The Untold Story of Christ

Jesus, The Son of Man The Untold Story of Christ

By Ray Carman

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Prologue “Do we really know Jesus or just who he is?”

I know that may sound like a ridiculous question. Most people reading these words have probably grown up in a church setting of some sort. If not, the majority of Americans have at least some hint of religion in their background (relative, friend, or the neighbor next door), and from that seed of knowledge, most people could answer the basic question, “Who is Jesus?”

Being raised as a preacher's son, I have heard about Jesus since I was a child. I have heard all the stories about his birth, life, death, and that he is preparing a place in heaven for me right now. I have listened with excitement about the miracles and wonderous things that he did. I was captivated at a very early age by this amazing person who I was taught was the Son of God! And who wouldn't be? Being raised in a church setting, we are told that Jesus came to die on the cross so that we could be saved. We were told that his purpose in coming was so that we could be freed from our sins. That of course led to being told how utterly sinful we are and how that sin has separated us from the love of God leaving us in a desperate situation. Without a sacrifice pleasing to God, we would spend eternity in hell! The description of hell would leave anyone in their right mind not wanting to go there! So Jesus of necessity became someone I really wanted to be on my side. It only made sense!

Unfortunately, my background in Jesus actually caused a great problem. And it is a problem I believe is more widespread in the American church than I think we want to admit. It is the issue of knowing Jesus as our Savior and call him Lord, but in reality we really do not know him! Yes, we know a lot about Jesus and we could pass a test on his life and person very easily, but, that is far from knowing someone. Knowing someone is intimate, personal, and requires some common ground.

We have preached Jesus as our Savior and Sacrificial Lamb for so long, it seems that we are missing a very vital part of his person and being. The part with which each man, woman, boy and girl can stand up and say, “Jesus really understands me and what I am going through!” We say those words so much, but I know from personal experience, they can seem so distant and cold. The truth is, I really need a Jesus who really knows how I feel and what I am going through, but the one we know in American Christianity today just doesn't seem to fit that bill. Is it possible we have been deceived about who Jesus is, or is it that we really just don't know him at all?

After my “Journey to God” (you can download this book for free at RazorRaysWorld.com), I began to have a major issue with my answer to the question about knowing Jesus. I had spent my entire life knowing about him, had professed faith in him at an early age, baptized at 14, and had preached about him on many occassions. I was always surrounded by church activities and Christian people and was the son of a “Preacher Man.” The past 4 years were spent with a very intense look at Jesus as I was striving to reflect his image in our world today. I wanted to be who I was called to be in Romans 8:29, I wanted to be a “Little Jesus” in my world. But after my encounter with God and the Enemy Within (you can read more on these in the Journey to God book), I suddenly had problem with my relationship with Jesus. My concern was based on the issue of having common ground for Jesus and I to walk on.

Jesus is the Son of God, and I was always taught that he was Fully God in the body of a man. That is why he was able to do all the amazing and miraculous things he did. That is also why he was able to live a “perfect life” without ever sinning and therefore be the perfect sacrifice for our sins. Jesus was my Savior and Lord, but from what I had read and been taught, we had little to no grounds on which we could be friends.

Now don't get me wrong, I understand our need for a Savior for our sins and the concept of 2

Jesus being Lord, but that does nothing for my need to have someone walk with me through my everyday issues. As a human being, I need someone who understands what it is like to have the pressures that are faced in our everyday lives. Pressures like putting food on the table at home.

Pressures like having everything you were working for seemingly fall apart right in front of your eyes.

The pressures of temptations that abound for every man in America. Women, wealth, wisdom, fame, glory, prominence, and more. The pressures of measuring up to the standards and expectations of friends, family, and the community. I needed someone who could walk in the trenches with me and know what I was feeling, not just someone I could pray to and ask for strength to make it through. I needed someone who had been there and could guide me and hold me up when I was falling. I needed a more than a Savior, I needed a companion.

This is where I really started having a problem connecting the dots. God tells me that I must have personal relationship with His Son in order to be accepted by Him. I have to be washed in His blood and live as he lived. But how was I to do that? If my upbringing had implanted anything into me about Jesus, it was that he was PERFECT and without flaws. All my staring at Jesus in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John confirmed what I already knew. There was no way on earth that I could ever be like Jesus!

That is why we heard the story of our need for a Savior preached so much! The story of his blood being shed and him being raised on the third day. The story of redemption. Praise God, for this story is both mighty and powerful. It is necessary to hear on the path to salvation. We are sinners! We cannot be perfect or earn salvation! We must rely completely on the work of Jesus to pay for our sins!

This message of redemption is the power of God unto salvation! But what about life?

It seems from our point of view that Jesus saves us then we are left to figure things out from there. We are left with a life of worries and concerns, the same concerns that Jesus seems to tell us not to “worry” about. The disciples at least had Jesus to walk with each day! We are left here struggling to make it through and we base all our hope on the fact that “one day it will all be over.”

This just does not seem to add up to the other verses about “lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Or “I will never leave you or forsake you.” These verses imply that Jesus is present with us right now. But even that brings little comfort to me.

If I can always turn around and expect a miracle from him when I am sick or when money is tight, that would be great. But that is not real life and many have excused his seemingly lack of involvement to our lack of faith. Followers of Christ were first called Christians in Anticoh (Acts 11:26) because they looked so much like Jesus. My question is how? I had called myself a Christian all my life, but I am riddled with flaws and imperfections. My life is governed by worries, concerns, needs, and at times, desperations. To be like someone, to look like them, you have to have some ability to relate to them, understand them, know what they are feeling as they go through a situation.

This is where I began to ask whether or not I really knew Jesus. Better yet, was it even possible for us to have a personal relationship? How could Jesus, the perfect Son of God, relate to me in my everyday life? How could he possibly understand what I am going through. Rich Mullin's song, “Hard to Get,” really became real to me as he asked the probing question, “Jesus, did you forget us when you had flown away?” That is no doubt how I felt about it all. In Scriptures we read of angels delivering messages, Jesus doing mighty things, Paul and Peter following suit, and they spoke of Jesus as if he was their best friend. I heard other people talk about Jesus this way. But my religious background, my view of Jesus along with my imperfections just did not seem to make any kind of relationship beyond Lord and servant possible. And we all know that a king has no real connection with his people. Their lifestyles are extremely different.

With these thoughts about Jesus running through my head, I struggled through life. The religious system I was raised and educated in tried to shove me into a “perfect mold” of what a 3

Christian should look like, but I just did not seem to be able to fit into this mold. I tried to make it through every day and perform my righteous duties as a good little Christian. When I messed up, I prayed a prayer of forgiveness. After marriage and experiencing true love first hand (thanks Katie), I even began to start looking like the guy I always imagined a perfect Christian to be. I went to church, tithed, served the body, told people about Jesus, put away my selfish sins, joined an accountability group, and turned my back on the world. I was living the life I was always told a Christian should live, and I was financially successful while doing it! I was doing everything possible to have a relationship with Jesus, but there always seemed to be a “disconnect” between us because He was God, and I was not! To make it worse, Jesus had said his followers would do even greater works than the ones he had done (feed multitudes with little, raise the dead, heal the sck, cast out demons, cause deformed body parts to suddenly be perfect, etc). Trouble was, not only was I not doing, or even seeing done, any greater works, I had never even been a part of any works as great as these!

That is when I realized there was something missing. I knew Jesus in the sense that I knew all about him. I knew every detail there was to know. My life had been spent surrounded by God, Jesus, and Christianity, and I had “decided to follow” Jesus, but there was a hole in me that was empty. I had done all the right things and even dedicated so much time to studying Jesus so I could “be like him,” but the problem was, I had failed to really “Know Him.” As this reality set in, a deep black hole of desperation followed! As I began to realize the necessity of knowing Jesus in a personal way, I begin to lose hope. There was no one more suited to “know Jesus” than me! I was raised in the perfect setting to know him. I was given all the proper training and tools on how to know him. I had the best of the best information and methods known to man for actually knowing Jesus, but we still did not seem to have anything in common beyond the connection at the cross. To be honest, if that was all there was to it, then this relationship didn't seem to be much at all, and it was definitely NOT personal. Kings and peasants don't quite have the same lifestyle and therefore no ability to understand each other. All hope seemed lost in my quest to really know Jesus!

That is, until God introduced me to Jesus, The Son of Man. 9 Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through him! 10 For if, while we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life! 11 Not only is this so, but we also boast in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation. Romans 5:9-11 NIV

Before We Begin 4

Before we get started, I think it is important to make one thing very clear. I am not saying that I have suddenly been told “the rest of the story,” or that I have had a vision from God. That is not at all what I am attempting to do. Much of what I have to say cannot be cross referenced in the Bible. I have no proof text or evidence for most of the story I am going to write. Rather, it is something different altogether.

In every story that is written or told, there is always the story hidden between the lines. The “Untold” story. However, the untold part can be just as important as the words we have heard or read.

In fact, there is usually more to found in the untold part than what is written.

As I began to sink into utter despair over the evident gap between Jesus and I, I found myself at a place of helplessnes and hopelessness. I found myself in a place of complete and utter need. Scripture made it clear that we had to “know God/Jesus” if we were to have any hope whatsoever. Not just hope for heaven! It was much more than that! It was hope for life, here and beyond.

This is where Jesus found me when he began to introduce me to the story I had never heard about him. The “untold” story. After finding out my mind had been held captive by the Enemy with the chains of the religion of Christ, God began to set me free. As freedom began to take hold, the battle for my mind began once again. God was telling me to “know Jesus” and my mind said I already “knew” Jesus. In my heart though, I knew there was a deeper need for much more than what my knowledge had to offer me. That is when I laid myself at his feet and begged him to open my eyes to see him, to know him.

What followed was God slowly directing my heart to first study Job so I could know that He does whatever He pleases with His creation. I had a basic knowledgeof this due to my Calvinistic Thoelogy background. However, the depths of this found in the book of Job are astounding. Once God had my attention there, He invited me to again stare at His Son. With a desperate heart and a seemingly empty mind, I began to read, looking for how we could have a real relationship. I found little help in the actual words, words I had read hundreds of times. However, as I watched my children and listened to His voice, I began to hear and see a story I had somehow missed all these years. It was in this story that I found a glimpse of hope for the relationship that seemed impossible. It was here that I begin to find the One I so desperately had longed to see.

What I have attempted to write is simply what I was shown. It is the seemingly forgotten story of Jesus Christ that we tend to brush over with just a few words. We have been drawn to focus so much on the deity of Christ that we have lost a vital part of who he is. My prayer and hope is that through my journey, you too may be drawn to seek out this amazing man who we know as Jesus, the Son of God, but who was also the son of Joseph and Mary.

So as you read, please seek God. That is my only request, my one desire. Seek Him that you may know Him and His Son. All else is worthless and a vain pursuit. May God be glorified and may Jesus be high and lifted up!

13 Behold, my servant shall act wisely; he shall be high and lifted up, and shall be exalted.

14 As many were astonished at you— his appearance was so marred, beyond human semblance, and his form beyond that of the children of mankind— 15 so shall he sprinkle many nations; kings shall shut their mouths because of him; for that which has not been told them they see, and that which they have not heard they understand.

(Is 52:13-15)

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Isaiah 53 1 Who has believed what he has heard from us?And to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed?

2 For he grew up before him like a young plant, and like a root out of dry ground; he had no form or majesty that we should look at him,and no beauty that we should desire him.

3 He was despised and rejected by men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief, and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

4 Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows;yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted.

5 But he was wounded for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his stripes we are healed.

6 All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned—every one—to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all.

7 He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth.

8 By oppression and judgment he was taken away; and as for his generation, who considered that he was cut off out of the land of the living, stricken for the transgression of my people?

9 And they made his grave with the wicked, and with a rich man in his death, although he had done no violence, and there was no deceit in his mouth.

10 Yet it was the will of the LORD to crush him; he has put him to grief; when his soul makes an offering for guilt, he shall see his offspring; he shall prolong his days; the will of the LORD shall prosper in his hand.

11 Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied;by his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities.

12 Therefore I will divide him a portion with the many, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he poured out his soul to death and was numbered with the transgressors; yet he bore the sin of many, and makes intercession for the transgressors. (ESV)

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The Parents

If you would be so inclined, I would like to invite you to take a time trip with me let us visit a little place called Nazareth. It is a city of Galilee, in the country of Israel. The country has been overthrown by the Romans and the Roman guards patrol the streets. It is a desperate time as the children of Israel have come under the bondage and captivity of the most powerful force on earth in that day. Rome had spread out and marched throughout the lands, conquering kings and nations that came into their path. They were an elite force and not to be reckoned with.

Every so often a rebel leader will rise up in Israel and try to set the country free from the grip of the Roman tyranny. Some were even successful enough to give the people a little hope. However, every time, the uprising is squelched and the rebel leaders are executed and put on public display in order to deter any future uprisings! But in their hearts, the people held on to a hope!

The people of Israel tightly hold on to their history by passing down the stories of Moses, David, Elijah, Samuel, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and all the other prophets. For years they have spoken of the promised king from the line of David who would deliver them from the hand of their enemies! This chosen king would deliver them from the hands of all who would dare attack them, and then he would reign on David's throne in Jerusalem forever! They sang songs and told stories to their kids about this future Deliverer, and the little children listened with anticipation and excitement as they clung to every word. Every man, woman, boy, and girl in Israel looked forward and longed for the day that their Deliverer and King would arrive!

It has been nearly 400 years since God had spoken to his people through any prophet or person.

Angels from God, who had once walked among the people, had seemingly pulled back into hiding. It seemed as if God had turned His back on Israel, but He had never failed to fulfill any of His promises.

Therefore, all the people clung desperately to their hope and trusted in the prophecies and promises from the days of old! Their history had proven God to be true to His word, so they dug in and waited for this promised King to arrive and set them free.

Among them was a young couple who were engaged to be married. Their hearts each anxiously awaited the arrival of the big wedding day, the feast, and all the “extras” that came with being married!

They had big dreams as this young man would follow in the footsteps of his father and run the family business. She would be a stay at home mom and raise their children, caring for them with all her love and passion. Together, they would guide their children and teach them all about their God and the promise of a Redeemer who would free them from the captivity of their Rome! Their names were Joseph and Mary!

Joseph was just coming into his prime as a member of King David's lineage! He was a man well known in his community as his family maintained a seat of prominence due to their royal heritage. He was well respected as a gentlemen and hardworker. His years had passed and now he was of age to get married. When his parents had selected Mary to be his bride, he was overjoyed. Every time he thought of this beautiful young lady, his heart would skip a beat! He worked diligently to prepare a home for them and dreamed of the wonderful life that was ahead of them.

Mary was a simple girl who came from a humble background. Her family was not wealthy or well known. Rather, they were simple folk who lived among the people. When she had been chosen to be the bride of Joseph, she was extremely honored and excited. This was a big “move up” in life for her and her family! This meant a lot to the future of her family, and it didn't hurt that Joseph was “easy on the eyes” as well! Under these circumstances, things could not have been going better for her, until........

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As Mary was running around preparing for her upcoming wedding, a paculiar guy shows up out of nowhere and says he is an “Angel of the Lord.” Here is how it reads in Luke 1:26-37; 26 In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, 27 to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. And the virgin’s name was Mary.

28 And he came to her and said, "Greetings, O favored one, the Lord is with you!

29 But she was greatly troubled at the saying, and tried to discern what sort of greeting this might be.

30 And the angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. 31 And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus.

32 He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, 33 and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end."

34 And Mary said to the angel, "How will this be, since I am a virgin?"

35 And the angel answered her, "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy— the Son of God. 36 And behold, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son, and this is the sixth month with her who was called barren.

37 For nothing will be impossible with God." (ESV) Can you imagine all that is going through Mary's mind! This “angel” says his name is Gabriel and he calls Mary the “favored one,” and he tells her “the Lord is with you!” The greeting was very strange and Mary was not quite sure what to make of it. As if he was reading her mind, the angel tells her not to be afraid because she had been chosen by God to conceive a son! Not only that, but this son would be be named Jesus and he would sit on the throne of David as king and rule over his people! He would be known as the Son of the Most High God and he would reign forever! He would be the promised Deliverer they had all been waiting for and he would set his people free!

Initially, Mary is excited to hear she will have a son. Joseph is of royal blood and any child of his would be considered to be in line for the throne of David. She had heard the stories that had passed down through the ages of God's promised Messiah who would come and deliver His people from their enemies. Therefore, having a son with Joseph could lead to the coming of a physical king again for Israel. A Redeemer who would rule God's people in peace. All that sounded great to her, but there was one major problem!

Mary was not yet married and this guy was implying that she was going to become pregnant immediately. Being pregnant did not bother Mary, but the timing seemed to be off. And, she had not had ever had sex with any man, therefore it was physically impossible for her to become pregnant. She knew all too well that to be pregnant, sex with a man was part of the equation! This part of the angel's story did bother Mary quite a bit.

Mary was a woman of purity! She had kept herself undefiled for her future husband and was not going to change that for anyone or anything. She did not mind having a son with Joseph, however, she 8

had no intentions of doing anything until the wedding night, which was not to be for another few months. This fact was causing Mary to be worried about the proclamation from this angel who was telling her she was about to conceive a son, seemingly outside of marriage. Therefore, she asked the only question that came to mind, “How can this be, seeing I am still yet a virgin?”

This is where things got a little sticky. Gabriel tells Mary that the “Holy Spirit will come upon you and the Most High God will overshadow you” and you will get pregnant! Basically, God is going to come himself and impregnate you with a son that will be His own and He will be known as “Holy” (or pure) and everyone will call him the “Son of God!” Put yourself in Mary's shoes! Imagine the weight of the words she has just heard. “God is going to make you pregnant with His son!” That is a very tall order that physically sounds impossible. Sure, Mary had read or heard the words of Moses from Genesis 6 in which we are told of “sons of God” having babies with “daughters of men.” But this was outrageous! God had been extremely quiet for hundreds of years, not sharing any new words with His people! Now He breaks His silence with the news He is going to come and make her pregnant with “His Son!” This was just too much to believe!

Again, as if reading her mind, Gabriel doesn't miss a beat and tells her about Elizabeth, her relative, being pregnant in her old age. This woman who had been called “barren” (unable to have a child), was now six months pregnant! With this the Angel says that Mary just needs to believe because, “Nothing is impossible for God!” In verse 37 we read that Mary humbly offers herself to “whatever” God wants to do with her.

However, do not be deceived into thinking this was an easy decision for her. Think about all the questions and concerns that must have run through her mind: What would she tell Joseph? How could she explain this to her parents? What would all her neighbors and friends think? Would anyone believe her when she told them about the angel and what he had said? If they didn't, this could mean she would lose everything. If no one believed her, her reputation would be destroyed although she had done nothing wrong. Joseph probably would not marry her because he would think she had acted like a whore. Her parents would likely be so ashamed and embarrassed that they would treat her differently.

Her friends and neighbors would mock her and call her a slut. This was no small decision Mary had to make when she agreed to let her body be used by God! But at the same time, it was the only decision she could make! How could she possibly say no to God? This was a defining moment in Mary's life, trusting God would somehow pull her through!

I am sure Mary ran and told her parents about what the angel had said. I am also sure there was uncertainty and dismay on their part. I can imagine Mary's father getting extremely upset with Joseph for evidently getting his daughter pregnant. “Wait till I get my hands on that no good for nothing....” he yelled. Mary tried to calm him down by saying it was not Joseph's child! At that, his heart is broken and he angrily says, 'Well then who is the dad?” Can you see his face as she says again, “Dad, this is going to be God's son. God is the dad!”

