John 11:35
Jesus wept.
From the time you were a child, you have probably known this as the shortest verse in the Bible. While it is the shortest, it is by no means the most insignificant. In its tiny form, it houses a wealth of blessings. This verse reminds us of Jesus’ humanity. It reveals His care, and it teaches us a lesson.
Jesus was fully God. He controlled the wind and the seas with His voice, cast out devils, opened blind eyes, made the sick whole, and, in this very chapter, raised a man who had been dead for four days. He was undoubtedly God, but He is God in the flesh. While He proved without a shadow of a doubt that He was God, He also proved that He was fully man. He partook in all our brokenness but none of our sinfulness. He was tempted in every point as we are, yet without sin. He wept, but He wasn’t bitter. He was hurt, but He did not return the hurt. He bore all the pains we have ever borne and took them with grace and perfect holiness. Oh, what a Savior is mine!
He wept. Have you ever wept? Your Savior has too. He has been in the exact place you are now, knows how you feel, and can “succour” you at all times. Remember, when you are weeping, He too has wept, and He can relate—not just because He is God and knows everything, but because He knows from your perspective what it is to weep.
Not only does this verse remind us of Jesus’ humanity, but it also reveals His empathy. He was weeping because of Mary’s tearful words to Him. He was weeping because the people He loved were weeping. In the verses prior, the Bible even says, “He groaned in the spirit, and was troubled.” Their heartfelt grief became His heartfelt grief. This is what He did on that day, but it is also what He did all His life. Part of His purpose in coming to this earth was that He might take our griefs: “Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows.”
I don’t think it an exaggeration to say that even the griefs and sorrows you carry in this hour are His as well. He bore them in His life of grief. Isaiah called Him the “Man of Sorrows.” What a name! We can’t find any greater illustration of that name than in this verse: Jesus wept. He not only wept for them on that day, but He also wept for you and me. He carried our sorrows, bore our griefs, and was “touched with the feeling of our infirmities.” He not only felt deep grief and sorrow—He felt ours.
Lastly, we find the lesson contained in these two words. Whatever Jesus has done is always, in some sense, an example for His followers. After all, we are Christians (little Christs). If Jesus wept with the weeping and was hurt when His friends were hurt, then we should be as well.
When tragedy strikes a loved one, it can seem as though a dark cloud hovers over them, and no one dares get close lest that dark cloud overshadow them too. This should not be. If a brother is hurt, bear his burden with him. Galatians tells us this is the fulfillment of the law: “Bear ye one another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ.” It was love that moved Christ to weep with the weeping, and it should be the love of Christ that stirs us to weep with our brethren.
Is there a friend with a lost family member for whom they have shed many tears? Have you wept with them on behalf of that lost loved one? Is there a brother who finds himself in a mess of a situation, pressed out of measure? Won’t you go and bear his burdens with him? In so doing, we will follow the example set for us by our Lord and fulfill the law of Christ.
One of the benefits of such a short verse of Scripture is that it is so memorable. So, the next time you think about these two words, Jesus wept, remember His humanity for you, the sorrows He bore for us, and how you ought to follow in His footsteps—and in so doing, fulfill His law.
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