Pray the word with David Platt is a resource from Radical.net.

Matthew chapter 2 verse 18, a voice was heard in Rama weeping and loud lamentation. Rachel weeping

for her children. She refused to be comforted because they are no more. This is the chapter that

contains the birth of Jesus. It's a glorious high point in all of history and in all of the

Bible. At the same time, isn't it striking that it also contains such sorrow and sadness as

Herod becomes furious. Matthew 2 16 says, and he sends and kills all the male children in Bethlehem

and all that region who were two years old or younger. The Matthew writes that then it was

fulfilled what was spoken by the prophet Jeremiah and the verse I read from Matthew chapter 2 verse 18

comes directly from Jeremiah chapter 31 verse 15, a time of lamentation and weeping among God's

people in the Old Testament. So why? Why do we have these two pictures side by side the birth of

Jesus in sorrow and death and evil right next to each other? Oh see the wonder the beauty and the

hope of the gospel. This is why Jesus came. He came to a sinful fallen world marked by evil.

In sorrow and death and he came to bring hope in the middle of it and I choose this verse to lead us

to pray according to because I know there are people listening to this right now who are walking

through sorrow who have experienced or are experiencing evil down against you. You're walking through

situations that involve weeping or loud lamentation and needing comfort and I just want to comfort you

from God's word with the reality. This is why Jesus came. He came for you in your weeping

and your lamentation. He came for you in your sorrow and your sadness and your suffering. He came

for you and me and a world of sin and evil and suffering and death. He came to give us hope in

the middle of it that this world is not the end of the story that sin and evil are not the end of

the story that for all who trust in him salvation from sin and ultimate salvation from suffering

is it yours that he came so that one day he himself will wipe every tear from your eyes and

...