Authenticity and Suffering
Who has believed our message and to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed? He grew up before him like a tender shoot, and like a root out of dry ground. He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering. Like one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not.
-Isaiah 53: 1-3 NIV
I tend to breeze past the descriptions of Jesus like we see in this verse. Isaiah presents a Jesus that is incredibly in tune with the suffering around him. When someone is suffering it is so much harder to approach a person that looks like they have it all together. The verse says that Jesus was familiar with suffering. He was that much more aware of the suffering around him because he was experiencing it himself. As a twenty-something, I can very easily lose track of my own mortality and when I am no longer thinking about frailty of life, my suffering radar can malfunction. I begin to lose touch with the meaning of life, and I quickly start to make selfish decisions.
It is also a picture of authenticity. Jesus is not putting on a cover in order to attract a crowd to himself. If you have an outward focus, instead of a self-serving focus, there is no need to put on a front in order to draw people to you. I think most people will be drawn to someone who is genuine before they are drawn to someone that is clearly faking their appearance.
1 year ago • 0 notes