There are many lessons which we may learn from the life of Joseph; but for the present let us see what we can learn by the Holy Spirit's leading from the tears of that one, whose life stands out so especially as a type of our Lord Jesus Christ—
Paul says that he was " mindful " of Timothy's tears; and there were many tears in the eyes of Joseph which we might well be mindful of David and Jonathan were weepers, as well as Paul and Timothy. But were I careful to do so, I might claim it for Joseph, that he exceeded them all. The occasions of his tears were more various. And indeed it is an earnest, real, and hearty flow of affections that we have to covet in the midst of the more cultivated and orderly attainments of this day. Tears are ofttimes precious things, and sometimes sacred too.
At the beginning, when Joseph saw conviction awakening in the conscience of his brethren, he wept. These were tears both of sorrow and of joy. He felt for them passing through the agony: but he must have rejoiced to see the needed arrow reaching its mark, and the bleeding of the wounds that followed.
He wept again, when he saw Benjamin. The son of his own mother, her only child besides himself, whose birth too had been her death, and the only one in the midst of his father's children (who were all then before him) who had not been guilty of his blood, such an one as this, was at that moment seen by him in Benjamin. These tears, therefore, nature could account for.
He wept again, as he saw the work of repentance going on in his brethren. In his way, he greatly longed after them in the bowels of Jesus Christ; till at the last, Judah's words were too much for him; conviction of conscience had then ended in restoration of heart. " The old man " and " the lad " again and again on the lips of Judah had eloquence which prevailed, and Joseph could no longer refrain himself. He sobbed aloud, and the whole house of Pharaoh heard him. But these were more than the tears of nature. This was the bowels of Christ, or the tears of the Father upon the neck of the prodigal.
Each of these weepings was beautiful in its season-but we have more still.
He fell on his father's face and wept as his father had just yielded up the ghost. This was as the grave of Lazarus to Joseph; and there he and his Lord can weep together.
And again he wept, when, after his father's death, his brethren began to suspect his love. He was disappointed. An unworthy return to the ways of a constant, patient, serving love, made him weep- in the spirit of Him, I may say, who wept over Jerusalem. For years had he been doing all he could, to win their confidence. He had nourished them and their little ones. Years had now passed, and not one rebuke of them do we find either in his life or in his ways. Grief over their departed father had just freshly given them to know what common affections they had to bind them together. He had supplied them with every reason to trust him. And yet, after all, they were fearing him. This is a terrible shock to such a heart as Joseph's. But he did not resent it, save with his tears, and renewed assurances of his diligent, faithful love. And have not such tears as these, I ask, as fine a character as tears can have? They were as the pulses of the aggrieved Spirit of the Lord. " How long shall I be with you? '" Why are ye fearful? " " Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me? " These were kindred pulses of an aggrieved heart in Jesus. Jesus has sanctified tears, and made them, like everything else that went up from Him to God, a sacrifice of a sweet-smelling savor; Joseph and David and Paul, yea, Jonathan and Timothy too, have made them precious, and put them among the treasures of the Spirit in the bosom of the church.