Sunday, November 1, 2026… All Saint’s Day
“Tears of Joy”
Scriptures: Psalm 1491-5; Revelation 7:9-17; I John 3:1-3; Matthew 5:1-12
Service Order: Divine Service III with Holy Communion, p.184, LSB
Hymns: “For All the Saints” #677; “Jesus Lives! The Victory’s Won” #490; “In Thee is Gladness” #818
Dear Friends in Christ,
Grace, mercy, and peace to you, from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.
All Saints Day is the day God’s Church on earth remembers all the loved ones and dear ones and friends who have left us for heaven. Here on earth, we cry tears of sadness, because we miss them. But Lord, help us to remember that the tears we shed on earth become tears of joy when we get to our heavenly home.
There are different kinds of tears, the experts say. Basal tears are the ordinary kind that keep your eyes from being dry. Reflexive tears are the “something in my eye” kind of tears. There are emotional tears, and especially tears of grief; which, curiously enough, have a different chemical composition than ordinary tears. To that I would add a fourth category – tears of joy (which have yet a different composition). If you could taste them, sad tears would be saltier, more bitter and acidic; and tears of joy would taste more sweet.
This is a matter of physiology and how our bodies are put together – it’s how God made us. We’re “fearfully and wonderfully made,” right down to our tears. Like everything else God has made, our tears have a purpose, whether they’re happy ones or sad ones. God gives us sad tears to cry out the toxins of grief and sadness, and happy tears to help us rejoice in the good.
Listen to what God says about our tears, and what purpose they serve. God says in Psalm 30: “Sing to the Lord , you saints of His; praise His holy name. For His anger lasts only a moment, but His favor lasts a lifetime; weeping may remain for a night, but rejoicing comes in the morning.” He says in Psalm 126: “Those who sow in tears will reap with songs of joy. He who goes out weeping, carrying seed to sow, will return with songs of joy, carrying sheaves with him.” In Psalm 56, King David writes, “Lord, You put my tears in a bottle; are they not written in Your Book?” (Another translation says, “Lord, You count all my tears.”) Our Gradual reading from Psalm 116 says: “Be at rest once more, O my soul, for the Lord has been good to you. For you, O Lord , have delivered my soul from death, my eyes from tears, my feet from stumbling, that I may walk before the Lord in the land of the living.”
Jesus says in Luke 6, in St. Luke’s version of the Beatitudes: “Blessed are you who weep now, for you will laugh.” In John chapter 11 is that short little verse, “Jesus wept”, as He stands at the tomb of Lazarus, His holy heart breaking at Mary and Martha’s tears. And He tells them, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies, and he who lives and believes in me will never die.” And then He gives them back their brother.
Jesus tells His disciples, in John 16: “I tell you the truth, you will weep and mourn while the world rejoices. You will grieve, but your grief will turn to joy… Now is your time of grief, but I will see you again and you will rejoice, and no one will take away your joy.” And in John 20, Mary Magdalene is standing outside the empty tomb of Jesus on Easter morning, crying. She sees two angels dressed in white, and the empty place where Jesus body had been. And then she turns around and sees Him, though she doesn’t know yet that it’s Him. And He asks her, “Woman, why are you crying?” And He turns her tears of sorrow into tears of joy.
There are two different crowds in our Scripture readings today, one here on earth and one in heaven. In Matthew’s Gospel, in that beautiful account of Jesus’ Beatitudes, His “blessed are’s,” Jesus looks out on that crowd on earth, with all their troubles and tribulations, all their faults, pains, and failures. Some of their grief has been caused by what living in a broken world does to people, but much of it is the result of their own foolishness and sin.
But Jesus isn’t there to condemn them; He’s there to give them hope, and to show them the way to the place where their tears of sorrow will turn into tears of joy. He wants them to see heaven through their tears, and to show them the Way to the place where their tears will turn to tears of joy. And He wants to show us how to get there, too.
So, “Blessed are the poor in spirit,” Jesus says, “for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven.” Blessed are you when you’re pressed upon, stressed, and heartbroken, struggling to hold on to your faith in Christ in spite of it all. Mending broken hearts is what God does – and heaven has a heart and a place for you.
“Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted,” He says. It’s the comfort of having hope for a life to come, even while you’re shedding tears today; and then the comfort of knowing everlasting peace when you get at last to where you’re going. It’s “hope for today and bright hope for tomorrow,” as the old hymn says, both a present and a future promise.
“Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth,” Jesus says, and “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.” Blessed are you meek and humble and gentle souls, so hungry and thirsty for this broken world to be made right again, and for all the things you’ve lost to be restored. “Those who wait on the Lord will renew their strength,” the Psalm says. Our “cups run over,” God says, filled with all the blessings of both earth and heaven. On the earth we’ll know mercy, says Jesus, and in the end our own eyes will see God. And we’ll know peace at last, no matter what we have to suffer though or how many tears we have to cry to get there.
