When Prayers Are Tears

A powerful truth that God has been working into my heart over the past few years is, tears are a pleasing offering to Him. What do I mean by that? Well, let me put it like this: I had to learn that God loves for me (and all of His children) to approach Him at all times, with all of the burdens and messes in our lives. He longs to be the one we call upon in the midst of the darkest points of our journey to healing and to wholeness. So, He loves our tears. He loves our tears because He loves when we can be real before Him and ask Him for His help, for His comfort, for His grace, for His power to be released on behalf of the ones we love most; for Him to bring hope and change when things are at their most hopeless point. 

LET THE FATHER, FATHER YOU
                                                                                                                   

Think of a Father who has a little girl, and the little girl has fallen and skinned her knee. The little girl is in pain- bleeding and knowing that she needs help- she doesn't know how to fix her skinned knee, and she doesn't know where the band-aids are. If this little girl felt like she must go to her room and hide her skinned knee- cry alone and bleed in secret because she only wanted her Daddy to se her when she was smiling and dancing- this would be so silly! And if the Father knew she felt that she couldn't come to him for the help that He could so easily and gladly give her- I'm sure it would break his heart. The good and kind Father longs to help and hold his daughter at all times. He loves to see her smiling and dancing, for this brings great joy to his heart. But, when the daughter has fallen and is hurt- it is the greatest joy of the Father to also be there to hold her and help her in her tears. It is his joy to bandage her wounds, to give her a kiss and hug, wipe her tears away and watch her smile again. And when the little girl has gone to her Father with her wound and found His love there as well, she comes away feeling more safe, more loved, and knowing that her Father is trustworthy in all things- for He not only wants to see her smiling, but he sees and loves her the same in smiling and in tears. 

God is this Father. He is this good Father. God is this Father and we are His beloved daughters and sons. How He longs for us to come to Him at all times, with all things. I believe He wants us to come to Him with our joy and our heartache, for He alone is strong enough to carry us, big enough to handle us with all of our mess, and loving enough to want to sit with us in the mess and in the pain until it is redeemed into beauty. And He alone holds the hope for the process. 

MONTHS OF PRAYING TEARS...

Yesterday I reached my sixth month mark. I have been living overseas in this beautiful country of South Africa for half of a year. It has been so incredibly wonderful, while at the same time being incredibly difficult and painful. I have learned SO much in this time, and one of the biggest things has been this truth: That the Father loves and listens to the language of tears. When tears are all we have to offer Him, He meets us and holds us and listens just as intently as if we were speaking words, and He send His Spirit to groan with us when words just can't be found. 

In these months, I have prayed more tears than words. Some times in our lives we must just pray tears, for that is the only language our hearts can speak. The Spirit is there too though; in every moment of praying tears, the Spirit is there. 

"Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words." - Romans 8:26

DAVID & HANNAH

There are two scriptures specifically, where this "prayers of tears," theme is comes up:

The first is in Psalms 6 where David pours out his heart to God, and says that his tears are a prayer that God hears and receives, ..."for the Lord has heard the sound of my weeping. The Lord has heard my supplication; the Lord accepts my prayer." And just before this, David talks of how he was tired out from crying so often! His couch and bd where he sat and slept were soaking wet from all the weeping and his eyes hurt, and God saw this and received it as a prayer.

The second is the story of Hannah in 1st Samuel 1-2. Hannah was in great distress over family problems, as well as her inability to have a child. In this state she cried to the Lord and made a life-changing request and promise. In chapter 1:10 it says, "She (Hannah) was deeply distressed and prayed to the Lord, and wept bitterly." This weeping was all Hannah had to offer and later we see that, "The Lord remembered her."(1:19) and He gives her the requests of her heart made through weeping. AND, later we see Hannah totally transformed and rejoicing! Here are some of her beautiful words to the Lord- "My heart exults in the Lord; my strength is exalted in my God. My mouth derides my enemies, because I rejoice in my victory...He raises up the poor from the dust; he lifts the needy from the ash heap, to make them sit with princes and inherit a seat of honor." 

What an encouragement these stories are to me. They remind me that our Father hears and receives our prayers when we have nothing left but tears. Not only that, but He moves in the heavens to bring change in response to the groans of our hearts. 

HE IS MOVING HEAVEN WHEN WE CRY 

So, I want to encourage you today- wherever you may find yourself. Never hesitate to come to our Father- even when there are no words left, but only tears. He longs to have us come to Him with our brokenness, our mess, the situations in our life that are just too big and too painful and too beyond our capacity to repair. He longs to hear our heart cries when we groan on behalf of the ones we love so dearly. He loves when we pour out our own broken hearts. He loves when we come in our tears and sit in His presence- and when there are no more tears to cry, His love and His grace is enough. For He is moving in heaven when we cry, to bring His Kingdom down to earth on our behalf.