No doubt this also caused quite a stir in the whole town as Mary began to show the signs of having a baby in her belly. All who asked and gossiped about it mocked her story of being pregnant by God! Think about how preposterous this all sounded to them! Their chanting seemed to never stop as they said, “Liar, liar, dress on fire!” Their words and reactions were extremely painful and devastating to Mary. Her reputation was instantly destroyed and distrust filled her house. The worst possible scenario with all the angel had said was becoming her reality.

It isn't long before Joseph comes back to visit Mary and he is greeted by the shock of the news!

Mary tries to explain that she had not broken her vows to wait on him! She begged him to believe her story of the angel's visit! But it was all just a little too much for him. Joseph was now faced with a huge decision of his own. He could either publicly humiliate Mary and her family with a big divorce proceeding which would restore his honor, or, he could divorce Mary quietly and go on with his life 9

and let his parents find a more suitable, and more honorable woman to be his bride. Either way, a divorce was the only way to clear his name.

As this is all taking place, Mary is broken and torn. What had God done to her? Why did He not send the angel to let everyone know she was telling the truth? To escape the overwhelming shame of her situation, she takes a trip to visit the only person who could possibly understand, Elizabeth!

Remember, Elizabeth's pregnancy was brought up in Mary's discussion with the angel. The story of how an angel had visited Zechariah were spreading around! He had been told by the angel that his wife would have a baby, but he did not believe the angel's story. Therefore, as a sign that she would conceive, Zechariah was not able to speak until the baby was born. His voice was completely gone!

I can see him now, coming home and writing down for Elizabeth everything that happened between him and the angel. Wanting a baby, I am sure Elizabeth thought of the story of Sarah (Abraham's wife) and she chose to accept this news with excitement. And what do you know, she got pregnant! The “gossip line� was buzzing, and this unbelievable story was headline news and had certainly made its way around to Mary's parents. In a desperate attempt to talk to someone who would understand, Mary went to the hills of Judea for a visit. As a side benefit, she would also be able to escape all the slanderous name calling and pressure she was under back at home as she waited on the news of how Joseph would divorce her.

As soon as Mary enters the house of Zechariah and Elizabeth, words of excitement pour from Elizabeth's lips as the boy inside of her own belly lept for joy at the sound of Mary's voice: 41 And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit, 42 and she exclaimed with a loud cry, "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb!

43 And why is this granted to me that the mother of my Lord should come to me?

44 For behold, when the sound of your greeting came to my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy.

45 And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her from the Lord."

To which Mary responded: 46 And Mary said, "My soul magnifies the Lord, 47 and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, 48 for he has looked on the humble estate of his servant. For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed; 49 for he who is mighty has done great things for me, and holy is his name.

50 And his mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation.

51 He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts; 52 he has brought down the mighty from their thrones and exalted those of humble estate; 53 he has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent away empty.

54 He has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy, 55 as he spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and to his offspring forever." (ESV) What a relief for Mary! Finally, someone who did not look down on her for being pregnant with this child she claimed to be a miraculous baby from God himself. Someone who finally understood!

Elizabeth had almost certainly heard of Mary's situation, and like anyone else, was concerned about the 10

validity of her story. However, Elizabeth herself was living proof that God could do anything He wanted, and when her baby got excited in the mere presence of Mary and her child, Elizabeth chose to believe! It is no wonder that Mary spent three months with Elizabeth during her pregnancy with Jesus.

It was the only place she felt accepted.

Mary's response is a statement of faith in God as well. Glorifying God and thanking Him for sending her to someone who could encourage her in her “humble estate.” Mary had been humiliated back at home and stood ready to lose everything she treasured. Her reputation was already destroyed and it appeared she was going to lose her husband as well. If that happened, she would most likely live out her days as a single mom, as no man of decent reputation would ever have anything to do with her now. None the less, she chose to celebrate what God was doing in her and to worship His name. She knew this pregnancy was from God and through God. Therefore, she held fast to the knowledge that she was innocent of all charges anyone brought against her and that God would clear her name someday, restoring her reputation for all mankind to know for the rest of eternity. In this very moment, she reaffirms her faith in what the angel had told her, and she declared her belief that this child of hers would be the promised king they were all waiting for!

Soon after, Elizabeth's son is born and Mary returns home. When she arrives back home, her belly has grown larger, due to the growth of the child inside of her, and she walks right back into the same situation she had left behind. Suddenly, all the joy from her time with Elizabeth is sucked away as she is faced with the grim face of reality. The neighbors are still whispering and calling her names. Her mom and dad are still hurt and confused. Joseph is preparing the divorce papers and getting ready to leave her for good. She knows life will not be easy, but she has returned with renewed confidence that God would vindicate her and restore her reputation in the eyes of her friends and neighbors, some day.

If it did not happen soon, it surely would happen once her son sat on his throne for everyone to see!

On the other side of this equation, we have Joseph.

Joseph is a righteous young man who comes from a prominent family of the line of David. In other words, he is of royal blood. If Israel was not under captivity, Joseph would either be in line for the throne, or, he would be sitting on it! Either way, his life would look much different than it currently did.

As it was, Joseph's family was still in the “upper class” in the area. Joseph was an aspiring young man with a lot of skill and talent. People highly respected Joseph and he was considered a prime catch when it came to having a husband. He would one day take over the family business and his future looked bright! Although he would never be king, he still would be a leader for his people.

That future now included a very beautiful young lady named Mary. She was not of the same social class as he was, but he loved her all the same. She was smart, funny, and very loyal. Not to mention her amazing looks! Joseph could not have been more thrilled with the girl that had been chosen for him. Until.....

One day Mary comes up and tells Joseph that she is pregnant! She then tells a ridiculous story of some angel visiting her to let her know God was going to make her pregnant and she would have the son of the Most High God. Joseph just looks at her in disbelief and thinks maybe she is joking around.

Yes, they are both excited about enjoying the “fruits of marriage,” but this had to be some kind of joke.

However, when he sees the pain in Mary's eyes because of his unbelief, he realizes this is for real.

It's not much longer after this that Mary begins to show the signs of being pregnant. Her belly is growing larger and larger. It is now clear that Mary was not kidding and it doesn't take long for people to to start assuming the baby belongs to Joseph. Joseph knows beyond a shadow of a doubt that this child is not from him as he has never slept with Mary, or any other woman for that matter. Joseph was at a loss as what to do. Mary had never been dishonest before, but this whole “God's baby” story was 11

just too much to take. As he discussed it over with his parents, it was evident that the only way to clear his name was to divorce Mary, thus proving to everyone that this was not his child. To accept Mary would be the same as telling everyone this WAS his baby. That would mean admitting to being impure before marriage, and that was something he just could not do. He loved Mary, but her apparent indiscretions had left him no choice.

Thankfully, Joseph did not have to rush off into a decision. Mary had left town and this had given him time to think things through. When she returned, everything came rushing back in and he knew he had to do the inevitable. The only decision left was whether or not to do this divorce publicly and cause Mary and her family a lot of shame, or to simply just put her away quietly. It was just a few nights before the big wedding was suppose to take place, and Joseph had decided to call everything off and just send Mary home quietly. He would not cause her to face the humiliation of a public ordeal. He would announce his decision in the morning.

As Joseph laid down to sleep, he found himself in the presence of an angel. This angelic being talked to him and tells him that Mary was not lying, but that the baby in her belly was indeed conceived by the Holy Spirit and was to be known as the “Son of God.” Matthew 1:18-23 reads like this: 18 Now the birth of(Jesus Christ took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit.

19 And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly.

20 But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, "Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.

21 She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins."

22 All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: 23 "Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel" (which means, God with us). ESV Imagine with me if you will how Joseph must have felt as he was waking up from this dream.

As the clouds of sleep drift away, he remembers the message he has heard from what appeared to be an Angel. He shakes his head once or twice to get rid of the cob webs, then he realizes that his dream was more than a dream, it was a message from God.! He instantly believes that Mary has been telling the truth. He feels horrible for putting her through the pain of his unbelief in her story. But come on, look at what we are talking about! A woman pregnant with the Son of the Living God? It still sounded ridiculous even after his encounter with the angel. We are talking about the same God that Joseph had been told about from his birth. The God who was in charge of creation, the freeing of his nation from Egypt, the mighty battles, the Psalms of David, and the words of all the prophets. This was so overwhelming!

“Isaiah!” Joseph thought! The words of the coming Messiah! The long awaited King who would rule over Israel on Davids throne forever! The one who would bring peace to the land and to God's people. The one who would set them free! This is the long awaited Deliverer Mary had in her belly!

And since she was to be married to Joseph, that baby would be in line for the throne! It all started making sense now! Except one thing!

12

Joseph knew as soon as he came out and announced the wedding was still on and that he would take Mary to be his wife, he would also take all the trouble that would surely come with it! To take Mary as his wife was the equivalent to admitting this baby was in fact his own. It was the same to his parents, Mary's folks, the town, ad everybody around, as saying he had slept with Mary. That is what everyone would instantly think. No man in their right mind would do this stupid thing! Especially since this was NOT his child. He now knew that Mary had not been lying to him, but who was going to believe his story about an angel visiting him. No one had believed Mary's story, including him, so who was going to believe his? Wouldn't it look more like an attempt to join Mary in the biggest sex cover up of all time?

Just like Mary's decision to accept the word of the angel and offer her body to God to carry His Son, this choice to accept Mary as his wife had major consequences for Joseph. If people did not believe his story, he would lose face in the eyes of his parents and his family. His position as “heir to the throne,” would be sacrificed. No man who was impure before marriage could ever be the leader of God's people. Not only that, but now Joseph would also have to endure all the verbal abuse and slander that he had watched Mary go through over the past several months. The burden that came with his obedience would be no small matter. To obey God meant to subject himself to a great amount of suffering and shame.

However, we are told in Matthew 1:24 that Joseph did obey the angel's words and took Mary as his wife. He made a decision to believe God and in doing so, did endure much suffering at the hands of those around him. Not only that, but this young man who was at the peak of male vitality, ready for passionate nights with his wife, would have to take her home and wait! Wait to experience the fruits of the marriage bed. Wait for sexual satisfaction. Wait for this “Son of God” to appear before he can enjoy the pleasures of being married! When put into real terms, what God was requiring from Joseph was a complete surrender and sacrifice of all that he was and all that he had. The cost of being the “supposed father of Jesus” was extremely high!

Don't be fooled, this was no easy decision that should be run over as we read only a few words in a story today! These were life altering moments for both of these young people. The shame they faced together was great as they heard the words, “whore, harlot, slut, bastard, sinner, immoral, unclean” and more thrown into their faces. No one believed their story about God sending His son as they embarked on this journey together. They were all alone, having only each other to hold on to in their time of greatest need. They each knew of their own purity and righteousness! Together they choose to believe each other's story about the angels and God's coming Messiah in Mary's belly. But this only made the pain of being called liars even harder to take. Each day they held each other tight, holding on to the fact that they both knew God would be faithful to them and one day, clear their names. One day, when this child did become king, everyone who called them names and threw them under the bus would be put to shame and come running to ask for their forgiveness. One day!

How long would they have to wait for this baby to be born and his kingdom to be put in place?

They constantly had to remind each other that they had simply obeyed God and offered their lives to serve Him!They had been given a wonderful opportunity to be of service to their God and they would just have to wait for that glorious day that their reputations would be restored!

With this as their only anchor of hope, they anxiously awaited the birth of this King!

13

The Birth

A few months have rolled by, and not much has changed for this young couple! Joseph has really struggled to adapt to his new found position in life. Sure, his parents still love him, but he has become a disgrace in their eyes and in the eyes of the community. Just think, he had everything going for him, and now it appears he has sinned by not waiting till he was married to sleep with Mary. The accusations are tough to take, but together they do all they can to hold things together until this baby is born. That is when they figured all would be put right and they would be set free from this curse they seem to be living under!

The next thing you know, it is almost time for the arrival of the baby and their time of vindication seems to be near. Word has just come out that Caesar Augustus has decided to have everyone registered and counted for taxation purposes, which means everyone has to go to their home town. Since Joseph was of the lineage of King David, he was required to take his very pregnant wife and make the80 mile trip to Bethlehem to be registered. Can you imagine loading up your very pregnant wife on a donkey and traveling several weeks out in the weather for this required registration?

At a top speed of 4 miles a day, it would have been 3 weeks of solid travel! In the back of their minds, I suppose it may have made sense. With the birth so close, it only made sense for the baby to be born in the town of a King, Bethlehem. It was the home town of the most famous and loved of all Jewish kings, King David.

I can hear the conversation now on the long journey in. This young couple has endured endless slandering and mockery at the hands of their closest family and friends. They have been taunted and teased for their “inability to wait,” and neither of them could wait to have all their enemies silenced! To make it worse, they were having to “wait” even longer than anyone could imagine to actually sleep together. It was extremely hard on them both.

All the way to Bethlehem they have been discussing how once this “Son of God” was born and God shows everyone that he indeed is the Deliverer they have all been waiting for, then Mary and Joseph will be able to face the world with dignity again. This life of being “alone in the fight” was getting very tough and really old. Their only hope was that God would come through on His end of the bargain and make this child king!

They arrive for the registration and find Bethlehem is running over with people. Not quite the scene they were hoping to drop in on. Joseph goes from place to place looking for a decent room for them to rent for the night. Everywhere they stop, all the rooms have been booked and no one seems to give a rip that Mary is about to have a child. Finally, one motel owner offers to let them have a stall in the barn so they can at least rest. Little did anyone know that this was going to be the night!

All the saddle bags have been brought in and Mary has arranged the hay for them to sleep on.

Then it happened! Mary's water breaks and the baby starts coming! Joseph looks around and panics a little. What are they going to do? He calls for help, but no one answers. Again, one of the biggest moments of their lives, and they are all alone. Outside of a few stable hands and stragglers, it is just him, Mary, and a soon to be born baby boy. Mary is learning first hand the difficulty of bearing a child.

She is experiencing the meaning of what God said when a woman would have extreme pain when giving irth to a child. There is no pain numbing medicine. Mary feels every thing, and it HURTS! Her screams fill the cold night air and Joseph does his best to calm her and encourage her through the 14

process. Mary had to be wondering why would God not have made having His son a little less painful.

Already her life has been filled emotional pain because of this “promised one,” could God not have made the actual birth a little bit easier and maybe a better place to have him born!

Long story short, after the pains of child birth, the baby boy, this Son of God, finally arrives.

They look around and Mary takes some cloth and swaddles the baby tight. The cold night air is rushing through the barn and she is afraid the baby might get sick. Joseph looks around and the closest thing he can find to a baby bed is a trough where the animals are eating from. He cleans it out and lines it with a little hay so the baby can have a little comfort.

That is when Joseph lost his cool! He looks around at the situation and it just ticks him off!

“What is going on here?” he says frustrated! “I thought this baby was God's Son? I thought he was suppose to be a king! This isn't a place fit for a king to be born! What kind of king is born in a stable out in the barn? I must be crazy for believing some dream I had. Angels telling me you were carrying the child of God! There is NO WAY that God would allow His Son be born in a barn. I must have been delusional for getting sucked into this craziness. I was expecting to be surrounded by royalty and the religious leaders for this event. I was expecting God to do some amazing miracle regarding the birth of this child and bring us justice for all the sorrow and emotional stress we have endured. But NO! We are stuck out here in a barn with a baby boy who is laying in cow slobber and we are sitting in goat droppings! This is ridiculous! How could God do this to us?”

Mary hasn't said much as she has been trying to calm the baby down and warm him up as he shivers in the cold night air. She has just endured the pains of child labor in a stall and is still having to address the bleeding that comes with giving birth! The baby is crying and hungry and Joseph has just vented his frustration! Tears are forming in her eyes as she plays back all the words the angel had told her regarding this baby boy she was now staring at. The angel said he was going to be a king on the throne of David and reign forever. He assured her that this was going to be a great thing God was going to do. She didn't say it out loud, but she agreed with the anger and frustration that Joseph was venting.

A barn was no place for God to have His Son born! How was this going to prove to anybody that they had been telling the truth. No one is going to believe that God would let His only begotten Son be born anywhere other than a grand palace surrounded by maids and servants and given the finest things any baby could have. This made no sense at all! This must be some kind of mistake!

What about the religious leaders and priest? Where were they at? If this was the “Son of the Most High,” wouldn't they have been informed by God somehow and have been there to receive this child into the world? Didn't God send out some kind of a memo for everyone that this Messiah was being born? And what of the vindication these two young people desperately hoped for? They had done nothing but obey the words of God, and for their obedience all they had received was slander and false accusations. Wasn't God watching? Didn't He care? They had done everything that had been asked of them, but in return they had received nothing but shame and suffering! “Some way to treat your favored one,” Mary thought!

Suddenly, there was a loud commotion as some local shepherds came running through the barn doors. They were moving from stall to stall, looking in each one as if they had lost something. One of them looks in and sees Joseph, Mary, and the baby. He turns and calls to his friends, “Over here guys!

He is over here!” All the shepherds rush over and catch their breath as they stare at this little family out in the barn. Their eyes are wide with amazement as they are focused on the newborn baby boy.

Joseph has suddenly been jolted back into reality from his release of frustration. As he steps up, he asks these guys what was the meaning of all this commotion. One shepherd after another begins to 15

speak, but they all keep interrupting one another as they try and relate what has just happened to them.

Joseph finally has had enough as the baby starts to cry due to all the loud noise. He waves his arms, motioning for silence. He points to to one of the shepherds and says, “Dear sir, will you please explain to me what is going on!”

The man begins to speak and this is what he says: “We were all out in the fields watching our flocks, when suddenly a majestic Angel appeared and scared the crap out of us. He told us to not be afraid as he was there to bring us good news that would be for everyone to hear. He told us that a baby had been born this very night who would be our Savior and would be known as 'Christ the Lord.' He also told us we would find this baby wrapped in linens and laying in a trough in one of the barns in town. Next thing we knew, there was a whole host of these majestic beings in the sky and they were singing a song of praise to God. Just as soon as they came, they disappeared! We were all so amazed by what we had heard and seen that we decided to come into town and see if we couldn't find the baby the Angel spoke of. We have been running from barn to barn looking for you guys. When we saw you here, we knew your baby was the one we had been told about and we just had to see him for ourselves!

It is not everyday that an Angel announces the arrival of a baby. This must be some special kid you have here. We are sorry to bother you, but we just had to come see him for ourselves!” (Luke 2:8-20) Mary and Joseph are blown away with this news. Here they were, wondering if God had forgotten them and left them alone in their shame and misfortune. The time for the “king” to be born had come, but it was nothing like they had imagined. Then they hear this tale of Angels announcing the arrival of their baby, and a big choir of angels singing glorious songs in the sky. As they soaked it all in, they barely noticed the shepherds walking away. Outside, they could hear the shepherds telling everyone on the streets about the evening and what had happened. Mary let all this sink deep into her heart and mind. What was God up to?

First He sends Gabriel to tell her that she would get pregnant by the Holy Spirit even though she was a virgin. She tells her parents and gets nothing but heartache and trouble. Joseph nearly divorces her, which would keep this child from being a “son of David” and thus negate the whole “King on the throne” idea. At the last minute, Joseph comes out and declares he is going to move forward with the marriage and takes her home to be his wife. They can't engage in any “marital activities” until the baby is born. Her and Joseph anxiously await the birth of the child so their reputations can be restored as they figured God was going to have this Son of His born in a royal palace. Instead they are stuck out in a barn and the only “announcement” God made was to the lowest of all classes, shepherds. These guys were below the bottom of the totem pole in Israel. They were the guys who could find no other job.

Shepherds were a despised group of people. Why would God announce the birht of His son to them?

