God invites His child to visit Him often at the Throne of Grace.  Dear child, do not be shy; come boldly to Him!

Part 1

Today:  Jesus, Our Compassionate High Priest

“For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities.”

“Who can have compassion on the ignorant, and on them that are out of the way; for that He Himself also is compassed with infirmity” (Hebrews 5:2).

Our High Priest – the God-Man, Jesus Christ, is also human and understands our human frailties perfectly.

“Be Touched with the Feeling of Our Infirmities.”

And not only does Jesus understand us, but He sympathizes with us.  The Greek word that is translated as “be touched with the feeling of” is an ancient word, “sumpatheō,” which you no doubt recognize as the source of our English word “sympathy.”  That old word means “to be affected with the same feeling as another.”  It is “to sympathize with … to feel for, have compassion on” (Thayer).  And that is our Lord Jesus!

Jesus certainly knows the meaning of, “Rejoice with them that do rejoice and weep with them that weep” (Romans 12:15).  Only Jesus can comfort us in our frailty, for He has overcome sin, death, and the grave.

“The perfect sympathy of a sinful man would have given very imperfect consolation.”[1]

“Our Infirmities”

“Our infirmities” are not the things that make us suffer but are our “weaknesses, moral and physical.”  These are the things that influence us toward sin and enable our sin (see Vincent).[2]  Jesus understands us because He overcame these weaknesses in His life.

Jesus knows just what I need.

“Surely He hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem Him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him, and with his stripes, we are healed” (Isaiah 53:4-5).

Jesus alone can heal those with the greatest needs.

“When the even was come, they brought unto Him many that were possessed with devils: and He cast out the spirits with His Word, and healed all that were sick: That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, Himself took our infirmities, and bare our sicknesses” (Matthew 8:16-17).

Jesus made Himself a servant.  He stooped down to mankind to meet our sin need.

“But made Himself of no reputation, and took upon Him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: And being found in fashion as a man, He humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross” (Philippians 2:7-8).

In the world of Jesus’ day, He was an anomaly.  The Jews believed that their God and Messiah was never lowly, and they could not fathom that their Messiah would die.  After all, God is powerful, not weak!  And Jesus did not fit their picture of what they thought their Messiah was like.  The Greeks also had an issue with Jesus as God, for their idea was also far different from the real Jesus.

“To the Greeks, the primary attribute of God was apatheia [“apathy”], the essential inability to feel anything at all.  Jesus isn’t like that.  He knows He feels what we go through”[3] (Guzik).

I am thankful that both the Jewish and the Greek thought of God is not correct and that Jesus is not like they think.  Jesus cares, and He knows us so well.  Tomorrow we will look at Jesus’ temptation to sin.

 

Quote:  “The righteous cry and the LORD heareth, and delivereth them out of all their troubles.  The LORD is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart; and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit.  Many are the afflictions of the righteous: but the LORD delivereth him out of them all” (Psalm 34:17-19).

 

 

 

[1] Popular New Testament, A Popular Commentary on the New Testament, the electronic version in eSword.  Hebrews 4:15.
[2] M.R. Vincent, Word Studies in the New Testament, the electronic version in eSword.
[3] Guzik’s quote from Enduring Word Commentary, the electronic version in eSword.  Hebrews 4:1-16.