‘In my alarm I said, “I am cut off from your sight!” Yet you heard my cry for mercy when I called to you for help. ‘ Psalms 31:22
I used to be a cry baby. I would cry all the time, but somewhere along the road I convinced myself that crying made me weak. I started to associate shame and a loss of control with my tears. I began apologizing to my friends every time I cried. I think it was because I hated looking weak, and I didn’t want to put pressure on my friends to have to “deal” with me being emotional. Sometimes, as women, we have had a really hard time finding a healthy space to cry. Either we cry too much, we cry to manipulate, or we feel shame about our crying and we simply don’t cry at all. So as I began prepping for this spiritual G series, I have to admit that the battles started rolling in. Everything felt hard. I felt challenged on every side and honestly, I wanted to give up. Because of all the pressure, once again I found myself on my office floor crying my eyes out! The more I cried, the more I felt like a failure and the more I felt completely opposite of a spiritual gangsta. With every sob, I felt more like a spiritual sell out!
However, at this point in my life, I know enough to know that it doesn’t end there. So after crying to my mama and even though I felt like a fake and a phony, with swollen eyes and a defeated heart, I opened my Word. “God I need something!” I found myself drawn to the psalms of David. I read some of my favorites like 37 and 91, and then I began to skim through more of David’s words. The Man after God’s own heart; as you read his psalms you can begin to see how he got that nickname. He wrote through the rollercoaster of emotions, YET his heart remained steadfast on the faithfulness of the Lord. Through the soulful cries of David, I was reminded of the beautiful way that the Lord has created us and how He is willing to use every part of us to bring Him glory… even our tears.
God reminded me that I was made with this compassion and emotion for a reason. There is a unique physical and even spiritual attachment to our emotions. Our emotions are powerful. We have emotions because the Lord has emotions. Our cries reflect only a glimpse of the vast level of compassion, love and pain that our Father feels. The Lord feels too. So when God creates space for us to cry, He knows the pain of a wailing cry of mourning, a cry of sorrow, a cry of disappointment, and a cry of desperation.
Even Jesus cried.
At the Garden of Gethsemane, out of anguish Jesus cried out. He cried out in prayer. He cried out to the only one who could meet Him in His sorrow. He cried out to the only one who understood the complexity of what He was feeling that night. And if I may speculate, here are only a few of the emotions he may have been feeling that night as he prepared to go to the cross: the fear of the pain, the sorrow of the shame, the hurt it would cause for his followers to see his abuse, the sadness he would see in the eyes of his mother, the darkness of carrying the weight of every sin of every human, and yet the compassion to save humanity, the love for his creation, the excitement of fulfilling the promise to His chosen people and all of mankind.
What a heavy weight of emotion to carry in one person!
His cries must have been heavy… weighted. He cried not just to the people who were there as He asked them to tarry with Him, but He cried to the father who doesn’t sleep or slumber (Psalms 121).
Jesus expressed to his disciples/friends that His soul was “exceedingly sorrowful” (Matthew 26:38) but though they loved Him, they were not aware of the weight he was carrying. They didn’t know how to be there for Him, even if they were just supposed to pray with Him.
I know that my sorrow can’t even begin to compare to the weight of what Jesus was carrying that night, yet I can often find myself overwhelmed by the things I am called to do. I can find myself “exceedingly sorrowful” and wanting to find another way out. I may not be called to save humanity through my own death and resurrection on the cross, yet the Lord has told me I will have to pick up my own cross. (Luke 9:23) My pastor always says that the Bible does not exaggerate. If walking in my calling would be easy, he wouldn’t call it a cross… It is a cross. It is a cross because walking with it will be heavy at times. The Lord intentionally calls us to carry our cross because being a “spiritual G” and walking in your calling will sometimes bring you to the ground with a soul depleted and struggling to find strength. You will undoubtedly find yourself in moments of heartache and moments of feeling abandoned and alone, YET God is not a liar! God is not forgetful! God is not unaware of our pain! And he reminds us not only through the modeling of Christ in the garden, but even through David in the psalms…to CRY out to God. Take all the emotion to God.
We often want to take it to others, but the Lord has clearly shown us that with Him is the safest place to cry. He doesn’t reject our cries. He doesn’t mock our disbelief. He doesn’t reject us in our sorrow. He loves us. He stores up our tears in bottles (wineskins) valuing them (Psalms 56:8). He also promises joy in the morning (Psalms 30:5).
A real spiritual G will hit the lowest points of sorrow because what God has called us to do requires faith. It requires a connection to Him. It requires holding on to what we cannot see. It is hard! So when we may find ourselves overwhelmed with the “feelings” of being abandoned “cut off from [his] sight” whether that be because of our own struggles or the attacks of the enemy, YET He is faithful to hear our “cry for mercy when [we call] to [Him] for help.” He hears you . He hears me. He loves me. A spiritual gangsta cries, but she especially takes her tears to the most reliable source of comfort, wisdom, and help. He does not abandon us in our sorrow. He didn’t abandon David. He didn’t abandon Jesus. He hasn’t abandoned Rachel, and he won’t abandon you. Hold on, and don’t be ashamed! Today I encourage you, after you have cried it out with your bestie and your mama and your neighbor and your spouse… don’t leave it there, they are awesome places to cry BUT don’t forget to be a “g” like David and Jesus and take those tears to the Father.
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