What Moves Us to Tears?

After the sermon on Sunday I got to seriously thinking about this question. The pastor presented us with the question at the beginning of the sermon.

So - what moves us to tears? Do you cry over the things that hurt us directly? The things that make us sad. Or...do you cry over the things that God would cry over? What is the difference in the things that move us to tears vs. the things that move God to tears?

I have come up with a brief list of some of the things that have moved me to tears in the last week:

1. My daughter blowing me kisses when I walked in her room to get her up a few mornings ago
2. Thinking about and feeling the pain of losing my middle daughter almost 3 years ago
3. Thinking about my daughter's 1st birthday that is coming later this week
4. The thought of not having any more children
5. My son's attitude a few nights ago

I thought more in depth about each of them:

1. These were good tears - something that made me so extremely happy! I think God may cry when we blow Him kisses too! That's how much He loves us!
2. Although I know it's normal to cry when we experience loss or feel pain, but God isn't crying over Claire not being here with me. He's happy that she's in Heaven with Him...so maybe I should just look forward to the day when I can be there with her!
3. Again - a bittersweet kind of crying...
4. I shouldn't cry over this! I am so very blessed to have two healthy children here on earth with me. I should focus my attention and energy on raising these two!
5. This was more of a fear of failure in myself. My husband and I have tried so hard over the last 4 years to balance discipline with self-confidence. Being a parent is such a challenge - never knowing until it's too late whether you did the right thing or not. Overall Hunter is a wonderful boy - I'm sure every parent wonders what happened to their "sweet" child at some point or another.

What things move God to tears though? Do we cry for the babies who never get a chance at life because their parents made the decision to abort them? Do we cry for those who are homeless on the street and no one gives them a second chance? Do we cry for those around us who don't know the love and saving grace of our Heavenly Father? I believe in my heart that those are the types of things that move God to tears.

Maybe we should stop being so "all about me" all the time and think about what makes God cry everyday. What can we do to help eliminate His tears? Isn't that what we try to do for others that we love? Try to fix things so that they aren't sad, hurting, etc.? Haven't we all said "I'd take the pain, sickness, hurt, if I could"? Let's try to do that for God!