This just didn't make any sense whatsoever!

Now knowing that things were not as they had hoped they would be, they seemed a little lost.

Just when all hope was fading away, God sends these shepherds with news of a heavenly announcement being made about the birth of this child. They talk things over and decide that maybe the baby would have to be a little older before they saw his kingdom put in place. After all, that made sense! No infant baby could rule a nation. With their new found hope that they would still one day be cleared of all the false accusations of them having sex before marriage, they set their faces toward the future with a new hope in their hearts. One day they knew they would see God's promise become a reality, and then they would finally get justice and a blessing for being obedient to God!

16

Circumcision, Wise Men, and a Trip out of State.

With this new found determination, Mary and Joseph set about to obey the laws and customs of circumcision and child birth. 8 days after the baby was born, they performed the circumcision and gave the boy his name, Jesus, just as they had been commanded! Sometime after Mary's 33 days of cleansing was over, they made the trip to Jerusalem to offer the required offering for a firstborn son. (Leviticus 12:1-8) A little over a month has passed and things again were starting to cave in a little for Mary and Joseph. For a “Son of God,” this baby sure seemed normal. There was no glow around his head or halo circling over him. He cried and whined like every other child when he was hungry or his diapers were dirty. They had long sleepless nights as this baby wrestled with learning how to sleep and eat. He had gas in his belly at times which made him scream for hours on end. This sure didn't seem like no “special child.” There was no big parade and no big royal welcome other than a story of angels singing in the sky they had heard from a handful of shepherds. Their hearts begin to sink again as they were forced back to the reality that they were in this all alone.

When they arrived at the temple, they bumped into an old man by the name of Simeon. He was kind and gentle of spirit. He was very near the end of his life, but something had kept him holding on.

He was known as being a righteous man and devout in his devotion to God. Through the Holy Spirit, he had been told he would not taste death until he had seen the Messiah that God was sending to comfort his people. (Luke 2:25-28) As Mary walks forward with the baby in her arms, this old man kindly introduces himself and asked if he might hold the child in his arms. Once he had looked the baby in the face he said: 29 "Lord, now you are letting your servant depart in peace, according to your word; 30 for my eyes have seen your salvation 31 that you have prepared in the presence of all peoples, 32 a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and for glory to your people Israel." (Luke 2 ESV) Joseph and Mary were both blown away by this unusual greeting from a stranger. They looked at each other with wondering glances, marveling at what this old man had just said. But he wasn't finished yet! He turned to Mary and said; "Behold, this child is appointed for the fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign that is opposed (and a sword will pierce through your own soul also), so that thoughts from many hearts may be revealed." (Luke 2:34b-35) Not only that, but an older woman named Anna came up and begin to praise God and speak to them all about the redemption coming for Jerusalem. This was a little overwhelming to Mary and Joseph. What were they to make of all this? It seemed every time they were ready to give up and throw in the towel, God would send some very small sign that maybe they weren't so crazy after all. These little things were reconfirming in their own hearts what they knew to be true! This child was indeed the 17

Son of God and they had been chosen to be his earthly parents. It wasn't the personal redemption they were hoping for that would clear their names and make them upstanding citizens again, but it was encouragement none the less to their weary souls. God was definitely on the move!

With all these words and events swirling in their heads, they finished the offering proceedings according to the custom of the law and headed home. They traveled back to Bethlehem to a house that Joseph had found for them to stay in. With the upcoming offerings they would have to do in Jerusalem, it made no sense to make the trip all the way back to Nazareth at this point. So they settled into their new home and Joseph went out and found work to make ends meat.

Months dragged by and once again clouds of doubt were clouding their hearts and minds.

Joseph would go out each day and work while Mary stayed home and watched the kid. They had finally been able to enjoy the fruits of the marriage bed, but this kid kept crying, whining, and being hungry. Raising a baby can literally suck the life out of a person, both mom and dad.

Also, it seemed like no matter how hard Joseph worked, he was just barely getting by. Money issues were no stranger to their home and this kid sure was using his fair share of linens! A nagging thought kept bugging Joseph, “This isn't even my kid! Why am I having to provide for him? If he really is the Son of the Most High, why isn't God sending provision to take care of him?” The realities of life were all to real for this young family, and having lost their position in the community due to the sin they were supposedly guilty of, every penny they earned had to be stretched out as far as it would go.

Life was hard and this “kid” was not making things any better for them.

Tempers were on edge constantly as Mary and Joseph wrestled through life. The grandparents were cordial, but a bastard son was not really thought highly off in their culture. He was actually more like a disgrace and a black spot on a otherwise perfect family tree! Getting help or even a baby sitter for a parents night out was nearly impossible. As the days rolled by, things just seemed to get worse and once again they were desperate for a glimpse of hope! Was God really going to come through for them?

Unknown to this young couple, there was a group of men from the far east who had made their way into Jerusalem. They were Gentiles who had seen a vision in the sky announcing the birth of a child who would be the King of the Jews! These particular men were watchers of the stars, searching for signs of things to come. When they noticed a bright star representing the coming of a king, they felt compelled to go and find this child and pay him their respects. It wasn't everyday that a new king was born!

They packed up precious gifts of great value in that day and age and headed out on a journey to find this king. The star they had seen led them to Israel. Once they realized the nation they were to be in, they took their eyes off the star and headed straight for the royal palace in Jerusalem. Surely that is where they would find the newborn king of the Jews!

When they arrived, they were brought in to see Herod who was over the province. He questioned them regarding the purpose of their journey. When they told of the birth of a “King of the Jews” in the area that had been foretold to them by the stars, Herod was extremely troubled. He was the governor of the area, seeing to things as Caesar's appointed ruler. His province was constantly troubled by uprisings of these pesky Jews. Word of a new king being born for these people was very unnerving.

His job was to put down any uprising that might occur, and if a “new king” had been born, then he knew he had to eliminate the child before he could cause any trouble.

It was evident that the travelers were lost in their search. There was no new baby in the palace so Herod called in the chief priest and the scribes and asked them about the prophecy of this “Christ” 18

(King) who was to be born. He wanted to know specifically where he could be found. They recited to him the words of the prophet Micah (5:2), telling Herod that this child was to come from Bethlehem, the city of David.

Herod thought about sending out a brigade of soldiers to find this baby and kill him. But which child was to be killed. He didn't want to stir up a lot of trouble. It would be easier if he knew exactly which baby to kill.

With that in mind, he called in the travelers and used his charm to find out exactly when they had first seen the star. He did this in secret, away from the scribes and religious leaders he had called in. He did not want them knowing too much about this baby just in case they tried to take the child into protective custody. It would be nothing short of a disaster if they were to groom and train a child to be king only for him to one day appear and a huge war be waged against his lord and master, Caesar. As the travelers and Herod talked, he exchanged information with them. He gave them the location of the baby in return for the time when they perceived him to be born. Once they were finished, Herod sent them on their way to locate the child with specific orders for them to return and tell him the exact location of the child so he too could go and pay homage to this newborn king!

As they mounted up, they again saw the star in the sky and they followed it until it rested over a house. Their hearts were overjoyed! They had finally found the place where this newborn king was living! Amazingly it looked more like a poor mans house than a king's palace, but this is where the star had led them.

All the while, Mary and Joseph are still struggling through life. The child has started to teeth and the long, sleepless nights just never seem to end. The child did seem to be a quick learner, but he did not seem that much different than any other baby. Joseph had to wonder! Despite all the “signs” and people declaring things over this child, was he really the child of the Most High, or had Mary slipped a good one past him. This inward battle raged so much in Joseph, that sometimes he felt like his head was going to explode! As he is thinking these things through, there is a knock at the door.

Joseph answers the door and sees a group of well dressed strangers standing on their threshold.

He greets them cordially and asks if there is something that he can help them with. They explain they have traveled a very long distance following a star in the sky in search for the newborn “King of the Jews.” They asked if they can come in and Joseph steps back to let them in. As he does, these men see Mary sitting with a child in her arms and immediately they fall to the ground and begin to worship this boy. They presented him with expensive gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh! These gifts alone were valued at more than Joseph could make in quite some time in his efforts at work. Mary and Joseph just looked at each other, shrugging their shoulders not sure what to think.

It had happened yet again! Just when their hearts were growing weary and heavy burdens were weighing them down, some strange occurrence happened to remind them that God had not forgotten about them or His promise. Again, it was not what they had been looking for! It was not the restoration of reputation they were seeking, but it was no doubt a reminder that they were in a very unique situation, raising a very unique child. Just when the finances were looking slim, God intervened and delivered a gift that would take care of their needs for quite some time.

They talked again that night after they had offered the travelers lodging with them for the evening. They had enjoyed a great meal together and talked of all that these men had gone through to find them. When Mary and Joseph heard of their stop at Herod's palace, they cut nervous glances at each other, wondering what Herod might do if he thought a new King for the Jewish people had been born. They said little until after every one was tucked away and they were in bed. They shared with 19

each other the encouragement they felt by what God had done in sending these men, but also their concerns about Herod and what his reaction might be. It was clear again that this was truly the Son of God they were raising, but when would he be recognized as king and their reputations finally be restored?

Together they resolved that it was still too early and they would have to continue to wait for the day that some religious leader or royal person came with a vision from God to train this child to take David's throne. They were thrilled to be involved as his parents, but they were not able to teach him the ways of a king as he needed to know. These gifts he had received were amazing proof that their dreams would one day become reality, gifts worhty of a king, but they would just have to keep holding on till the day of his kingdom came!

A few days later they said goodbye to their new friends who told them they had been warned in a vision not to return to Herod who wanted to know the location of the boy. The men from the East set off for home, going a different way than they had come before. That very night, Joseph was visited by an angel in his sleep that said to him, "Rise, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you, for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him." (Matthew 2:13).

Joseph woke up in a cold sweat! This was extremely terrifying news. This wasn't his son, but he was certain that he was a special child and from all the strange occurrences and dreams he was having, this must truly be the Most High's little boy. So without question or hesitation, he gets out of bed, wakes Mary up, and they set off in the middle of the night for Egypt.

Can you imagine the looks on the faces of all the family members and neighbors when they realized Joseph and Mary had left in the middle of the night. As someone drops by for a visit they notice the house is a mess, as if someone had packed in a hurry. Everything was in disarray and there was food left to spoil. Where could they have possibly gone?

Meanwhile, Joseph and Mary had set out on a long and difficult journey to Egypt. It was approximately 300 miles and the road was lined with dangers from wild animals, thieves, and murderers. About halfway there, Mary asked again why they had left in such a hurry. Joseph explains again that he had been warned by an angel in a dream that Herod would come looking for the child to kill him. He was told to take her and the child and go to Egypt. He knew it was strange, but what about their marriage up to this point hadn't been odd?

Mary nodded in agreement and they set their faces toward Egypt. This seemed to be a serious setback to this child ever becoming king of the Jewish nation and sitting on David's throne. How could this take place with them living in a foreign country? How would the religious leaders find him to train him? How would he be recognized as king if he did not even live in his own country?

None the less, what else could they do at this point but just keep obeying the leading of these angels. They had put everything on the line up to this point, why stop now? At least in Egypt they wouldn't hear all the name calling and gossiping they endured back at home. With nothing left to lose, they chose to step forward in faith, trusting that one day this child would be king!

20

The Boy.

It isn't long after they had settled down in Egypt, that word of Herod's rampage through their hometown reaches the ears of Joseph and Mary. When they heard the news, they just sat down in shock! Tears filled their eyes as they thought of all their friends who had little boys who were now mourning the loss of their sons. How could Herod do such a terrible thing? Why would God allow it to happen? He had sent them away, so why didn't He just step in and keep this murderer from doing such a horrendous act?

At the same time, they both felt a huge relief that they had obeyed the voice of the angel from Joseph's dream. Just think if they would had stayed! This little child whom they loved would have been slaughtered! Emotions overwhelmed them as Mary scooped up this growing little boy and they sat in a huddle on the couch and wept. The little fellow could not possibly understand what all was going on, so he lifts up his mothers eyes and gives her a grin that brought joy back to Mary's heart. Joseph grabbed Jesus in his arms and gave him a huge, papa bear hug, and kissed him on the cheek. Although they mourned for their friends, they praised God that He had rescued them from the nightmare their friends at home were living in. God was evidently protecting this child in ways they could not understand. This was yet another sign to renew their faith and hope that this child would one day rule his people and bring peace and freedom to them all.

Living in a foreign country, they had much to learn. They had heard the stories of how their ancestors had been miraculously brought forth from this very place. They heard stories about those days from years gone by and they did their best to fit in. Joseph looked for work and Mary stayed at home to raise the baby. The child kept growing in size and you could start to see the “lights coming on” as he learned something new everyday. For the parents, the chores of raising a baby were all the same as what they are today.

I think it is only fair to state that from this point up to his ministry beginning, we have very little about Jesus written down. There is no Book of Mary with scrap book photos and memories written down that we can verify as being authentic. Therefore, we cannot speculate on details or specifics about Jesus' childhood. However, there are some simple realities that we can know just by watching a boy grow up. I have personally learned so much from watching my own children and my nieces and nephews grow up. So if you will indulge my imagination a little, I think there is much we can gain from looking at basic realities of Jesus as a child.

I think we must first realize that Jesus was just a baby boy like any other baby. There wasn't some iridescent glow around his head nor was there a halo over it. He did not have wings or magical powers as a boy. He didn't come out of his mother's belly walking and talking. He arrived just like any other child, covered in goop and screaming his head off! His eyes were closed tight as he struggled to adjust to his new environment. There was no big parade or special doctor on hand to deliver him into this world. He was a baby, just like any other.

As his parents wrestled through their struggles with doubt, confusion, and amazement regarding Jesus, their chores were no different than that of parents today. When he was hungry, he received milk from his mother's breast. As days slipped by, he began to have a hunger for something more substantial, like a banana or mashed up vegetables. With each change in his diet came the reality of a new kind of “stinky” in his cloth diapers. Like any other baby, he dealt with rashes and sores if his diapers weren't 21

changed promptly. I can imagine Mary's face when she experienced his first “blowout” and had to completely change his outfit.

Jesus also had to go through all the stages a baby must pass through on the way to growing up.

He had to learn how to roll over from his belly to his back, and vice versa. He watched with wide open eyes as his mother responded to his first smile and grin. Everything slowly came into focus as his eyes adjusted to the big world that was around him. He had to learn everything from scratch!

There was the first day that he sat up on his own. Mary and Joseph kept watchful eyes on him as he began to crawl. Like any child, he was drawn to the flame of a fire and pretty things around the house. He had to learn his boundaries, meaning there were some things he could not touch. Like any other child, he had to learn some of these lessons more than once. When Jesus took on human flesh, he also took on the fullness of human limitations. As a baby, he did not understand words like “HOT” or “No,” he had to be taught. He did not have some super human ability to know all these things, he had to learn. He was a baby like any other.

I am sure that more than once Mary and Joseph drug through their days with weary eyes because Jesus had not slept well the night before. He got belly aches and gas just like our babies. He also went through the teething process which brings on lots of screams accompanied with crocodile tears. I can even hear Joseph and Mary discussing whether or not they really wanted to have any more children of their own. Lets face it, some of the details in child raising are not all that glamorous! There can be lots of sleepless nights which can result in short tempers.

However, coupled with these tough times are also many joyous moments. Like when Jesus learned to crawl and walk. There are usually rounds of applause as these simple task are learned and then mastered. No parent really forgets that moment that their child lets go of what they are bracing themselves with and takes those first few steps toward growing up. It is an amazing moment that we cherish forever. For Mary and Joseph it was no different. The situation that they were living in was not “ideal” or what they had dreamed of, but they knew they were obeying God despite the opinions of their family and friends.

Let us not forget to mention those first words that a baby says. Yes, Jesus had to learn how to talk. He probably started out with “Da-da” or “Momma” like most kids. Or maybe it was “uh-oh” or simply “NO!” He probably struggled going from gestures to words like most children. He was a human baby and had to work through all the limitations of a growing child. I can see the shear joy on Mary's face the first time he told her, “I lub you Momma!” When later in life people were amazed at how well he spoke, Jesus had his parents to thank for teaching him how to talk.

No one really knows how long it was, but eventually this family made its way back home. We know Herod had died and Joseph again followed the leading of an angel in his dream to return to Judea.

While on the way, he heard that Herod's son had taken his place as governor and this troubled him.

What if Herod's son was as ruthless as Herod was? Therefore, Joseph bypasses Jerusalem and Bethlehem and takes the family back to where this whole story started, Nazareth in Galilee. (Matthew 2:19-23) Just to put that into perspective, we are talking about nearly 400 miles of traveling with a wife, baby boy, all their earthly belongings, along a road that was filled with potential danger. I can hardly stand 400 miles in a car with a group of people. My only reprieve is knowing that in about 10 hours, it will be over. For Mary and Joseph, this would be months of traveling, which means months of no work and no stable home. This was no small journey they would undertake, and I am sure the little child didn't make it easy as he was full of life and energy by now. How many times do you think Jesus asked, 22

“Are we there yet?” (go ahead, it is okay to laugh!)

Now this is going a little out on a limb, but do you think that maybe, just maybe, Joseph and Mary have had another child by the time this trip had started? We know that Jesus had brothers (Matthew 12:46-50). With a journey of about 5-10 miles a day, this trip was somewhere between 2-3 months, if not longer. They have been in Egypt for awhile, and we know from Matthew 2 that Herod had slain all the male children under the age of 2 based on the time he got from the wise men who had come through. So Jesus could be roughly 4-6 at this time, so I would say it is safe to assume that this trip was made with more kids. Whether it was or not, we do know that eventually he was an older brother.

This is very important to think about. Ever hear of sibling rivalry? Yes, I am sure there were those moments that the kids had to be taught how to share and how to be nice to each other. I am sure there was a shoving match or two as well as they learned to live together. Just like my brother and I had to wrestle with how to love each other and accept our roles in life, Jesus had to do the same with his half brothers and sisters.

I say half brothers because Joseph was not the father of Jesus. I am also sure that this was very hard on Joseph. I am sure he did his best not to play favorites, but it had to be difficult. He had accepted the responsibility of Mary and with her came this son, but Jesus wasn't his child. So when he was given a son of his own flesh and blood, he was thrilled and excited. Yes, he loved Jesus and provided for his needs, but these other boys were his very own! Each one fighting for the attention of their father, wanting to be with him all the time and do everything he was doing. Jesus was just like his brothers in his efforts to please his “dad,” but there was just something that was different. Somehow he didn't fit in quite as well as the others. This could explain a little about why it seems Jesus was so close to his mother as he grew older.

Remember that this family has come back to the very place this whole story started. They are back in Nazareth, the town that Joseph and Mary met and were married. It was also the same place that they had endured such grief and sorrow at the hands of everyone around them when Mary was found to be with child. They had been called names and their families had endured the shame of having kids who seemingly did not wait until after the wedding to consummate their marriage. Now that they were back home and the family had grown, things maybe were a little better for them, but the stares and gossips were still there. People have the tendancy not to forget other peoples mistakes and they always come back to haunt you.

None the less, they did as they were told and came home. Little did they know they were fulfilling very specific words of prophecy each step they took. When they got to Nazareth, they settled into a house and Joseph became one of the most skilled carpenters in town. Other than the normal issues inside a family, things were going pretty smooth. Until the ghost of their past catches back up to them.

Jesus and the other boys were out playing with the neighborhood kids. It was a normal day like any other until the door busted open and Jesus comes running in with tears in his eyes. His mother surveys him over looking for some bump or scratch from a fall he must have taken, but there was none to be found. She holds him tight and asked him, “Jesus, what is wrong?” At first Jesus is reluctant to say anything, but like a good mother, she pressed him for an answer. Finally he looks into her eyes and asked, “Momma, why do the other kids call me a bastard son and an illegitimate child?”

