{"id":1655,"date":"2011-04-20T12:07:44","date_gmt":"2011-04-20T17:07:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.freedomfrommedom.com\/member\/?p=1655"},"modified":"2011-10-31T18:46:02","modified_gmt":"2011-10-31T23:46:02","slug":"twirl-031-42011-empowered-by-the-sympathetic-savior","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.freedomfrommedom.com\/member\/twirl\/twirl-031-42011-empowered-by-the-sympathetic-savior","title":{"rendered":"TWIRL 031 (4\/20\/11): Understanding the Sympathetic Savior"},"content":{"rendered":"

This Week In Recovery Lesson<\/h2>\n

Understanding the Sympathetic Savior<\/span><\/strong><\/h3>\n
    \n
  • Why is Jesus the remedy for our problem of lingering and deepening dissatisfaction?<\/span><\/li>\n
  • Besides being the plan of God, why is Jesus uniquely \u201cqualified\u201d as the acceptable sacrifice for our selfish sin?<\/span><\/li>\n
  • How can it be said that Jesus can honestly and completely sympathize with your plight in this life?<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

    The objective here is to really get to know Jesus Christ as the person who knows you intimately, and has experienced personally\u2014physically, emotionally and spiritually\u2014all that you have experienced in our lifetime. He knows the emotional spectrum from human triumph and elation to deep sorrow, paranoia, fear and devastation.<\/span><\/p>\n

    Somehow God, in the person of Jesus Christ, humbled himself to the point that he became human, born from a young virgin woman. I cannot explain this. Just like I cannot explain where God came from, except that he has always been. I can describe for you the holy trinity (God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit) but I cannot fully comprehend it or explain it in a way that makes much sense. Jesus was chosen as the one sacrifice for my sin and yours. I can explain, according to Scripture, why it was necessary for there to be a sacrifice for sin but I don\u2019t fully comprehend how God became human for the specific purpose of dying for my sin for the possibility of forgiveness.<\/span><\/p>\n

    From the beginning Jesus was the sacrifice intended to restore mankind into relationship with God. Because we are not and never were God, we were by our nature prone to choose independently from the perfect will of God. God, knowing this, had already prepared a way for mercy for the imperfect choices and behavior of mankind.<\/h4>\n

    The Bible says that God gave us his only begotten Son. But, the word \u2018begotten\u2019 used to describe how God gave us Jesus means, \u2018brought forth\u2019, \u2018produced\u2019, or \u2018created\u2019. Jesus has always been, from the beginning, God, as the Bible tells us he has. So perhaps he was identified by God as his Son for the first time when he was conceived inside the womb of his earthly mother Mary. While the person of Jesus always existed as God, his humanity was \u201ccreated\u201d or made\u00a0for\u00a0Jesus, becoming the begotten Son of God as conceived by a human being to be born human. What killed the body, mind, and human heart of our Lord Jesus was the sin of mankind that, not only killed Jesus on the cross, but also was responsible for Jesus being exhausted, hungry, thirsty, and able to experience pain, sickness, fear, discouragement and even despair.<\/h4>\n

    This is important to better comprehend and appreciate the degree to which Jesus was actually human as he demonstrated his dependence on God the Father to live out his life of humanity\u2014what the Bible refers to as \u201cflesh\u201d\u2014without sin. Jesus modeled for us the perfect example of recovery from flesh as he would\u00a0admit\u00a0powerlessness,\u00a0believe\u00a0that his Father, God, would empower him with authority over his mortal body and mind of flesh, and\u00a0commit\u00a0to depend on God the Father for everything. The approach of Jesus to his own recovery from humanity was as though his life depended on it. Jesus learned to recognize that his very breath was dependent on God to survive his life as a human being.<\/span><\/p>\n

    We may not be able to understand\u00a0how\u00a0Jesus, as God,\u00a0made\u00a0himself to become this \u201ccreation\u201d of human flesh by the reproductive processes created by God, but the Bible explains\u00a0why\u00a0Jesus became flesh.<\/span><\/p>\n

    That being said, God somehow caused a virgin to conceive and the humanity of Jesus began. The human life of Jesus began when the egg of the virgin Mary became fertile and formed into an embryo, which grew into a fetus with the exchange of human blood and DNA from his mother.<\/h4>\n

    He had his Heavenly Father\u2019s Spirit, but the Bible tells us he was fully human. Jesus had the full deity of who he was as God but somehow laid it down in order to fully experience humanity in order to better relate by identification with you and me.<\/span><\/p>\n

    The Word\u00a0(the person of God)\u00a0became\u00a0flesh and dwelt among us\u2026 <\/strong>John 1:14<\/p>\n

      \n
    • What does it mean that Jesus was in the flesh?<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

      Does it merely mean that Jesus was God manifest in human form by means of flesh and bones, or was Jesus born in the flesh as it speaks to the whole person \u2013 body, heart, mind and soul (the character, or spirit of a person)?<\/span><\/p>\n

        \n
      • Was Jesus fully God and fully man?<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

        Could Jesus be tempted to sin in\u00a0all\u00a0aspects as we are if he was fully God in his \u201chuman\u201d experience? It is important to understand the human condition of Jesus to appreciate the scope of his sacrifice, mandated by God in order for us to have a restored relationship with God. Jesus, was\u00a0made\u00a0to live the full human experience, the Bible says.<\/span><\/p>\n

        Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but\u00a0made\u00a0himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death. <\/strong>Philippians 2:6-8 (NKJV)<\/p>\n

