「憂愁強如喜笑；因為愁容使心得益處。」－傳道書 7:3
憂愁顯露我們靈魂的深度，也將許多豐富的經歷和潛藏服事的能力帶給我們。終日嘻笑滿面的人是膚淺的，他們從未認識他們人性的另一面。憂愁是神的鋤頭，掘開靈魂的深處，使魂飽得美果。
若我們從來未曾墮落，總是處在榮耀的境地，那麼神聖喜樂水流衝擊的能力，本來就能使我們經歷更深；但在現今墮落、敗壞的世界，不帶絕望的憂愁卻是免不了的憑藉，帶領我們更深的認識自己。憂愁讓我們思考的更深遠、更清明。
憂愁使我們能停下自己，安靜下來傾聽自己深處的存心和動機。憂愁開啟了我們內在屬天的生命，憂愁也使我們願意將自己交託給神，讓神帶領我們來服事祂和身旁的人。
神若要大大地使用一個人，祂必須先破碎他。約瑟是雅各的眾子中，最飽受患難的一位，而這些憂愁卻使他成為餵養萬國的糧倉。因此聖靈說：「約瑟是多結果子的樹枝，是泉旁多結果的枝子；他的枝條探出牆外。」（創世記 49:22）憂愁開拓了我們靈魂的疆界。－屬天的生命
我們能說：「夜晚是有福的，因為顯明了星空。」我們也能說：「憂愁是有福的，因它顯明了神的安慰。」－特榮布爾
"Sorrow is better than laughter; for by the sadness of the countenance the heart is made better" (Eccles. 7:3).When sorrow comes under the power of Divine grace, it works out a manifold ministry in our lives. Sorrow reveals unknown depths in the soul, and unknown capabilities of experience and service. Gay, trifling people are always shallow, and never suspect the little meannesses in their nature. Sorrow is God's plowshare that turns up and subsoils the depths of the soul, that it may yield richer harvests. If we had never fallen, or were in a glorified state, then the strong torrents of Divine joy would be the normal force to open up all our souls' capacities; but in a fallen world, sorrow, with despair taken out of it, is the chosen power to reveal ourselves to ourselves. Hence it is sorrow that makes us think deeply, long, and soberly.
Sorrow makes us go slower and more considerately, and introspect our motives and dispositions. It is sorrow that opens up within us the capacities of the heavenly life, and it is sorrow that makes us willing to launch our capacities on a boundless sea of service for God and our fellows.
We may suppose a class of indolent people living at the base of a great mountain range, who had never ventured to explore the valleys and canyons back in the mountains; and some day, when a great thunderstorm goes careening through the mountains, it turns the hidden glens into echoing trumpets, and reveals the inner recesses of the valley, like the convolutions of a monster shell, and then the dwellers at the foot of the hills are astonished at the labyrinths and unexplored recesses of a region so near by, and yet so little known. So it is with many souls who indolently live on the outer edge of their own natures until great thunderstorms of sorrow reveal hidden depths within that were never hitherto suspected.
God never uses anybody to a large degree, until after He breaks that one all to pieces. Joseph had more sorrow than all the other sons of Jacob, and it led him out into a ministry of bread for all nations. For this reason, the Holy Spirit said of him, "Joseph is a fruitful bough?by a well, whose branches run over the wall" (Gen. 49:22). It takes sorrow to widen the soul. --The Heavenly Life
Every person and every nation must take lessons in God's school of adversity. "We can say, 'Blessed is night, for it reveals to us the stars.' In the same way we can say, 'Blessed is sorrow, for it reveals God's comfort.' The floods washed away home and mill, all the poor man had in the world. But as he stood on the scene of his loss, after the water had subsided, broken-hearted and discouraged, he saw something shining in the bank which the waters had washed bare. 'It looks like gold,' he said. It was gold. The flood which had beggared him made him rich. So it is ofttimes in life." --H. C. Trumbull