Mary feels like she has just been punched in the stomach! She was certain they had left all this in the past, but here it was, like a crushing wave rising over them. It had come back up and now Jesus 23

was wandering what it all meant. Mary fights back her tears and holds her son tight, not sure how to answer his question. She prays with all her might, hoping that the boy's Father would help her explain what was going on. How would Jesus take it when he learned that Joseph wasn't his real dad?

Slowly, and very cautiously, Mary begins to explain to Jesus the entire story. She told him about how her and Joseph were preparing to get married when an angel came to visit her. Jesus interrupted her and ask, “Momma, what is an angel and what did he look like?” Mary does her best to answer her son's question and then continue on. She told Jesus how God had announced that He had chosen her to give birth to a son who would be known as the “Son of the Most High” and that one day he would be king over all His people. Without getting into details, she explained that she got pregnant, but that she was still a virgin. (Imagine answering the next obvious question! “Momma, what does virgin mean?”)

She went on to explain how when his father, Joseph, had found out she was pregnant that he almost did not take her to be his wife.

“Son,” Mary said, “I know this will be hard for you to understand completely, but Joseph is not your real dad. He has been a great father to you, but he is not your father. Everyone thinks he is and they think that mom and dad did something wrong before we got married and that is why they call you those names. They don't understand and they didn't believe me when I told them about the angel and God making me pregnant with you.”

Jesus had heard his mom and dad talk about the God of Israel. He had listened to all the stories they told him at bedtime with great interest. He was especially intrigued with this God and everything he had done. He felt a strong connection to these stories, but wasn't sure exactly why. Now his mom was telling him that his real dad was not Joseph, but rather, this “God” he had heard so much about. For the first time he was learning of his true origin! How could this be? This sounded so strange and different.

As he was soaking in the news, his mom interrupted his thoughts by saying, “And son, even though it is not true, people are always going to call you a bastard or illegitimate child. I am sorry, but when you are finally king and people can see, maybe then they will believe us and not call you such horrible names. Your dad and I have had to live with this ever since that night the angel came and told me I would give birth to you. Your dad, uh, I mean Joseph has really been the one who has paid the highest price for all of this. He has been the best dad he could be, but when he took me as his wife, he paid a very high price. He lost his position in the community and people called him some horrible things too. He was accused of committing sins that he never did, but nothing we could say would change people's minds. All he had to do was turn his back on me, but he didn't! And, he has raised you like you were his very own. I can't stop them from calling you names, but what they are saying is not true and one day they will see!”

Jesus looks up and sees that Joseph has come into the room. He had heard Jesus come running through the yard and into the house. Thinking something was wrong, he had dropped everything he was doing to check on him. He has listened as Mary has explained everything to Jesus. He had tears in his eyes, something that was unusual for him. He looked at Mary and Jesus and put his arms around them both. The bitter truth of their lives of being accused falsely had come back and they felt all alone again.

All they had was each other. To make it through, they were going to have to stay close and Joseph realized he would have to be careful not to exclude Jesus from his life although he was not his biological son. He would have to fight the desire to favor his own children over Jesus. God had put all of them together and they would have to stick together until the day when the promise of Jesus becoming king was made a reality.

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We could carry on speaking of the goofy things Joseph and Mary did to cheer him up when he was sad. We could imagine the jubilant joy on his face as he banged things around and made loud noises as a baby. We could picture the imagination he had as he pretended to be David fighting Goliath or being Joshua at the battle of Jericho. We could talk of his ability when playing sports and how tough it was when he was going through puberty. We could mention all the girls who snickered and grinned as Jesus walked past, each hoping maybe one day they could gain his affection and become his bride.

There was never a dull moment as other young men who grew up with Jesus came over to play.

Because he was different, the only way the other boys could deal with it sometimes was to put him down and call him names. There was more than likely a bully in the neighborhood who pushed him down and shoved him around.Being of a tender heart, Jesus would hurt deeply when these other kids treated him so bad.

Jesus was all boy, which meant he liked to push the limits. Imagine as Mary's heart fell every time Jesus would say, “Hey Mom, watch this!” just before taking a leap from a high perch! He liked insects, lizards, and bugs. He dreamed of being a warrior and hero. He fought imaginary battles in his minds. He played with toys and rolled in the dirt. He was everything one could expect in a growing young boy, and more.

All these things went on, but ever since that day when he learned the meaning of the words “bastard” and “illegitimate,” Jesus had something else he wanted to know. If Joseph was not his real dad and this “God” was, then he wanted to know everything he could about his Dad. He was a none stop source of questions about God and his birth and the angels his parents had encountered. He may have been young, but like any child, he wanted to know who his real Dad was. So from that day forward, as he played and worked, he had a single focus in his readings and studies. His focus was now on God, his Father!

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From Child to Teenager

There is precious little written about Jesus after his birth, trip to Egypt, and trip home. There is literally only one mention of him between his journey home from Egypt back to Nazareth and his ministry beginning. However, there is so much to be gained from looking at the realities of his life around that one mention and the things in between.

After his return to Nazareth, it is said that he grew in strength, learning how to walk, talk, run, play, work, help around the house with chores, as he became a young man. We have already talked about the emotional suffering he endured at the hands of friends and people who chose to call him names and refer to him as the “bastard” son of Mary and Joseph. He has gone through the conversation with his mom about what this means, and he now has his focus set on learning about his real Dad. Thus we are told that the “favor” or blessing of God was upon him. However, none of this favor shielded him from having to live with the names and the treatment that came along with it. His blessing of God did not rescue his mother and Joseph from having to bear the burden of what having a child out of wedlock brought on in that culture. He may have been blessed by God, but he and his parents were living under the curse of man. They were treated like a lower class of people with no escape possible. There was no “redemption” for them according to the law. They had refused to offer a sacrifice for “sinning” regarding the birth of Jesus, therefore, they were never allowed to hold any prominent position in life.

No matter how good Joseph was at his work, there was many people who would not use him because of who he was and what he had supposedly done. In general terms, life was HARD! With Jesus' pursuit of knowing who his dad was, he began to pour over the writings and stories from the days of old. He learned to read and write and he used every spare moment he could find to dig into the nature and truth of who God was. As he grew older, he spent a lot of time working with Joseph in order to help with the financial needs that came with having a growing family. With their particular position in society, this was made doubly hard. However, when Jesus did find the time, he read Isaiah, Jeremiah, Job, and the books of Moses. He poured over the Psalms and Ecclesiastes. He was intrigued greatly by the writings of Moses and the days of creation and how his Father brought the Israelites out of Egypt. Whenever he could find a break between chores and play time, he spent his spare seconds reading and taking notes. The more he learned, the more he begin to see the story of a coming Redeemer who would rescue his people. This was the very Redeemer his mom was telling him he was born to be.

There was, however, one passage in particular that troubled him and caused him to wonder what it could mean! The prophet Isaiah spoke of so much pain, grief, sorrow, and death regarding a Lamb of God. It mentioned sins and transgressions and a sacrifice that had to be made. It talked about God being “pleased” to bruise this chosen one. These words were followed with ones of redemption and being lifted up, but it was still confusing to him. It was in these days of questions and seeking that Jesus began to develop a deeper passion for knowing who he truly was and who his Father was. In his mind he would ask, “God, who are you and what am I here for?”

With this passion for knowledge he joined his parents for their annual trip to Jerusalem for the Feast of the Passover. (Luke 2:41-52). He was 12 years old when they arrived in Jerusalem for this week long feast that all Jews loved to celebrate. It was a time they remembered the time their ancestors had been brought out of Egypt and freed from the hand of Pharaoh. They talked about the plagues God had used to break Pharaoh's pride and all the Egyptians. They also talked of the great slaughter that 26

God brought on the first born children who were not covered by the blood on the door post. All these things Jesus listened intently to. He loved to hear of how God moved and acted on behalf of his children. His mother had told him that this God was his daddy and he loved to hear stories of the Father he had never seen with his physical eyes or heard from with his physical ears.

To be sure, with all the grief Jesus had endured because of his situation, there was a boy who would struggle with doubt. There were times that the teasing of the other young boys would really hurt him and he had to have questions. How could a loving and almighty Father who could destroy the Egyptian army allow His son to be treated this way? However, each night that he wept over how hard his life was as a child, his mother would embrace him and reassure him that everything she had told him was the truth and that it was all going to be okay. People would not believe until they saw him as king. But when he was king, all this teasing and torment would stop! She promised.

As a child, Jesus chose to believe that his mother was telling him the truth. Children have an inbred instinct to trust their moms. He allowed himself to get completely wrapped up in the prophecies of a coming Messiah. He grew to understand through his studies that God had promised a Redeemer, and if he was God's son, then he could believe he would be the promised one.

With that in mind, it makes perfect sense that he would have made his way to the temple in Jerusalem. He had read that this was the place that God dwelt. If God was his daddy, he certainly would have wanted to visit his Father's house. He was well aware of the law and the temple practices from all his schooling and times reading about it. He knew that God would be in the Holy of Holies and only the High priest was allowed to enter that area, and that only happened once a year.

However, this caused a little problem as the feast was over and everyone started heading home.

Now I am not aware of how things happened in that day, but I find it a little odd that Joseph and Mary would take off not being certain that all the “flock” was in tow. We know they had more children and that they were traveling in a larger party of family and friends. They were under the assumption that Jesus would simply know they were leaving and would be in the group. After all, he was nearing the age of “manhood” and had become a very responsible young man as he helped with the family work and raising the other kids.

What a surprise awaited Joseph and Mary that evening! After a full day of traveling, they are getting ready to settle in for the evening. Suddenly Mary has one of those moments like the mother from the “Home Alone” movies. She looks around and can't get away from the overwhelming feeling that something is missing. She counts heads, and sure enough, there is one missing. She panics and starts to call out, “Jesus! Jesus, where are you?”

Joseph hears her calling out and he joins the search. They go from tent to tent looking for him only to find he is not there. They desperately search and everyone in the group is now on the hunt for the missing child. Panic turns to worry and worry turns to fear as they realize Jesus is not with them.

Mary breaks down and cries violently. “I am a terrible mother! What kind of mother leaves her child in a strange place? He must be so scared and frightened!”

Joseph does his best to console her, but it is to no avail. Mary looks up and says, “We must go back! We have to go right now!”

“But Mary, it is night time and the road will be lined with all kind of dangers. Wild animals and thieves. We will have to wait till morning!” Joseph replied.

However, nothing would sway the heart of this mother. She doesn't care for her own safety in the light that her oldest child is all alone in a strange place. Realizing his pleas will be ignored, Joseph 27

arranges for the other kids to finish the trip home with someone else. Then he and Mary start the long walk back to Jerusalem with only the light of the moon to light their way.

I do not even want to imagine that journey. I am sure it was full of fears and frustrations as each parent accuses the other of being the one responsible for making the mistake of not being sure Jesus was with them before they had left. I am also certain there was much internal blame going on as they each also wondered how they could be so stupid. If something happened to Jesus, they would never be able to live with it. After all they had gone through with his birth and the horrible treatment they had endured because of him, how could they survive if he were hurt, killed, abused, or kidnapped? I can hear Mary praying now, begging God to forgive her and to protect their son.

They arrived as daylight was breaking and they go back to where they had stayed, thinking Jesus might be there. No trace of him could be found. This was the beginning of a three day search that was filled with panic and fear soaked with a mask of tears. All hope was fading away on that last day.

Something horrible had most certainly happened to Jesus and Mary was broken. She looked at Joseph through her tear soaked eyes and asked him to take her to the Temple. All she could think to do now was pray. Would God ever forgive her for losing His son, the one who had been promised as the future redeemer of Israel?

They slowly made their way in the Temple. Joseph was having to almost carry his wife who is overcome with sorrow and grief. As they enter, they here some chattering in the corner. Among the voices was one that sounded so familiar. Could it be? Mary looked over to where she had heard the sound come from. To her utter amazement, she saw Jesus sitting there among the religious teachers! He was asking them question after question about God and all the prophecies of the Redeemer.

At first shock set in! She had finally found her lost son! When she returned to her senses, she screamed out his name and ran over to embrace her son. She clung to him with arms once again filled with strength. She pulls her baby in tight and promises herself to never again let him go! There are no words to describe the joy a mother feels when their lost child is now found! It was overwhelming.

Jesus was hugging her back and simply saying everything was okay. Hearing him speak, her love and joy turned to the wrath of a mother as she pulls back, still clasping his arms in her hands. She wipes away her tears and looks him straight in the eye. Sternly she says, “How could you do this to us?

Your father and I have been looking for you all this time and we had started to lose hope. We thought someone had taken you or maybe even killed you! What were you thinking? Don't you know how dangerous it is for a young man like yourself to be alone in a big city like this? There are people who do bad things to little boys like you! Son, why did you do this to us?”

Jesus was shaken a little at the tone in his mom's voice. He was just a little rattled at the words she had used and how hard she had been shaking him while she was talking. (Of course she didn't mean to shake so hard, it is just the natural reaction of a mother who thinks her worst fear of losing a child has come true.) Jesus looked up with small tears gathering in the corner of his eyes. He didn't mean to hurt his mom, he loved her more than any other person on earth.. She was the one who had taken care of him and made sure he had food. She had bandaged his scrapes and kissed his bruises. With his soft eyes, he looked into hers and said, “Mom, didn't you know I would be at my dad's house?”

His answer did not quite sink in at that moment. Mary looked at Joseph and he just shrugged his shoulders. This was no where near his house or that of his parents. Mary, looked back at Jesus, but he had nothing else to say. She did not understand his reasoning, but she brought him in close again and whispered in his ear, “I am sorry son, I will never leave you behind again! I love you!”

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They stood to leave and one of the teachers asked if he might have a word with the parents.

Holding Jesus close, they all turned and listened as the man explained at how Jesus had been there for several days and had been grilling them with questions about God and the prophecies found in the scrolls of the prophets. He explained how they were stunned with the depth of the questions he had been asking. He could not help but wonder who this boy was and how they had taught him so much at such a young age.

Not sure how to answer, Mary just said he was quite the book worm and loved to study a lot. At that, she grabbed Jesus and left with Joseph to go home. It was rather a quiet trip home, with the occasional question to Jesus about why he had done all this again. Every time his answer was the same, “I just had to visit my Father's house.”

Mary nor Joseph fully understood exactly what he was saying in that moment, but Mary treasured these words in her heart. On the way home, she reminisced over the story of how God had come and made her pregnant before she had ever known a man in the bad chamber. She thought of how Joseph had almost left her to raise Jesus by herself, but had come through in the last minute after a dream he had. His choice brought her much joy because he told her he believed her story of carrying the child of God. But it also had brought on all the pain and sorrow of be ostracized from his family and the community. Their choice to follow God had caused them great suffering and shame.

However, it had also brought on moments of great wonder. The shepherds on the night of Jesus' birth with their story of angels in the sky. The wise men and their treasures worthy of a king. Then the trip to Egypt that led to the escape from Herod's murderous rage. The journey home and the moments watching Jesus grow up.

Years had passed and maybe they had just slipped into the role of normal parents who were waiting on this boy to emerge to the throne. In the mean time life was filled with the mundane and the ordinary. Jesus was very smart and bright and he had suffered so much teasing. Now this whole incident of being separated for three days had brought her back to the reality of who this boy really was. He was not just a normal kid like any other. No, he was special! He was different. He was conceived in her by the power of God moving over her. There was a promise made to her about how he would sit on David's throne. How could she had forgotten this?

Silently she looked up at the sky and whispered a prayer. “Thank You for reminding me that this boy is much more than ordinary. Never let me forget again. Help me to train him in Your ways and to walk in Your paths. I too am amazed at how quickly he has gained such a deep understanding of You. I really shouldn't be surprised After all, You are his Father. Please help him grow in his wisdom and understanding of You as he becomes a man. Help me be the mother that he needs. Thanks for Joseph and how hard he works to care for us. Please bless him! He has endured so much loss because of his decision to take me as his wife and to raise Your son. Please hold him tight and remind him of Your promises regarding this boy and how one day people will see him as the earthly father of a King!

Thanks again for choosing me to be Your handmaid and mother of Your only begotten child! I love You and bow my head to Your service!”

She then looks over at her son who is now asleep. She leans down and kisses his forehead as she whispers in his ear, “Son, I love you! You are God's son and you will be King!”

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The Silent Years

Eighteen years have flown by. There is not a single word written about Jesus again until he is found walking down to the Jordan river to see John the Baptist. It is like a black hole in his life which we are told nothing about. Is there anything we can learn from these missing years? All we have spanning this time is two statements found at the end of Luke 2: 51 And he went down with them and came to Nazareth and was submissive to them. And his mother treasured up all these things in her heart.

52 And Jesus increased in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and man.

Remember, we are talking about how we can relate to Jesus as a man and how he can relate to us in every aspect of our lives. That was my desperate pursuit as I thought about my walk with God. I had heard so much about Jesus as God's Son, I felt as if I was unable to connect to Jesus in any practical, tangible way.

So far we have seen how his parents have had to endure an immense amount of suffering and shame because of their willingness to obey God. We have seen how over and over their hopes of being vindicated have been put off as they await the crowning of Jesus as king. We have seen how Jesus was born into utter poverty and in need of help. He had dirty diapers, runny noses, bumps, bruises, and was picked on by other kids. He was called names and finally learned of his true origin which put him on a path of seeking knowledge about his Father. When he was born, he was given every limitation in the human body and had to learn just as we do. He had to memorize the very Word he had been responsible for writing. He had to seek out information on the identity of his Father in order to learn of his true identity. He had to humble himself and suffer the shame of being known as the “bastard son” of Joseph and Mary and all that came with that. When he left his parents to seek out His Father in His Father's house, the only two people in the world who should have understood, didn't! Therefore, he had to resign himself to a life of being misunderstood.

Now we have this “black hole” in his story, but I believe there is a lot we can learn from this time. His pursuit of His Father did not begin and end at the age of 12. He was not just biding his time till he was ready for ministry. Instead, he went home and “submitted himself” to being obedient to Mary and Joseph while growing in years and wisdom. He also grew in favor with God (His Father) and people. He had to earn the respect of people and the blessing of His Father. Personally, I think there is a lot we can glean from these years of his life and what he did.

The first thing we are told about these years is that he went home and submitted himself to his parents. For a teen with raging hormones, that is not an easy thing to do. They have already displayed an inability to fully grasp the reality of who he is and his main desire, to know his Father. We all know how a teenage boy is when they are going through puberty. It is tough and they think they know everything. Why do you think Jesus seemed to have no issues being off by himself for 4 days without his parents? He figured he was a man and was ready to go off into the world on his own.

I know we rarely think about this fact about Jesus. But yes, he too had to go through the natural changes in a boys body when they reach a certain age. He had to deal with raging hormones and the desires of a normal teenage boy. He saw girls, and he thought they were pretty. He had brothers and 30

sisters and I know his little brothers teased him when his voice would squeak as he went through the changes from being a boy to becoming a man. It is just a fact of life and Jesus had to live through the embarrassments of it.

By now he had learned the Hebrew language and also the Greek of modern day. He probably had been schooled in Aramaic as well and according to what we are told, grew in his wisdom and knowledge. Assuming he was beginning to understand who he was and what he was capable of, I imagine it was very difficult during these years to be submissive to his parents and not to change his brothers and teasing friends into frogs. Not only was his body changing, but he was starting to realize he had some different skills, able to perform miraculous things as well. As he gathered all this information in, he had to fight to remain obedient and humble with his mom and dad. He had to fight the urge of every teenage boy to force his will upon those who opposed or heckled him. He may not have been bulky and strong, but with his supernatural abilities he could have been the biggest bully around.

