“Jesus Wept.” John 11:35

I have always loved the story of Lazarus. Here was a close friend of Jesus. He was sick and died. Now, Jesus is God; He knew and even told His disciples that this sickness would not end in death (John 11:4). Yet, He was still sad at the death of His friend. When He received word that Lazarus had died, they went to the sisters to comfort them. When Jesus saw Mary weeping, and other Jews who were with her, He was moved, and He WEPT! Jesus wept. Even though He knew that Lazarus would not stay dead, He wept over the loss of His friend, He wept over the hurt He saw Mary and Martha experiencing. Jesus was human. He experienced on earth everything you and I will ever experience, yet without sinning. He laughed, He danced, He was tempted, He cried, and so on.

Jesus, our best friend, has been there! He knows what it feels like to be hurting, to be sad.  In high school, November of my sophomore year, I experienced a tragedy. I was in a car a few cars behind my friends who were in a car accident. Two of my friends in the car were killed instantly. I was able to help one friend by sitting with him until an ambulance arrived. It took me a long time to even be able to sleep after that night. The one thing I remember was that I had a friend who was in the car I was in, so he also was at the scene of the accident. He was one of the only people I could talk to. It meant so much that he had experienced the same thing, seen the same things, lost the same friends. Jesus is like that friend. We can go to him about everything, anything. He knows exactly how we feel.

Matthew 5:4, “Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.” Throughout our time here on earth we will have many times where we will mourn, when we will weep like Jesus did. We can turn to Jesus for comfort, and look forward to our day in Heaven when we will be completely comforted. We will no longer have any reason to mourn. Mary and Martha had a foretaste of this when they saw Lazarus raised from the dead. How awesome would that be? One minute they are weeping, and Jesus is weeping right along with them, and the next He is telling Lazarus to come out! Their brother is alive!  Oh how I wish I could have been there to see such sadness turn to joy in an instant! Oh how I look forward to the ultimate joy we will experience in Heaven!