Heb 4:15   For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are--yet was without sin.

 

Jesus understands us. He sympathises with the struggles we have. He knows what we go through. This is one of those things that separates off the Christian faith from all other religions – we have a God who understands what we go through because He has gone through it as well. This is the unique wonder of Christianity, that God has come to earth in the form of His Son and lived for some thirty three years in a human body, with all that that means. Jesus became tired. Jesus had to cope with other people. Jesus had to cope with trying circumstances. Jesus ate, slept, walked, ran, laughed, cried, Jesus did all the things normal human being did. He never entered into a physical relationship with another person, but he did enter into deeper relationships with some than others. In all these ways, he shared in our humanity and so knows what we feel.

 

The way he was different from us was that, although he was tempted like we are, he never gave way to that temptation. Does he look down on us because we do? No, you miss the point of him not giving way to temptation.   He knew he had to be a ‘spotless lamb' to act as God's sacrifice for all our sin; that's what drove him to overcome, that loving desire to redeem us from sin and judgement by the sacrifice of his own life that had to remain sinless. Hallelujah!