So What Makes You Cry?
Good Morning Friends,
Some say that both sorrow and joy are inner experiences related to our belief in the meaning and purpose of our life or the lack thereof. You see sorrow and joy are intertwined in the inspiration of love in the lives we live together. Maybe that is why we cry over all sorts of things. And maybe that is why tears often occur during and immediately after the stresses of the holidays. Explaining why this happens is not nearly as easy as to see how it happens. But even that is not simple. It is a bit of a paradox that we cry to lubricate our eyes so that we can see. And when we cry sometimes our vision is blurred. And because we cry for emotional reasons it gets complicated. We cry when we submit. We cry when we suffer. We even cry to understand and I think especially we cry to give meaning to the things of life. And in today’s scripture we read about Jesus, the man, seeing a bit of his future and crying with those closest to him as a signal of his vulnerability as from out of his pain to come he sheds
tears of compassion about the meaning and purpose of life. And friends, perhaps this is the key to understanding.
It is nothing less than the connection of sorrow and joy and purpose. So What Makes You Cry?
Scripture: Jesus wept.
John 11:35 (NIV)
When Mary came where Jesus was and saw him, she knelt at his feet and said to him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who came with her also weeping, he was greatly disturbed in spirit and deeply moved. He said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see.” Jesus began to weep. So the Jews said, “See how he loved him!” But some of them said, “Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?” Then Jesus, again greatly disturbed, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone was lying against it. Jesus said, “Take away the stone.” Martha, the sister of the dead man, said to him, “Lord, already there is a stench because he has been dead four days.” Jesus said to her, “Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?” So they took away the stone. And Jesus looked upward and said, “Father, I thank you for having heard me. I knew that you always hear me, but I have said this for the sake of the crowd standing here, so that they may believe that you sent me.” When he had said this, he cried with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” The dead man came out, his hands and feet bound with strips of cloth, and his face wrapped in a cloth. Jesus said to them, “Unbind him, and let him go.”
John 11:32-44 (NRSV)
In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to the one who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission.
Hebrews 5:7 (NRSV)
Then shall the young women rejoice in the dance, and the young men and the old shall be merry. I will turn their mourning into joy, I will comfort them, and give them gladness for sorrow.
Jeremiah 31:13 (NRSV)
But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers and sisters, about those who have died, so that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have died. For this we declare to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will by no means precede those who have died. For the Lord himself, with a cry of command, with the archangel’s call and with the sound of God’s trumpet, will descend from heaven, and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up in the clouds together with them to meet the Lord in the air; and so we will be with the Lord forever. Therefore encourage one another with these words.
1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 (NRSV)
Message: The well-known adage, “Laugh, and the world laughs with you. Weep, and you weep alone,” is surprisingly true in most situations but there are occasions when the opposite is true. When Michael Jordan first won the national basketball championship he cried. When cleanup crews at ground zero found crosses in the rubble they cried. When those on my street shared a tear for the loss and in the shock experienced when a neighbor suddenly died, we became surprisingly closer. Surely living in the reality of death will serve to keep our lives focused and our priorities in order, but there is more to today’s message than knowing our days are numbered. Jesus cried three times in the Bible. He cried when he heard about his friend, Lazarus’ death. He also had tears of sorrow for the city of Jerusalem. And finally Jesus had tears of struggle in the Garden, known as Gethsemane. Jesus cried in sympathy for the loss of a friend. He cried in sorrow for a Jerusalem that would be crushed into the ground because the people of this place did not accept the opportunity for salvation in the Messiah. Jesus cried in suffering because he was heartbroken at the prospect of being painfully separated from God the Father. Some things are worth crying for…. and Jesus understands them all. He understands the power of tears and their worth in making us whole; in bringing us home …in bringing us together….He understands the healing power of tears. Here in our tears, Jesus connects to our pain and the very powerful human experience and emotion of grief. He knows every heartbreak and headache we have ever had. He even knows the joy that surprises us when He comes to comfort us. Friends, when we hurt, God is right in the middle of the experience.
Analyze your own tears for a moment as you consider how Jesus in his suffering and obedience was made perfect so he might become the source of our salvation. Consider the nature of our tears as you contemplate that some of the most joyous people on the planet may not know where their next meal will come from. Friends, tears reveal the truth for all to see, and if we have the ability to interpret them, we might the more appreciate their purposes.
Pray we realize that Christ came into this world so we might have the light of life abundant. Pray that in the living of it we understand that there is a right kind of learning, and right kind of grieving and a right kind of believing that hinges on compassion.
Pray we gain understanding into the nature of our tears shed in the love of life. Pray we therefore not underestimate the power of empathy in building communities. Pray we rejoice in the life of others. Pray we rejoice in the life of Jesus in us. Pray our tears of sympathy, sorrow and suffering bring us together in the hope of a meaningful life. Pray we realize that tears of sorrow helps us to understand joy. Pray we realize that tears of joy birth love. Pray we have tears of love to glorify God together as a community.
Blessings,
John Lawson
Daily Devotionals 