, they are as invaluable as diamonds.
Our world is full of pain…but we know it won’t always be this way. A time is coming when there will be no more death, no more tears, no more pain (Rev. 21:4). We yearn for that blessed time!
But our earthly walk is not in vain. Like the memorial stones in Joshua 4, our tears mark our sufferings as well as how God redeemed us from those sufferings. Our tears become a memory marker of the pain, as well as a memorial of God’s enduring and all-powerful love.
One day, we’ll see the bottle of our tears that God has kept, and this will resound in our hearts: “God is for me.”
He records your tears, dear one. He sees them. Every one.
But He is for you, and He will redeem what you have lost. You must only heed His call of Love…
Sources
[1] Bryant, Perceforest, p. 409
