James 4:9 KJV
[9] “Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep: let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to heaviness.”
The Lord wants our lives to be full of joy and laughter. However, there is a time to mourn and a time to weep. We must weep over sin. There should always be an affliction of the soul when we stray from God. That is what James is telling us in this verse. To experience the joy of the Lord, we must repent of our sins.
When I read this verse, it reminds me of the faces I see in many congregations as I travel to revival meetings. Folks sit silently with sad countenances and look like they have lost their dearest friend. Once the final amen is said, the church is alive with joy and laughter. It seems as if worship is a burden to them. A time that should be joyful has become dreadful in a lot of sanctuaries. Why is this? Could there be a lot of unconfessed sin in our churches today?
To experience revival, we must first deal with ourselves. That means we must deal with any sin that is in our lives. The altar has become nothing more than a decorative piece of furniture in many churches today. We need to get back to preaching and practicing genuine repentance. We must get broken before God.
God responds when His children come clean and honest before Him. Knowing that we see our sin and look to Him for forgiveness gives Him great joy. He is willing to cleanse us from all of our sins and restore our fellowship with Him. Dear reader, I challenge you, as I do myself, to take inventory of your heart and soul. Ask the Lord to show you anything in your heart that does not please Him, then repent with all sincerity before Him.