Able to Sympathize

Hebrews 4:15 “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.”

Thomas Goodwin, in his book The Heart of Christ, aims to convince his reader, particularly “disheartened believers,” that “even though Christ is now in heaven, He is just as open and tender in His embrace of sinners and sufferers as ever He was on earth.” I think we tend to believe this truth half-heartedly. Maybe it’s something we give intellectual assent to, but we have a hard time letting this truth settle down into the recesses of our heart. But, Goodwin wants to make a case - from the Bible - that Jesus is no less-approachable today than He was when He walked the earth.

Now, pause for a moment. In what ways do we see the approachable-ness of Jesus when He was on the earth?

Why do we struggle to see the risen/ascended Jesus in the same light?

Consider the broader context of the verse above:

Hebrews 4:14–16 “Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”

Is a call to genuinely know and understand Christ’s affections for us, even now in His seated-in-heaven state.

Notice that Jesus is able to sympathize with our weakness. A little bit of a Greek language lesson — the word “sympathize” is compound word in the Greek. The word starts with a prefix that means “with,” and it ends with a Greek word that means “to suffer.” Jesus doesn’t so much understand how we feel as much as He actually feels what we are going through - there is shared suffering. It’s like hearing about a tragic situation in life, and there’s a difference between saying, “I know how you feel” when you’ve actually been through the same thing vs. not actually having gone through the same thing (and even then, it’s not always a direct correlation).

Because of the incarnation, Jesus who is God actually becoming a human, His human nature is thoroughly acquainted with human brokenness. There is a true and genuine and deep solidarity - unity - that Jesus feels towards us in our sin and sorrow.

The path we are on, that is such a struggle to succeed at sometimes, He walked it, too. He was a normal man to normal humans. So, He was tempted like us in every respect. So, let’s be real for a minute. Sure, this is what the Bible says, but isn’t this one of those times where what the Bible says needs interpretation, because surely it doesn’t actually mean that Jesus was tempted like we are. But let’s think about this for a second: have you ever made New Year’s Resolution, particularly to give something up? And, did you stick to it? What’s usually the easiest day to keep a resolution? Why? The longer you resist, the harder it is to resist.

Christ endured every ounce of our temptations and testings, but He never gave in. So, better than any of us, He knows the full strength of temptation and the true cost of complete obedience.

But what does the passage say about Jesus? He was tempted in every respect and yet without sin. He completely resisted to the uttermost. He never gave in. If we felt it, He felt it more. Listen to the conclusion Dane Ortlund draws:

When the relationship goes sour, when the feelings of futility come flooding in, when it feels like life is passing us by, when it seems that our one shot at significance has slipped through our fingers, when we can’t sort out our emotions, when the longtime friend lets us down, when a family member betrays us, when we feel deeply misunderstood, when we are laughed at by the impressive - in short, when the fallenness of the world closes in on us and makes us want to throw in the towel - there, right there, we have a Friend who knows exactly what such testing feels like, and sits close to us, embraces us. With us. Solidarity.

Honestly, the enemy has a way of convincing us of our alone-ness the further down the difficult road we go. The harder it is, the more we are alone, or so goes the lie. The Bible is teaching us, “Our pain never outstrips what He himself shares in.”

Ortlund continues by noting Jesus “shares in all our pain…as the pure and holy one. Our sinless high priest is not one who needs rescue but who provides it. This is why we can go to him to ‘receive mercy and find grace’ (4:16). He himself is not trapped in the hole of sin with us; he alone can pull us out. His sinlessness is our salvation. Not only can he alone pull us out of the hole of sin; he alone desires to climb in and bear our burdens. Jesus is able to sympathize. He ‘co-suffers’ with us.”

So, that begs the question: how do we draw near?