Romans 12:15     Rejoice with those who rejoice, and weep with those who weep.

My son, a missionary to tribal people in New Guinea, told how his motorbike recently skidded in the sand of a primitive path, throwing him face first into gravel. At the mission compound his fellow workers - seeing his puffed, slashed, discolored face - jested, "Wife beat you up again?" "Run into a revolving door?" "What's the other fellow look like?"

Yet one native reacted differently. Throwing his arms around my son and laying his head upon his chest, he shook with sobs and shed tearful tears.

I wondered: Whenever I weep for whatever reason, whom would I wish to have alongside? Wouldn't it be someone like that tender-hearted native?

Why is it so often in our society we make jokes about another's pain? Why can't we be like Jesus, Who wept?

Teach me to share sorrow, Lord, the way You did.
Isabel Champ