We all wish that the Bible could tell us more about the earthly life of Jesus, the divine Son of God, what He was like when He was with us “in the flesh” as a man, as a child, as a youth. Luke spends a little time telling us some, in his chapter two (vss. 40ff), but we long for more.
For example, when Jesus prayed, how did He pray? We read often that He prayed, and one prayer we have (John 17); but what would it have been like to listen to Him pray?
We have a vivid picture in Hebrews 5 where He is compared (and contrasted) with the earthly high priests (the words “so also”):
(a) He, like they, “is taken from among men” (vs. 1). Jesus must be one of us!
(b) He has “compassion on those who are ignorant and going astray, since He also Himself is beset by weakness” (vs. 2). Note: Jesus was not beset by His own sin, for He had none; but He was beset by the kind of our “weakness” that left Him utterly dependent on His Father. He is needy, one of us!
(c) He “did not glorify Himself to become High Priest” but was “appointed” by the Father (vs. 5, 6). He did not push Himself.
(d) “In the days of His flesh ... He ... offered up prayers and supplications” (vs, 7): two words—the latter derived from the custom of an utterly bereft suppliant carrying an olive-branch (Vine, Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words). He begged the Father for help!
(e) When Jesus prayed, it was “with vehement cries and tears” (vs. 7). We say He was “broken up.” The climax of course came in Gethsemane when He prayed so “vehemently” that He sweat blood (Mark 14:33, 34; Luke 22:44), but He came near to that many times in His prayers.
(f) As one of us, He begged to be “saved from death” (vs. 7), the most anxious praying imaginable. “Death” to Him meant the second death.
(g) He was “heard because of His godly fear,” not because He was the Son of God! As one of us, He had humble reverence for God!
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