For because He Himself has suffered when tempted, He is able to help those who are being tempted. –Hebrews 2:18
Yesterday, I was tired and stressed out from work and I found myself once again taking that hour bus-ride home. I still don’t know what occurred to me that day but the boredom and the ever monotonous journey of staring at the blank walls of the transport drove me to become more introspective and more conscious about myself and my thoughts. For some strange reason, I was led to do something what people in New Creation Church were trained NEVER to do: count our sins.
While queuing for the bus, ‘evil thoughts’ (anger) arose in my head as tons of people literally cut in front me. While the bus was on its way to the train station, I saw a parked super car that aroused my flesh and I once again found myself flooded with ‘evil thoughts’ (covetousness and bitterness). In one bus stop, a group of young noisy punks boarded the bus and loudly talked and made fun of each other ruining the peace I had for this ‘introspective exercise’ that I’m experimenting on. As you guessed it, ‘evil thoughts’ (anger) rose in my head as I wished having the power to throw them off the bus. All these occurred in a span of 15 minutes. For only 15 minutes I caught myself falling in anger 3 times! And these are only for sins that I’m conscious of and for sins that I’m willing to consider as ‘sins’. What about the ‘sexual’ thoughts that appears when an attractive female passenger boards the bus? How about the rejection of the urge to pray in tongues? In less than 20 minutes, I finally understood why my Church discourages us from counting our sins; because if we are really honest to ourselves, the ugliness of our flesh will drown us in less than 20 minutes. When all these negative thoughts were running in my head, I heard God’s voice inside me saying: “Kirby, do you know that My Son went through all your sufferings?” And in a flash, The LORD led me to this verse:
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. –Hebrews 4:15
My only reaction to this was – WOW! In a span of 20 minutes I committed countless number of sins yet we have Jesus Christ live His entire life as any normal human being would; He was tempted in every way like all of us and YET HE WAS WITHOUT SIN.
I got home and started reading Christ’s human life and I was led to the book of Luke.
- Jesus Christ was raised by human parents (not angels and not by God). –Luke 2
- Jesus Christ was born poor that he was born in the midst of animals. –Luke 2:7
- Jesus Christ grew up as an obedient boy. –Luke 2:51
- Jesus Christ earned His wisdom and His stature (it wasn’t just given to Him). –Luke 2:52
- Jesus Christ as a Man was victorious to all of the devil’s temptations. –Luke 4:1-13
All the nonsense of this life, Christ went through. He suffered the betrayal of His friend, He was lied upon and lied to, He was physically beaten and socially rejected by his friends and family; all these He suffered and YET HE WAS WITHOUT SIN.
I began chewing on those 5 words until it sank into me how great a Man our Lord Jesus Christ is. Then a thought (or a voice) inside me reminded me: “This is the Man who is loving you right now.” There and then, what seemed to be a frustrating bus ride home became a bus ride with God. My whole spirit was helplessly raised in worship for the perfect man, the perfect High Priest (Hebrews 4:14-16) that it frustrated me that my stop has to come soon.
JESUS CHRIST, WHO CAN COMPARE TO YOU?
* Image taken from Google Images