Devotional Song: … GO TO THIS LINK … Please take the time to take in a video of Ray Boltz singing the poignant and personal song, Does He Still Feel the Nails, expressing the rather tragic thought and question of Jesus shedding tears of pain when we sin … even today?
Highlight Passage John 11: 33-35 [ESV] …
33 When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in his spirit and greatly troubled. 34 And he said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see.” 35 Jesus wept.
… Shortest verse in the NT … shows just how much Jesus cares for what we experience.
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Highlight Context - John 11: 32-44 [ESV] … USE THIS LINK …
… When Jesus, knowing Lazarus had died, saw saw Mary, Lazarus’ sister, weeping, … He wept for her?
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Reference Passage #1 - Luke 19: 41-42 [ESV] …
41 And when He [Jesus] drew near and saw the city, He wept over it, 42 saying, “Would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes.
… Jesus, when he drew near Jerusalem just before His passion and death, wept for the sins of God’s chosen ones.
Reference Passage #2 - Luke 22: 41-44 [ESV] … USE THIS LINK
… Jesus, praying in Gethsemane ,,, was so grieved His tears became blood
Reference Passage #3 - 2nd Timothy 1: 7 [ESV] …
7 … God gave us a spirit, … not of fear … but of power and love and self-control. …
… And let us not forget this truth when we’re fraught with fear …
Reference Passage #4 - 1st Peter 5: 7 [ESV] …
7 … casting all your cares on Him, for He cares for you …
… Oh, … how much our Lord cares for us …
My Journal for Today: Today’s Our Daily Bread author, Cindy Hess Kasper, reminds her listeners how sharing tears and memories of loved ones who’ve past can help to remind us of the joys we shared with that loved one during our lives. The author reminded me that often, at a memorial service, we waver between tears and laughter when we remember how much a loved one has meant to us.
And Kasper also took me back to the emotions Jesus felt for His beloved friend, Lazarus, weeping with His friend’s sister, Mary, when He saw her grief and confusion over Lazarus’ death [see the highlight passage, linked above]. And there was the time when Jesus wept just before He entered Jerusalem for the last time before His passion on the cross [see Luke 19 above]. And hearing the song, linked above, a saved sinner, like me, can’t help but wonder, knowing that Jesus intercedes for me in Heaven, if Jesus sheds tears of anguish when I sin, as He did in Gethsemane and must have on the cross for the sins of mankind.
But then I remember the promise of Revelation 7: 17 that God will wipe away all the tears of all His faithful children in heaven; and I’m reminded that Jesus is God; … and He is all joy; … and in heaven, He knows what lies ahead in glory for all, like me, who’ve received His Spirit. So, why would He be crying for my sins now; because, though He prays for me and cares for my anguish, He knows that one day I’ll be sharing eternal joy with Him.
And I [we] simply must remember the exhortation Paul gave to Timothy (and all Christians) in 2nd Tim. 1: 7 and the teaching of Peter to persecuted Christians in 1st Peter 5:7, both Apostles trying to get fearful, any maybe even tearful, believers to remember that we need to cast all our cares and woes and fears on Christ, Who has overcome them all on the cross and who now sits on God’s throne, praying for all of us who have concerns/cares.
So, let’s just cast those cares today on Him, knowing that He doesn’t have to shed tears for us because He knows that one day we’ll be with Him in glory.
My Prayer Today: Oh Lord, … thank You for taking your tears of concern for us and turning them into Your blood, shed for us that we might live with You in glory. Amen
Blogger Note: Everyday during this year, my daily devotional blogs are influenced by the reading and study of the online devotional blog entitled Our Daily Bread, distributed online via email by RBC Ministries. If you GO TO THIS LINK on the date of my blog, you can read/study the ODB blogs; or you can subscribe to the blog via email at that site.
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