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December 10

A Man Of Sorrows

Text: Isaiah 53:3

April 9, 1966. This infamous day will be remembered as the day Time magazine released their iconic cover, Is God dead? Atheists applauded. Agnostics continued to wrestle. Theists decried this as heresy. Honestly, God had been slowly draining out of American society ever since the release of Darwin’s Origin of the Species. The irony is that though God is being aggressively pushed out, Jesus of Nazareth is still fairly relevant. Matt James of Pop Culture Died said this about the “Jesus is my Homeboy” phenomenon, 

“These shirts became a hot item in the early ‘00s after they started being sold at the trendy Teenage Millionaire on Melrose. Everybody from Ben Affleck to Pamela Anderson was spotted wearing one, and in recent years, I think I saw Lily Allen wear one on Instagram.”

Now without a doubt, a lot has changed in the last 15 years. Even the pacifist, inclusive, feminist, queer version of Jesus is having a hard time sustaining an audience in our post-Christian, post-theist, post-truth Western world. Yet I know the real Jesus, the Jesus of the Bible, the Jesus who is God clothed in flesh would be just as sorrowful as He was in the 1st century. Isaiah told us this. 

“He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not.” (Isaiah 53:3) 

Do we like the idea of a Messiah who is a Man of Sorrows? Some might say they don’t. But I do. Jesus wept for Jerusalem. Jesus wept for the impending disaster. Jesus wept because they rejected the offer of salvation. Jesus wept because they held onto the lies of religion. Jesus wept because He loved the world. If you are not sorrowful about the current plight of humanity, you are either too comfortable, too rich, too selfish or too bitter. 

Look around. Please look around. Sorrow can exist with hope. But hope is much sweeter when sorrow has a voice. Christmas is just a fortnight away.