“Jesus wept.” (John 11:35)
One of the most comforting verses in the Bible to me is also the shortest verse. It says simply, “Jesus wept.”
This is so comforting because it shows that Jesus understands grief and pain. He wept at the death of his dear friend, Lazarus. He wept at the pain and sorrow it caused Mary and Martha, Lazarus’s sisters. He wept because he hated the evil of death. Jesus felt deeply, and that means He understands and is with us in our deepest, most challenging moments.
But it’s also comforting because of what it doesn’t mean. When we weep at a loss, it’s because we couldn’t change or fix it. We feel helpless, at wit’s end. But that isn’t the case for Jesus. Yes, he wept at the death of a dear friend. But shortly before that moment, He declared, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live.”
So Jesus already promised that He would overcome death and that all who trust in Him would live forever with Him. His weeping wasn’t from helplessness. He wasn’t at wit’s end. He wasn’t grasping for answers. He is the answer to pain and sorrow and loss and helplessness.
This means we have a savior who not only understands our sorrows and shares them with us but also one who has promised to overcome them and set things right in the end. Let’s cling to Jesus as the resurrection and the life today.
I originally wrote this post for my church, Immanuel Nashville, in our Daily Pulse email. If you want encouragement from God’s word delivered Monday thru Friday to your inbox, I encourage you to subscribe!
Photo by Mayank Dhanawade on Unsplash
