Crying Out to God

Dannah Gresh: Think about it. Babies do it a lot. Toddlers do it quite a bit. Elementary-age kids do it some. Teenagers…also some… Adults, not as much, although we do have our moments.

I’m talking about (pause) crying. 

But WHY do we cry? And should we?

We’ll talk about that today on Revive Our Hearts Weekend. I’m your host, Dannah Gresh. 

Here’s the deal. We do a lot of crying in our lives. And sometimes it’s for good reasons. Even Jesus was called “a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief” in Isaiah 53.

I’m going to propose to you that not only can it be good and right to cry, but we should actually do more of it.

I mean, there’s a lot around us to cry about, isn’t there? Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth says we women should do more crying out to God. Here she is to explain.

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: It's easy for us as women to feel hopeless and helpless as we consider the magnitude of the problems facing our nation and our world today. What can we do against such a tidal wave of evil and—as I've taken to saying in recent days—craziness. (And evil does make things crazy.)

I don't think that most Christian women realize the incredible influence they have—in our culture, in their churches, their homes and their communities. For sure, there is one thing we can do—perhaps the most important thing we can do—and that's to join together in united prayer and cry out to God.

Throughout the Scripture, and then again throughout history, when there have been similar situations—desperate times—over and over again God's people would go to prayer and they would cry out, and God would hear, and He would intervene.

Let me just read you one example, found in 2 Chronicles, chapter 20 (portions of verses 5–12):

After this the Moabites and Ammonites, and with them some of the Meunites, came against Jehoshaphat [the king of the southern nation of Judah] for battle. Some men came and told Jehoshaphat, "A great multitude is coming against you from Edom, from beyond the sea" . . .

Then Jehoshaphat was afraid [of course he was! You would be, too; I would be, too! So, what did he do? He didn't first call out the army; he first . . .] set his face to seek the Lord, and proclaimed a fast throughout all Judah. And Judah assembled to seek help from the Lord; from all the cities of Judah they came to seek the Lord.

And Jehoshaphat stood in the assembly of Judah and Jerusalem, in the house of the Lord, before the new court, and said, "O Lord, God of our fathers, are you not God in heaven?" So, he didn't focus on the enemy; he didn't say, "Do you see these Meunites and these Moabites and these Ammonites?" He said, "God, You are God, You are over and above all of these powers!

"You rule over all the kingdoms of the nations. In your hand are power and might, so that none is able to withstand you."

So, he starts with worship, he starts with exalting God, he starts by lifting his eyes up.

And then, beginning in verse 10 of 2 Chronicles 20, he tells God the situation (it's not like God didn't know the situation); he says, "This is what we're up against." And then he ends, in that very familiar verse 12: "O our God . . . we are powerless against this great horde that is coming against us. We do not know what to do, but our eyes are on you." That's the prayer.

We see the same concept in Esther's day, when God's people were threatened with annihilation. Two Jews, Mordecai and Esther, called people to fast and to turn to the Lord, and God heard. He intervened, His people were spared; disaster was averted.

I don't think we will ever know what God it is could do in our day if we don't stop what we're doing and start getting on our knees and calling out to the Lord together to intervene.

In Jeremiah 9:17—at a time when Israel was in great distress—the Scripture says: "This is what the Lord Almighty says: 'Consider now, call for the wailing women to come; send for the most skillful of them. Let them come quickly and wail over us . . .'"

These, of course, are mourners. They're saying, "There's been a death, there's death in the streets. Call for these wailing, mourning women to come; let them come quickly and wail over us. . . till our eyes overflow with tears and water streams from our eyelids" (Jer. 9:18 NIV). Call for the wailing women to come. 

It's time for us to stop wailing to each other, "Oh, this is so awful! What do you think? Who's going to do this and who's going to do that?" Stop wringing our hands, get on our knees, join our hands together, and cry out to the Lord God in heaven.

And what could be more vital, more critical for such a time as this than for women to get on their knees together and to cry out to the Lord, repenting, pleading with Him to have mercy and to intervene in our world.

There's a promise from Psalm 34:17, "When the righteous cry for help, the Lord hears" (ESV). I love that!

In 1857, a Manhattan businessman, Jeremiah Lanphier, posted notice of a prayer meeting to take place at noon on September 23. Here was the situation: In that day, it was in the throes of the Industrial Revolution and people were making money hand-over-fist. They were wealthy, smug, self-satisfied. They had no room for God.

