To weep! What! when he saw his beloved brother Benjamin, and heard, that his affectionate, aged father was alive and well? Yes, the sight of the one and the news of the other created such an ecstasy of joy in his heart as was too great to bear. He sought where to vent it by tears. O, had one followed good Joseph to his chamber, and heard what passed there between his God and his soul! Methinks I see the dear man fall prostrate, crying out in a flood of grateful, joyful tears, "O what a God do I serve! What amazing scenes of his providence have opened to my view! How has the Lord appeared graciously in my behalf! How strangely has he exalted me in life! And now, to crown all and complete my happiness, I see my beloved brother, and hear of the welfare of my honored father." Doubtless he wept, he prayed, he praised, he rejoiced, he loved, he adored his God, his kind preserver, his bountiful benefactor, his dear Saviour.
Methinks we cannot meditate on Joseph's conduct without calling to mind some sweet weeping seasons of spiritual joy with which our souls have been refreshed: when in some highly favored moments the blessed Spirit has brought some joyful tidings, some tokens of love from our once crucified, but ever-living Redeemer. O then what joy has sprung up in our souls! too big for utterance. When he has assured us of his love to us; that we shall soon see him as he is, be with him where he is, and eternally enjoy him and his Father and our Father in glory –O, the rapture of this faith! Then we are ready to fly the world and all its concerns, and even our brethren in Christ too: we seek to be alone to pour out our souls, to give vent to our joy in a flood of loving, grateful tears. Then, like the disciples on the mount, we cry out, It is good to be here: this is sweet: me thinks my soul is drowned in tears of love!
Now are we not ready to wish, O that it were always thus with me! But neither Joseph, you, nor I, could live in such ecstasy and rapture: the body could not support them: my weak body could not. Neither are they always good for the soul: if so, we should be always favored with them. Of this we are fully assured: for "no good thing will the Lord withhold from them that walk uprightly." Psalm 85:11. But these God withholds. You never read of one saint in the Bible always in an ecstasy of joy. He who freely gave us his Son, "how shall he not with him also freely give us all things!" Rom. 8:32.
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