Jesus Wept

The Gospel according to John chapter eleven and verse thirty-five is the shortest written in the Holy Scripture; and at the same time one of the most profound and well known phrases found in the bible. No two words more clearly state just how awesome is the God we serve. This is elegant proof of how Jesus is both fully God and here as described by the Jesus beloved disciple John, also fully man. Earlier in this chapter Jesus receives word that his good friend Lazarus is deathly ill;

“Therefore his sisters sent unto him, saying, Lord, behold, he whom thou lovest is sick”. (verse 1)

However Jesus is not shaken by the news

“When Jesus heard [that], he said, this sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God might be glorified thereby.” (verse 2)

Through his divinity Jesus knew just how the events of Lazarus’ pending resurrection where going to proceed. Yet when he arrives on the scene some four days later in his flesh Jesus is overtaken by the emotion and mourning happening around him and in the clearest evidence of his humanity Jesus displays his anguish by crying. This man who will later endure Calvary, this man that will be scourged for the sin of all humanity, who will humiliated more than any man before or since, who will be beaten and bruised and yet will at no point cry out allows his flesh to express itself freely; Jesus son of the only living God weeps.

Jesus weeps not because he is doubtful as to what will happen next, he weeps not because he mourns the passing of his friend, he weeps because he is both fully man and fully God and in his humanity he cried to show you and I that there was no piece of the human experience, short of being given to sin, that he did not partake of. Jesus in every righteous way imaginable experienced life as a flesh and blood human being. What a blessed assurance we have to know that there is nothing we can experience on the road of life that in some manner or fashion our heavenly Father did not also experience. We are more than conquerors today because we serve a God that can uniquely identify with our struggles, our hardships, our triumphs and our pain and therefore is able to prescribe just what is needed at any given moment in order for us to overcome. Realizing that in many instances what we may need most at any given moment is the strength to stay still. Be encouraged and know that you can overcome the world because though Jesus wept, Lazarus still got up from the grave.