Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":
It so happens that I have neither a cat nor a dog just now, so the quail have made my back yard their home. They feel safe. It’s interesting to watch the submission of the little quail to their parents’ leading. The Lord Jesus tells us that the infinite Father in heaven cares about even them: “One of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father [caring]. But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many” little birds (Matt. 10:29-31).
Did the infinite Father in heaven care about the Lord Jesus? He said plaintively, “The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man hath not where to lay His head” (Matt. 8:20). Did “we” care?
It’s a terrible feeling to be a grown man and have not even a square inch you can call your own “nest,” nor the means to provide one or rent one. You can feel so utterly alone.
So did Jesus, when He was among us. Yet He was 100 per cent human; He felt His aloneness—not physically so much as the constant realization that His closest friends, the disciples, were spiritually “strangers.” I have often felt so ashamed for them (and at the same time felt their shame is mine for I am as corporately guilty as they were)—not one of them came up to the cross where He was hanging in agony, and gave Him even a drink of water! Nor was even one of them able to share the burden on His heart.
We cannot say that the Father really forsook Him when He screamed in agony, “My Father, why have You forsaken Me?” (Matt. 27:46) but the Father was forced to appear to forsake Him and to leave Him to feel the utter aloneness and condemnation that sin has brought on the human race.
The “condemnation” we have all received from our fallen “father Adam” has always been only judicial. No human in 6000+ years has ever endured it actually—except Jesus only.
On your knees, thank Him that He has not left you alone; let your worldly, egocentric heart be warmed by the realization of His “much more abounding grace” that saves you from eternal aloneness, and gives you a place in His eternal kingdom of sunlit fellowship (cf. Rom. 5:20).
Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.
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