‘As he approached Jerusalem and saw the city, he wept.’ (Luke 19:41, NIV)

When Jesus cried over the city of Jerusalem, it wasn’t just a few tears rolling down his face. Jesus wept. His heart broke for the city and its people. In the same way, God has created us to feel sad for the things in our broken world that make him sad.

The cool thing is, that we don’t have to stay heartbroken for the things that break God’s heart and ours. He has given us a job to do something about it, to share the deep and never-ending love of God, which we talked about last week, with those around us. That we too would have a self-denying love for others.

There’s a song, that you might know (it came out before some of you were even born), called ‘Hosanna’[1]. There are two parts to this song, both of which could be our prayer as the young people of The Salvation Army New Zealand, Fiji, Tonga and Samoa.

‘I see a generation
Rising up to take their place
With selfless faith.’

This is already us, a generation that is rising up to take our place. But imagine if we were described as being a generation with selfless faith. That our love in action would be a self-denying love.

‘Heal my heart and make it clean
Open up my eyes to the things unseen,
Show me how to love like you have loved me,
Break my heart for what breaks yours,
Everything I am for your Kingdom’s cause,
As I walk from earthinto eternity.’

This is a powerful prayer. A prayer that God would show us how to love, that we would be heartbroken for the things that break his heart, and that all we have would be used for God’s purposes in our world.

• What is something that breaks both my heart and God’s?
• What can I do about it?
• How can I show love in action this week?

Donate something to your local pataka kai or food bank this week.

God, I thank you that you care for us so deeply. I pray that you would help me to have the same heart for your people, that I would love people deeply like you do. Lord, help me put your love into action. Amen.