Dear Disciple,
“In bringing many sons and daughters to glory, it was fitting that God, for whom and through whom everything exists, should make the pioneer of their salvation perfect through what he suffered.” Hebrews 2:10 (NIV)
Praise be to God for another day of life and more time in this world to serve Him and grow nearer to Him! As dark and difficult as life in this world can be, we can live each day knowing that the One who calls us to become like Himself understands what it means to suffer, to struggle, and to face terrible hardship. More than that, according to the Scripture quoted above, Jesus was made perfect through His suffering!
The language here can be tricky for some because, if Jesus was made perfect, the suggestion is that He wasn’t perfect before He suffered. If He wasn’t perfect, we are tempted to reason, then He was somehow sinful or flawed. This is, of course, not the right way to view the statement about Jesus being made perfect. The word translated here as “perfect” communicates fullness, completeness, or maturity.
This doesn’t clear up the problem, though, because we assume that Jesus was full, complete, and mature before He suffered. So here’s the question: in what way was Jesus not full or complete before He suffered? As the author of the book of Hebrews points out here and in a few other places (see 5:9 and 7:28), Jesus had to suffer to be fully and completely qualified to be our High Priest. He had to take on our humanity and suffer in that humanity in order to be the kind of High Priest who fully and completely meets our needs.
What a remarkable truth about our Master’s suffering and death! They were not just meant to make a way for our perfection; they also served to give our Master the experience He needed to perfectly play His role in our lives that the Father called Him to play. He had to show in actual experience that He would obey the Father when it was hardest to do, much like Abraham had to do so long before (see Genesis 22). Now, when we come to our High Priest who sits at God’s right hand, we can know that He understands our struggle, our weakness, and our pain. Because He went through what He did throughout His mortal life and death, He is the absolutely perfect One for the job!
Give fresh thanks and praise today, won’t you, Disciple? Our Master Jesus was willing to obey our Father in the costliest and most painful of circumstances. He has shown us what true loyalty and obedience look like, and now may we demonstrate that same level of loving loyalty and obedience to Him!
Grateful for our perfect High Priest with you,
Ryan
