Have you ever been rejected or betrayed by anyone? Or lost someone close to you? How did you feel at the time? How do you feel about it now? Did you heal from the trauma or have you suppressed the pain in order to move on? These are valid questions for anyone who has struggled with relationships. Jesus can offer deep healing because He was also deeply wounded, rejected and betrayed, and He understands our pain. He has lived it.
How did Jesus feel at the moment Judas betrayed Him into the hands of the Romans? What emotions prevailed in Him that compelled Him to cry out, “My God, My God, why have you forsaken Me?” (Matthew 27:46). In Matthew 26:36-44, we learn of the intense anguish that Jesus felt in the garden at Gethsemane on the night that He was arrested.
“Then Jesus went to a place called Gethsemane, and said to them, ‘Sit here while I go over there and pray.’ He took Peter and the two sons of Zebedee along with Him, and began to be sorrowful and troubled. Then He said, ‘My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with Me.’
Going a little farther, He fell with His face to the ground and prayed, ‘My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from Me. Yet not as I will, but as you will.’ Then He returned to His disciples and found them sleeping. ‘Couldn’t you men keep watch with Me for one hour?’ He asked Peter. ‘Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.’
He went away a second time and prayed, ‘My Father, if it is not possible for this cup to be taken away unless I drink it, may your will be done.’ When He came back, He again found them sleeping, because their eyes were heavy. So He left them and went away once more and prayed a third time, saying the same thing.”
THE EXTREME DISTRESS OF JESUS
Luke 22:44 records that, “And being in anguish, He prayed more earnestly, and His sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground.” The extreme distress of Jesus in those moments caused a condition known medically as hematidrosis, where the blood vessels surrounding a person’s sweat glands constrict and then dilate to the point of rupture. The intensity of the stress of knowing what He was about to endure must have been mortifying.
None of us can assert that Jesus isn’t empathetic towards our inner pain. He understands because He personally experienced deep inner pain also. Hebrews 4:15 echoes through the corridors of time, “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.”
Jesus loves our whole being, deepest failures and all. And He saves us completely – from our darkest moments and our most egregious sin. God wants the gospel to penetrate deeply into the core of our being and heal our innermost wounds. Belief and repentance simultaneously facilitate the metamorphosis of our souls and through the process of regeneration we are born again from the inside out.
Seven hundred years before Jesus was born, the prophet Isaiah wrote these words about the promised Messiah: “The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on Me, because the Lord has anointed Me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent Me to bind up the broken hearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn, and provide for those who grieve in Zion – to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair.”
THE WORDS OF JESUS
Luke 14:16-21 records the words of Jesus regarding this prophecy: “He went to Nazareth, where He had been brought up, and on the Sabbath day He went into the synagogue, as was His custom. He stood up to read, and the scroll of Isaiah was handed to Him. Unrolling it, He found the place where it is written:
‘The Spirit of the Lord is on Me, because He has anointed Me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent Me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.’
Then He rolled up the scroll and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on Him. He began saying to them, ‘Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.’” Everything humanity truly needed hung on those words, yet moments later, everyone in the synagogue became furious and tried to throw Jesus off a cliff (Luke 4:28-30).
This was just one of the many rejections Jesus experienced. John 6:60-71 reveals how Christ’s polarizing teachings caused many people to reject Him. “From this time many of His disciples turned back and no longer followed Him.” (John 6:66). Isaiah 53:3 tells us, “He was despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering and familiar with pain. Like one from whom people hide their faces He was despised, and we held Him in low esteem.”
Not only does Jesus relate to us in our rejection, He demonstrates that forgiveness sets us free from it. When He hung on the cross, He prayed, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” Redemption not only impacts our vertical relationship with God, it also affects our horizontal relationships as well. We forgive others who trespass against us.
ADVERSITY BUILDS CHARACTER
Adversity builds character. James 1:2-4 offers encouragement to anyone who has faced it. “Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.”
The earliest manuscripts of this passage of scripture do not contain the word “it,” Without “it” the verse provides slightly different insight into our interpretation. No one finds adversity joyful at the time. Rather, considering pure joy in the midst of adversity provides the hope to overcome our trials.
Through perseverance we can become mature and complete. The Greek word teleios is rendered as “perfect” in some translations, however, this does not imply that believers are without sin. Teleios means: “to fulfill an intended purpose or to be fit for a task”. Our difficulties equip us to better manage adversity in the future and to solidify our conviction to respond to our calling.
My personal hardships prepared me for prison ministry by blessing me with empathy and the recognition that the brokenness of others is no more severe than my own. “For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by His grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.” (Romans 3:23-24). We all share the need for redemption.
The perspective provided by this insight offers a better understanding of Mathew 5:48, where Jesus declares, “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” The context isn’t sinless perfection (although God is perfect in every way), bur rather, a mature and complete spiritual development. When we ascertain that our complete surrender to the sovereignty of Christ consummates in His righteousness being imputed onto us, we become fully obedient and complete in our love for God and others.
We can spend our entire lives in denial of our inner trauma by suppressing the hurt from wounds in our past through severing the connection between our hearts and our heads. By living disconnected from our deepest emotions and depriving ourselves of the healing we desperately require to be complete. The resulting dysfunction affects our relationships with family, friends, colleagues and God.
In the same way that we must fully surrender every room in the house to completely overcome sin, we also must surrender our whole hearts to Christ in order to provide Him with the opportunity to heal us from within. Jesus stands at the door to our hearts and knocks, and anyone who opens the door will have deep fellowship, connection and healing in the deepest corners of their being (Revelation 3:23).
Deep wounds require deep healing and Jesus provides the greatest extent of healing there is – physically, emotionally, mentally and spiritually. By His wounds we are healed. Jesus offers redemption to all and He also offers restoration. “He heals the broken hearted and binds up their wounds (Psalm 147:3).
