In a scene from my favorite Christmas movie, “The Homecoming,” missionaries dole out presents to needy children in a small town who are willing to memorize passages from Scripture.
On the big night, the older kids recite fairly complicated verses, and then a tiny girl darts breathlessly from the crowd, lisps “Jesus wept” — and receives her treasure.
That verse echoes in my heart as I tearfully struggle with the most painful challenge of my life, which is accepting my husband’s sudden death.
“Jesus wept” has become my new mantra whenever I’m knocked down by waves of grief — in the grocery store, at church, at the mall and over supper at friends’ houses.
Jesus wept, as I’m sure you recall, when he accompanied Mary and Martha to the grave of their brother, Lazarus, who was his dear friend.
Scripture tells us Jesus intended all along to raise Lazarus from the dead — so at first I puzzled over his shedding tears. After all, why mourn someone who will soon be alive again?
The answer — both startling and comforting to me — is that Jesus was deeply moved when he saw Lazarus’ grieving sisters and friends. In fact, he was so severely shaken that St. John depicts him as “groaning in himself.”
Like many other heartbroken widows, I can definitely relate to Martha’s rather harsh words for Jesus: “If you had been here, this would not have happened.”
Like her, I sometimes get angry with God for taking my sweetheart away from me.
Then I remind myself that no one lives forever — and in every marriage there comes a day when husband and wife will be parted by death.
Was 55 too young? Yes, until I think about all the men in their 20s and 30s suffering the same fate. Jesus himself was only 33 when he faced an agonizing, prolonged and gruesome death.
Still, these neat and tidy facts do little to prevent another wrenching wave of sorrow from pummeling me.
“If you’ve been up all night and cried till you have no more tears left in you,” C.S. Lewis wrote, “you will know that there comes in the end a sort of quietness.”
In “Experiencing Grief,” an excellent book, pastor and psychologist Kenneth C. Haugk says tears can be soothing and healing. He mentions a grieving father who would close his office door, cry for a few moments and then get back to work.
“Sometimes what we need most is a good cry,” Haugk writes. “Tears are cleansing … and healthy.”
Jesus knew that Lazarus would rise again, just as he knows my husband still lives. I believe Jesus wept to reveal the compassionate, tender heart of God — and to show us tears are not shameful.
True, I still cry every day, but I also cling to his promise: “He that believes in me, although he be dead, shall live.” And with this promise, every now and again, comes a sort of quietness.
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