Very truly I tell you, you will weep and mourn while the world rejoices. You will grieve, but your grief will turn to joy. A woman giving birth to a child has pain because her time has come; but when her baby is born she forgets the anguish because of her joy that a child is born into the world. So with you: Now is your time of grief, but I will see you again and you will rejoice, and no one will take away your joy.
Jesus is preparing the disciples for Good Friday. It’s wild because HE is the one that is going to die, but they will be the ones left to mourn.
He sums up the worst and best parts about grief in this little bit. We despair and have pain while we’re going through the trial, but when we get out of the trial and we see Jesus, we gain an incredible level of joy. Jesus cares so much about these guys (and us!) that He sums up every kind of suffering we’ll ever encounter in this.
Talk to anyone that has suffered, and you might hear about the great joy they got when they were comforted in it or as it ended. You might even know or be one of those people that can say “That was the worst thing that ever happened to me, but I’m glad God used it to make me into the person I am now.”
God uses all things for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose. Jesus’ death on the cross was the ultimate display of that, and He wanted to apostles to pay attention as they went through it.
Today we can pay attention to what the Lord is doing in us. We can have hope that when we see Him again, we’ll forget about our anguish because the joy will be so big and loud and forever.