Sometimes there is a synergy to your reading that is unexpected. Books will pick up a similar thread, though they are not obviously related. I had one of those moments today.
My progress through the Letters of John Newton has slowed lately. But this morning I read one of his letters to Mrs. Thornton. Apparently she had recently undergone a crisis of some sort. He was responding to that crisis and pointed her our Great High Priest.
“He with whom we have to do, our great High Priest, who once put away our sins by the sacrifice of himself, and now for ever appears in the presence of God for us, is not only possessed of sovereign authority and infinite power, but wears our very nature, and feels and exercises in the highest degree those tendernesses and commiseration, which I conceive are essential to humanity in its perfect state.”
He brings up the hypostatic union to make his point. The exalted Christ is still fully human. As a perfect human, he is prone to tenderness and the ability to commiserate with our weakness and misery. Or as Newton says later, “compassions dwell within his heart.” He is not just our Savior, but also our Brother and unashamed to declare this among the assembly. As a result:
“No, with the eye, and the ear, and the heart of a friend, He attends to their sorrows; He counts their sighs, puts their tears in his bottle; and when our spirits are overwhelmed within us, He knows our path and adjusts the time, the measure of our trials, and every thing that is necessary for our present support and seasonable deliverance, ….”
He has experienced our weakness and frailty (though not our sin). He loves us and is concerned about those things that weigh us down. He pays attention, and is moved to act. He is not cold, unconcerned and unmoved. He is full of compassion.
Newton explores the reality of the Incarnation.
“He has sanctified poverty, pain, disgrace, temptation, and death, by passing through these states; and in whatever states his people are, they may by faith have fellowship with him in their sufferings, and He will, by sympathy and love, have fellowship and interest with them in theirs. … He pities us more than we can do ourselves, and has engaged his almighty power to sustain and relieve us.”
We quickly suppose that Jesus doesn’t understand our suffering and affliction. But he does. He often acts in unnoticed ways. We are sustained by sufficient grace more than we realize.
Later in the morning I began to prep for our community group by reading the chapter in Instruments in the Redeemer’s Hands. In discussing how little we tend to know the people in our lives as a result of busyness, superficiality, blind spots and more, he brings in Hebrews 4 about our Great High Priest.
“There is a promise of personalized help. Christ is able to sympathize with each of our weaknesses. And the Greek word ‘sympathize’ here means much more than a flash of compassion or a surge of pity. Our experience of sympathy are usually limited to feeling sorry for someone and being thankful that we’re not in the same boat. But sympathy here means to be moved by what has moved someone else. Christ’s sympathy is so strong that our problems become his. … Jesus really understands what it means to live in this fallen world.”
Hebrews paints Jesus as our Priest for his heart of compassion just as much as his substitutionary sacrifice. He is human, and all that brings with it. He hasn’t forgotten the weight of our difficulties. He is moved by the things that shake and break us. He moves toward us in compassion, not away from us in shame. He comes to sustain and preserve us.
Sadly, we can push him away. We’ve all been self-consumed at some point in our lives and pushed away the arms of someone who sought to comfort us.
Rich Mullins
Sometimes we think he refuses to comfort. I remember a particularly difficult time. Rich Mullins’ A Liturgy, A Legacy and a Ragamuffin Band was often on my CD player. Hold Me, Jesus was a favorite song.
“Hold me, Jesus, cause I’m shaking like a leaf
You’ve been my King of glory, won’t you be my Prince of peace.”
He is willing, so willing. Let us draw near.
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