Description
Empathy in Times of Joy and Sorrow: Biblical Guidance
In this touching episode, we explore how Christians can support t… (visit YouTube for more)
Transcript
My wife and I lost one of our boys last year, and people, Christians often don’t know what to say or how to be with those who are experiencing grief or suffering. The Bible has a great recommendation for us for those times of joy and sorrow, in Romans 12 verse 15: Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep.
In the 23rd Psalm, it says that even if we walk through the valley of the shadow of death, we know that God is with us, alongside us. And this is our experience in life so often, isn’t it that God doesn’t airlift us outta those difficult situations? He doesn’t make the suffering and pain just go away. No, in fact, the gospel is a gospel that includes suffering because as a result of our fallen nature in this fallen world, there is sin in this world, and there is suffering and death and decay.
So what do we do about them? Do we ignore them? Do we just pray harder? Do we expect that our faith will make everything go away?
No. Jesus was the Suffering Servant. He went to the cross. He experienced great agony on our behalf. He knows what it is to suffer. And when we suffer, he is right there alongside us.
And so Paul says in Romans, this is what we should do too. When people are rejoicing, rejoice with them. Has somebody achieved amazing results in exams? Let’s celebrate together.
Has somebody lost someone close and dear to them? We don’t need to try and make things better. We just weep alongside those people who are in distress.
This is great advice that Paul gives, that we should be empathic with one another. We rejoice together. We weep together, we do life together.
Lord God, I thank you for these wise words to us. Please help us to apply them to our lives, being your hands and feet on this earth to comfort, to mourn, to celebrate, to rejoice. To walk in short as Jesus walked. Amen.