This may seem a little degrading to our Lord and Savior, but it is not. It is merely the facts of life. Jesus had to constantly face the temptation to assert his will and manipulate his surroundings to benefit him. As his knowledge of who he was grew, he faced the dangerous temptations to have his way with the ladies and also be the coolest guy in town. What better revenge for the young boy who was mocked, pushed, shoved, made fun of, and called all kinds of names! How easy it would have been to just embrace the role everyone assumed he would take. Be a trouble maker and a ladies man. I am not certain of how Jesus handled all of these formidable pressures, but I do know he faced them. Every twist and turn was laced with ways to vindicate himself and thus free his parents from this life they were enduring.

Think back! Jesus has learned of his origins, and thus the origins of his parents. He knew the plight of his mother and how much Joseph had given up for him. Joseph was of royal blood, he came from prominence and position. Now they were barely getting by as he watched his father build things to put bread on the table. Jesus watched as his mother was treated like a second class human being because she had supposedly engaged in “sexual activity” prior to marriage. Now this growing young man enters the time of life when every boy feels invincible and able to conquer the world. What more could he have wanted than to loose the chains that held his family down. Can't you hear him now, “Come on mom, just this once let me turn these idiots into a pillar of salt or something! I know I can do it!” His mother would calm him down and simply say no and he submitted himself to them and continued to learn who he was, all about his Father, and what his “powers” were to be used for.

He may not have made a mistake during this time, but he was surely faced with the opportunities. We are foolish to think that the time of temptation only began when he went to the desert to face Satan. No, Satan was on the attack from day one. First trying to have him killed through Herod.

Then attacking his emotional state, having him called names, causing him to call into question his identity as the Son of God. As he was learning of his powers and abilities, he is offered chance after chance to set things right for himself and his earthly parents. If there was ever a time to take the throne and stir up the people, now would be the time while his hormones raged wild.

Jesus was never free from this battle either. A battle that was oft times filled with doubt because of his circumstances. How could he really be the Son of the Most High God described in the scrolls and stories of old, and yet be forced to live in this existence? He could easily make himself rich and famous. We are even told people are starting to like him. He must have become quite the carpenter during this time as Joseph set about to teach him a trade in order to prepare him to be a husband and a 31

father. By day he worked and by night he studied. All the while wondering how the God of the Universe could let his only begotten son live in such a horrible situation.

To compound the situation, do you think it is possible that Mary ever came and asked him, “Son, do you have any clue when you are going to be made king? You dad is working so hard and things are so tight right now with money, have you been given any clue as to when your reign as king will begin?” As a human being, I am sure this situation would arise from time to time as this family was growing and their financial situation was not always the best. There were days when Mary and Joseph would have to eat scraps and leftovers from the kids plates as they struggled to get by. Having a son become king certainly would bring some relief to their situation, not to mention shut up all the mouths of the slanderers in the neighborhood.

I imagine as Jesus sought out the truth he had a lot of questions for his Father. Probably some very similar to these: “Why wasn't he born into a kingdom? Why did he have to be poor? Why did God have to do it this way? Wasn't there a better way to redeem the Israelites than living in obscurity and poverty? Wasn't a king suppose to have servants and maids and be pampered in a palace?” Any young man who is coming into his strongest years would wonder about this. Especially one who has been told by his own mother that he is the Son of the Most High God! However, asking these questions and having these emotions and struggles do not put Jesus in a lower state than we hold of him now. Quite the opposite is true. Jesus was just a man who was seeking out his identity with his Father. You can't do that without having a real relationship! And, you can't have a real relationship without having the privilege to ask tough and probing questions. Real relationship is forged through fire. Fire that is fueled by times of frustration and passion. These are the very thing that drove Jesus to grow during these years.

He had been told a story of his birth and about his Father. He had sought out answers through the words in the prophecies and law. He had sat down with the teachers of the law to learn more. He had faced the harsh realities of mankind and how cruel they could be to each other. All so he could learn more about his Father, thus finding out who he really was.

There was no magical “poof” moments in Jesus life. We have already discussed that he was not born with a halo or glow about his face. He screamed and cried like every other baby. He ate and then messed his diapers. He bruised and he could bleed. He got sick with viruses and he puked when his stomach hurt. He was called the worst of names and then he had to face the shame of going through the bodily changes between childhood to manhood. His body was faced with having to find release from the hormones and sexual desires inside. He was reading that he was king and that he was to be a Mighty Deliverer, but his reality was that of a peasant and despised boy. Even his parents had to fight through doubts because they were having to face the reality of raising five boys and some girls. This was not the life of a king at all. That is why we can know for sure that Jesus had to wrestle with the vicious cycle of doubt and curiosity. Without them, his bond with his Father could not have been forged so deep that he would be able to face what would be his price to be the king his Father had promised him to be. If he did not have to face all these horrible circumstances, he would not have given himself to know his Father in the way that would allow him to say, “Not my will, but yours be done!”

In that little phrase alone, we can see that Jesus had a will. He had ideas on how things could be done. He could dream of a hundred ways to free the people without having to endure the cross.

However, he had learned that was not the will of his Father. He also learned that there was only one way to take the throne of David for all eternity and truly set his people free. His Father's way. How did he learn? Because he wrestled with his Father when he was young. He fought against the rages inside 32

his own body that drew him into lustful desires and temptations. He saw things he wanted in the flesh, things he could not have. As he buried his weeping eyes into a pillow at night, he cried out to his Father to explain to him why he had to go through all this. Why did he desire to be with a woman, yet could not? Why did he have to bear the shame of being called the names? Why could he not exact revenge upon his enemies and reveal his true identity? Why did his kingdom have to wait?

Jesus was torn inside! He waged a war between what his flesh wanted and what he knew His Father demanded of him. He was battered and bruised long before the cross every came into view. He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief long before Calvary. His entire childhood into his manhood was riddled with things that caused him great suffering. His favor with men was not acquired without much heartache and difficult paths. He did not have some simple and easy road to attain man's blessings upon his life. Quite the opposite! They loved him for what he could do, but they hated him for who he was! They loved that he could do awesome and amazing things, but hated that he was a bastard son of a peasant couple. He was praised for his knowledge in school, yet never allowed to be head of the class. They bragged about his skill as a carpenter, but his entries in the competitions never won a prize. He was disqualified from the beginning by the law of his people because of his “parents mistake.” He would never outgrow or outlive this reality, and he would never be free from the desire to silence his critics in the flesh. Not in his lifetime!

His war always raged within him. Yet he made a choice! A choice to quietly submit himself to his parents as he grew in his understanding of who he really was and what his kingdom would really be! He had the power to free his parents inside of him and be their king, but he had read of a much greater plan. He had to make a choice between what his flesh wanted and what his Father had set before him. His body, mind, and hormones said, “Take it NOW!” However, a still small voice inside of him urged him to wait. But as with any young man, waiting is not an easy thing to do. Pushing back the temptations of his flesh was not a breeze for Jesus. He was a man like any other, and because of that fact, his flesh desperately wanted relief from his circumstances in the here and now. A fight that would prove vital in the days to come.

He was tempted to be rebellious against his parents. He was tempted to have sex with the young girls who lived around him. He was offered opportunities to exact revenge on those who gave him grief. All he had to do was commit one selfish act and act out of selfish ambition and his whole life would be altered. All it took was one slip! His teen years, and all through his twenties, were filled with moments where he was ready to explode and get what he wanted his own way.

That is why it is so important that he grew in his knowledge and wisdom. That is why God orchestrated his circumstances to force him to study who his Dad was. God arranged for him to be called names and live in poverty. His Daddy knew if he was ever to fulfill his destiny he first had to endure hardships that would drive him to the end of himself and put him in a place to desperately desire information of who his Father was. Without these situations in his life, he would have been nothing more than another man who may have risen to promote himself and rule in his own power and ambition, seeking his own self gain. Without all this, he could never understand the people he had come to save, and without that understanding he would never be able to really save!

Before being born, God the Father set out the very steps his son would have to travel (Psalm 139). He chose a life that would be filled with pain, sorrow, and confusion. He chose a life that would force Jesus to ask tough questions and study the depths of who God was. As a child, he simply accepted the words of his mother who told him he was the son of God. As a teenager, he dove into seeking out his Father by reading books and sneaking off to the temple to ask questions about who his Dad was.

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But as a young man, he was driven to make a decision about his life. No longer could he simply accept the words of his mother nor submit to the teachings of any man. He had read the stories of this Messiah and who he was to be. The spotless Lamb of God. He had researched the depths of what was taught in the law and prophecies regarding the path of the Deliverer. What he saw was exciting because of the prize, but it was also painful because of the price. Now as a man, Jesus was faced with a decision.......

Would he accept his role as Messiah? Would he believe he was the Son of God? All he had to go on was the words of his mother and the teachings found in the prophecies of old. As he grew in his knowledge of the Messiah, he was faced with the disturbing fact that to be king he would have to become a sacrificial lamb. He was also faced with the grim reality of how the Messiah would be treated. He had already experienced so much pain, rejection, and misunderstanding, could he possibly endure any more? Jesus stood at a cross roads and he had to make a choice.

If he chose one way, he could live out his existence as a man and die in obscurity. However, this choice would mean being able to enjoy a normal life. If he chose this path, he could avoid being made fun of and being despised by his own people and his family. He could find a wife, have children, and carry on without the burden of what being the Messiah meant for him. After all, how could he really be certain that he was this chosen Messiah? What if his parents had made up the story to cover their mistake? If he decided to accept his role as Redeemer and he was found to be a fake, what would that mean for his life? He would have wasted himself for nothing. Choosing to simply be a carpenter and fly under the radar would be the easier path, but then he would never really know the truth! He had sought truth his entire life and now the truth was staring him in the face. The very truth that would set him free to be who was created to be.

However, if he chose to accept the fact that he was God's son, he would certainly endure the wrath of man, Satan, and God. He would have to daily face the war within himself between his flesh and his spirit. To be God's son meant to bring on immense suffering and pain, so much of which he had already endured. To accept the responsibility of being the coming Messiah meant to face a cruel and unusual life, and a torturous death. It would mean to bring on the mockery and shame of all those he had come to set free. It would mean walking away from the family business and turning his back on the ones he loved the most. It meant not being able to bring vindication to his parents, at least not in their lifetime. It meant only being popular among the people for what he could do for them, not for who he was. It meant facing constant temptations in a world full of glamor and glory for a man able to perform miraculous acts. It meant rejecting the king he could be and becoming the King he was born to be.

By earning the favor of men around him because he was so gifted and knowledgeable, he could easily have waltzed into the role of being the physical king of the Jews. By allowing himself this little luxury, he could justify all his hardships and pain and be who everyone wanted him to be. He could stir up the hearts of the people and wage a war to regain the throne that was rightly his to take, the throne of David. He could see a smile on the face of his mother and once again allow Joseph to have his proper place in society. He could, but that would mean having to turn his back on the truth he was seeing in his studies regarding the path of the true Messiah.

This was no easy decision. It was one Jesus would wrestle with for many long nights and hard days. He had to wage war in his soul to remain calm and wait for his time to come. How frustrating it was to know you could do something to relieve the misery of your family and your people, but have to restrain yourself in order to fulfill the role of the Redeemer that His Father was calling him to be. The battle was intense and Jesus struggled through this with much groaning and confusion. Everything in his body rejected the concept of what the Messiah would have to suffer, but his spirit heard a still small 34

voice guiding him along a very straight and difficult path. Just the thought of being bruised caused his flesh to convulse with pain. He knew from previous experience how difficult and painful a beating could be. He had been teased and picked on so much as a child. Could God, His Father, possibly be asking him to do it all again, but with no earthly gain for himself or restoration for his family's reputation here and now? Was he to do this and receive no immediate reward for his suffering?

Jesus pondered and he wrestled. He had to make a choice. The time was drawing near and he had to choose which path he would walk. Would he just be Jesus, the supposed son of Mary and Joseph. Would he be a carpenter who used his powers to become king here on earth? Or, would he humble himself, believe he was truly God's Son, and accept his role as Jesus, the Messiah?

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Messiah Is Here

Thankfully for our sakes, Jesus chose to accept his role as the coming Messiah and humble himself to the direction of His Father. But if you think it was an easy decision, then maybe you need to re-read the first part of this story.

Every thing Jesus wanted as a boy and young man had to be sacrificed in order to fulfill his calling in life. It wasn't only his dreams that had to be put on the altar, but the hopes of his parents and family as well. Every ounce of humanity in him screamed for him to choose the easier path, the one of earthly gain and popularity. He could have rewritten history and set himself up as king of Israel forever.

He could have answered the call and left a legacy the world would never forget. The history books would have spoken of his conquest throughout time and he would be honored as a man of courage and bravery. His battles would be those of folk lore and legend as they spoke of the way he ruined the Roman Empire and set Israel on the map as a super power not to be trifled with ever again.

Praise God that he did not choose such a worldly goal. If he had, all of us would be without hope. If God's only begotten son was sucked into a world of selfish ambition, then what hope would we ever have of being restored to our place as children of God the Father. We of all people would be most pitied. May his name ever be praised for accepting his role as the Deliverer who would redeem us from our helpless plight.

However, even his decision to accept his place as Messiah did not remove Jesus from a life of temptations in the flesh. In fact, his choice to believe His Father and that he was indeed the Son of the Most High brought on more intense battles than he had ever faced. Instead of calming the storm, it only made it worse!

As Jesus bows his head to the call on his life, we are reintroduced to him as he walks down by the river Jordan. John, aka John the Baptist, has come out of the wilderness and has been preaching repentance from sin. He has called people to forsake their sins and be baptized in water. People were attracted to this rugged man who wore camel skin clothes and lived out in the wild. He came crying “Prepare ye the way of the Lord!” When questioned about whether he was the Messiah, John denied the rumors that were circulating. He did not claim to be the one everyone had been waiting on, but he did claim to be preparing the way for him. John said he came to baptize with water but that one day he would reveal who the “One” who would baptize with the Holy Spirit and fire (John 1:29-34).

Amazingly, this part of Jesus story is retold by each one of the gospel presentations that we have in the Bible. Up to this point, he has only been a boy/man who has had to deal with life as we know it, a life that was laced with the extra burden of being the assumed bastard son of his parents. The one who was conceived before the law permitted. This burden had caused him great grief and sorrow as he watched his mom and dad work so hard just to get by. He carried this burden and faced the temptations to fix his own situation through his years as a teenager and young man whose hormones drove him to fight. Instead of doing what his instincts called out for, he chose to wait and continue to study. If he was the Son of God, then he had read that he could trust God to fight his battles for him. Now that he has endured the torture of his circumstances, he has submitted to be the Messiah, and also to be the Lamb required to pay the price required for the prize. As Jesus did this, as he accepted the reality of who he was, he was led down to the river Jordan to see John.

John sees him coming and declares, “Behold, the LAMB of God!” John desired that Jesus 36

would baptize him, but Jesus refused, saying they must fulfill the prophecies which spoke of him. John knew exactly what Jesus was talking about because he too had been studying the books of old. He too had been told he had a special purpose in life which was to prepare the way for the coming Redeemer.

He too had heard stories about what he was to do from his parents. Therefore, he also had given himself to learn. His parents more than likely died when he was young (remember they were old when they conceived him), therefore he more than likely had to learn how to survive on his own. As he was surviving, he was also studying every word that had been passed down about the One he was to prepare the way for. He too had to give himself over to his calling in life, realizing his position would not be the highest one. He too had to submit himself to promote someone other than himself. As he surrendered to the purpose of his life, he was given direction from the Spirit and was told how he would know who the One was. When he realized it was Jesus, he wanted to have the baptism of the Holy Spirit from Jesus, but he knew what his purpose was, and he fulfilled it.

When that happened, the one thing Jesus had been waiting on his entire life finally happened!

He had been asking, “Am I really the son of God?” He had heard the answer from his mother and Joseph, but there was one voice he desperately longed to hear it from! His Father! He had to make the decision to believe that he truly was God's Son before ever hearing his Father confirm it. He had to submit himself to obey the commands of his Father before he ever heard the words that his heart so desperately longed for!

As he came up out of the water, we are told that he finally gets what his soul longs for. The Spirit descended on him “in the form” of a dove, and he heard the voice of his Father say, “Yes, you are my Son! Chosen and marked by My love! The delight of My life!” (Mark 1:9-11, Matthew 3:13-17, Luke 3:21-22).

Finally! After all these years of seeking and searching. Begging and praying! Crying and groaning! Jesus finally hears the voice of his Daddy. He hears his Father tell him what every son so desperately wants to hear, “I am pleased with you son. I am satisfied with you. You have my approval.

You have done great and I love you with every ounce of my being! You are so special to me! I am here and I will walk with you! You don't have to be afraid or worry for I will give you what you need! I love you Son!” The joy that must have filled the heart of Jesus when he heard these words. He had tried so hard to be a son who would please the Most High God. He had struggled through the hard task of growing up without once having any confirmation from his Father that he was doing good. His Dad had been silent all this time, waiting to see if Jesus would be patient and accept the role of being the Messiah and Deliverer of his people. God had patiently watched as his son endured difficult things at the hands of mankind, never saying a word or giving him even a hint that he was headed down the right path. Jesus had begged his Father to speak during that time, even just a single word. Something to give him strength to continue on, but God waited and He watched.

We may think this is a horrible thing for a dad to do. To put his son through such hard times without ever reassuring him things were going to be okay or work out. But God knew that if Jesus was to endure the things that were to come, he must first survive the rejection and misunderstanding as a child and young man. In order for Jesus to come to grips with who he really was, he had to first see who he was not. This path was extremely painful for Jesus, but it prepared him for this very moment.

The moment he had longed for! The moment his Father would speak.

Contrary to popular belief, this word from God was not mainly for those who were there. The person that this moment was intended for was Jesus himself. He desperately needed to hear from his 37

Dad. He had read all the books foretelling of who the Messiah was and what he was to endure. He realized that misery he had gone through up to that day was nothing compared to what he was going to face in the future. In order to face it with confidence, he desperately needed his Dad to tell him that he was on the right track. He needed his Dad to reassure him it was going to turn out as he had been promised. That he would be the King his mother had been told he would be. That he would receive the prize after paying the price. He had stepped out in faith to follow the leading of the Spirit into the role of Messiah. In response to his faith, His Father spoke and said, “Yes, this is who you are and what you are to be! And Yes, I love you!” Like an encouraging word spoken through the mouth of a friend at the perfect moment, these words gave wings to Jesus' heart and he seemed to soar on the inside.

If it had come a moment too soon or a moment too late, it would have thrown him off balance.

Too soon and he would not have been able to identify with the sorrows of those he came to rescue and their need to step forward in faith. Too late and he may have fallen prey to the desires of his flesh to storm the gates and become king here on earth. Had God spoken before this moment, then Jesus would not have had to wrestle with the choice of surrendering to the call of being the Messiah and Sacrificial Lamb. He would have been able to make his choice without the dilemma that comes with being a man in the flesh who had to step forward in faith. If he did not have to face that choice, then no one he came to save could have related to him for he would not have fully walked in our shoes. Without that, then we would not have a brother who we could cry out to and know that he understands. He would not have been able to intercede and groan on my behalf beforer the Father because he would not have know how I felt when I was faced with a difficult decision that required faith to move forward.

