“This High Priest of ours understands our weaknesses, for he faced all of the same testings we do, yet he did not sin. So let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious God. There we will receive his mercy, and we will find grace to help us when we need it most.” Hebrews 4:15-16 NLT
Jesus faced down the same crummy situations that we do. The idea that Jesus had temptations is hard to process. The best glimpse is Satan tempting him in the desert. Jesus was tempted to make his own will happen over God’s will. Test the limits of who he is and what his mission would be. Get and gain everything a human would want by taking shortcuts and believing a con-angel. I forget about the deep pain and suffering that occurred in many of his interactions with religious people as well as those who were suffering physically or broken emotionally – oftentimes both.
Jesus was deemed a fake, a liar, a rebel and a power hungry conspirator from his own religious leaders. He IS God, but the guys who supposedly worked for God couldn’t recognize one characteristic of God in Jesus! It is extremely painful to be misunderstood, or worse, categorized as a contrarian. Then there is the pain of empathizing with those who had been marginalized and beat up by the religious culture of perfection all while they profited and maintained power. The strong got stronger at the expense of the weak getting weaker. This environment decimated faith and distorted people’s view of God – both religious and sinner.
It is painful to watch others suffer and then be told they deserve it. The author of Hebrews delivers the truth in the conversation of Jesus being the final High Priest – it wasn’t an easy calling. Hebrews writes, “Even though Jesus was God’s Son, he learned obedience from the things he suffered.” Vs 5:8. My idea of learning obedience was simply doing what God says to do. Haven’t we learned that being obedient, doing what’s right and following God PREVENTS suffering? It’s not just that God disciplines us when we are disobedient, but now there’s the problem of suffering when doing RIGHT.
In my thinking, I should NOT suffer when doing right! Making right decisions and following God in obedience should get me a pass on suffering, right? That’s the whole carrot/stick scenario. Do right, get the carrot. Do wrong get the stick. Which is more motivating? Carrot please. Jesus did right and got the stick! He continued to do right and got the cross. Where’s the motivation? Where’s the reward? Hebrews has the audacity to tell us that suffering for righteousness sake yields obedience. Suffering can help us learn to obey God no matter the circumstances. If, for one moment I may think, “well, that’s for Jesus, and I am not him.” We both know that’s dodging the truth.
Obey God. Trust God. Suffer if we must, but do not confuse resistance, grief, mockery, gossip or mistreatment as an indication that we are doing something wrong. If we are being obedient to God, then suffering will come along with it.
Prayer
Dad,
Of course I confuse suffering with doing wrong and sinning! I am full of sin and just figured that suffering is what I deserve. I never thought of suffering for righteousness or suffering as a means to learn obedience. I want to avoid suffering! It is just not a good feeling. Help me to see the lesson, the value of suffering as Your Word shows me to be humble and to learn. I can’t tell you I like it, but I do know how much I love you and want to do what is right. Pour out your mercy and peace so that I can handle suffering appropriately.