        This is a revelation given to us by the Apostle Paul, to describe for us the nature of the man, Jesus. Observe the pattern of submission within this verse. While being in \u201cthe form\u201d of God, meaning\u00a0before\u00a0becoming human, Jesus placed himself under the authority of God the Father. Jesus never ceased to be God. So, in being God, he would not consider it robbery to be equal with God. The Bible in this passage tells us that in his humanity Jesus gave up the function of being God by the laying down of his deity and divine nature so as to have\u00a0no advantage\u00a0in his human experience. He humbled himself to be a man of no reputation to the point that, in his humanity, he was subject to the law of sin that leads to the decay and death of his human flesh\u2014body, mind, heart and soul. He also did not consider himself to be equal with God, in terms of function (power and authority) while in human flesh. This fact came from the lips of Jesus himself, delineating between God\u2019s perfect goodness and his own humanness.<\/span><\/p>\n

        Now a certain ruler asked Him, saying, \u201cGood teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?\u201d So Jesus said to him, why do you call me good? No one is good but one, that is, God.\u201d<\/strong>Luke 18:18-19 (NKJV)<\/p>\n

        The relationship of God the Father and God the Son had been established. Exactly when this relationship between God the Father and Jesus, the Son of God, was established is hard to say. The prophets were given revelation of the father-son relationship between God and Jesus way back in the Old Testament (Psalm 2:16). The prophet Isaiah referred to Jesus as God\u2019s beloved\u00a0Servant\u00a0(Isaiah 42:1, 53:10). Revelation tells us Jesus was slain from the foundation of the world. As stated previously, I believe that Jesus became God\u2019s begotten\u00a0(remember that \u2018begotten\u2019 means \u2018made\u2019 and \u2018created\u2019)\u00a0Son at the point he became flesh in Mary\u2019s womb even though it was planned from the beginning.<\/span><\/p>\n

        What is remarkable, in close examination of this relationship, is that it appears that Jesus, as God, humbled himself out of necessity to fulfill his purpose of becoming a submissive servant. While still being God, according to these verses in Philippians, Jesus\u00a0chose\u00a0to lay down his divine nature and authority. Then,\u00a0after\u00a0Jesus lowers himself, as if to initiate a divine hierarchy, he offers himself in submission to God as his servant, as a son under the authority of his father, and lowers himself from who he is as God to the form of a human being. Paul writes in Philippians that Jesus emptied himself of being God for it to be even possible to become authentically human.<\/span><\/p>\n

        John wrote,\u00a0\u201cThe Word became flesh and dwelt among us.\u201d\u00a0What does scripture say about the flesh? The flesh is imperfect. It is by nature unclean because of sin, and it is decaying to death because of the law of sin. Remember that the law of sin dictates that what is made alive on this earth\u00a0must\u00a0die. The Bible tells us that Jesus humbled himself and became obedient unto death, meaning he was subject to the law of sin. His body would eventually get worn out, grow old and die.<\/h4>\n

        What is so interesting in determining to what extent the Jesus the Son became flesh is that the original Greek word for flesh in the Bible is the word \u2018Sarx\u2019.<\/span><\/p>\n

        The meaning for \u2018Sarx\u2019 is as follows:<\/span><\/p>\n

        \u00a7\u00a0the soft substance of the living body covering the bones and permeated with blood<\/h4>\n

        \u00a7\u00a0the sensuous nature of man<\/h4>\n

        \u00a7\u00a0the physical man subject to suffering<\/h4>\n

        \u00a7\u00a0human nature apart from divine influence, and therefore prone to sin<\/h4>\n

        A root word for \u2018Sarx\u2019 is \u2018Sarkinos\u2019, which means:<\/span><\/p>\n

        \u00a7\u00a0consisting and composed of perishable flesh<\/h4>\n

        \u00a7\u00a0wholly given up to the flesh, or rooted in the flesh<\/h4>\n

        What makes this necessary for our discussion is that the original meaning of the word flesh in Scripture could mean flesh in appearance, or completely flesh all the way into the soul of a person. I contend that for Jesus to be tempted to sin (Hebrews 4:15) there needed to be human desire that is prone to independence by nature from God. I will also contend that for Jesus to genuinely sympathize with the human experience he needed to be genuinely and completely \u201cgiven up to the flesh \u2013 rooted in the flesh\u201d. Only then could He be subject to the laws of the flesh, that being the law of sin.<\/span><\/p>\n

        Was Jesus subject to the law of sin in his soul? I believe that we learn that Jesus, a man of flesh, was vulnerable, and even \u201cobedient\u201d to the reality of sin in the world as a person of human flesh. I will not pretend to comprehend this; however, this point needs to be made for Jesus to be authentically human, having the will of the flesh, meaning human desire. It is important, then, that we accept that God the Son essentially emptied himself of\u00a0beingGod in order to\u00a0become\u00a0flesh.<\/span><\/p>\n

        Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant,\u00a0being\u00a0made\u00a0in human likeness. <\/strong>Philippians 2:6-7 (NIV)<\/p>\n

        Here lies the irony. We observed in Genesis that our sin is predicated on our desire for control in order to minimize our discomfort. The Bible communicates that we have the desire to be our own god. We sin in our ambition to have god-like control. Yet Jesus, who in actuality is God, relinquishes his control as God, and by choice maximizes his discomfort in order to know us and sincerely understand our weakness. This would suggest that Jesus the man experienced human dissatisfaction. This is astounding to me. We strive to be more our own god in our pursuit for control, which we eventually learn by experience is impossible to attain, and Jesus who is God, completely lets go of the control and authority that is his, to become flesh as Jesus the Son, and must totally trust in the control and power of God.<\/span><\/p>\n

        The revelation for us in Scripture is that Jesus, for thirty-three years, was in a position of need and was dependent on God for help, ranging from self-preservation to maximizing human performance, so we must learn from his example.<\/h4>\n

        Your attitude should be the same as Christ Jesus. <\/strong>Philippians 2:5 (NKJV)<\/p>\n