(P)As...
Illustration
(P)
As a boy, I read the book The Prince and the Pauper without ever relating the story to that of Jesus. Not until many years later, as an adult who is a preacher of the gospel, did I realize the incarnational implications. A good but unfeeling prince finds himself cast out of his world of insulated palatial privilege. In the rags of pauperhood, he participates in the deprivations and injustices of his ordinary subjects. He becomes one of them. The Prince exchanges places with the pauper. The Prince gets kicked around, abused, harassed. He lives in poverty. He moves among the dirty, ragged, hungry, and looked-down upon ordinary people. He will never be the same again. When he returns to his Princely status, he will not any longer be unfeeling about the problems and pain of ordinary people. He will understand. He will care. He will help. He will reach out.
This, it strikes me, is a marvelous parable of the meaning of the Incarnation. We need never despair about a remote or unsympathetic God who is unable to hear our prayer and feel our pain. Our God understands! In the matchless lines of out text --
For we have not a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sinning. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. (Hebrews 4:15, 16.)
-- Campbell
As a boy, I read the book The Prince and the Pauper without ever relating the story to that of Jesus. Not until many years later, as an adult who is a preacher of the gospel, did I realize the incarnational implications. A good but unfeeling prince finds himself cast out of his world of insulated palatial privilege. In the rags of pauperhood, he participates in the deprivations and injustices of his ordinary subjects. He becomes one of them. The Prince exchanges places with the pauper. The Prince gets kicked around, abused, harassed. He lives in poverty. He moves among the dirty, ragged, hungry, and looked-down upon ordinary people. He will never be the same again. When he returns to his Princely status, he will not any longer be unfeeling about the problems and pain of ordinary people. He will understand. He will care. He will help. He will reach out.
This, it strikes me, is a marvelous parable of the meaning of the Incarnation. We need never despair about a remote or unsympathetic God who is unable to hear our prayer and feel our pain. Our God understands! In the matchless lines of out text --
For we have not a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sinning. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. (Hebrews 4:15, 16.)
-- Campbell
