What Glenn Writes

I spoke about crying out loud in yesterday’s article . I know this is not something many people, especially men – you know, the real manly man – are comfortable doing. In fact, many of the so-called real men reading the article yesterday probably stopped reading it when I started confessing times of grief in my life.

They may have even called me a girly-girly man.

The basic truth of the matter is tears are built into us as a relief valve – an outlet for our grief, pain, hurt, frustration, or other bottled up emotions. We are built in the image of God and likeness of God, who also knows the value of tears. The world around us has created a false concept that crying is a sign of weakness; while in truth it is a way of getting stronger. 

We need to see the lie for what it is: false and hindering. This may be a difficult notion to grasp, a real paradigm shift in thinking, but we are made weaker in holding back the tears. There is stress and energy wasting junk in holding back feelings or emotions; bottling up the grief and anxiety we should just express through tears steals our strength.

Let’s take a look at one of the most powerful cries of all time: Jesus in the garden. We find this recorded in Luke 22:41-44:

He walked away, perhaps a stone’s throw, and knelt down and prayed this prayer: “Father, if you are willing, please take away this cup of horror from me. But I want your will, not mine.” Then an angel from heaven appeared and strengthened him, for he was in such agony of spirit that he broke into a sweat of blood, with great drops falling to the ground as he prayed more and more earnestly.

In this passage, Luke gives us a physician’s insight to the sheer anguish of Jesus’ prayer in the garden, expressing the real beginning of His excruciating walk to the Cross. When we read, “…he was in such agony of spirit that he broke into a sweat of blood, with great drops falling to the ground…”, we find detail that is more than just flowery prose to describe a moment, but medical fact.  The very rare phenomenon of hematidrosis, or bloody sweat, is caused under great emotional stress.  Tiny capillaries in the sweat glands break, thus mixing blood with sweat. This process produces marked weakness and borderline shock in most patients. 

This was the first step in suffering for our Savior, Jesus Christ.  For this only happens under great emotional stress and anguish, we gain an insight to His emotional state just before His capture. 

He knew what was to come… He knew the betrayal… He knew the desertion of His close friends… He knew His total and complete separation from His Father in Heaven… He knew of the loneliness He would have to endure… the suffering in a physical sense… the emotional sense… and also in a very real spiritual sense… 

He knew of His death to come and the burden He would carry to the cross; the burden that He would take the sins of the world into the grave with Him.  

You might argue the verses above do not specifically state Jesus was in tears during this time, however most theologians recognize Jesus’ physical, emotional, and spiritual state during this prayer as one of unbearable sobs and heart wrenching cries. Now, read the passage one more time and pay attention to what happens just before He sweats droplets of blood.

An angel appears to strengthen Him!

Now angels just don’t go appearing willy-nilly wherever they want, strengthening people, delivering messages, and doing their angel stuff… they are sent by God. In this case, this angel appears to strengthen Jesus at the command of God the Father, knowing what Jesus would have to endure in the prayer – a time of crying out! There was a direct purpose for the angel and a direct purpose for the tears and blood expressed during Jesus’ prayers in the garden.

Moments, and a few verses later, we find Jesus has a calm resolve as He faces the guards coming to the garden to lead Him away. Throughout His trials, His beatings, His suffering, His walk to the Cross, and His time on the Cross, we witness His strength to accomplish the mission for which He was sent.

Could He have done it without His time in the garden? Maybe. Did his tears and expression of grief in the garden strengthen Him, clear out the bottled up emotions and stress, and better prepare Him to accomplish what He set out to do? Definitely.

Many of us are facing some tough times in our lives. Many of us are about to or are enduring a crisis in our lives, and we are purposely sabotaging our abilities to handle the issues. Let me encourage you in the same way I encouraged you yesterday: Find a place in the next day where you go quietly and pray about whatever hurt or bitterness or pain or shame or whatever you have been holding back. If you feel the tears come, don’t stop them… they have a purpose.

Cry it all out – if it was good for Jesus, it will be good for you, too. It is a way for you to get stronger.

Glenn Sasscer

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