Saturday, January 10, 2009

Saturday Selah: Jesus Wept

Inspired by a brief (under 2 minutes) radio spot, I'm changing the format of Saturday Selah. I would like to offer a place where we can share encouraging messages we have heard throughout the week. In as few as 50 words or less, we can share a Bible verse or two and what they meant to us. Perhaps we heard song lyrics that touched our hearts. Anything that made a difference in your week can be posted here.

Our job as women of faith is to encourage others to seek God. If something stood out as special encouragement, then God meant it to help others as well. Don't worry about the word count - it's not a strict policy, just a guideline. Sometimes God gives us a little to say, sometimes He gives more.



Now to my inspiration from this week. I hope you are as blessed by it as I have been.

In John 11 we see Jesus arriving in Bethany four days after Lazarus died. Mary, brokenhearted, collapsed in grief at His feet. She tells Him, "Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died." [John 11:32 (NKJV)]

Jesus' response contains the shortest verse in the Bible: He wept.

He did not weep for His own grief at the loss of His friend. His heart broke for the pain Mary was suffering.

Then He asked, "Where have you laid him?" In other words, Jesus told Mary to take Him to the source of her pain.

That is what Jesus does with us. He has compassion for our breaking hearts. Our pastor defines compassion as sympathy with the intent to take action.

Jesus weeps for our pain, and asks us to take Him to its source...to open that wound and let Him do all in His power to comfort and heal that pain.

Dear friends, reach out to Him right now with your heart break. Let Him in to comfort you and guide you into His blessed rest and peace.




3 comments:

Denise said...

Very nice post dear.

Esthermay Bentley-Goossen said...

Good thoughts!
I like the new format of Saturday Selah . . .

Vikki Wright said...

Greetings from Uganda! Esthermay put me onto this great meme...thanks for hosting it! It was just what I needed to share what I'm going through at the moment.
I tried to copy your button to put on my blog, but it was too big and didn't fit into my sidebar. Do you have a smaller version, or can you tell me how to make it smaller?
Thanks, Patricia, and be blessed!
Vikki