worth the Tears.

I once heard a saying and it went like this, "no man is worth your tears and the one who is will never make you cry."  That saying sounds nice and wonderful but it is simply not true.  At all.  Unless you are talking about Jesus (though I'd contend that He makes me cry, though for totally different reasons that I'll get to in a minute).  Even that picture makes life look all happy and simple and, dare I say, perfect.  You can stand out in the sun and kiss your significant other and you'll never cry a single tear because you are so completely and perfectly and incandesantly happy (name that movie!).  After all, what ill could possibly harm your relationship?  Why on God's green earth would you ever cry?  Why would he make you cry? 

I used to think that if I was dating someone that it would have to be over if they hurt me or made me cry.  I'm pretty sure that if that were true I would never get married, nor would anyone else.  Even my least "girly" female friends have been known to shed a tear or two over their boyfriends (and their husbands).  Make no mistake, these men they are dating or married to are good men.  But at the end of the day, they are still men.  That's not to say they are horrible beings and I'm not using men in any foul sense, dripping with sarcasm.  I say that they are men to empahsize that they are human, they are, by their very fallen nature, imperfect.  Only perfection will not make you cry.  Imperfection, inevitably, will.

There are about a thousand reasons girls cry, only a few of which are related to hormones.  We cry.  We cry at a good movie, a touching Hallmark commerical, the death of a loved one, stress, worry, hurt feelings, as a way to get out of trouble, attention, joy, the list goes on.  But in the case of that phrase in that overly-cute picture at the beginning of this post, we should apparently never have to cry because of a man.  Ever.  After being with Mr. Irish for six months now (when did that happen?!) I can honestly tell you that I've cried.  We are both human, imperfect, fallen beings.  But just because we fight sometimes and just because I cry does not, by any stretch of the imagination mean that he's not worth my tears or worth the pain that goes with the fight.  Remember when I wrote the ache of Love?  Crazy to think that was nearly a year ago and yet I had it right - it hurts because we love.  Mark Hart once said, "If love were only about feelings, Jesus would have been hugged to death for our redemption.  With true love comes suffering."  With true love comes suffering - we are bound to hurt, bound to cry because we love.  We want perfection, we long for perfection, we were made for Eden, not for Earth and so we are continually left disappointed and aching for more, so we cry because our hearts know we were made for more and still we aren't there yet.  We miscommunicate, we disagree, we see things differently than our significant other does.  We cry.  Don't make the mistake of thinking that just because we cry that the man in our lives isn't "worth it" anymore.  There is a difference between crying because a man (who probably really isn't a man at all) is continually hurting you and a man worth fighting for - that is a distinction only you can make, it can't be made by some nice, cheesy saying. 

Jesus is the first Man who will ever be worth your tears, and even He will make you cry.  In His presence I realize how imperfect I am and it often leads me to tears, humbling tears.  He, however, is worth the fight.  His love is unending and I'd rather cry over/because of Him everyday for the rest of my life than live a single moment without Him in it.  I remain convinced that if you open your heart to love, to being vulnerable with another human being, that Jesus won't be the last man who will be worth your tears or worth the fight.  Let love outweigh the hard times because they are sure to come, but just as sure as they are to come, they are sure to pass, leaving a deeper love in their wake.