The Real Jesus

In his sermon this morning the Vicar challenged us that our image of Jesus may have been distorted by pictures we have seen maybe as a child of him looking very angelic, cuddling lambs etc.

The idea of Jesus coming to live amongst us was to empathise with us, to feel the whole human experience and to engage with us, to set the example to follow. Jesus became a real man, he wasn't the baby who didn't cry, like the lyrics to 'Away in the manger' might have us believe. He fully embraced humanity, and lived the life of an anonymous carpenter for many years.

"He grew up before him like a tender shoot,

    and like a root out of dry ground.

He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him,

    nothing in his appearance that we should desire him.

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He was despised and rejected by mankind,

    a man of suffering, and familiar with pain.

Like one from whom people hide their faces

    he was despised, and we held him in low esteem." (Isaiah 53)

 When Jesus said "Take up your cross and follow me." He wasn't expecting us to do anything he hadn't done. It's unlikely we will be crucified, but everyone has their own crosses, our own pain and we can carry it, but not alone we do so with the strength of knowing Jesus is carrying us.

For we have not a high priest who cannot be touched with the feeling of our weaknesses. (Hebrews 4)