Our Great High Priest

Thoughts From a Bible Reader

As I shared with you a while back, not only is the Father God, not only is the Holy Spirit God, but Jesus is God as well. We call this the Trinity, and in that post I shared these two photos to help us a bit in comprehending the mystery that there is only one God, but we see Him in three persons. Looking at the first, we would think that we were looking at three separate things, joined together artificially by braiding them together.

But when we zoom back and look again, we see that we are actually looking at a single thing, from beginning to end, but one in which separations were made in the middle, and then the three strands were braided together.

If you and I could see God throughout all of eternity, we would see that, from beginning to end, He is One. But right here in the middle, all that we can see is that He has divided Himself up into three parts, each with its own role to play. If you want to look more deeply at that, I suggest that you go to my posts on the Trinity, but I will not go through all of that again. I will only say that the Father reigns on His throne in heaven. The Son came to the earth and lived as one of us, coming so that He could die for us and redeem our lost lives. And the Holy Spirit right now lives inside of us, if we are Christ’s disciples.

Today we are going to concentrate on God the Son, Jesus. Graham Joseph Hill had a post, The Human One Came to Serve, in which he explains that, in the Aramaic that Jesus and His disciples spoke, He did not call Himself the “Son of man,” as most of our English Bibles (translated from Greek translations of Jesus’ Aramaic words) tell us. No, Hill says, in the Aramaic He called Himself “the human one,” which is a close idea to “the Son of man,” yet subtly different. Jesus, God the Son, is also Jesus, God the Human One.

And yet we may wonder just exactly how human, how like us, He was. I think that we may have the impression of Jesus that His life could best be exemplified by His walking on water. Things that are obstacles for the rest of us were of no consequence to Him. Our pains and troubles? He is probably clueless. Our temptations? He has no idea what they are like. And so, while He called Himself human, we doubt that He really experienced a life anything close to ours. No, He was probably Super Jesus.

But Paul told the Philippians that Jesus “emptied himself by taking on the form of a slave, by looking like other men, and by sharing in human nature. He humbled himself, by becoming obedient to the point of death —even death on a cross!” (Phil. 2:7-8). God, our Creator, came here and lived among us. He shared our nature. And, when He did, He didn’t embrace any kind of cushy life. No, He came as a slave. We aren’t told about Jesus’ work history before His ministry started, but if this had happened today, instead of 2,000 years ago, what would it mean that He took on the form of a slave? Today He might be a busboy or dishwasher in a restaurant. Or a janitor. Maybe He would be a migrant farmworker, or dig ditches. He might be your garbageman. Think of the job that you would least like to do in the world, and that is the kind of life that Jesus embraced when He came to the earth. He chose to live in a strata of society that none of us would desire to join. He didn’t move far from being born in a barn.

On another level, Jesus came as a slave because, as He told us, He only did and said what the Father told Him to do and say. He was a slave serving His Father because He did not use His own will, His own choices, as He went through life. “So Jesus answered them, ‘I tell you the solemn truth, the Son can do nothing on his own initiative, but only what he sees the Father doing. For whatever the Father does, the Son does likewise’” (John 5:19). “For I have not spoken from my own authority, but the Father himself who sent me has commanded me what I should say and what I should speak” (John 12:49).

After His baptism, the Holy Spirit led Jesus into the wilderness, and He went 40 days without eating, and “he was famished” (Matt. 4:2). Maybe, after 40 days, “famished” is too mild of a word. Les Miserables is one of my favorite stories, and the story begins with Jean Valjean’s nieces and nephews being famished too. And so Valjean steals a single loaf of bread to feed them, earning a prison sentence of 5 years. Every single day thousands of people around us go hungry. And every single day some of those people are tempted to do something wrong to try to feed the hungry, whether that’s themselves or someone who they love. After Jesus’ 40 days of not eating, Satan came and tempted Him to do what is wrong as well. “If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become bread” (Matt. 4:3). Turning stones into bread, if you have that ability, isn’t inherently wrong. If you or I could do it, I don’t think that God would condemn us for doing so. But for Jesus, the temptation wasn’t really about the bread. It was about choosing between obeying God or being swayed by the devil. And so Jesus the Human One starved at times. And Jesus the Human One was tempted to do things that He should not do. It’s just that, unlike us, He never gave in to those temptations.

Jesus was homeless, too. “Then an expert in the law came to him and said, ‘Teacher, I will follow you wherever you go.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Foxes have dens, and the birds in the sky have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head’” (Matt. 8:19-20). Have you ever walked past a homeless person and thought to yourself, “Wow, that could have been Jesus!”?

He got tired. As He was traveling with His disciples, they stopped in a Samaritan village at noon. “Jacob’s well was there, so Jesus, since he was tired from the journey, sat right down beside the well” (John 4:6). Tired, and the day is only half done! And then there’s that time that He preached all day, and then fell asleep in the boat while His disciples crossed the lake. Apparently He was so exhausted that even a storm that scared experienced fisherman, experienced sailors, out of their minds failed to wake Him (Mark 4:1-41). Are you still seeing, in your mind’s eye, Super Jesus? Or are you starting to see Jesus the Human One?

He had enemies, even long before He was crucified. He angered Jewish leaders over and over by healing people on the Sabbath, leading them to want to find a way to kill Him (Matt. 12:9-15, Luke 13:10-17, Luke 14:1-6, John 5:1-18, John 9:1-41). And He was betrayed by a very close friend (Matt. 26:14-16). That doesn’t sound like an easy life to me.

