“Jesus wept.”
This was always a go-to verse as I was growing up going to Sunday School. Whenever the Sunday School teacher would tell us that we needed to have a verse memorized by the next week, I knew that John 11:35 would be easy. In fact, so did seven or eight of the other boys in my class!
I have come to realize, though, that this verse is not just the shortest verse in the Bible, it is probably one of the most profound. Why was Jesus crying? He knew that in moments He would be raising His friend Lazarus from the dead. He was about to turn everyone’s tears of sadness into tears of joy. So why the weeping, Jesus?
This passage presents Jesus’ humanity and His divinity as clearly as any other in the New Testament. Yes, Jesus knew that He was going to raise Lazarus from the dead. At that time, however, He saw His friends, Mary and Martha, crying because their brother was dead. Jesus wept because His friends were weeping. Jesus was in the moment. He felt their pain.
Where is God when we are hurting? He is standing beside us, crying with us. Let us never forget this. While it may seem sometimes that God is remote and distant, in fact, He is as close as our next breath. He feels our joys and our sorrows. And sometimes, He still cries.
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