"Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.”
- Hebrews 2:17-18
Why should we have confidence that God is near to the brokenhearted (Psalm 34:18)? Why should we trust that “a bruised reed he will not break, and a faintly burning wick he will not quench” (Isaiah 42:3)? What confidence do we have that God cares for our sinful condition and can relate – in some way – to what it means to inhabit these broken lives of ours? We can have such a confidence because God himself took on flesh to suffer and be tempted like we are.
In her book, Creed or Chaos?, Dorothy Sayers explained the incarnation of Christ in these powerful terms:
“For whatever reason God chose to make man as he is— limited and suffering and subject to sorrows and death—He had the honesty and the courage to take His own medicine. Whatever game He is playing with His creation, He has kept His own rules and played fair. He can exact nothing from man that He has not exacted from Himself. He has Himself gone through the whole of human experience, from the trivial irritations of family life and the cramping restrictions of hard work and lack of money to the worst horrors of pain and humiliation, defeat, despair and death. When He was a man, He played the man. He was born in poverty and died in disgrace and thought it well worthwhile.”
These words are comforting and often come to mind during the Advent season. However, the truth of Christ’s coming to live among us serves as more than a reassuring example that “Jesus had to suffer too.” Indeed, Jesus’ suffering and temptation here on Earth brokered something for us. His ministry in human flesh enabled him to serve as the propitiation and as the intercessor we needed.
Though certain cult groups deny either Jesus’ divinity or his humanity, both were needed in order for us to have a qualified advocate before God the father who dwells in unapproachable light (1 Tim. 6:16). We needed not only a divine representative in heaven’s court, but we needed a human intermediary who was able to live, suffer, be tempted, and succeed where Adam failed in order to represent us as a priest before the Father.
For our sufferings to find a resolution, Christ had to “be made like his brothers in every respect.”
For our failures to be propitiated before God, Christ had to live a sinless life.
For our temptations to be met with a loving response from God, Christ himself had to endure temptation.
And because Christ has entered the plea of his own perfect life on our account, we can experience not only an eternal peace with God relative to our sin debt, but we can also experience practical help in the day-to-day trenches of human life. “He is able to help those who are being tempted.” And because he is able to render such help, let us “draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Heb. 4:16).