Highlighting – “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet he did not sin.” (v.15)
What does it mean to empathize? Psychology Today defines empathy as, “the experience of understanding another person’s thoughts, feelings, and condition from his or her point of view, rather than from one’s own”. Today’s highlighted verse says, “we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses”, meaning God became man, Jesus Christ, and through becoming a man, He experienced what His created beings feel. God, in the person of Jesus Christ, has been through what we currently go through, so He understands us at our level. No other god is like this. Jesus gets “it”. He genuinely understands the fight we go through daily with our flesh in order to fully submit to His Spirit (consider Satan tempting Jesus in the wilderness, Matthew 4:1-11). I love that my God empathizes with me. God knew how difficult it would be to overcome our flesh with our own strength, that He gave all believers the gift of the Holy Spirit to dwell in us as reinforcement. Jesus Christ lived, felt what we felt on Earth, prayed for all believers before His departure, and now pleads to God on our behalf in Heaven (John 17:20-23, Romans 8:34). God does not leave us to our own devices, unless we choose that route, of course (because He gives us free will to choose Him or not). But if you choose Him by faith in His Son, He does everything in His power to help you, that’s true love.
When no one else understands us, Jesus Christ knows exactly how we feel. For this reason, we should go directly to Him at the onset of temptation, testing, difficulty, depression, anxiety, persecution, etc, because He’s already been through it and did not sin. We can walk in that same victory in Jesus Christ, and by the power of the Holy Spirit at work in us.
Dear Father, thank You for understanding me on a level that no one else truly can. I’m in awe of who You are and how You’ve provided for me in ways I didn’t realize I needed. I’m forever grateful that You love me so much. In Jesus’ name I pray, amen!
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