Saturday, March 14, 2015

Could We Relate to Jesus?


Did Jesus ever cut himself accidently? Did he ever stub his toe? Did he ever get sick? Did he ever give the wrong answer to a math question or any question?

We know he never sinned. He never acted outside of love. He obeyed God perfectly, even though he was fully human. That’s remarkable.

John tells us that Jesus was weary. In other places we’re told he was hungry. He got angry. Sad. I would suspect that was the case as a boy too. If he never hit his shin on a piece of furniture in the dark, that would be astounding. All of us have injured ourselves.

If he was always right about everything… 100% on all questions on all subjects… then his siblings would conceivably have had to deal with raging jealousy. Inferiority too.

Did Mary favor him over his siblings? He certainly would have been unique and one of a kind. If she was partial to “my little Jesus,” then again, the seeds of family dysfunction could have been deeply imbedded in Joseph’s clan.

You see, his mom and supposed father Joseph, and his siblings were human. They were like us. They would have hurt themselves, gotten sick, and been wrong in answering some questions. If Jesus was not like that how could they have related to him? “The whole family are down with colds, but not Jesus, he never gets sick.” “That really hurt to bump my head on the door post, but Jesus wouldn’t know, he’s never done that.”

I like the story of Jesus when he was 12 years old and sitting in the temple area talking to the learned men. The Bible records that the youth, Jesus, was asking questions. Asking questions. Learning. It seems he wasn’t a “know it all.”'

His cousin, John the Baptist, didn’t know he was the Chosen One until that day by the Jordan River. Maybe Jesus had just seemed ordinary before that? Really nice, but ordinary.  A boy who gets hurt, gets sick, is sometimes wrong in his facts, gets his tongue tangled, etc.

Something changed about age 30. That day at the Jordan. The power and presence of God’s Spirit came upon him. And from then on, He was extraordinary, especially in his knowledge.


All this tells me that he knows and that he cares. Small things matter to Him. 

You matter to him.

Quotes of Note ... The Invisible World

“Spiritual warfare is learning to recognize the strategies, refusing to cooperate with them, and aggressively cutting off the schemes of the devil in Jesus’ name.” Dean Sherman

“those who protest that God cannot exist because there is too much evil evident in life… Evil exists; therefore, the Creator does not. That is categorically stated… If evil exists, one must assume that good exists in order to know the difference. If good exists, one must assume that a moral law exists by which to measure good and evil. But if a moral law exists, must not one posit an ultimate source of moral law, or at least an objective basis for a moral law? By an objective basis, I mean something that is transcendingly true at all times, regardless of whether I believed it or not.” Ravi Zacharias

“But the Devil is no big threat to God’s purposes; he is not even remotely comparable in power. He has been given a limited time before his final judgment to try to prove his case, just as all other moral beings who have chosen to live in rebellion against heaven.” W.A. Pratney

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I've served since 1975 in missions. I lived overseas for about 30 years. I have a great wife and three lovely daughters. I hope you enjoy some of the thoughts. Let me know what you think.

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