Spiritual growth is one of the ways God redeems our suffering for a greater good. So it was that Mary and Martha learned at their brother's grave that God weeps.

Suffering isolates us--we think no one else feels our pain or knows our grief. If someone would weep for you, they stand with you. And Jesus wept.

The pain and despair of many in our world seems beyond description or resolution.  The good news is that Isaiah promised a Christmas Christ who would be our "Everlasting Father," literally our "Father forever" (Isaiah 9:6). At the grave of his friend Lazarus, the Messiah proved himself to be that kind of compassionate Savior when "Jesus wept" (John 11:35).

Isaiah promised that the Christ of Christmas would be our "Everlasting Father," literally a "Father forever" (Isaiah 9:6). He is the Father to whom we can come with all our pain and problems. If that is true, why are our lives so often so hard? Why does it sometimes seem that our Father isn't listening to the prayers of his children?

Two shootings yesterday have stunned us again. Tragedies at a missionary training center near Denver, Colorado, and at a megachurch in Colorado Springs are making national headlines...How does a pastor help his people at a time like that?

Golf is "flog" spelled backwards, and even reading about it reverses the term for you. But I'll bet you know Sergio Garcia or his twin. You know people who are wondering this morning if they will ever achieve their dreams, who are afraid they'll never be more than they are. It's likely that the Sergio Garcia you know best is yourself.

In a week devoted to the Virginia Tech tragedy and the grace of God, it seems fitting to close with the story of a man who will long be remembered for his sacrificial heroism. By now you've seen the news accounts of Dr. Liviu Librescu, the Holocaust survivor who died Monday protecting his students from Cho Seung-Hui's shooting rampage. His is a story of commitment to others which we should each hope to emulate today.

As we have seen this week, the Lord made us with free will so we could choose to love him and each other (Matthew 22:34-40). When we misuse our freedom, the consequences are not his fault but ours. It seems fair and just to expect him to prevent the misuse of free will when innocent people will be killed as a result. But once God starts intervening in our freedom, where should he stop?

After I finish this essay, I'm leaving for a breakfast meeting at Dallas Baptist University, where I serve on the board of trustees and teach adjunctively. I will drive onto the university campus with a new appreciation for the tenuous and perilous nature of college life. And the knowledge that no student and no environment is completely safe.