By J.R. Miller
"For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses." Hebrews 4:15
The gospel story of Christ, closes with the account of His ascension. He was received up into heaven and sat down at the right hand of God. Was that the end of His interest in this world? Does He think of us, up there in His glory? Does He know anything of us down here in our struggles, our toils, our cares, and our sorrows? Is He interested in our lives in this world--in our joys and griefs, in our hopes and fears?
The answer to these questions is that in heaven He is "touched with the feeling of our infirmities." He sympathizes with us in all the experiences of our lives. The word sympathy means suffering with. If two musical instruments, standing near each other, are tuned to the same key, and a performer plays on one of them, the chords of the other respond too, as if invisible fingers were playing the same music on the strings. When two friends are side by side, and one of them is passing through an experience of either joy or pain, the other shares the experience. So Christ in heaven sympathizes with his friends on the earth in their experiences, and is instantly touched with the feeling of their gladness and their grief.
We believe all this as a doctrine--but what meaning has it for us in our own lives? What is Christ in heaven to us in a personal, practical way? If the truth of the sympathy of Christ becomes real in our experience, it will bring great strength and inspiration to us. We are helped in times of weakness or suffering by the consciousness that human friends are thinking of us and sharing our trouble. Immeasurably greater is the help which it gives us to know that Christ in heaven is touched by our pain and feels with us.
If we were really conscious that Christ cares, fees with us, is actually interested in our large and small affairs, it would change the meaning of all life for us.
We have hints of the same truth in the Old Testament. For example, we read with reference to God's people: "In all their afflictions He was afflicted." But the New Testament teaching means far more than this, for Christ lived all the story of human life through to its close, for Himself, and, therefore, knows it by experience. When we are weary--it comforts us to remember that many times He was weary, too. When we are treated unfairly, unkindly, or even with bitter wrong--it strengthens us to know that He understands, because He suffered in the same way. In our temptations--it helps us to endure to remember that He was "tempted in all points like as we are." In any path in which we have to walk--we can always find His footprints--He went over the same way before us, and, therefore, understands and sympathizes with us.
There are many experiences in which the sympathy of Christ, if it were realized, would give great comfort. There are people who are misunderstood. Indeed, there is no one whom others always fully understand. Even our truest friends ofttimes put wrong constructions upon what we do what we say. Little things separate lives--which ought to be kept close together. Very much sadness is caused by misunderstandings.
But Christ understands us perfectly. He knows all the truth about us. He knows our faults, and is patient with them, and does not chide us, nor cast us off because of them--but helps us to overcome them. When we are blamed unjustly, He understands and sympathizes with us and strengthens us to go on in patience. When we have done wrong, He knows--but is pitiful toward our weakness, and merciful toward our sin, if only we are striving ever to grow better. In every mood of our experience, He sympathizes with us.
There are sorrows in every life--many of which are inexplicable. There are those whose quietest days are full of struggles of which their closest friends can know nothing. It is very hard for some people to be godly, to resist temptation, to keep sweet under irritation and insult, to maintain purity of heart amid all the enticements of temptation. Nothing else gives such strength and help in hard experiences, as knowing of the unfailing sympathy of Christ.
The superintendent of an inebriate asylum said that he always had hope of even the worst alcoholic, if he knows that the man had someone at home who loved him and was praying for him; but that he had little hope of the permanent reform of any one for whom there was no wrestling love at home. If there is such help in human love and interest and prayer, how much more must there be in the confidence that Christ is sympathizing and interceding?
The story is told of a distinguished woman, that when she was a girl she was so homely that even her mother said to her one day: "My poor child, you are so ugly that no one will ever love you." The cruel words fell into the child's heart--but instead of making her bitter--they had just the opposite effect. She determined that if her face was homely--that she would make her life so beautiful that people would love her. She began to be kind to everybody, to be loving, thoughtful, gentle, and helpful. She never became handsome in features--but she did become the good angel of the community in which she lived. It was love in her which that transformed her life, and saved her from utter disheartenment.
There are those whose lives have been hurt in some way, and who seem doomed to carry their marring or wounding through all their days--but whom the love of Christ can yet restore to beauty and strength. There is no ruin which He cannot build up again into fair loveliness. There is no defeat which He cannot turn into victory. To know that He is touched, the Christ on His throne of glory, with the feeling of our infirmities, puts into the heart a new secret of joy which will transform the dreariest life into heavenly gladness.
