Jesus Is Close to the Brokenhearted

Your lower lip trembles just a bit.  You take slow, deep breaths, and that helps you manage.  The tears are starting to flow, but you can quell them.  You are still holding it together.

But then, exchange glances with someone you love.  Their eyes are red.  Their lips are tightened.  Tears are flowing freely down their cheeks.  And instantly, the tears begin flowing freely down your cheeks too.  No longer can you suppress your internal waterworks.  You could hold the tears in for a time, but as soon as you saw them weeping, everything changed.

This can happen at weddings.  It can happen at funerals.  It sometimes even happens when you’re watching a movie that breaks your heart, or when you are comforting someone who has had their heart broken.  You begin crying, because you see them crying.

Did you know that this very thing happened to Jesus?  A little over a week before he died, our Savior went to visit his close friends, Mary and Martha.  Their brother Lazarus had just died, and Jesus was going to comfort them.  The Scripture reveals God’s heart in this way: “When Jesus saw Mary weeping, and the Jews who had come along with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in spirit and troubled (John 11:33,35)…Jesus wept.”

Jesus Christ is not a stone!  Jesus Christ is not all-business-but-zero-emotion!  In the cemetery, Mary was weeping, and so were many of her friends and family members.  Jesus saw them, and loved them.  He was deeply moved in spirit.  He wept.  He cared.  He had just promised that anyone who believes in him will live even though they have died.  And just minutes after he had proclaimed this, he raised Lazarus from the dead.

Do you think that God is powerful and cold-hearted?  Do you consider him to be disconnected and distant?  Are you assuming that he cares very little about your life?  Stop lying to yourself!  Jesus cares about your needs.  Jesus is close to the brokenhearted, not far.  He gladly offered his life as a gift that makes everything right between you and God once again.  When you weep, be thankful!  You don’t weep alone – your empathetic Savior understands.  And do you know what’s even better?  One day he will wipe every tear away when you arrive at your inheritance – his heavenly mansions! 

Prayer:   Heavenly Father, fix my eyes on Jesus.  Help me think more about things above, and less about things below.  Prevent me from lying to myself, and assuming that God doesn’t care about my life and my needs.  Assure me that even when I cry, he is close to me and not far.  And help me look forward to that glorious day, when I enter your eternal mansions and my tears are wiped away forever.  It’s in his holy name I pray, Amen.