The prophet Jeremiah when he realized the awful guilt of his people, cried: "Oh that my head were waters, and mine eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of my people" (Jer. 9:1).

Our Lord, when He saw the sin and shame of Jerusalem, wept in agony.

The Psalmist said: "Rivers of waters run down mine eyes, because they keep not Thy law" (Psa. 119:136).

When Josephine Butler realized the condition of many fallen women in England, she cried: "I felt that unless I went into the street and cried aloud my heart would break". Her soul was burdened by the sin of sinners. Her sorrow was a godly sorrow.

Florence Nightingale went into the battlefields of Crimea because, to quote her, “I was moved by the misery of the world”. Among the memorials she brought back with her from the battlefields, was a tuft of grass stained with human blood. Her hospitals which exist today are memorials to a woman’s tears.

God understands the tears of His saints. “He holdeth them in a bottle”, the Bible says. He will also wipe away our tears, and in Heaven they will be unknown.

But on earth we should weep with others. We should weep with God over a lost world.

The eyes that have never shed tears of sorrow have never looked upon our Saviour.