Lanphier was a businessman, and he saw this, and he said, "We need the Lord!" So he posted a notice in New York City, saying, "Come and pray, in [this particular church] on September 23 at noon." That day showed up and six men came to pray—just six! A pretty small beginning.

I don't know about you, but I think if that would have been me, and that was the outcome, I would have thought, Maybe this isn't the right time; maybe I'm not the right person; maybe we just need to move on.

But Lanphier posted again and said, "Let's come back next week and pray and ask God to come and meet with us," and the next week twenty showed up. And they said, "Let's come back again next week." And the next week forty showed up. 

And the following week, there was a financial crash. All of a sudden, people who had been making tons of money lost it all! And do you know where they headed? To the churches, to pray. To pray!

It was said in New York City that during those days you could go from one church to the next. One newspaperman on his horse actually went from church to church counting up how many people were in the churches praying at noontime—not just once a week, but every day. He lost count at ten thousand in just that one city. 

They were coming together day after day—not just at the lunch hour, but through the day, through the night—the churches were crowded with people crying out to the Lord. And it was not just in New York City, but in Chicago and Philadelphia and all across this country . . . as the news spread about how people were seeking the Lord.

People dropped what they were doing; they began to cry out to the Lord and to pray. Some people estimate that one million people came to faith in Christ as a result of what came to be known as the great Prayer Revival of 1857 and 1858 in just over a several-month period.

Our prayer is, "Lord, would You do it again? Do it again! Would You come? Would You move?"

We're praying to a God who hears, who cares, who can help. He has done it in the past. He can do it again—calling, turning the hearts of His people, first, and then the heart of the nation, the hearts of nations of the world to come and seek the Lord . . . as, one day, all peoples of the world will do.

So we're praying, "Lord, have Your way. Bring Your kingdom to come in this world, and have Your will done on earth as it is in heaven."

Dannah: Anything going on in your world that makes you want to cry out to God for help? Yeah, I thought so. That’s Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth. She authored a year-long devotional book called Revive My Heart. This month, as a thank you for your donation of any amount, we’ll send you a copy when you request it. There are many prayer prompts in it to help guide your own crying out to the Lord. 

To give, just go to ReviveOurHearts.com/donate. When you do, be sure to request Nancy’s devotional Revive My Heart.

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So here’s a question. When did we get to the point that we cry mostly for our own pain, and less often when others are hurting?

I, for one, know I need to grow in my ability to produce empathic tears. Oh, I’ll shed my share when my day gets stressful, or my children are hurting, the bank account runs low, someone I love is sick, or my marriage is tested. But, my eyes are rather dry—too dry—when I see the far more horrific challenges of others who are less connected to me.

The Scripture records that Jesus cried three times:

• Once over the brokenness of the city of Jerusalem. (Luke 19:41)
• Once at the tomb of his friend Lazarus. (John 11:35).
• And he cried in the Garden of Gethsemane, as he anticipated the horror of his crucifixion and carrying the weight of our sins. Hebrews chapter 5 says “...Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to him who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverence.” 

What moved him to tears? In each case, he wept as he considered the results —the consequences—of sin. He knew that the city was going to be leveled because of sin. He knew that Lazarus’s sickness and death were because of the curse brought on all creation by Adam and Eve’s sin. And he knew his communion with the Father was about to be broken as Jesus became sin for us.

All across the globe, people are in pain. Right now. And their pain is directly or indirectly a result of sin. Our streets and airwaves and social media platforms are full of people expressing their hurt. Stories of war and death stream through our screens daily. There’s terrible stuff going on these days. The outcome of sin and injustice always leads to grief for someone.

We should be sad. Not just for ourselves, but for others. While there is a need for us to put words and petitions together in cognitive conversation with God, I think tears and strong emotional identification with the pain of others is a form of intercession. And it’s one that’s appropriate for this broken moment in history.

God instructed His people to wail during similar times of sin and injustice in the Old Testament.