Mary and Martha “sent a message to Jesus, ‘Lord, look, the one you love is sick.’ When Jesus heard this, he said, ‘This sickness will not lead to death, but to God’s glory, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it.’ (Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus.)” (John 11:3-5). And then Jesus stayed put for two more days before heading out to help Lazarus, telling the disciples, “Lazarus has died, and I am glad for your sake that I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him” (11:14-15). They arrived in Bethany four days after Lazarus had been buried, and Martha, hearing that Jesus was coming, went to meet him. She told Him that she knew that Lazarus would not have died if He had been there, but she also knew that God would do whatever Jesus asked of Him. And then Martha went to tell Mary to go and talk with Jesus. People who were at the house to console the family followed her, and when she got to Jesus she, like her sister, told Him that Lazarus would not have died if Jesus had been there. She was crying, the people with her were crying, and we are told that Jesus, too, “was intensely moved in spirit and greatly distressed” (11:33). After asking where the tomb was, Jesus cried as well, leading some to proclaim His love for Lazarus. But others accused Him of not doing everything that He could have done to keep Lazarus from dying in the first place. And yes, Jesus could have just gone right away and kept Lazarus from dying. But remember, He was a bondservant, a slave, to what the Father wanted for Him to do. And that is what He did. And yet doing so caused grief for His friends, grief for Himself, and accusations against Him. God the Human One, experienced all of this personally. He knows what it really feels like. Life was not all like walking on water for Him.

After the Last Supper, as Jesus was in the Garden of Gethsemane with His disciples, Mark says that He “became very troubled and distressed. He said to them, ‘My soul is deeply grieved, even to the point of death’” (Mark 14:33-34). Why was Jesus very troubled, distressed, deeply grieved? Because He knew what lay ahead of Him. Death. “But He conquered death,” you say. Yes, He did. But that came at a great cost. God, in all three of His parts, had always been one, complete. And now, what lay before God the Son? Separation from both God the Father and the Holy Spirit. We will come back to this, but for Jesus it was enough that “Going a little farther, he threw himself to the ground and prayed that if it were possible the hour would pass from him. He said, ‘Abba, Father, all things are possible for you. Take this cup away from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will’” (14:35-36). Jesus, God the Son, in His distress and anguish was asking the Father for a way to save you and me without His having to die.

But God’s will was for Him to die for us. And, although Jesus never experienced being sick, never experienced the pain that an extended illness like cancer can bring, He did experience horrible physical pain after He was nailed to the cross. Psalm 22 is an amazing prophecy, telling us just what it would be like for Jesus on the cross. “My strength drains away like water; all my bones are dislocated. My heart is like wax; it melts away inside me. The roof of my mouth is as dry as a piece of pottery; my tongue sticks to my gums. You set me in the dust of death. Yes, wild dogs surround me— a gang of evil men crowd around me; like a lion they pin my hands and feet. I can count all my bones; my enemies are gloating over me in triumph. They are dividing up my clothes among themselves; they are rolling dice for my garments” (Psalm 22:14-18). That may have been, most probably certainly was, more pain than I will ever suffer at one time in my life. And He went through that for me, and for you as well.

And, in the midst of all of that pain and suffering, what did He do? He made sure that His mother would not be left alone. “So when Jesus saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing there, he said to his mother, ‘Woman, look, here is your son!’ He then said to his disciple, ‘Look, here is your mother!’ From that very time the disciple took her into his own home” (John 19:26-27). Some of you may read that and think, “Yes, He is Super Jesus!” Others of you, who have had family members facing death and seen the concern that they had for those who they were leaving behind will know, though. That is not Super Jesus. That is Jesus doing a very human loving thing.

“At about three o’clock Jesus shouted with a loud voice, ‘Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?’ that is, ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’” (Matt. 27:46). The cup that Jesus had prayed that the Father would take from Him the night before? That He was in agony and distress over? This is it. God the Human One was forsaken, abandoned by God the Father. Cut off completely. Have you ever felt abandoned by God? Believe it or not, God knows exactly how that feels. Because He felt it Himself.

And then Jesus gave up His Spirit, the Holy Spirit, and He died. We have heard the crucifixion story so many times that I don’t think that this really hits us the way that it should. We are somewhat numb to what Jesus did for us, for what it cost Him. Because that braid that we looked at earlier, representing God in three persons through all eternity? Well, from three o’clock on Good Friday to Easter Sunday morning, here’s what it looked like.

Hebrews tells us, “Therefore since we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast to our confession. For we do not have a high priest incapable of sympathizing with our weaknesses, but one who has been tempted in every way just as we are, yet without sin. Therefore let us confidently approach the throne of grace to receive mercy and find grace whenever we need help” (Heb. 4:14-16). We have a great high priest standing before the Father for us, right at this very moment. And this high priest, Jesus the Son of God, is also Jesus the Human One. He can sympathize with our weaknesses because He lived as one of us. He was hungry. He was tempted. He was tired. He suffered both mental anguish and intense physical pain. He cared for His family. He knows what it feels like when we feel like God has abandoned us. He knows, intimately, what we go through, each and every day of our lives. He understands it as only another human being could. “Therefore let us confidently approach the throne of grace to receive mercy and find grace whenever we need help.”

Do you have questions or comments that you would like to share with me? Feel free to drop me an email (stevesuterfaithandfruit@gmail.com).

My posts come from my observations in reading the Bible literally dozens of times, always hoping to understand it a little bit better. If you want to go back and read more of what I’ve observed in my reading, click here.

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