Christ Identifies with our Sorrows

Christ Triumphant - A Devotional by E.G. White

Christ Identifies with our Sorrows

Today's Text: Jesus said, Take ye away the stone. Martha, the sister of him that was dead, saith unto him, Lord ... he hath been dead four days. John 11:39

The Message:      Christ alone was able to bear the afflictions of the many. "In all their affliction he was afflicted." He never bore disease in His own flesh, but He carried the sickness of others. With tenderest sympathy He looked upon the suffering ones who pressed about Him. He groaned in spirit as He saw the work of Satan revealed in all their woe, and He made every case of need and of sorrow His own.... The power of love was in all His healing. He identified His interests with suffering humanity.      Christ was health and strength in Himself, and when sufferers were in His immediate presence, disease was always rebuked. It was for this that He did not go at once to Lazarus. He could not witness his suffering and not bring him relief. He could not witness disease or death without combating the power of Satan. The death of Lazarus was permitted that through his resurrection the last and crowning evidence might be given to the Jews that Jesus was the Son of God.      And in all this conflict with the power of evil, there was ever before Christ the darkened shadow into which He Himself must enter. Ever before Him was the means by which He must pay the ransom for these souls. As He witnessed the suffering of humanity, He knew that He must bear a greater pain, mingled with mockery, that He would suffer the greatest humiliation. When He raised Lazarus from the dead, He knew that for that life He must pay the ransom on the cross of Calvary....      Christ was strong to save the whole world. He wept at the grave of Lazarus at the thought that He could not save everyone whom Satan's power had laid low in death.... From the light of His exalted purity, the world's Redeemer could see that the maladies from which the human family were suffering were brought upon them by transgression of the law of God. Every case of suffering He could trace back to its cause.... He knew that He alone could rescue them from the pit into which they had fallen. He alone could place their feet in the right path. His perfection alone could avail for their imperfection. He alone could cover their nakedness with His own spotless robe of righteousness....      By actual experience He knew nothing of sin; He stood before the world the spotless Lamb of God. When suffering humanity pressed about Him, He who was in the health of perfect manhood was as one afflicted with them. This was essential, that He might express His perfect love in behalf of humanity.-Manuscript 18, 1898.

Commentary: My friend, when Jesus was on this earth the Jews questioned His authority; they questioned and rejected that He was the Son of God, for it was by His authority that He could relieve the sufferings of all those who came to Him in faith.  The Son of man came not to destroy but to redeem mankind. In the courts of heaven, there was one who questioned the authority of the Son of God.  Lucifer, the one who was daily in the presence of the Father, was exalted above all other angels and was next in authority to the Son of God.  Yet though he was thus honored, he began to covet the position of the Son, and began to question as to why he was not brought into all of the counsels of the Father, and he began to question the authority of the Son of God.  Thus the mystery of iniquity began in the heart of Lucifer. In heaven, Lucifer began to insinuate doubts as to the authority of the Son of God and all of heaven was brought into the controversy.  In response to his accusations the Father clarified the position of the Son before all of heaven, declaring that His only begotten Son was the only being in all the universe that could enter into all of His counsels.  To this, all of the angels rejoiced.  Lucifer was caught up with the rest of the angelic host and rejoiced with them for a while, but within his heart the spirit of rebellion remained, and he soon continued to insinuate doubts as to the authority of the Son of God until he was in open rebellion against the government of God. In the time of the first coming of the Son of God, he continued the work that he began in heaven and instilled doubt into the Jewish leadership as to the authority of the Son of God, and through this doubt he led them to reject and crucify the Son of God.  The one thing that Satan hates above all else is the fact that our Redeemer is the Son of God.  The authority of the Son is in His connection to the Father, and it is this authority that Satan is at war with. Today, the arch deceiver has led the whole of the Christian world to deny the authority of the Son of God by the introducing the doctrine of the trinity.  In the trinity he has artfully separated the authority of the Son from the Father, by changing the title of the Son of God to "God the Son".  In placing his divinity first, he has in essence separated Him from His authority as the Son of God.  The authority of the Son is in the fact that He is the Son of God.  By making this subtle change in how we view God, the arch deceiver has led many to worship a false god for "God the Son" is not the Son of God, for the authority of "God the Son" is in himself, and the authority of the Son of God is in the Father. The sad fact today is that the Seventh-day Adventist Church, by adopting the false doctrine of the trinity, is separating the people from the Son of God, and by this deception is preparing the church to receive the mark of the beast to come.  The trinity is the central doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church and from it come all of its doctrines, to include Sunday sacredness.  By adopting the trinity as the image of God, the remnant church is brought into harmony with Rome.  By looking unto "God the Son" we are separated from the Father. My friend, it is only by our connection with the Son of God that we are brought into connection with the Father.  That is why Hebrews 12:2 says "Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith;"  As we look unto the Son of God we are brought into connection with the One true God.  "And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent." (John 17:3). May you look away from "God the Son" and unto the Son of God today. God bless,

Video of the Week Laodicea or Philadelphia - by Bill Cave Bill Cave presents a message of how the Seventh-day Adventist church became Laodicea from Philadelphia and that we need to go back to the church of Philadelphia.