In Jeremiah 9, the prophet writes about the nation of Israel dealing with all kinds of evil, wickedness, and deceit. He records:

“Thus says the Lord of hosts:
‘Consider, and call for the mourning women to come:
Send for the skillful women to come;
Let them make haste and raise a wailing over us,
That our eyes may run down with tears
And our eyelids flow with water.’" (Jer. 9:17–18)

Here’s something I find ironic about this passage:

As Nancy mentioned earlier, the “mourning women” were professional mourners brought out to conjure up and express the emotions of the people attending funerals. Apparently, the tears of the people of God were so dried-up that the “professionals” were called upon to usher in a more appropriate response to what was happening in the world.

A similar “professional” position still exists in some African cultures where I’ve witnessed one funeral which employed a mourning woman. Her wails released the grief of those who were locked in numbness. And how! I only observed from a distance, but the sound is cemented in my mind forever. That woman released the guttural sound of grief into the air, and it was followed by a growing din of inexpressible sadness as others slowly joined her. One-by-one they unified to a strong sound that told the world that all was not well. Everything was not right. And it invited even those of us who did not know the circumstances to pause from our endless busywork to consider how we should cooperate with God to set this world back on course.

We need to be fully engaged in the sadness of this moment. Not just because people are lying, fighting, killing, and dying, but because we need to grieve over the things that grieve God’s heart to demonstrate that our hearts are in alignment with His. Out of this will spring heartfelt petitions rather than empty words for revival.

We need to “cry out” to God. And I’m begging you to do it with me in this season. Not only that, but I’m begging you, if you’re a parent, teach your children to do it.

Nancy often says, “Desperate times call for desperate prayers!” 

It’s time to cry out on behalf of your family…

On behalf of your church…

On behalf of your community…

On behalf of our nation and culture.

I’m not asking you to do this as a personal spiritual growth exercise, but as a part of connecting with your son or daughter and teaching him or her to cry out to God.

He calls us to teach our children to weep for others, too. It’s not lost on me that Jeremiah is called “the weeping prophet.” He recorded that God wanted those wailing women in Israel to invite their daughters into the process of crying out to God.

Hear, O women, the word of the Lord,
And let your ear receive the word of his mouth;
Teach to your daughters a lament,
And each to her neighbor a dirge. (Jer. 9:20)

Let’s not be too busy...too tired...or too consumed with our own needs to get on our knees with our kids to cry out to God—and even to weep—about what’s happening in our world right now. We have a wonderful opportunity to use this moment to mature them. Perhaps if we take this time, they’ll be more likely to live like Jesus—“deeply moved” by the horrible pain of others rather than quick to cry tears over their own (often more superficial) challenges.

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I want you to hear from a man who knows a thing or two about prayer. And that’s Stephen Kendrick. He and his brother Alex have helped produce a number of films, most recently one I highly recommend called The Forge.

Prayer plays an important part in their stories. Not too long ago, Stephen spoke at a True Woman conference, sponsored by Revive Our Hearts. We had just seen a video about Stephen’s mother, Rhonwyn Kendrick, who is a prayer warrior in her own right. Let’s listen to what Stephen shared with us about crying out to the Lord.

Stephen Kendrick: Good afternoon. I praise the Lord for my mother! How many of you already love her!? (applause)

I was getting ready for this, and she said, “Stephen! You need to tell them how to vote in the next election!” (laughter)

I said, “Mom, this is not a political event.”

She said, “It’s so important that they hear it!”

I said, “I’m not going to mention any candidates or any party.”

She said, “Well, tell them to get their Bible, and go read all the party platforms, and compare them to the Scriptures, and to vote according to what God’s Word says.” (applause) 

So, in honor of my mother, I’ve told you.

I have a friend who came to me and said, “Stephen, the closer I get to the Lord, the less impressed I am with you!” (laughter) 

And I said, “Okay, I can receive that.”

He said, “You keep talking about how God can do exceedingly abundantly above all we can ask or imagine. You didn’t make that up. That’s in the Bible! I found that in the Bible.”

I said, “I never said I made that up. Where’d you get that?”

Some of the people who work with us, they come and they say, “Okay, tell us how you produce these movies.” We’ve had many filmmakers come down to Albany. They sit across the table from us, and they say, “Okay, what’s the ‘secret sauce’?”

We say, “Look, we don’t know what we’re doing, but we are trusting an Almighty God; and so, we’re praying through every aspect of the filmmaking. We’re asking the Lord to guide.”

