“And God will wipe away every tear. . . .”

Most of my nighttime dreams are funny and I wake myself up laughing. Occasionally I dream a mystery story (likely from reading so many of them) or a weird one that my dad would attribute to what I ate for supper. Seldom do I have a bad dream, but lately have had a couple. One of them was about being in a dangerous situation with nowhere to turn. I called my husband on my cell phone and instead a friend answered. Wrong number? I tried again. My husband answered but he was traveling to a far place and could not help me. I was terrified. Even though the friend sent a helicopter to rescue me, and even though this was just a dream, it revealed that I am scared of the future.

My head says God has all things in His capable hands, that He will take care of me no matter what happens concerning my husband. My heart agrees, but my emotions are not listening. As I ask the Lord for help with this, He gave me a strange verse from Psalm 149: “Let the saints be joyful in glory; let them sing aloud on their beds.”

We Christians call heaven ‘glory’ and usually think of beds as a place of rest, even that final rest in death. So it seems the order is reversed. The singing on our beds should happen first, then after we go to glory, we will continue to be joyful.

My mind goes back to my first experience as a Christian with death. It was at a time when I feared what God would ask of me now that I’d planned to follow Him. My gracious and wonderful mentor, Irene, lost her beloved husband of many years. I watched her at his grave. Her back was to me and she was leaning over it as if she wanted to be in that coffin with him. Then she turned around and I will never forget what I saw. She was absolutely radiant.

God spoke through her joy. He said to me, “See, I can give this woman joy in sorrow. I will never take you anywhere without sustaining you in it and through it.”

Later, my pastor at that time came to visit me. He’d just been to see Irene. He told me, “I thought I would comfort her. Did I ever get a surprise! She told me that she grieved, but only because she felt sorrow for herself. Her husband was in such a wonderful place and, in her love for him, she felt great joy for his sake.”

That verse from Psalm 149 is a rebuke to me in some ways. Instead of being concerned for myself, I need to be thinking about my husband. He is traveling to a far place. Is he afraid? What can I do to help him? God says that he can sing aloud on his bed. Can I encourage that?

Last night he was up at 2:00 a.m. working on a Sunday school lesson. He could not sleep, but he needs his sleep. This was not normal, but he didn’t seem anxious, at least not as anxious as I was. In bed or not, he seemed joyful.

Upon reflection, this verse is as much for me as it is about him. While I probably won’t sing aloud on my bed (my terrible singing voice would disturb the neighbors), I can think about and be glad that both of us know Jesus. No matter how challenging our lives are, that is cause for joy.

Not only that, even though the future seems to include sorrow and tears, that will be only a very short time. Eventually, together, we will rejoice in glory forever.