As we have been studying, Jesus was fully divine while being fully human, yet completely holy and without sin. As He mingled with sinners in His earthly ministry, He shared their griefs and sorrows, and He felt hunger, thirst, pain and fatigue as they did, tempted in all ways as we are yet without ever yielding to temptation or sinning (Hebrews 4:15). In no way was His perfect virtue corrupted by encountering, touching, healing, forgiving and raising unclean, sinful, diseased, and even dead people.
Jesus had compassion on the widow who lost her only son (Luke 7:12-16). He was unmistakeably dead, and Jesus unequivocally raised him so that he immediately sat up and began to speak! Jesus felt sorrow and compassion for His friends Mary and Martha, and He raised their brother Lazarus from the dead (John 11). It is such a comfort to any of us who is grieving over any loss, whether rejection or betrayal from others or even loss of a loved one to death, to know that Jesus Himself sees our sorrow and has compassion on us even when we turn away from Him.
Isaiah 53:3 He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not.
Matthew 9:36 But when he saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion on them, because they fainted, and were scattered abroad, as sheep having no shepherd.
Matthew 14:14 And Jesus went forth, and saw a great multitude, and was moved with compassion toward them, and he healed their sick.
Mark 1:41 And Jesus, moved with compassion, put forth his hand, and touched him, and saith unto him, I will; be thou clean.
Jesus touched and forever changed the lives of outcasts by giving them physical and spiritual healing. Praise God that He allowed His Son to walk among us, entering this world not in the form of the King of Kings that He truly is (1 Timothy 6:15; Revelation 17:14), or as the Great High Priest (Hebrews 4:14) who would not lower Himself to enter our sinful, filthy and corrupt world. Rather, Jesus came as the Son of Man who took on the form of a humble servant and became the perfect sacrifice to pay our sin debt that all who believe in Him are justified by His righteousness and have eternal life.
In thankfulness, therefore, let us pour out all we have to honor Christ by serving others, just as the sinful woman washed Jesus’ feet with her tears, dried them with her hair, and anointed them with costly perfumed ointment (Luke 7:37-50). Let us trust Jesus, who cast demons out of those who were possessed, to cast out our wickedness so that we may be restored to our right mind and sit humbly at His feet (Luke 8:27-36).
Love in Christ,
Laurie Collett
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