In the entire world nothing feels worse than the grief that we feel when a loved one dies. During such a time, words alone cannot alleviate our grief. The most that someone can do for us is to cry with us and to lend a shoulder to cry on.
The Bible tells of the time when a man named Lazarus died. His sisters Martha and Mary grieved. Lazarus had a friend named Jesus who went to Martha and Mary after Lazarus died. How did Jesus respond to their grief?
John 11:32-36: "Now when Mary came to where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet, saying to him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in his spirit and greatly troubled. And he said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see.” Jesus wept. So the Jews said, “See how he loved him!”
Jesus wept. The ultimate preacher did not respond to Mary’s grief with words from a religious text. He cried instead. As the Jews pointed out, Jesus loved Lazarus. It would be correct to say that Jesus loved Mary, too. The one who claimed that he was “the way, the truth and the life” felt the same grief that Mary felt.
What does this story mean to us today? Well, if God loves you like people say that He does, then He is going to be crying with you during your times of grief. He will do so even if you deny that He exists, because His love for you does not depend on you believing in Him.