Sunday 21st July
Read John 11:33-37
“When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come along with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in spirit and troubled. 34 ‘Where have you laid him?’ he asked.
‘Come and see, Lord,’ they replied.
35 Jesus wept.
36 Then the Jews said, ‘See how he loved him!’
37 But some of them said, ‘Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?’” (NIVUK)
Many sermons have been preached on the shortest verse in Scripture (v35). Two words that speak immense volumes about the divine stooping down to the very human. Don Carson captures the heart of these verses well in one of his many sonnets. I shall leave it to him.
Could not the one who opened blind men’s eyes
Have kept this man from dying? Did he care
So little he delayed until he dared
Not linger further? Were there futile tries
To heal, quite swallowed by the mourning cries?
The healer must have loved him: he can’t bear
This death with stoic unconcern, nor tear
From this man’s tomb his weeping eyes.
The one whose primal home is heaven’s bliss
Makes dust of Palestine his friend, and weeps
With those who weep. No studied distance, this:
He dons our flesh and into anguish leaps.
Removed from savage death, he could have kept
Aloof; but Scripture signals, “Jesus wept.” (Holy Sonnets #33, Don Carson)