But praise be to God the Father, though surely torn at the plight of His son, He did not intervene until the perfect time! Rather, He silently sat by and waited until the perfect time to speak to His son had arrived. Anyone who thinks that God did not ache for communion with Jesus before this does not understand the heart of a Father at all. However, God knew there was a bigger purpose in mind, and that His son needed to learn what that purpose was. This separation required a sacrifice on both of their parts. Both Father and Son had to give up what their hearts yearned for so that we could be saved.

Once Jesus understood why he had come, then His Father was able to open the “lines of communication” and let him know that he was indeed His Son and that he was on the right track. With the confidence he found from hearing his Daddy speak, Jesus was able to begin the long, hard journey to the cross. This one simple confirmation gave Jesus the strength he needed to move forward into the life he knew was now before him. It gave him the strength to sacrifice what he wanted in the flesh so that he could gain what he wanted in his spirit.

As the Son of God, Jesus had grown in his understanding of what he was to face. He had read the law and knew what a sacrificial lamb had to endure so that the person could be freed from their guilty sin stain. He had come to understand that the Messiah would reign on David's throne, but before that could happen, he would have to be the Sacrificial Lamb. His stomach muscles contracted at the thought of the pain the Lamb must endure. His mind fought desperately to remind him of all the things he could have without going through the suffering. Inside of Jesus there was a constant battle being fought. We may have only a few passages talking about it, but it was a non-stop issue he had to deal with just like you and me. He was a man, and as a man he would have wanted the best of everything he saw here on earth. His flesh was not free from the allure of earth pleasures and wealth. However, accepting the responsibility to become the Savior of his people, he had to forsake all the desires of his flesh and submit to the will of God. He had to deny himself daily, take up his cross, and follow His Father!

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Facing Temptation as a Man

Fresh off this exciting moment and having the Spirit descend on him, we are told that Jesus was driven, by the Spirit, out into the wilderness. We are told that for 40 days he was there alone with nothing to eat. What a great conclusion to the most exciting moment in his youg life. Jesus is sent by his Dad out to a lonely place and seemingly left to starve to death!

It is amazing how when one is chosen by God to free his people, they are seemingly always taken to be alone in a wilderness place. Moses before coming to Pharaoh and leading out the Israelites.

Martin Luther was taken to a castle to be alone before the Reformation began. Others who were used

by God to revive/free his people, were first taken to be alone as Jesus was here in the wilderness.

Now, I won't lie. I would think after all the suffering and turmoil Jesus suffered as a child, trying to figure out who he was and his place in life, once finding out he would have wanted to move forward and prosper in his purposes. With this fresh dose of the Spirit of God, he probably was curious as to why he felt compelled to go out into the wilderness. Maybe it would be like Moses for him, and God was wanting to meet with him out there in a burning bush. Maybe it was to be like Joshua or Jacob and he would encounter God in the desert as a warrior. Maybe this was his training period like Samuel's and he would begin to hear his Father speak as the prophets did.

Instead however, he goes out and for 40 days is simply ALONE! He has no one to talk to. He has nothing to eat. Can you imagine the growling of his stomach and the aching he felt for food. After forty days of wandering around, his body would have started to turn on itself and he would soon become delusional and incoherent. His Father has just told him that He loves him and then His Dad has driven him out into the desert to seemingly die. What kind of twisted fate was this? How many times Jesus must have wanted to get up and go back home to grab a bite to eat. He surely remembered the story of Elijah and how the birds brought him food (1 Kings 17). So where was his ravens at and his portions to eat? As the forty days were nearing the end, the flesh of Jesus is starting to think maybe he has suffered all this torture as a child and young man for nothing. His hopes of being the Messiah and King were turning to dust. His body revolted at the pain as it prepared to shut down. Jesus was dying when help finally arrived....

His help however was not his Father nor his earthly mother. His help came in the form of the most powerful being on earth, Satan.

All this time, Satan has been on the attack to kill this lowly sack of bones that God had produced with a woman. I am sure Satan scoffed at the sight of Jesus in such a weak state. Angels had bred with women before and produced giants (Genisis 6:1-4). God, Satan's arch enemy, had bred with a woman and made this frail looking man who was on the brink of death. Was this really the one who would come and destroy Satan? Was this the “Chosen One� who had been prophesied to be the one to bring him down for good? Satan laughed as he prepared to move in on this seemingly easy target. He had studied Jesus, watching him all the way. He knew the inner working of Jesus' mind and his weakest points. He knew what Jesus wanted the most and with that knowledge, he pounced on his prey, ready to destroy.

Again, as a clarification, we are looking at the humanity of Jesus and how he can relate to us on a personal basis. That being said, lets look at this conversation between Jesus and Satan. (btw, there is a difference in order of the temptations between the accounts of Matthew and Luke. However, the 39

temptations listed are the same as are the responses. For this writing, I will use the book of Matthew.)

So Satan comes along as Jesus is very weak and he is fighting to remain coherent in his thoughts. His body is extremely exhausted and his hunger level is off the charts. His mind is set on doing whatever it takes to fulfill his destiny, but his body is screaming for relief. Satan slithers in and says, “Hey you, oh Son of God. The chosen one who is marked by His love, in whom He is well pleased! How are you doing? You look tired and hungry! Are you okay? Is your Father taking care of you properly? You look exhausted and thin! How about you come over here and just command these stones to become bread. You can do that you know. You have the power. I know you are starving, so just take a minute and use your power to fulfill your own need.”

All we have is one sentence as the response that Jesus gave. But what about the situation and how his flesh would have dealt with this? If we are not carefule we will fail to understand the gravity of this temptation if all we do is read a verse and move on. Take a moment and imagine the immensity of this situation.

Jesus has been brought out to this place by the Spirit of God. He has expected maybe a little communion and fellowship with his Father after having heard his voice down by the Jordan. What he has received is 40 days of being alone with no food. His flesh is on the brink of falling apart. The offer that was made to him goes way beyond just having food to eat. That was not the point of the temptation. It was something much deeper.

Jesus had become aware of his abilities and powers he had to make food out of anything because of who he was in God. He had learned of his abilities to do miraculous things. He had read the Old Testament stories of the power of his Father and how people had been healed, raised from the dead, and spirits defeated. He had read how the widows jars of flour and oil never ran out as long as the prophet was with her. He was aware of his ability to change rocks into food. However, he also knew that any attempt to use his power for his own gain would be a misuse of his God given abilities and therefore an act of selfishness. One act to satisfy his own need would lead to another and then another, eventually leading him to use them for his own selfish ambitions which would be an act of mutiny against God his Father. Turning rocks into food was not the issue, selfish ambition was what Satan was hoping to get Jesus to pursue. Is first effort was to use Jesus' need for bodily food. There is no doubt, Jesus was starving and without food woud soon die.

In his flesh, this was more than just some simple thing Jesus could respond to with a verse. It was a deep and very difficult fight. His body wanted that food. His body NEEDED that food. But he had come to want something even more than food. Something he was willing to die of starvation for.

What was this one thing? A deep abiding relationship with His Father. That was what he had come to want even more than food. That is the reason Jesus was able to recall a verse about this situation that allowed him to overcome his fleshly desire to eat. It was a verse that defined his greatest passion. “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.” Jesus was unable to act on his own strength in this situation, he had to fully rely upon his Father and the words of his Father to get him through. Jesus was a man who had to lay himself in the hands of God and trust God to do with him whatever He pleased. Jesus had to trust God to take care of his needs.

Jesus had just heard His Father's voice a little over 40 days before this time and that was the “food “that kept him going. That word from his Daddy had filled his soul so much that he was desperate for more of God, even more than food for his body. He had tasted that God was good and he wanted more. He knew an act that satisfied a personal need of his own would nullify his hunger for God his Father. Therefore, he chose death over what his body wanted the most. However, we must not 40

misunderstand! This was more than quoting a verse, this was war within his soul. A war between his human desires and the desire of his soul. Round one was over and through the power of God's word of love and confirmation, Jesus chose his Father over life itself.

But Satan does not give up easily, especially not on prey that is weak and tired. Satan went for the easiest blow first, hoping it would work. When it did not, he moved in on the next vulnerable area in Jesus.

Jesus had suffered all his life with an “absent” Father. He had searched for 30 years hoping to hear from him to no avail, that is, until just recently. Jesus longed for a deep, intimate relationship with God his Father, but in reality, that relationship had only just begun. He had just heard his Dad's voice for the first time in his life. To say the least, it wasn't like they were exactly the “closest of friends” just yet. They were just beginning and Jesus was learning how to fully trust himself to His Dad. With that fact in mind, Satan moves in and attacks the depth of that trust head on. He takes Jesus to the top of the steeple on the Temple and says, “If you are really the Son of God, JUMP!” Then he adds a few verses that Jesus would have known by heart from all his years of studying (Psalm 91;1112). “You know, if you really are the Son of God, then you can jump and you won't get hurt because he will send his angels to take care of you and keep you from getting a scratch,” Satan said.

Again, it is so easy to read Jesus' response and not really think this through. Jesus has spent his life hearing he was God's son, but only recently had fully given himself to believe this truth in spite of what his life had been like. It was extremely hard for anyone to think God would have allowed His son to endure the life Jesus had lived up to this day, but Jesus had chosen to have faith and believe it was true. He had chosen to look beyond his circumstances and trust what his mother and Father had said was true.

At the age of 30, a man is in his prime and stronger than ever. His first reaction to any situation is to prove that what he knows is the truth, at all cost. A 30 year old man will argue with a fence post if he believes the fence post has called him a liar or does not believe him. A male of this age is primed and ready to defend himself, oft times to his own harm. To admit to being wrong is rarely an option for a man in his prime.

Satan has just attacked Jesus' new found choice to believe he is the Son of God. He hit on it subtly in the first test, but this time, Jesus' relationship with his Father is the focal point of the attack.

“Do you really think you are God's son? Would God really have let you have such a crappy life up to this point? Would a Father, especially an Almighty God, ask you to walk the path that by now you know is ahead of you? Surely a good father would do everything to make sure the life of their son is filled with comfort and ease. Surely any Father who could, would go to all lengths to protect his son from being harmed. Especially the Most High God. If you really are His son, then there is no way He would let you get hurt by jumping off the Temple. This is His house isn't it? He is here, right? So He must be watching! Go ahead, prove you are His son. Prove it to yourself and to the world. I know you are still wrestling with doubt, especially since He has put you out here and left you to stavre. This is a way to put this doubt of your to bed. Jump off here and lets see if He is true to his word! If He is, then you will know beyond a shadow of a doubt that you are truly His Son.” Now this would have been a very difficult test for Jesus as a man in his prime. How his rage and anger would have risen as someone was attacking his Dad's love for him. He had spent his life seeking acknowledgment of God's love for him and he had just heard God say, “I love you.” Oh how Jesus would have wanted to jump and show Satan that he was most certainly the son of the Most High God. If he jumped and God did catch him, he never would have to face Satan again and he would not have 41

had to live by faith, relying on God to provide for him. This one leap would have settled that issue for good and He could have walked forward and not have feared anything that came in his path. If God kept him from harm here and now, then he would not have to worry about any other test he would face.

For just a second Jesus imagined what this one “leap of faith” could mean for his life. This could rescue him from all the doubt, frustrations, and concerns that face a man, plus, everyone in the temple court would see him land and it would be like a glorious reception for him to be accepted among all his people here on earth.

However, if he did jump and crashed to the ground, then it would prove he was nothing more than a man and his life up to this point would have been a waist and a lie. On the other hand, if he died, then his life would be over and he would not have to hear the jeers and slander of his neighbors anymore. He would be free. One jump would settle this question of being God's Son forever. If God came through, then no one could ever doubt him again and he would never have to wonder if he was God's Son. Just one jump!

Jesus' mind is racing at this point. Does he take this leap of faith and settle the question of who is Father is forever? Satan had been given the right to fly him up to the pinnacle of the Temple and was really testing Jesus' resolve in his decision to accept the fact that he was God's son. One jump and the truth would be made known. However, there was another issue at hand. If Jesus jumped, no matter the outcome, he again would have been doing something to satisfy a longing in himself. He would be using His abilities to bring about self gratification. If God was his dad, then he could shut the mouths of all those who had ever mocked or ridiculed him and his parents here on earth. If he landed with ease in the crowded streets below, then he could claim to be God's son and no one would ever doubt him again. All those years of being teased and called a liar. All those years of hearing his mother and Joseph agonize over how difficult life was because no one believed them. All that could be settled with one simple leap.

Thankfully, even in his extreme weakness due to lack of food and fellowship, Jesus was able to remember that there was much more at stake than what his flesh wanted. He had completely sold out in his spirit to the role of being Messiah and he knew that this same jump that would hush the mouths of his naysayers would also jeopardize the entire mission he had come to accomplish. One act of selfish ambition and his whole life would be a useless waste. As he looked down, his body wanting so badly to prove to everyone that they had been wrong about him and his parents, Jesus heard a still small voice whisper, “You shall not tempt the Lord you God.” Jesus, closed his eyes, breathed in deep, set aside his own desires and repeated what he had heard to Satan. “It is written, you shall not tempt the Lord your God, and I will not force my Father to act on my behalf in order to bring validity to my claim of being His Son. Instead, I will simply choose to believe in the Words he has spoken to me, telling me that I am indeed His only begotten Son.” Again, Jesus faced the temptation to make God prove in a tangible way that he was His Son. His heart wanted this confirmation in the flesh so bad. He knew all it would take is one small act on his part and he could put to rest this lingering fight in his mind and body. One stone to bread or one leap of faith would hush his mind and all the people forever. However, Jesus had to choose to live by faith both times, trusting in the word of His Father over the tangible desires of his flesh.

With each test, Jesus' spirit is growing stronger despite the weakness of his body from lack of food. With each test his resolve to believe in his Father grows deeper, even if it means death for his body. His body is weaker than ever before, but his spirit was growing stronger. Satan could sense this and he was frustrated. He had originally moved in on a frail man who was extremely weak in the flesh.

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His first two attacks had been very pointed, but neither had worked. In fact, they had the opposite effect from what he had hoped. Instead of drawing Jesus into sinning, he had given him more strength to trust and rely upon his Father for all his needs. Therefore, Satan saved his secret weapon for his final attack.

So far he has attacked Jesus' body and his relationship with his Father. On this last attempt to break Jesus before his ministry began, Satan hit the softest spot that Jesus had, his love for his mother.

Remember how Mary had accepted the role of Jesus' mother based on the promise that one day he would reign on David's throne and free his people. Remember how she had suffered shame and was called a liar when she was pregnant. Remember the odd birth of this supposed king and how from the moment of his conception Mary's life had been torn apart. Not only Mary, but Joseph as well. Their choice to obey God and submit to his calling had brought nothing but disaster into their lives. It had reached a point now that they wondered if Jesus was ever going to fulfill the promise that the angels had made. He was 30 now and the time for doing “something� with is life was nearing the end. Being raised by these two people who had sacrificed everything so that he could be born, Jesus, the Son of Man, wanted nothing more than to see them set free from their life of toil and labor and for them to be vindicated in front of everyone who had ever given them a hard time. The way for that to happen immediately was for him to become king!

Knowing this soft spot in Jesus' heart for his mother and earthly father, Satan moved in with a most glorious offer: 8 Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory.

9 And he said to him, "All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me."

The torture this particular temptation would have caused Jesus. You could have presented him with a thousand virgins and it would not have been as tempting as this offer. Satan was not only offering the throne in Jerusalem, but every throne in the world. Jesus was not drawn to the popularity or fame of this offer. Neither was he drawn to the power that came with it. His heart ached for what this would mean for his mom and for Joseph. What this could do for his brothers and sisters. They too had lived a difficult life because of him. His parents had been all but thrown out into the street when Mary announced her pregnancy and Joseph his willingness to take responsibility for the child she bore. They had given up everything in obedience to God. Jesus was well aware of what throne he was to receive as the Messiah, but that would do nothing in the present for his parents. They had waited for 30 years for him to take his position as king of the Israelites and have all the mouths of the mockers shut. As Messiah, that would never happen for his dear mother and Joseph during their lifetime.

As God's Son, Jesus could easily walk away from this offer, but as the Son of Man, this was no easy task. He was faced with his most difficult dilemma to date. This was the greatest battle of the three so far. His mind was set on following His Father, but his heart burned to see his mother set free. To reject this offer was, in essence, to turn his back on his mom and all her hopes and dreams. To follow God meant Jesus would have to forsake his very own flesh and blood family, and there was no going back!

To accept this offer of all the thrones in the world would bring a smile to her face and joy to her heart. Taking the thrones would not be selfish, as he would be acting on behalf of someone else. Being the king of the world was not a sin in and of itself. There was nothing in this offer that was selfish, however, he would have to do something to obtain it. He would ave to bow his head and offer himself to serve Satan in order to have his mother's dreams come true. It was all so tempting, but Jesus knew if he did this one thing, he would have to turn his back on his Father and the prize his Father offered to 43

him. Jesus looked at all the kingdoms and then looked over at the prize his father offered. His human mind calculated the worth of both offers. His flesh measured it in wealth and comfort as his spirit measured it in longevity. The kingdoms looked alluring. The ability to give his mom her one hope and desire weighed heavy on his heart. However, he also wanted to please his Father! Who would he choose to please and bring honor to?

So when Jesus said, “Get out if here Satan! For it is written you must worship only the Lord God,� it was done so with much more than the ease of a butterfly on the wind. The decision to tell Satan to buzz off was done through much anguish and grief. On the one hand, Jesus knew he was pleasing his Father with this decision, but on the other, he also knew it would bring much sorrow to his mom. He was literally put in a place he had to choose between his Dad and his mom. He had to decide in that moment whether or not he would completely surrender to the desires and directions of his Father or would he sacrifice everything so that his mom could be free from her plight in life. Simple choice some might preach, but then again, they probably have never faced a dilemma as great as this! This one moment in Jesus' life would define how he would live for the rest of his life. This one choice was his defining moment!

Praise God he chose to honor his Father and live in his spirit as the Son of God while he wrestled in his flesh with the battles of the Son of Man!

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Jesus In the Game!

The truth is, Jesus went through so much more than I had ever taken time to imagine. I was content to simply except the stories of his miracles and wondrous works as God's Son. Those stories gave me something to be excited about. So did the story of the cross and how he was raised from the dead so I could go to heaven one day. In essence, Jesus was my ticket to a better life. His ability to do mighty works brought me great comfort knowing he could still do things like that for me if I needed it.

When I was sick or hurting, he could heal me. When I was hungry, he could feed me. When I needed money, he could provide it for me. Jesus was someone who could do something for me, that is why I “loved” him. He was the super hero I needed to make me get through life. We could “hang out,” but we really could not be very close because his life seemingly was easy outside of the whole “cross and dying” thing.

However, as I began to see Jesus as Mary's son, who fulfilled the words of Isaiah 53 long before Calvary, my whole world began to change. Jesus suddenly became real and tangible. He no longer stood at a distance just waiting for me to die and join him in heaven. Rather, he stood right next to me, hand in hand, feeling my pains and carrying my every burden. He started to become a companion on my journey instead of a cheerleader on the sidelines. He strapped on the gear and got into the game. He had taken the same lumps and hits I do every day. He took the same beatings and got the same emotional bruises that I suffered along the way. Instead of just being a God who put me through hard situations to make me see him, he came and endured my every sorrow, every hard path He designed, so He could say, “I fully understand.” No longer was he just the Son of God, he was my brother, a son of man.

For Jesus, these were only the beginning of his troubles in life. He went through so much more, and I am not referring to the cross. He endured misunderstandings and temptations all along his path throughout his ministry. When I thought he could not relate to my situation or was giving some random rule to be obeyed, I did not comprehend that it was something he had to endure first.

