Isaiah 53:2-3
My servant grew up in the LORD's presence like a tender green shoot, like a root in dry ground.
There was nothing beautiful or majestic about His appearance, nothing to attract up to Him.
He was despised and rejected--- a man of sorrows, acquainted with deepest grief.
We turned out backs on Him and looked the other way. He was despised and we did not care.
The idea of a "Common" Jesus is foreign to most believers.
Why?
Because we want our Jesus to be superman....
We want bulging muscles and wavy black hair that fills a muscular face.
Jaw of granite...
Steely eyed....
Booming voice...
Able to leap the Temple in a single bound...
One who fights for truth, justice, and the right way to live.
The muscular Jesus.
but what I read in the Isaiah passage is that Jesus was plain....
Very plain.....
Maybe even what some might say would be homely.
Isn't that just the way our world operates?
All bout the image and not the substance.
Give me the flash and grin on the outside and cast aside that which truly makes the man
Kind of hard to wrap my brain around the fact that God chose an unassuming body to inhabit when He came to earth to walk among us. Isn't that just like God though? He came to where we were....He brought His complete power and authority and yet, laid it aside to become the payment for our sins.....A payment that demanded blood shed and death to satisfy justice. He didn't have to do this. He didn't have to become one despised and rejected, but He did.
What manner of love is this that Jesus possesses that He would leave heaven to once and for all time, with His death and resurrection, break the power of sin, cancel the penalty of sin, and arm those who answer His call to salvation and life with the overcoming of the presence of sin.
The other side to the is coin is the idea that some have of a wimpy, powerless Jesus. Hanging there on the cross, you can count every rib in his side because He appears to frail. You might even say that His dying was a good thing, because it doesn't look like He could even take care of Himself. He probably got picked last at recess when the other kids chose sides for football games. "O.k.....we'll take Jesus. You go long and we'll fake the ball to you."
How Boink is this thought? The idea of a Wimpy Jesus? So we have the Terminator Jesus or the Don Knott's Jesus.
Truth be known, the reality is somewhere in the middle.
I love it that Jesus possessed the ability to blend into a crowd and not be recognized.
Think about it.
He has been going around the countryside teaching and demonstrating the reality of the kingdom of God. He healed people. He fed the multitudes with a simple "Happy meal". He raised the dead. Made the lame to walk. Gave the blind their eyesight back. He was at the Temple doing all of this in front of the religious rulers, but when it came time to arrest Jesus they had to hire someone to identify Him. They could not pick Him out of the crowd, and it took the kiss of a traitor to mark Jesus as the one that was the focal point of all their hatred.
The common Jesus...
The unrecognized Jesus...
Unrecognized by the religious....
But not by the common man and woman....they knew this Jesus and they followed Him around to see what He would do next.
I think I would like this Jesus best....
The one who chose the foolish things of the world to confound the wise.
The Jesus who chose the ones who were powerless to shame those who thought themselves powerful.
That is my Jesus.
The Jesus that chose those things despised by the world. Things counted as nothing at all.
That is my Jesus.....
Why?
Because I am one of those foolish things He has chosen to confound the wise.
I am well aware of my limitations and yet, through His empowerment by the Holy Spirit, I am able to accomplish things that were never in the realm of possibility.
That is my Jesus.....
What kind of Jesus do you have?
Hmmmmm....
Think on these things.
God on you.....
michael b.
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