Jesus did not cling to his divinity. He did not simply dip into our existence, wave the magic wand of divine life over us, and then hurriedly retreat to his eternal home. He did not leave us with a tattered dream, letting us brood over the mystery of our existence. Instead, Jesus subjected himself to our plight. He immersed himself in our misery and followed man's road to the end. He did not escape from the torment of our life, nobly repudiating man. With the full weight of his divinity he descended into the abyss of human existence, penetrating its darkest depths. He was not spared from the dark mystery of our poverty as human beings.
Nor are we "spared from the dark mystery of our poverty". Now we have a guide to see us through it.
...but the end was just the beginning! Jesus descended to the depths of our humanity, and in doing so elevated us to the level of his divinity. He lives within us, creating us ever anew in his image. Therein lies the HOPE!
I have often thought that this is one of the reasons Jesus came on his mission to earth. That is, he came to experience first-hand what it was like to be human, and perhaps to return to God his father with this information.
Shirley
There was a story going around several years ago about a farmer, warm in his cabin on a snowed in farm, seeing a bird outside his window that had missed the migration and was suffering from the cold that the bird had no defense against.
The man gave up his warmth to go out into the snow, believing that if he could just get the bird into the barn, that the bird would be able to survive the cold amongst the warm straw and food. But for all of his trying, the man finally realized that only another bird could show the bird how to save itself.
For all of God's trying, He could not get through to us His creations, because we could not conceptualize His existence. It took the emptying of God into a man, someone who we could see, feel, touch, etc., to give us the chance to finally "get it". And still, many didn't and still don't.
God did though, give us a walking breathing example to follow; and knowing that we would still not totally get it, the grace to help us when we don't, time and time again.
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