Man of Sorrows, What a Name!
Jesus understands our suffering
My Dad suffered a great deal of pain in his last years of life. On one of my last visits to him — two plane trips away — I shared with him,
“Isn’t it comforting to know that our Lord knew what it was like to suffer?”
He nodded. His eyes glistened as a tear or two appeared.
Amazingly, God became man, became human. “Incarnation” comes from the Latin “in carne,” in the flesh. In Spanish we have the verb “encarnarse,” meaning “to personify, to represent an idea, to become flesh.”
Some consider that Jesus had it easy, that he wasn’t tempted to sin. Wrong!
Hebrews 4:15 tells us he was tempted in every way but did not sin:
“For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are — yet he did not sin” (NIV).
Temptation involves turmoil and suffering.
Jesus understands your temptation.
Christ knew what it was like to be rejected, even by His own townspeople. “ Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor except in his own town, among his relatives, and in his own home” (Mark 6:4, NIV). His own siblings did not believe He was the Messiah — at least in…
