Weeping and shouting at once
The foundation laid
Listen, before you look. On the day they laid the foundation of the second temple, a sound rose from the crowd that no one standing at a distance could name, because it was two sounds braided into one. The priests sounded the trumpets and the singers sang the old refrain, that He is good and His lovingkindness toward Israel endures forever, and at that the people answered with a great shout. But folded into the shout was another note. The old men, the ones whose memories reached back to Solomon's temple in its glory, who had seen the first house before the Babylonians burned it, lifted their voices and wept aloud at how much smaller this foundation looked, how diminished the new thing seemed beside the splendor they had lost. The young shouted for joy at what was rising. The old wept for what was gone. And the two could not be told apart, the weeping and the shouting blended into a single great noise that carried far off. That mingled sound is the truest music of reorientation: real grief for what was lost and real joy for what is rising, sounded together, refusing to cancel each other out.
“The old men who had seen the first house wept with a loud voice, and many shouted aloud for joy.”
— Of the temple's refounding — Ezra 3:12 (WEB)
“They sang... for he is good, for his lovingkindness endures forever toward Israel.”
Reorientation is bittersweet construction, where grief for the lost old and joy for the rising new sound at the same time. The phase does not ask you to choose between them or to muffle one for the sake of the other. It asks you to let both be honest, to hold the weeping and the shouting together as the true music of a people rebuilding.
Reorientation rarely sounds like clean celebration, and you should not expect it to. The new thing rising in your life is genuinely good, worth a shout, and the old thing you lost was genuinely precious, worth your tears, and there is no rule that says you must pick one. You may well find yourself weeping and rejoicing in the same hour, at the same foundation, and feel half a fraud for both, as though gladness betrays your grief and grief betrays your gladness. You are not. The mingled sound is the honest one. The people who could only shout had perhaps not loved the old house enough to miss it; the people who could only weep had not yet let themselves believe a new one could rise.
You are allowed the whole sound. Grieve what is gone with your full heart, and welcome what is coming with your full heart, and let the two notes braid together without apology. That blended noise, weeping and shouting at once, is simply what the far side of upheaval actually sounds like when you are honest about it.
When the Church rebuilds, the generations hear it differently, the young thrilled at what is rising, the old grieving the grander house they remember, and the wise Body holds both sounds together rather than letting either shout the other down. Every turn of the recurring rummage sale has its mingled noise: real loss for traditions passing away, real joy for the new thing God is raising, sounded in the same breath across the whole Church. The generations that could only shout perhaps never loved the old enough to miss it; those who could only weep have not yet believed a new house can rise. Under both notes runs the one that cannot change: He is good, and His lovingkindness endures forever.
What cannot be shaken is the goodness sung under both the weeping and the shouting, that He is good and His lovingkindness endures forever. The first house could burn and the new one rise smaller, but the steadfast love the singers named outlasts every temple, the one note no upheaval can take.
- What am I grieving and welcoming in the same hour right now?
- Have I felt I must choose between mourning the old and rejoicing in the new?
- Can I let the steadfast love of God be the note that holds both my weeping and my joy?
Lord, I am weeping for what is gone and shouting for what is rising, and I have felt I must choose. Let me bring You the whole sound. Hold my grief and joy together, and under both let me hear the one thing that never changes: You are good, and Your love endures forever. Amen.