It's a beautiful morning here in Memphis. It's been a great week spent traveling with my wife Katie and one of our housemates Abbye Pates. We love living in community. Thursday night we were in Hattiesburg, MS singing with our friend Katherine Kramer at her CD release concert. (I produced and recorded her album in December through Nightlight Music.)
Yesterday I started reading in Hebrews chapter one where the author perks our ears up to realize that something absolutely unique in history has taken place: God himself has personally visited us and hand-delivered a his message of salvation. Today in Hebrews two I was struck by the way the author refers to Psalm 22 when he's communicating about how Jesus has become just the kind of saviour that we need in verse 12.
Psalm 22 is the one that goes, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" You'll remember Jesus quoting it from the Cross. It's full of agonizing prophecies about the way Jesus would die. What strikes me today is that it was also written way back then by somebody who felt abandoned by God and was simply a suffering human being. The author (David) of Psalm 22, though obviously prophesying, was also uttering the aching plea of sinful humanity suffering in torturous separation from God - a race rightly under wrath. Not only under wrath but also under the sad consequence of an entire existence broken by sin.
Verse 24 of Psalm 22 says this:
The Suffering Psalmist has been heard by God. In fact, God has so deeply responded to the words of his groaning that we end up hearing Jesus quote this Psalm from the 'inside'. I mean Jesus has climbed inside of that aching plea until it poured out of him. He became one of us. I'm blown away by that combination of absolute holiness and unprecedented compassion.
"Both the One who makes people holy and those are made holy are of the same family. Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers and sisters."
Jesus is such a beautiful Saviour.
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