"The righteous call to the LORD, and he listens; he rescues them from all their troubles. The LORD is near to those who are discouraged; he saves those who have lost all hope."
“For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared to the glory that is to be revealed to us” (Romans 8:18). So, if you weep, be comforted to know that God sees your tears, He values your sorrow, and He will one day remove every tear from your life.
We trust in God through heavy tears and blurred vision because He will rescue us. Our tears before God are never in vain. He hears our cries, and He will make all things new.
He hears our cries of unhappiness, pain, frustration, exhaustion, and fear. We can be honest with Him. His listening ear is always open to our prayers. His loving heart wants to embrace us as we cry on His shoulder.
Does God see me and my pain? The answer is certainly yes (see Deuteronomy 31:6 and Matthew 28:20).
Not only is God aware of our pain, but He sees our most heartbreaking moments and hears the sound of every gut-wrenching cry. He sees, He hears and He cares. Yet the sound of our weeping doesn't cause Him to recoil in disgust.
He hurts when we hurt. The psalmist said, “As a father pities his children, so the Lord pities those who fear Him. For He knows our frame; He remembers that we are dust” (Psalm 103:13-14). The truth that God hurts when we hurt found full expression when it was revealed in the person of Jesus Christ.
Tears communicate to others your need for support and love. So in one way, God's designing of tears was actually a design born from His care for us. That tears would symbolize “I'm hurting” to those near us. If they communicate our pain to those around us, how much more to God?
We cry out to God in acknowledgment that He is God and we are not. In doing so, we look to Him as controller of the outcome. We pray in faith, knowing that God is more than capable of answering our prayers, but we also accept the reality that He may not answer in the way we want.
On the one hand, the cross arises from the absence of God. At the climax of Jesus' crucifixion, he cries out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Mt 27:46; cf.
Our ability to express our emotions with tears is a gift, and God keeps track of each tear we cry. Psalm 56:8 says, “You keep track of all my sorrows. You have collected all my tears in your bottle. You have recorded each one in your book” (nlt).
Job 35:12-14 New King James Version (NKJV)
There they cry out, but He does not answer, Because of the pride of evil men. Surely God will not listen to empty talk, Nor will the Almighty regard it. Although you say you do not see Him, Yet justice is before Him, and you must wait for Him.
Through the scriptures, we are taught that God will always hear our prayers and will answer them if we address Him with faith and real intent. In our hearts we will feel the confirmation that He does hear us, a feeling of peace and calm. We can also feel that everything will be fine when we follow the Father's will.
Tristitia (sorrow/despair/despondency)
Yes, he works all of our sufferings for his glory and our good. But he does not enjoy breaking us. He does not take a perverted pleasure in seeing us brought to nothing. All suffering is the result of sin in the world (not necessarily personal sin, but the fact that sin is in the world).
Joyful sorrow
Whether they result from physical pain, from emotional pain, or from an encounter with goodness and beauty, one of the gifts of tears is precisely that we pray through them. All of our tears have been taken into the divine life by Jesus, the one who has wept with us.
“The righteous cry, and the LORD heareth, and delivereth them out of all their troubles” (Psalm 34:17). “When I cry unto thee, then shall mine enemies turn back: this I know; for God is for me” (Psalm 56:9).
Psalm 77: Seeking the Lord in Distress
David opens Psalm 77 (read the entire chapter on Biblica) by explaining that he "cried out to God for help" when he was in distress.
Certainly the Spirit of the Lord can bring strong emotional feelings, including tears, but that outward manifestation ought not to be confused with the presence of the Spirit itself” (in Preach My Gospel: A Guide to Missionary Service [2004], 99).
the most explicit reference to divine pain comes in Genesis 6:6. Contemplating the evil of the antediluvian world, the text says: “The Lord was grieved that he had made man on the earth, and his heart was filled with pain.” And Isaiah 63:9 states that in all the distresses of His people “[God] too was distressed.”
Classical theology has historically tended to depict God as a distant, dispassionate and literally apathetic being unmoved by emotion. The unmoved mover doesn't weep. He (or, perhaps better, it) moves, but is not moved. Nothing can have any impact on him.
It gives vent to grief, guilt, anger, fear, and frustration, as well as joy and happiness. Our broken heart and contrite spirit cry. Our tender mercies cry. Sometimes when the Spirit touches on the crusty, hardened parts of our heart and we soften up – we cry as a result.
Do not take revenge, my friends, but leave room for God's wrath, for it is written: 'It is mine to avenge; I will repay,' says the Lord” (Romans 12:18-20). God will repay, so leave room for His wrath. You don't need to take it into your hands when you know it is in His. God will deal with this.
When we are suffering, God is right beside us. Nothing can separate us from His love. He wants to show us His love through His church, and give us a purpose through His Word!
Where is God when it hurts? He is in us—not in the things that hurt—helping to transform bad into good. We can safely say that God can bring good out of evil; we cannot say that God brings about the evil in hopes of producing good.