The second crowd in our Scriptures today is that “multitude that no one could count” in Revelation 7, “from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and in front of the Lamb… wearing white robes and holding palm branches in their hands.” God made a promise to Father Abraham that one day his offspring would one day be “as numerous as the stars in the sky and like sand upon the seashore.” And here they all are, God’s children by faith, from every nation, tribe, people, language, every skin color, race, and ethnicity, rejoicing together in a place where none of those things matter anymore. These happy people surrounding God’s throne have been judged, not by the color of their skin, but by the content of their hearts. The white robes are robes of forgiven grace. The palm branches are symbols of peace, held up and waved with joy by all those who’ve found their peace with God.
And those sweet souls in heaven all cry out with loud and happy voices: "Salvation belongs to our God, who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb." Salvation belongs to God, and is from God, through Jesus, the Lamb of God, who died on a cross to take away our sin. The Book of Revelation describes Jesus as “the Lamb standing in the center of God’s throne, looking as if He had been slain” - still bearing the scars it took to save us, but now very much alive. And because He lives, so does this happy, praising multitude that surrounds Him – and you and I will live, too.
“All the angels” (ten thousand times ten thousand of them!) “were standing around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures. They fell down on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, saying: "Amen! Praise and glory and wisdom and thanks and honor and power and strength be to our God for ever and ever. Amen!"
What are the four living creatures? No one is really sure. They could be Cherubim, or Seraphim, those mightiest of God’s angels. In the Book of Ezekiel, the Cherubim the prophet sees have four wings and four faces – of a man, an eagle, an ox, and a lion. In the Book of Isaiah, Isaiah sees six-winged Seraphs in God’s Temple, who use two wings to cover their faces, two wings to cover their feet, and two wings to fly. Whatever they are, these glorious ‘living creatures’ are part of God’s creation, holy and blessed and good. And here in Revelation, they’ve joined the praise-shouting crowd around the throne; and they’re on their faces, too, along with you and me and all God’s creation.
Then one of the elders asks John, "These in white robes--who are they, and where did they come from?" That’s something we’d all like to know, and a question we all need the answer to. Because “How did they get here?” answers the question of “Lord, how will I get there?” and “What hope do I have not only for myself, but for the people I love and miss, that I’ll see them there, too?” John answers, "Sir, you know."
And the angel answers, "These are they who have come out of the great tribulation; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. Therefore, they are before the throne of God and serve him day and night in his temple; and he who sits on the throne will spread his tent over them.” Our tribulations are the troubles life puts us through, along with the troubles we create for ourselves by our sin. Tribulation, to pick the word apart, means “to be under pressure.” It means to be hemmed in, to be confined or restricted, to be backed into a corner, to have your back against the wall, until there’s no way to escape and nothing you can do.
We come to stand before God with all the dirt of the world, all the filth of our sin, clinging to us - obvious, apparent, and undeniable. “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,” St. Paul says. “By thought, word, and deed,” as we say in our confession, “by what we have done and by what we have left undone.” And we sin over and over again, like a dog who’s been in the muck, and you give him a nice bath, and he shakes himself off and goes right back to rolling in the dirt again. And yet the God who loves us is “patient with us, not wanting anyone to perish, but sinners to come to repentance.” Jesus came “not to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.”
How do we make our sin-stained robes white again? How can we hope to one day stand in that happy crowd and be holy and clean before God? By “washing our robes and making them white in the blood of the Lamb.” “Wash me, and I will be whiter than snow,” says King David in the Psalm. (Come and be baptized!) “The blood of Jesus purifies us from all sin,” St. John says. (Welcome to the Lord’s Table!) “You were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God,” says St. Paul. Jesus ends His “beatitudes” message by telling the people, “Great is your reward in heaven” – that is, your reward for trusting God and believing in His Son and holding on to your precious faith.
And our reading in Revelation ends with a glorious promise, both for us and for everyone who lives and dies with faith in Jesus: “Never again will they hunger; never again will they thirst. The sun will not beat upon them, nor any scorching heat. For the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd; he will lead them to springs of living water. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes."
When I get where I’m going, there’ll be only happy tears – and no tears left to cry but tears of joy.
Father in heaven, how great is the love You have poured out on us, that we should be called Your children! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it does not know You through Jesus (though we pray with all our hearts that everyone we love will come to know Him, too). Merciful Savior, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. (Such a long way we still have to go!) But we know and believe that when Jesus appears, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. May this be the hope that comforts our souls and purifies our hearts, until He comes for us at last. In Jesus’ name; Amen.
Rev. Larry Sheppard, M.Div.
Trinity Lutheran Church, LCMS, Packwaukee, WI
St. John’s Lutheran Church, LCMS, Oxford, WI
pastorshepp@gmail.com