Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread,"
We read of Jesus that “He is despised and rejected of men” (Isa. 53:3).
We might say, “Oh, He was the Son of God and He knew that all heaven was His, so it didn’t bother Him!” But can we forget that when He came to earth to be incarnate, He became one of us truly, fully, and He laid aside all the prerogatives of His divinity? He never laid aside His divinity, no; but He laid aside all the benefits that His divinity could give Him.
So, when He experienced being “despised and rejected” it hurt Him just as much as the experience hurts us. What makes rejection especially painful to endure is when you know that this bitter hatred you now must endure was once love; it’s love that has gone sour, curdled as it were.
Think of the people of Nazareth; once upon a time they loved Jesus as Mary’s Baby and as a Child, not knowing of course who He was or is. The women would coo over Him as a Baby, and admired Him as a Teenager, but when He went back one time to visit them and to preach in their Sabbath worship hour, all that human neighborly love they had once felt for Him turned sour and bitter, and they tried to throw Him over a cliff and kill Him (see Luke 4:16-29).
What was once love had turned to become bitter hatred! But if you have tasted it even a tiny bit, you can sympathize with Jesus in the pain He has had to feel.
Instead of spending your time praying that you might become happy, spend some time praying that the Lord Jesus may be rewarded soon for the pain He has had to endure.
--Robert J. Wieland
From the "Dial Daily Bread" Archive: December 29, 2008.
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