By maternal request (request with weight, of course) I read part one of Michael Card's A Sacred Sorrow last night.

In it, Card talks (obviously) about the importance of lamentations in the Christian life. Not Lamentations, but lamentations. (i.e. not the book.)

Without lamentation and weeping, salvation loses its weight. If the sinner isn't confronted with the full weight of sin, crushed by it to almost despair, they feel no need to be saved from it.

Without sorrow, there is no repentance. If our actions don't grieve us, why apologize? Why repent? Why turn away from them?

This all struck me sharply; it seems set squarely against the notion of joyous victory over sin, and rejoicing in Christ. Again, it seems so.

It isn't though.

Ecclesiastes 3:1-8

To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:
A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that
which is planted;
A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up;
A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to
embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace.