HE HANDICAPPED HIMSELF FOR HUMANITY

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I’ve always known that we have a High Priest (Jesus Christ) who is able to understand and grasp what we experience and go through everyday. For example, fear, grief, anxiety, abandonement and so on. Knowing that Jesus is able to empathise with us has always brought comfort to me. 

We do not have a High Priest who is out of touch with our reality. He’s been through weakness and testing, experienced it all.

Hebrews 4:15 (MSG)

But I never thought about how Jesus is ALSO able to relate to those who are handicapped (like me). Okay, maybe I’ve asked myself a few times can Jesus relate to disability? Or something along that line. But I didn’t have the answer. Until one day when I was listening to an audiobook co-written by Joni Eareckson Tada.

“You probably know at least a few disabled people. But did you ever think of the Lord Jesus Christ in that category?”

And here my answer would be no which makes sense, because Jesus did not have any physical disabilities. He wasn’t wheelchair-bound, blind, deaf or anything. 

“But He did handicap himself when He came to earth.”

Handicap. What does this word mean? According to the Webster dictionary, “handicap” is define as any difficulty which is imposed on a superior person. So is to hamper or disadvantaged him making that person more equal with others. By this definition, Jesus was handicapped, because “on one hand He possess the fullness of Almighty God, yet on the other hand made himself nothing.”

When Christ came to earth, He emtied himself. “Taking the vcry nature of a servant.” Talk about handicap, hey? 

“To be God on one hand and to make himself nothing. What a severe limitation. You would think it must have hampered the Lord. Put him in a disadvantage.”

How about this? “Jesus, Master Architect of the universe, designs planets and stars, galaxies and more, but on earth He was a carpenter, limiting his design work to stools and to tables. Jesus the eternal word spoke time and space into being, but on earth He chose to speak to prostitutes, lepers, and sinners. These limitations just didn’t happen to Jesus in the same way circumstances happen to you and me, Christ chose to be handicapped. If you have a physical handicap or maybe even an emotional or mental one, then you’re not in bad company. If anything, you’re in an elite fellowship wih Jesus Christ himself. We have no choice over our handicap, Jesus did, and He chose to be limited. So that He might set us free.”

I love the love of God for humanity! And the fact that, yes, Jesus CAN relate to disability. He can relate to your handicap. The next time the feeling of limitation arise, remember that there is a High Priest who is able to empathise with you. Remember that Jesus was also limited (by choice!).