I am always complaining about how hard it is to provide for my family. It is a tough job and carries a lot of anxiety in our world. We want our children to have the best and be the best. We want them to have a better life than we did growing up. We want to give our family a “charmed” life. Yet Jesus says we have to forsake our family in order to be his disciple (Matthew 10:36-38, Luke 14:2633). How dare he say such a thing, he never had to do that, right?

Well, that is what I always thought, until now. Putting together the whole story of Jesus and his upbringing with his mission in life, he had to make this very choice himself. He had to choose the will of His Father over the earthly well being of the ones he cared for the most. He had to forsake them in order to embrace the companionship and love of God. Also, there was a verse that caused me to wonder greatly about him knowing what it meant to have to be a provider.

In Matthew 4:13, we are told that Jesus left Nazareth, his home town, and moved to Capernaum to live there. This is verified in Scripture when it says he returned to Capernaum and that the people got excited because he “had come home.” (Mark 2:1). Then I read a verse in John 2:12, where it mentions Jesus going down to Capernaum and his “mother and brothers” going with him. Suddenly I was struck with the understanding that the fact is, we often see Jesus with his mother, brothers, and sisters mentioned, but not really hearing of Joseph. Other than he being referred to as “Joseph's son,” Joseph 45

seems to no longer be in the picture. Then I remembered how in many cultures that when a father is no longer in the picture due to death or abandonment, that the duties of “head of household” and provider fall to the oldest son. This was true in our nation just a very few generations back. If something happened to the father, then the eldest son had to take care of the family. Not only that, but in the culture of Jesus' day, families stayed together and lived in the same places. So if Jesus moved to Capernaum, then so would have his entire family if he was responsible to provide for them.

Now, again, I am no scholar or interpreter, but rather, I am just saying what has come to my heart as I have studied these passages. I know that Jesus was VERY close to his mom and he loved her very much. I know he oft times felt obligated to help her out or do things for her simply because she was mom (John 2:1-11). We know so much of his life was lived in silence (12-30) and we know it was not an “easy life” of him just waiting for his ministry to start. No, he had to work hard, earn a living, pay the bills, and carry the weight of being the “man of the house.” He was the one everyone under his roof was looking to to provide for their needs.

Could I be wrong on this? Sure! All I am stating is there appears to be this role that was in his life. A role he had to abandon, or turn in his back on, in order to obey his heavenly father. If I am off on this point, then he still had to turn his back on his family as a provider in another sense.

Remember what his mother had heard from the angel? “This child will sit on David's throne and reign for ever!” She had been told Jesus would be king over his people. Mary had no way of understanding the eternal role of this statement. Her mind would have instantly gravitated to the role of a physical, tangible, “here on earth” king. She had lived her whole life longing and waiting for this moment. She and Joseph had lost EVERYTHING in their choice to obey God and be the parents of God's begotten son. Her only hope was that one day she would again be held in high regard by people as her son sat on his throne. All the misery of being a poor person would be worth it when she lived in the palace of her son. She would have servants and all her needs would be taken care of. This only makes sense she would long for that day. Up until now, life had not been what she had hoped for or dreamed.

In this case, Jesus would be the one to provide for her dreams to come true. Why else would she push her son to do things to gain popularity with the people? The story of turning water to wine is proof positive that Jesus had to deal with a mother pushing her dreams onto her son. Every mother hopes their son becomes great, and in the future will be able to take care of the one who has cared for them. It is no sin to wish for this. It is simply being a mom. Mom's want the best for their sons, and Mary knew that Jesus being king would also bring justification to her and right so many of the wrongs she had endured.

However, Jesus also had to turn his back on this role as a provider for his family as he followed the leading of his heavenly Father. He knew that to obey God would mean his mother's dreams and desires would never be met in the present life. She would never be exonerated of the charges of having sex before marriage At least not in her lifetime. She expected so much from Jesus based on the words of the angel, but she had no clue as to the depth of what she had heard. She could not see eternal in light of the present. Therefore, she was frustrated when her son was not seemingly game to go out and take his kingdom and sit on his throne. She had waited all this time, yet he was off being a lowly preacher and making friends with the castoffs of society.

Not only did Jesus know the weight of providing for a family, but think of what it meant to be considered a Rabbi (teacher) and call people to follow you. He called men away from their jobs and the way of providing for their families. These men were married (Peter had a mother in law, Mark 1:29-34) 46

and most likely had children. They were of age in the society to marry and probably were close to Jesus' age of thirty. Most men were married by the age of 18 in those days, so kids would have followed quickly. Therefore, Jesus had called these men away from their professions so he could teach them. This came with the burden of trusting that those families were not going to suffer without food and clothing. Why else would he constantly remind his disciples that life was more than food, water, and clothing? Why else would he say you have to forsake everything to follow him. How could he ask others to do something if he had not done it himself?

He couldn't and he didn't!

Jesus knew exactly what he was calling these men into. He had been called to do the very same thing by his Father. Jesus also knew this was no easy call to answer. The war in the mind over issues like this were intense. Where would the money come from? How could he be certain his mother, brothers, and sisters would not starve to death? He also had to deal with the frustrations of his brothers and mother when they got upset that he “left” them to fend for themselves. He knew exactly what his disciples experienced when their parents, in-laws, wives, and kids got upset at them and called them crazy. He knew what it felt like to have to trust that everything was going to be okay even when life did not appear to be that way. The disciples had to make a hard choice to forsake their families in the service of God, but so did Jesus!

From every worldly point of view, it was ludicrous and ridiculous to do what he was doing and it appeared he was causing other men to be drawn away by his foolishness as well. Don't think for a moment that Jesus did not hear about it as well. In Mark 3 we read of a time when his own family thought he was crazy and went to perform an intervention!

20 Then he went home, and the crowd gathered again, so that they could not even eat.

21 And when his family heard it, they went out to seize him, for they were saying, "He is out of his mind."

Other translations say, “They decided he was getting carried away with himself.” Jesus was simply helping people as they were all coming to get their physical needs met. Jesus helped them even to his own hurt. He was so busy that he did not even have time to eat. It was getting out of control and his family decided that he was going crazy, so they went to have a word with him, and I am sure to talk him into coming home so they could discuss how he could use his powers to become king. Later in the same chapter, we see that his mother and brothers arrived and sent in so he would come out so they could have a word with him. Jesus amazingly said, “Who are my mother and brothers?” Not saying he did not know who they were, but he was making a point that those who obeyed the will of God were his family. Obedience is thicker than blood!

In all honesty though, should we really be surprised by Jesus' constant battles that he faced?

Luke 4:13 tells us that Satan “left him until an opportune time.” But that was not JUST at his time of suffering. Jesus was under constant attack and pressure all the time. He had to fight battles against the temptations of the flesh non-stop. Look at his life! He was surrounded by prostitutes and drunks. He was surrounded by sinners and thieves. Constantly his reputation was under attack, even from his own family (Matthew 10:36-39). We know that at any moment he could have called down legions of angels to come and right all his wrongs. Just having that knowledge was a temptation in and of itself to use his power for his own glory. As he grew in his knowledge of who he was, the Son of God, the temptation to put an end to his earthly misery grew constantly.

He constantly was faced with the temptation of pride and arrogance. These simple minded nitwits who called themselves wise teachers tried to confound him constantly, yet he had to remain 47

humble in his spirit while dealing with their ignorance. He was constantly faced with frustrations as his own hand picked disciples did not seem to really understand much of what he was saying. This easily could turn to discouragement and depression as he knew one day all his work would be left in the hands of a group of men who did not quite seem apt to handle the chore. Satan was there constantly whispering in his ear, “Just give up! You know it is not worth it! These guys are incapable of carrying on what you are trying to start. My offer of all the world's kingdoms stands. Are you sure what you are doing is going to last? How can you be certain your Father will accept your sacrifice? Did I just sense a bit of frustration or anger on your part? Isn't that a sin? It is in my books, so you better just come on over here and be on my side cause He is never going to accept you now!”

The burdens in Jesus' life were great, possibly greater than death itself. His mind was a constant battlefield. I am sure there were days that Jesus felt like Job and Jeremiah, wondering why he had ever been born. Or in his case, why he had agreed to be born as a man. Life is tough, and for Jesus, it was no different. For him, it was brutal. Being aware of his identity and still having to deal with the frustrations of life intensified his battles greatly.

Jesus was in the game! He was living with the same burdens and troubles I carry in my everyday life. He faced the temptations and the struggles of just getting by like I do. He could feed five thousand people, but not once could he simply cause stones to turn to bread to satisfy his own hunger.

He had to rely on his Father to provide for him just like I do. He could not use his power to heal himself, he had to rely on his Father to heal him and raise him from the dead, just like I do. He could not test his Father's promises by making Him prove his love by “taking a leap of faith” and hoping it all worked out. He had to wait and only do exactly what his Father told him to do, living only by faith in the word of his Father, just like I do.

Jesus could have easily taken the throne his mother wanted him to have. He could have easily changed his position in life and been a man of great wealth and means. He could have easily walked among us as a supernatural being and shared the same stories and did the same miracles without the frailty of a body and limitations of a human mind. But he didn't! He chose to bear our sorrows and acquaint himself with our grief. He chose to live as a man. Need food like a man. Be dependent on drinking water like a man. Rely upon others for help like a man. Endure the shame of having his own dung be on him like a baby. Allow himself to wear the same skin and bones as I do. He literally bore our sorrows and our shames. Not just on a cross, but in everyday life.

He became just like me so that one day I could look him in the eyes and know that he really understands what I am going through. Every time I am overwhelmed, wondering how my family will eat that day, he knows exactly what I feel because he felt it too. Every time I wrestle with how I will make it through to the next day, he carried my same sorrows. Every time I am frustrated when those I am trying to help just don't understand what I am saying, he endured that same frustration. Every time the devil tells me there is no way I can be worthy of God's love, he heard those same words. Every time I think God is being too tough on me and giving me more than I can bear, he knows exactly how I feel!

(Father, is there any other way?) Jesus not only endured my shame and sin on the cross, he endured my everyday burdens as well. What a wonderful Friend is he!

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WOW!

I know much of what I have said should not be a great surprise. However, it was to me!

Somehow I had been able to accept all the details and facts about Jesus being the Son of God, his diety and sacrifice for sin, but I was never really able to embrace him as a Son of Man. I never really gave myself to think about how difficult his life really was. I always thought he marched through life without a care in the world because he was God's son. I never realized how much he really did so we could have a real, personal, intimate relationship.

What I have learned along this small journey with Jesus (and I have only just begun), is that Jesus did not come just to show me “how to live,” but rather, he came to show me who I am. He did not come just to be a sacrificial Lamb, he came to be my brother, my friend, one in whom I could confide.

There is not one single thing that could happen in my life that I could give me reason or grounds to say to him, “Jesus, you just don't understand!” Now that is a bold statement considering some of the things we endure, however, I know it to be true.

If I was picked on as a child, so was he! If I was abused as a child, so was he. He endured great suffering at the hands of bullies and the lips of mean people. He was beaten and he was bruised as a child. That makes him “willingly” taken a beating as a grown man even more unbelievable than I had ever imagined. He could have simply said the word and it would all have stopped.

I know what it is like to be pushed around as a boy. I know what it was like to have bigger kids do and say things that caused you pain. I also know that I developed a desire to never let that happen again when I grew up. Therefore I became a man who gave himself to be strong so I could fight back the physical attacks of a man. I thickened my emotional skin and buried things deep so no words could openly affect how I felt. I would let no man push me around, rather, I would be the pusher.

I can imagine the anguish in the heart and mind of Jesus as those Roman Soldiers took great pleasure in releasing their pent up emotional issues on him. Every stroke they gave his back healed a wound in their own lives as they lashed back out because they had been lashed out against. And all the while, Jesus is fighting the desire to call his troops to come to his rescue. The angels stood ready to fight, as they watched their Masters son be battered by these wretched human beings. Jesus' ears were filled with the taunts and jeers of the demons as with each stroke they reminded him that they were going to do much worse to him once God turned his back. “Your Daddy won't be here to protect you anymore! We are going to do whatever we want to you! You think this is pain, just you wait Jesus. Wait till we get our hands on you!” As they are taunting him, Jesus hears a calm voice at his side saying, “I can stop all this! I can cause it to go away. Just worship me and it will be over. I will still give you those kingdoms and make you ruler over all this world.” Satan never stopped, not up to Jesus' last breath.

Yet Jesus never cried out for help. He never quit. Not in life and not in death. His flesh screamed for it to all end, yet his spirit kept living on the word of his Father. As he learned about who he was in the flesh, he embraced who he was with his spirit.

He was God's Son, but he had chosen to be the Son of Man. He had chosen to embrace our suffering in our everyday life so that he could reveal to us the reality of who we are. He did not come to condemn us or make us feel bad when we screw up, he came to show us that we are just like him, Sons of God (Romans 8:12-17). In order to show us our true identity, he took on our's in the form of a sinful 49

man (Romans 8:3). In order to show me who I am in the Father's eyes, he came to be exactly like me in the eyes of the world. He took on all my struggles and limitations in oder to learn as I do. As he did this, early in life, he gave himself to know one thing and one thing only, his Father. As he wrestled through life, the work, the bills, the hunger, the frustrations, he learned his true identity and then gave himself to live in it by faith. He calls us to walk by faith because he had to do the same.

I have often thought of the passage in Philippians 2 during this study of Jesus.

5 Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, 6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.

8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

I have pondered on what it all meant. How Jesus could not grasp his Deity and walk away from being basically a nobody as far as his present world was concerned. He was a poor man from humble beginnings. In Isaiah 53, he is mentioned as a root who sprang up out of dry ground. In other words, when he showed up on the scene, people were shocked at how smart and great he was, but were confused because he seemed to just come out of nowhere. He did not emerge from a palace or the temple and start his work. He came out of a carpenter's shop and a very poor household. He did not fit the description of a man who could say or do great and mighty things. In his hometown of Nazareth, they even turned their noses up at him because they knew his questionable birth, therefore he did not do much their. He was rejected by the people who he hoped would embrace him the most. (this carries on after his death as Israel turns there backs on him and the Gentiles embraced him with enthusiasm.)

All Jesus had to do was say a word and things could have been set in order. God could have spoken a single word and sin would have been abolished. He could have intervened and stopped mans fall into sin. Even after the fall, he could have wiped the slate clean and taken us home without Jesus coming. He did not have to give up his only begotten son to save us. He could have stayed with the animal sacrifices or even done it a different way. Why do you think Jesus asked if God would not consider a different way? We learned from Job's story God can do whatever He wants, however he wants! He could have, but he didn't. He did it this way! The hardest way one could imagine so he could look us in the eye and say, “I know what you are going through. I know how you feel!”

We are told that it brought God pleasure to bruise his son. It brought Him great joy to see his son endure the hardships of life and the suffering of the cross. God enjoyed seeing His only begotten son take on our condition, face our difficult lives, and suffer at the hands of brutal men. Jesus literally took abuse from the hand of his Father and it brought God pleasure. (Isaiah 53).

As remarkable, and possibly unbelievable as that may sound, it happened! But it is not the most remarkable detail of this story. Seeing Jesus deal with my frustrations and my burdens is not the most shocking thing. Seeing that he took abuse from the hands of his Father is not what shocks me the most.

It is something far more amazing than that. It is the “Why” behind it all! The reason why did Jesus what he did is what is the most unbelievable part of his story.

The answer to this question is what brings me to great tears of joy and causes my heart to leap!.

Remember we said Jesus read the stories of the Messiah and he saw the great price that had to be paid! Remember we also said he was able to see the prize that was to be obtained by that price being 50

paid, and he counted the prize worthy of the price!

So what is the prize that Jesus considered worthy of having to become a man and be like me?

What did he value so highly that he clamped his mouth shut when every bone in his body wanted to cry out to his army of angels to stop his pain. What did he think was worth so much that he endured my shame, carried the burdens of being a man, and picked up his cross daily and followed his Father?

What could have possibly been so precious to him?

Isaiah 53:10-11 10 But the LORD was pleased To crush Him, putting Him to grief; If He would render Himself as a guilt offering, He will see His offspring, He will prolong His days, And the good pleasure of the LORD will prosper in His hand.

11 As a result of the anguish of His soul, He will see it and be satisfied;

By His knowledge the Righteous One, My Servant, will justify the many, As He will bear their iniquities. (NASB) Romans 5:6-11 6 For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.

7 For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die 8 but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

9 Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. 10 For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life.

11 More than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation. (ESV) To sum it up, Jesus saw that you and I was the prize that was at the end of all his hardships and heartache. He made a choice to accept us as worthy of the cost he knew he had to pay. I know we have heard that before, but for me it was always in the light of him being the Son of God. When I began to see Jesus for who he was as a son of man, it made this fact even more amazing. When I saw that he faced every temptation and every trial that I have and will, then I began to understand what he was saying about being “like him” and living in the reality that he did. When I saw that his life was a “perfect” sacrifice, I began to understand it was not because he had a perfect life, but rather that he faced all my trials and tribulations and not once did he act in selfish ambition. Not once did he use his understanding or knowledge to promote himself. He never once tried to use his place to “take the place of God.” Not once did he choose his own desires needs in his flesh over me. It wasn't that he did not sin, it was why he did not sin. The miracle is wrapped up in the reason he chose not to pursue his own 51

fleshly desires, and that reason is me and you!

Satan had fallen because he allowed selfish ambition to control his actions. Mankind (Adam) fell because of our selfish ambition to “be like God.” Today we are still slaves to our own selfish ambitions, striving to promote ourselves to a higher position in life. Selfish ambition was the central key to the fall that separated us and Satan from God. Being perfect did not mean Jesus did not get frustrated. Rather, it was that he his frustration was not rooted in selfish desires. He was not frustrated at the disciples for their ignorance for his own sake, he was frustrated because it was holding them back from being who they really could be. He was not frustrated with his mom at that wedding because she asked him to change water to wine, he was frustrated because she did not understand what kingdom he was to be Ruler of and her ignorance held her back.

Being perfect did not mean Jesus did not get angry or upset. Rather, it means that when he did let his anger out, he did so out of ambition for his Father. He did so out of ambition for his disciples. He did so out of ambition for his mother and his family. He did so out of ambition for us!

As a dear friend of mine once told me, “Ambition is the Key.” Jesus did not go through life not doing some of the things we would define as sin according to our rule book. That is why the Pharisees so often called him a sinner because he did not “stick to God's rules” as they defined them. Jesus was a rebel to them. He was a “law breaker” and a sabbath breaker. Yet they still could find no “fault in him.”

In other words, their official complaints held no water in light of his life and what he did. Jesus lived for others and they could not deny that. They so desperately wanted to prove that he was being selfish in some way, acting out of ambition for his own glory, but they could not. His ambition was always for his Father and for those His Father had given to him.

From God's point of view, Jesus “denied himself daily” and followed Him. Jesus wanted to give his mother the one thing she wanted most, but he denied himself that pleasure so he could give His Father what he wanted. Jesus wanted to do the sacrifice another way, but he denied himself and did it His Fathers way. Jesus preferred a group of smart guys to have as his students, but he denied himself and called the ones His Father directed him to. Jesus wanted to be popular and famous in the flesh, but for the sake of his prize, he denied what he wanted in the flesh in order to gain what His Father offered him in the Spirit.

Jesus never asked us to do anything or carry any burden that he himself did not carry first. Jesus did not ask us to deny ourselves and follow him before first denying himself to follow his Father. Jesus did not ask us to forsake our families, our goals, and our dreams before he first forsook his family, his goals, and his dreams. Jesus did not ask us to drink a bitter cup here on earth before he drank his own.

He did not ask us to not worry about food, water, money, clothes, shelter, and everything else in this life before he decided not to worry about these things himself. He did not ask us to walk a lonely, difficult life before he walked it himself.

