Tears of joy

I just heard the song… You Came by Jonathan and Melissa Helser  What a beautiful song!  It has been my morning meditation and prayer today as I have imaged Jesus waiting outside the tomb of Lazarus with tears still on His face.  Oh the beauty and wonder as His tears turned from sorrow to joy when He called to His friend, Lazarus, and raised him from the grave.

Dear Lord, I pray that those I know who have died are your true friends and as with Lazarus, you stand outside their graves, with tears of joy on Your face as you call for them to rise again to new life.

Oh my Lord, my Love, my All in All – let us anxiously await and yearn for the moment when we too will hear Your call and will rise from the grave to see You anxiously waiting for us with tears of joy on Your beautiful face.

His tears…

We have an ornament in the shape of a cross that hangs on our Christmas tree.  It has tiny plastic jewels glued onto it in the shape of teardrops.

A few weeks ago as I was putting our Christmas tree away I found one of the teardrops on the ground.  It fell off the top of this cross as if our Lord was crying.

It made me think of His tears and the sorrow He feels when we are cruel, when we speak to each other without thinking, without consideration, and without kindness.  He cries as He sees the cruelty ripple outward and downward in a revolving cycle of hurt, anger, and gossip.  He cries as He watches His peace slip from our hearts as we lose sight of Him and begin this downward spiral.

I have hurt and been hurt with words.  Many times I have begun this cycle or been swept away by this cycle wasting minutes, hours and days obsessing over an unkindness rather than gazing at You.

Lord please let only kindness pass my lips or nothing at all, please open my ears to Your voice alone calling me out of this spiral, and please open my eyes to You alone so that I might not be a cause for Your tears of sorrow, but instead bring You tears of joy.