I read this today and thought how well it ties in to what we were talking about last night. So thankful for the example that Jesus gave us of how to live!
"Some people have been taught that the Christian life makes no room for sadness, gives no permission to mourn, allows no time for lament. This kind of mental toughness might seem a practical approach for immediate survival, but unexpressed grief can become a bitterness that chokes us. When we dull our pain, we dull our joy. When we numb our lows, we numb our highs.
Jesus has a different perspective on grief. He never lacked emotion or expression. He “was a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief” (Isaiah 53:3). And in His impassioned Sermon on the Mount, He gives us this promise: “Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted” (Matthew 5:4).
When we grieve—not if—we will be comforted.
Not long after His sermon, Jesus experienced this for Himself. “He took Peter and Zebedee’s two sons, James and John, and He became anguished and distressed. He told them, ‘My soul is crushed with grief to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me’” (Matthew 26:37).
Jesus wept from empathy, from disappointment, from pain. He mourned, and when He was finished mourning, He surrendered to the work of God—work that brought great freedom to all of us.
None of us wants to encounter such deep grief in our lifetimes. But the more we mourn our sin and need, pain and loss, the more we can trust and anticipate the gracious comfort Christ Jesus promises to bring." - Rebekah Lyons