Jesus was a man of greater burdens than we can imagine, and although he had family and friends, Jesus had to carry his burden alone. There was no one else to walk his path for him or with him. There was no one else who understood him, except his Father. Everyone wanted to be his friend because of what he could do for them. They all wanted to gain something from him. Even his closest friends, the disciples had the motive of being his right hand men when his kingdom came to pass. They had forsaken everything in hopes of having a place in his “Royal Cabinet” one day. They did not understand what he meant when he spoke of his kingdom. All they could see was the physical. The here and now. They had the present on their minds while all he was focused on was the future ahead of 52

them. That is why they seemed so thick headed when he spoke of “the kingdom of God.” They could not see the forest for the trees that captured their attention.

So Jesus' life was a lonely life. That is why he had to form such a passionate relationship with his Father and go out to be alone with him so often. He faced discouragement and doubt, therefore his Father reminded him of who he was on the Mount of Transfiguration. His body trembled and shook as he thought about the torture that he was to face. His flesh screamed out for him to run and hide or call in his warriors to take him back home. He faced his troubles alone just like we do. He told others what was bothering him, but they still did not understand. He had to work through his worries, concerns, frustrations, embarrassments, emotional pains, stress, and life as a human being. He not only bore our sorrows and afflictions, he carried them on an intensified scale. He did so in order to be able to relate to each and every one of us in a very personal and intimate way. Saving us for heaven and all eternity was not his only goal, he came to save us now and give us life. A real life that was free from the worries that are tied to our circumstances. He came to show us that as children of God, our lives, here and now, are much more than wondering how much money we make or how much we have. Those things suck the life from you. He came to free us from these things. Not in a tangible way, but to free us in a spiritual way so these things would not have any sway over us here and now and we could start living our lives of freedom now!

He lived his lifestyle so he could know who we are in a personal way, thus making him able to show us who we are in our spiritual reality. Without Jesus, we would truly be without hope. Not just because of the sacrifice God required, God could have done that in anyway He chose. He did what he did so we could have an intimate relationship with him. It was necessary that God allow himself to become one of us so that we would have a firm foundation for our relationship to stand on. For this to take place, there really was no other way. That is why Jesus said in the end, “Not my will, but yours be done.” It wasn't just the shame and pain of the cross that was before him, he knew what it took for me and him to be able to have common ground on which to build our relationship while I lived. Therefore he laid down his rights and took on my limitations. My suffering. My sorrows. My tears. My shame.

My embarrassments. My temptations. My sin! He did all that for ME! And he did it for You! We are the prize Jesus saw at the end of all he was to endure in his life.

That is why it is said that we find reconciliation in his death, but are saved through his life. His blood paid the price, but his life gives us hope that a mortal man can really “walk with God.” His life, along with all the struggles, is the very thing that gives us hope that there is One who stands before the Father and pleads on our behalf. He can plead for us because he knows and understands us in a deep and personal way.

He gave himself to be one of us. He knows what is is like to suffer pain and shame at the hands of the ones who we love the most. He knows what is like to be picked on and bullied by others who are stronger than we are. He knows what it is like to carry the burden of being a provider and caretaker. To be the one everyone is looking to for their survival. He knows what is like to see something you like and want, and yet have to say no to yourself. He could have had everything this world has to offer, yet he had to say no so he could have me!

WOW! It is because of his humanity that we can sing “Amazing Grace!” It is because of his flesh we can sing “Blessed Redeemer.” It is because he took on our condition, was created in our likeness of sinful man and carried with him the weight of the sinful desires of our flesh that we can say, “Oh what a Savior!”

Can't you see it! This story of Jesus is much deeper than just him dying on the cross for our 53

sins! It is much broader and more meaningful than just a story of redemption. It is literally a story of God descending and taking on EVERY struggle that we face in the flesh. Jesus had to fight the urge to sin. He had to fight the desires to fulfill his sexual desires. He had to fight the desire to dominate his foes and his enemies in the flesh. He had to fight the desire to glorify himself. He had these desires in his body, but he had to deny himself so that he could have me! Yes, he came from the loins of God, but he was the son of Mary, and because of that, he had to carry the weight of our sinful nature.

Uh oh! I can hear it now, all the people are screaming in Christendom over what was just said.

Sorry, but it says clearly in Romans 8 that he “took on our human condition” (MSG) and when he did that, he took on ALL our limitations, functions, and desires. The temptations in the wilderness would have meant nothing to Jesus if he did not have a struggle inside himself for life (food), popularity (jump off the temple), and power (kingdoms of the world.) These temptations would have been useless words to him! As the Son of God they were of no use, but as the Son of Man, they caused a raging war in his body and mind. He wanted what we all want. His flesh wanted fame, glory, success, and power.

His body wanted pleasure, sex, comfort, and adoration. Jesus took on our sinful nature and he warred with it constantly so that he could look at you and I and say, “I really do know how hard it is. I really do know how difficult it is to fight this fight. However, if ou will choose to believe that you are a Son of God, as I chose to believe, then you too can win this war.”

If he did not fight all these battles as a man, then his sacrifice would mean little to me or anyone else. He could have done that without living in our skin. He could have flown down, got on a cross, and paid the price. But it could in no way have brought me or you back into a “relationship” with the Father. It would have just paid our price so we could enter heaven and not got to hell. If all he was concerned with was eternity, he could have done it a different way. But eternity was not his only objective. He came to reveal to you and I who we are TODAY! If today was not on his agenda, then his death would be for nothing more than punching a ticket for me to have a bigger, better life along with a promise of eternity in heaven. His suffering on the cross is meaningless if not connected to his suffering in his life. Without his life, we would have no hope of a passionate, intimate relationship with our Creator. We could only have existed in his presence, nothing more than an angel or servant of his. Without his life to save us from being a lost wanderer in the desert of life, then we could never be a passionate bride, only a bride who acts of of duty and service.

However, because of his life, we have been saved from this end of empty love and have been redeemed and made ready for a life of pure and holy intimacies with our Creator. Jesus did all this so we could have a REAL relationship with his Father. Amazingly, he did not do any of it for himself. His motivation for his life and death was not his own glory and gain, it was for the glory and gain of his Father. He truly was without selfish ambitions.

Yet, His Father was so pleased with his life that He said he would turn over this “prize,” this treasure of you and I, to Jesus as his reward for his selfless act. His ambition to bring glory and honor to his Father has purchased for him a priceless treasure, a pure and spotless bride. A bride worthy of the only begotten Son of God. A bride whom he counted me and you worthy to be a part of. A bride he considered valuable enough to take on our every flaw and corruption of mankind and go to war against it so we could be free. We are the treasure he considered worthy of him “selling all he had” so he could go and “purchase the field” in which he found his greatest treasure. To Jesus, we are “the kingdom of God!”

54

Who I Am!

All I can say is how amazed I am. I know there are people who would love to have all the verses to back everything I said up. It would be awesome to have the written story of Jesus' childhood so we could verify all that I have said. A “Gospel of Mary” would have been neat with some scrapbook drawings or pictures of Jesus. But it was not meant to be.

There is a reason all this is not written down in concrete for us to have our fingers on. I think it is because he wants us to really want him before he just gives himself to us. There are some verses at the end of the Gospel of John chapter 2 that speak of many people “giving themselves to Jesus” because of the miracles he did, yet, Jesus did not “give himself to them.” He knew the only reason they wanted to be connected with him was because of what he could do for them. The miracles stirred up their hearts for the “magical” and the supernatural. They wanted Jesus because he gave them a hope for a better lifestyle. He gave them hope that their country would be free from the tyranny of Rome. But these would be the same ones who would leave Jesus when the real rubber met the road (John 6).

You see, I believe that Jesus did not come mainly to show me how to live or what all I could do.

He did not come to show us how we could have power over demons or do miracles ourselves. His main purpose was to remind us of who we are! Whose we are! He came to show me who I am.

Jesus came because we had lost sight of the reality that we are the “sons of God.” When Adam and Eve chose to follow their own selfish ambition, wanting to be like God, our true identities were lost and we became blinded by our sinful nature. No longer could we understand that we were created to be intimate companions of the Most High God. He loved walking in the garden withus and “shooting the breeze.” He loved revealing Himself to us beond what we today can even fathom or imagine.

Because of our sin, we are lost in a world of deceit and lies created by Satan. It might could be described as an alternative existence in which we saw ourselves in a distorted view. Over time, we completely lost the understanding of who we were created for and who we were created to be. Jesus entered our existence, took on our frailties and limitations, subjected himself to our internal wars and fights, so that we could once again have common ground on which to stand with God himself. Because of his work, we now have the ability to have a deep, abiding, intimate relationship with God just like we were originally created to be. Because of his life, those who have been given eyes to see can once again embrace their true identity through the righteousness of Christ. Once again, we can “walk in the Garden and fellowship with God right here and right now.

However, this understanding of who we are does not come cheap and easy. It is not something one can simply say a sinners prayer and receive. No, this is a choice that comes with a price equally as high as the one Jesus paid when he accepted the position of being the Son of God in the flesh of a man.

It requires that every earthly desire and dream be given up and all things of this world be counted loss.

Jesus had to give up everything he knew and loved to obtain the prized possession of you and I, and to obtain him, we must forsake and abandon everything we have ever known or wanted on earth. This is not the “American Dream Gospel” or the “say a prayer and you are saved gospel.” No, this is God's gospel and it comes hand in hand with suffering, trials, tribulations, pain, heartache, loss, and death. We literally have to turn our backs on ALL our hopes and dreams and embrace the suffering of the cross.

We must count all things loss in order to obtain the only thing of any real value, Jesus Christ the King.

This gospel may not bring warm fuzzy feelings, but it is the only gospel of true life. It is the 55

only story by which we can be made truly alive in our dead and dying flesh. The gospel that only relates Jesus as the Son of God falls short of the truth in that it is not the whole story. The gospel that relates only the heaven vs hell and good vs evil gospel is not the full gospel and therefore cannot transform a dead person into a living being. Any gospel that does not include the life of Jesus and the cost of being his disciple is a perversion of the truth in order to gain what we want from Jesus. This perverted and twisted gospel will lead us into a life of deception and destruction. It is useless and worthless to our souls reconcilitaion and can have no saving impact on our lives.

Jesus was very clear that any man or woman who is not willing to embrace ALL of who he was as the Son of God AND the Son of Man, cannot be his disciple. Any man who is only in “Christianity” because it assures him of eternal life in heaven and fellow “Christians” he can cry to in times of trouble here on earth will not be in the final Book of Life. Many people in Jesus' day hung around and claimed to be his followers when he was doing the miracles, yet Jesus knew they were in it only for what they could get from him, so he never fully entrusted himself to them. He never fully allowed them into the deepest part of his life and never committed to a personal and intimate relationship with them. These were even people who did great things for him and in his name, yet, he never said “I do” with them.

Because he knew that when the going got tough and the truth was revealed, that they would turn and walk away. Even in the end, his closest friends fled and left him all alone when he was arrested in the garden. Their dreams of being the highest advisers in his kingdom had faded fast and they fled for fear of their earthly lives.

However, Jesus had committed himself to these men he called disciples and he believed his Father's promise that of them he would lose none. He knew they would return to him and once God fulfilled his promise to accept his sacrifice (which s a whole other story of the struggle that was in Jesus), that these men would have their eyes opened and would see the truth of what his real kingdom was and the real purpose of his life. They would be able to embrace the reality of who they were as his brothers and would be able to do the same things he had done on earth, and even greater things. And they would do them all without pride and boasting because they would know it was not of them, but through the power of God given to them through his life that they could do mighty and wonderful works. They would see they too had to daily rely on the Father for all their needs and the power to heal the sick, raise the dead, and cast out demons.

Jesus wrestled with our flesh so that he could reveal to us our birthright in God the Father through his life and death. He took on our every frustration, limitation, struggle, emotion, battle, and war so he could show us who we are as the adopted children of God. He did not take the easy road, but rather stooped to the lowest of all places, bore our sorrow and the shame of being a man. It says he was made a little lower than the angels, the very angels he helped create, so that we could again see who we are in the eyes of God. And who we are is the sons and daughters of the Most High God, created to have an intimate and a passionate relationship with him.

This is not just a religious acknowledgment of His existence and performing of certain duties so we can please Him. Rather, this is an understanding that we are not of this world, but that we are walking in this world as reflections of His glory in the middle of Satan's darkness.

The bottom line is this, Jesus' life was not lived in a bubble of protection so that he could walk up to Calvary and claim a victory. His life was a constant battle with the same things we face on a daily basis. His nature as a man longed to taste the pleasures this world had to offer, just as my flesh longs for these things. His flesh longed to promote itself to a higher position just as I long to promote myself to a higher place. His flesh desired to be accepted and popular with his peers just as I want to be 56

accepted and popular among my peers. His flesh longed to experience all the beauty this world has to offer.

Yet, he had to daily count the cost of what giving in to his own desires would mean. He had to measure the price against the glory of the prize that was set before him. Sure, he could have done some of the things the flesh desired, but he would have to gve up the prize he he wanted above all else, you and I. Therfore, he daily looked the devils offer in the face and said, “Yes, I want you, but for the sake of receiving a prize I value much higher than all this, I refuse to accept your offers and will wait for what I want the most, my beautiful Bride.�

57

In Conclusion

So what does all this mean? How is this information suppose to change my life? These are very good questions. For you, I don't have the answers. You will have to seek His face for that in your own walk. I know for me, it has been life changing!

My realities have began to change. I still fight the battles as every man does, but now I understand what it means to have him fighting at my side. He is not some super secret weapon that I call upon to be my nuclear missile, but rather, he is my fellow warrior in the trenches who can fight with me because he understands. He can be the shoulder I lean on when I am weakened by the fight and he is the strength I can stand on when I am able to go to war.

I believe God is on the move and that He is coming to reveal to us again the realities that have been lost in the religion of our Christianity. I believe He is coming to expose the ways Satan has bound us by twisting our minds to only see one side of the story. I truly believe that half the story is more dangerous than none of story. Only seeing Jesus as the Son of God can cause a person to be deceived into thinking that Jesus came only to pave a path to heaven and that a simple prayer and a life of striving to be good will earn a spot at his side in eternity. This we know is not true because God demands intimacy! God demands a passionate, personal, and real relationship that cannot be found in the rituals of Christianity or any other religion.

Do not be deceived, our enemy is not stupid. He is not unwise. He is crafty and he has created multiple forms of our religion for us to get lost in. (notice the word LOST). He has no need to waste his time on deceiving those who are in the world and will never be born again. Therefore, his battle has always been, and always will be with the chosen children of God. He wants to destroy us! So far, his most effective method has been, “If I can't beat them, I will join them.” And join us he has.

I am but a young man who has little to no training or understanding. But God has revealed to me that our chains of religion come in multiple forms and fashions. Once I thought myself to be free form religion, only to find that I was more enslaved than ever before. Even today it is a constant battle and fight, because there is nothing we like more than ritual and routine to make us feel good. We love to be able to put our walk with God into terms we can define and describe on a “normal basis.

Therefore, we find ourselves trapped in the sludge of Satan's traps over and over, most of the time without even noticing it.

His traps are amazingly attractive as they hold so much of our truths. He has used our own Savior's story to create a religion that Jesus himself never came to form. Jesus never came to be the centerpiece of our attention, rather, he said his purpose and goal was the Father. Jesus came to glorify God the Father and point us to him. Jesus came with no selfish ambitions or desires! He only wanted to open our eyes to see his Daddy once again. He wanted us to see God as he saw Him. That is what he came to do. He came to glorify the Father and it is the Father who has seen fit to glorify the Son. To accomplish his mission, Jesus humbled himself to take on the form of a man and suffer unjust and unfair treatment at the hands of his Father. He did all this so we could be awakened from our lifeless existence and once again walk with God in the “cool of the day.”

Satan knows this truth of the man, Jesus of Nazareth, will change the world and awaken the souls of all those God had chosen for His son. He knows this amazing story would bring us into living in the power of our God and Father. He knows this story would allow us to do the things that Jesus did 58

and bring light into the midst of darkness. He knows it would give us the power to have victory over him on a daily basis. Therefore, he set out to destroy us by taking this story and forming a religion out of it. He took something free and unfettered and burdened it down with chains. He pushed us to focus so much on the deity of Jesus that we would forget the truth of his manhood and not be able to relate to the person of Jesus. He knew if he could keep this “disconnection” between us and God, it would keep us from living in the reality of who we truly are, the Sons and Daughters of God. And if he could pull this off, then we would be weak and worthless in the fight against him.

But as is seen, in Job, we learn that God is actually behind even these deceptive ploys of the Enemy. God is not only allowing Satan to craft this plan, God has a purpose for it, just as Jesus had a purpose for speaking in parables. Jesus told us he used parables so that only the true children of God could be awakened to the reality he came to show us. God has hidden the simple things from the wise because He does not want every man to understand His ways. God is using Satan to accomplish His own purposes. Part of that purpose is, and has always been, that in times of great darkness, God would burst forth in His radiant light and all who He has chosen for His son would be drawn in to this amazing walk with Him. The natural question here is “Why?” Why would God do such a thing? Well, why would He find pleasure in bruising His Son so that we might be saved? Why would He count us worthy of such a high price? Why did He create us in the first place?

The simple answer is all through Scripture. He did it because He wanted to and because it brings Him great pleasure. However, nothing is ever simple when it comes to God. I propose that the reason He allows such questions is so that each and every one of us, on a individual basis, will come and seek Him out for the answers to these questions. And the truth is, we won't all agree. We won't always land on the same system of belief!

However, the point is not what you believe, the pont is the pursuit of God. The struggle it takes to develop this relationship with Him. That is what He is after. He wants us to want Him. He wants those people who are willing to forsake all their dreams, goals, aspirations, and desires, and make Him the singular focal point of their lives. To do this means to sacrifice everything this world has to offer.

Money, position, power, fame, popularity, wealth, comfort, freedom, and the “American Dream.” He requires that His children count all this as worthless as a pile of cow manure and Him as priceless as all the treasures of the world combined.

What I have learned in this looking at the untold story of Jesus is that it can't all be found in the “black and white.” The words only tell us a story. The truth oft times is found hidden “between the lines.”

I could write on about this “untold story” for days and days, but the truth is, it is something that you must pursue yourself. The Apostle John said that if everything Jesus did was written down, the world would most likely run out of paper and ink. Jesus' life was a life full of the wonders of being a Son of Man and also the Son of God. There is so much to be obtained from the study of the very little we are told about him, and even more to be learned from the “untold story.” (Isaiah 52:15). However, before this story can change anyone, including myself, we must first see that we have been deceived by Satan and must cast off all the knowledge we think we now hold. We must lay aside our wealth of understanding and realize it is a pile of stinking garbage and filthy rags that has enslaved us to the lust and desires of this present world. We must cast off our burden of religion, even the religion of Christianity, and simply seek God's face and beg Him to personally reveal to each of us the wonders of the glory of Himself and His Son. 59

I have concluded, that it is impossible to see God for who He really is unless we are privileged to see Jesus as both the Son of God and te Son of Man. This, and only this, can allow us to see ourselves for who we really in our dual realities, and therefore bring us into the intimate relationship that God requires of all His chosen children. I wish I could give you a five steps to obtaining this relationship or some 6-8 week program that would make it real in your life, but that would be an abomination in and of itself. My only encouragement to you the reader is this, Pursue God with every ounce of your being and forsake all of the world, family, friends, fortune, and fame, and turn your eyes on the glorious wonder of our amazing Lord and Savior, Jesus the Christ!

Thanks for reading and I pray that what God has done in me will bring Him glory and draw you closer to Him.

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