One of my friends came and worked with us on War Room, and when he was done, he said, “They’re telling the truth. They don’t know what they’re doing, and they do pray about every decision.”

So, I want you to know that. If you were to spend a lot of time with us, the less impressed you would be with us, and the more impressed you would be with the God that we serve. (applause)

I want to show you a picture up on the screen (it was on the video). This is of my mom and dad getting married. On the right side of the screen, my dad’s dad—my grandfather—was seven feet tall! So, I hugged his knees when I was a kid.

He was an alcoholic for a good portion of my father’s life, but he married a woman who became a praying woman—and our dad had a praying mom who had a big impact on his life. My grandfather—my mom’s mom (as you heard in the story) was a praying woman as well.

She is impacting the nations, you could say, through prayers that she prayed many years ago. Now, I want to show you a picture of my family. This is my wife Jill and I and our six kids.

I’ve got behind me a very supportive wife, who prays for me and supports me. Engraved on the inside of my wedding ring (so it’s with me everywhere I go) it says “1 Samuel 14:7: ‘You do what you’ve set in your heart to do, and I will come support you with my heart and soul.’”

So some of you, like my wife, may be in a situation where you’re thinking, I’ve got girlfriends who are out working in these jobs, and they’re making the new iPhone, and they’re making a lot of money over here, and they’re beating out the men, and they’re becoming the CEOs and presidents of companies . . . and I’m just a mom.

I want you to know, God has you exactly where He wants you. You, whether you know it or not, are likely the most influential person in your husband’s life, and your prayers for him . . . God has given women this ability to discern how the marriage is going (a whole lot better than the man), how the kids are doing (a whole lot better than the man). He reveals those things to you so you can intercede on behalf of your husband and your children like nobody else on the face of the earth. You are likely, in these formative years—if your kids are little, like my kids are—the most influential person in your kids’ lives.

John Wesley—a man who was a catalyst for one of the great awakenings—said, “My mother taught me more theology when I was little than I’ve learned in all the other books and the training that I’ve had over the years.”

I heard a story about St. Paul’s cathedral being built: A man walks up and sees these two workers working. One man is laying bricks, and he’s grumbling and complaining, and he’s working slow. Another guy is over here laying bricks, whistling. He’s working hard; he’s keeping a good attitude.

The man walks up to the man who’s complaining and asks, “What are you doing?”

The man replies, “I’m laying bricks—what does it look like I’m doing?”

He walks over to the man who has a good attitude and is whistling, and he asks, “What are you doing?”

He replies, “I’m building a great cathedral!”

Both of them were doing the same thing, but one of them saw it from a bigger perspective!

The enemy wants to tell you, “You’re washing dishes . . . you’re folding another load of laundry—didn’t you just wash these clothes yesterday?” You’re changing diapers. With six kids, we’ve added it up—it’s into the tens of thousands of diapers that my wife has changed!

I’ve told her, “Sweetheart, you’re not changing diapers—you’re raising world-changers. You’re not preparing meals—you’re training up leaders of the next generation. You’re not stopping our kids from fighting and just spanking the one that’s the cause of the problem—you’re raising up people who will help take the gospel to the ends of the earth. You’re building a great cathedral!”

So I just want to affirm you. The enemy wants to step in and tell you that what you’re doing doesn’t matter. But God has strategically positioned you, wherever you are, for His glory—for such a time as this!

Dannah: Those are encouraging words from Stephen Kendrick. You can hear more of what he shared when you visit ReviveOurHearts.com/weekend, and click on this program. It’s called "Crying Out to God." 

I hope you’ll think of ways you can pour out your heart before God on behalf of your family and country.

Today Nancy mentioned the influence we as women can have on our communities and nation. We’re going to explore that further next week, as we call women of God to rise up and be used by the Lord.

Hey, thank you so much for listening today. I’m Dannah Gresh. I hope to see you again next time, for Revive Our Hearts Weekend.

This program is a listener-supported production of Revive Our Hearts in Niles, Michigan, calling women to freedom, fullness, and fruitfulness in Christ.

“Lord from Sorrows Deep I Call (Psalm 42),” by Matt Papa and Matt Boswell, Keith and Kristyn Getty, Sing! Psalms: Ancient + Modern (Live at the Getty Music Worship Conference), ℗ 2019 Getty Music Label, LLC

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