What a tender moment! These words of the Apostle John allow modern readers to peer through the crowd in ancient Bethany and see a touching scene unfold. Lazarus and his sisters Mary and Martha had been friends of Jesus. News reached Christ that Lazarus had died. When Jesus arrived, Lazarus had been “in the grave four days already” (John 11:17). Jesus sees Mary weeping “and the Jews also weeping which came with her” (11:33a). The Greek of the New Testament helps us here. Mary and her Jewish friends wailed and sobbed. Theirs was the weeping of loss, of despair. Surely their grief could have been heard from afar. The word used when Jesus wept speaks of the soft shedding of tears. Mary and her companions wailed aloud. Jesus quietly cried.The different Greek terms also highlight different motives and mindsets. Mary and her companions were crushed that Jesus had arrived too late to heal Lazarus. Their weeping reflected that. Resentment, or even bitterness, may have mingled with their tears. The Lord Jesus responded to their grief with a different grief. “He groaned in the spirit and was troubled” (11:33b). That groaning may have shown indignation (at the effects of death? at the consequences of sin?). His troubled spirit may have reminded him that soon he himself would taste death. Mary’s cry seemed dejected. Jesus lamented a fallen world. Both were sorrowful, but our Lord would thwart death at the cross. Mary could do nothing about Lazarus’ death.Christ’s sacrificial death and victorious resurrection would defeat death.

Jesus continues to love a fallen world. The writer of Hebrews tells of Jesus’ lofty status as eternal high priest, the one “who is set on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens” (Hebrews 8:1). His intercession for us as high priest is magnificent. His lowly grief at the grave of Lazarus, however, leaves us in awe of such perfect passion. Jesus wept. What a clear display of the humanity and divinity of the Savior. He loved all who were present at the grave of Lazarus, and his tears showed that love.

Fully human, Jesus wept. Fully divine, Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead.“Jesus wept” captures so much. He is “touched with the feeling of our infirmities” (Hebrews 4:15), and his tears show that. He is both intimate and infinite, both emotional and eternal. Such a Savior deserves our awe, our obedience, and our praise.