I love how pretty much anything in life can be answered by the cross of Jesus Christ. I read in John 12 tonight. It's after the raising of Lazarus where Jesus WEPT over his good friend's death. Even though He knew He was about to do a miracle. Let me just go back to that for a minute. If I'm being completely honest, I have to admit...I avoided reading John 11 for a few days. I think it was because I know how that story speaks to my heart. I am an emotional person, through and through. I feel things deeply. I didn't want to gloss over that chapter. I wanted to live in it for a while. And in my laziness, I put it off. I was being lazy with my time, and lazy with facing head on what I knew I would feel when I went there. It's the same thing I felt when I read The Magician's Nephew by C.S. Lewis. When Digory returns from his journey with Polly and he has the fruit that Aslan said would make his mother better...Digory takes it to Aslan and starts crying. Aslan knows Digory has the fruit, he knows it will heal Digory's mom. But when the crying Digory looks up, he sees tears in Aslan's eyes. AH! That just speaks so loudly to me. Jesus loves me so much that even though He knows that He is working everything out...my pain brings Him pain. My sadness makes Him sad. My broken heart breaks His heart. There is no love in the history of the universe to match Jesus' love for each one of us.
Which brings me back to my original point in John 12. Jesus raised Lazarus and they had a party, and then He entered Jerusalem on a donkey and the people came out to worship Him and welcome Him. But He knows. He knows everything that's about to happen. He knows that the same crowd who worshipped Him is going to demand His death a few days later. He knows exactly what He is going to endure. And in verse 27 He says "Now my soul is deeply troubled. Should I pray, 'Father, save me from this hour"? But this is the very reason I came! Father bring glory to Your name." Jesus was human. I forget that a lot. His soul was deeply troubled. I don't know about you, but when my soul is deeply troubled, it pretty much consumes me. My Jesus knows better than I do what it feels like to have a troubled soul. And He has the power and the authority to meet me there with his grace and his comfort and his love and heal me.
Jesus' soul was troubled. He wanted to ask the Father to take the cup of His suffering from Him. But He knew that was the whole point of the incarnation. The entire reason Jesus took the lowly form of one of us. It was FOR US. For our redemption! So that we could have a way to have our relationship with the Father restored to what it was originally created to be. "Who for the joy set before him endured the cross, despising the shame and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God" (Hebrews 12:2 ESV).
Jesus is the ultimate example to follow. We should be striving to be more like Him in our everyday lives. In our interactions with our friends, and with people we don't like, and with the cashier at the store, and with the other drivers on the road, and with every other person we may come into contact with. We should strive for that even from the mundane tasks like getting ready in the morning and walking to class and doing our homework, to the divine interruptions that God brings our way.
That is what sanctification is all about. And it is overflowing in grace. I was reminded in one of my classes this morning (well, yesterday morning) that "nothing I do can make God love me more, and nothing I do can make God love me less." His love is unconditional. Once again, it does not depend on my merit. And it is so great a love that he suffered more physical, emotional, mental and spiritual pain than I will ever experience in a lifetime, to die in the place of the messy. The criminal. The lost. The mockers. The hurting. The wretched. The sinner.
Me, in a nutshell. And you.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2j0rYJI37yg
“Man of Sorrows!” what a name
For the Son of God, who came
Ruined sinners to reclaim.
Hallelujah! What a Savior!
Bearing shame and scoffing rude,
In my place condemned He stood;
Sealed my pardon with His blood.
Hallelujah! What a Savior!
Guilty, vile, and helpless we;
Spotless Lamb of God was He;
“Full atonement!” can it be?
Hallelujah! What a Savior!
Lifted up was He to die;
“It is finished!” was His cry;
Now in Heav’n exalted high.
Hallelujah! What a Savior!
When He comes, our glorious King,
All His ransomed home to bring,
Then anew His song we’ll sing:
Hallelujah! What a Savior!
I think that pretty much says it all.
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