Published by Jesus wept… at the tomb of Lazarus for a people unable to believe in the God who passed over them in Egypt. He wept for a people who feared the Romans more than the Lord. He wept because of the pain and suffering they stubbornly put themselves through.
Jesus wept… on a hill overlooking Jerusalem…for a people who embraced the very things that brought them emptiness and suffering…for those who were victims of their own desires, and (as the Eagles used to sing) “prisoners…of their own devices.”
Jesus wept… in a garden as He prayed for the strength to sacrifice Himself for the sins of so many people…endless multitudes of people…outwardly accepting the world they found themselves in. Mistreated and abused they became abusers themselves and all the while their souls yearning to know why.
Jesus cried out… to God in anguish on the cross…”Father, forgive them… The absence of faith and love and the presence of pain and suffering alter the soul. Eyes cannot see. Ears cannot hear. Spirits lie dead in the womb…they know not what they do.”
When I lived in Denver, Co., there was a six year old girl who was abducted by an adult male. After he molested her, he took her to a state park and threw her into the bottom of an outhouse to die. She stood hip deep in human waste for three days until a man heard her. The man looked down into the darkness and asked her…”how did you get down there?” She answered…”I live here.” My fellow Christians, this is the cry of so many people, born into the shit, whatever it may have been…longing for things to be different, but unable to believe that they can be. If you ask them, “why do they act that way,” they say something equivalent to…”I live here.”
We are so blessed with faith and hope and love! Don’t let it wither. Don’t let the weeds of life choke it off. Grow it and share it. It’s the treasure that you best not burry in the ground. It’s the light that we dare not hide under a bushel. It’s what God has given us. Yet this glorious life we have is not always warm and fuzzy. Sometimes we cry out in anguish because we are Christians.
So as we go forth and teach all people about the forbidden fruit, and the corrupt nature of man, about the flood, about the judges, kings, and prophets, about the judgment of and atonement for sin, about justification by faith, about morality and holiness, about the end of days and the throne of God and the lake of fire…please, my brothers and sisters, try to keep in mind that knowing all this and more…Jesus wept.
