No Mere Mortals

In bringing many sons to glory, it was fitting that God, for whom and through whom everything exists, should make the author of their salvation perfect through suffering. Both the one who makes men holy and those who are made holy are of the same family.
So Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers. Hebrews 2:10-11

I have a brother and a sister, both living in Alberta, as well as other very close family members.
You may have met some of my family over the years.
I dearly love them and would do anything needed if they required my help. I know the same is true for you too.
It may be some one other than a close relative who is like a brother or a sister for you, but for most of us there is at least one person who becomes that for us.

Can you imagine that person being Jesus?
That may be difficult.
The writer of Hebrews says something quite remarkable. I hope you hear it.
I am going to change the gender so it applies to us all
He says,

Both the one who makes us holy and those who are made holy are of the same family.
So Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers and sisters.

How can this be?
First, Jesus made himself our brother on earth.
Then he made us his brothers and sisters of heaven.

Jesus renounced his throne to which he was entitled. He became human.
This is the one characteristic that separates Christian belief from all others.
It is the notion that God became flesh and blood in the form of Jesus of Nazareth.
Not a mythical person, but a real historical figure who lived in one particular geographical locale at one specific moment in history, who was known by the people he lived among.

Jesus was subject to all the same physical, emotional and mental limitations as you and I.
He gave up all his divine power and fore-knowledge to live as a human being, subject to all the laws of a mortal human being.
So then how was he able to raise the dead and prophecy what would happen in others lives?
How did he know? How did he act?

He knew by the power of the Holy Spirit.
What was singularly different about his life was that it was completely sin free.
And he spent hours in prayer with God.
So that when he went about the Holy Spirit directed his actions and have him the knowledge about people that he needed.
He says this in John where he says he does nothing of his own will, but only follows the directions of his Father.
And often he would pray before acting. He prayed before calling Lazarus out of the grave.
He conveyed upon his disciples much of the same authority to act in his name.

Hebrews says he was the one who makes us holy.
By his sinless life, he paid once and for all, the price of all our sin.
When we confess it and ask for forgiveness, it is gone.

And in doing that for us, he makes us citizens of heaven.
We become his brothers and sisters, not just of this realm, but of the heavenly realm too.
He understands what it is to live here with all its temptations, but he overcame it for us.
Then he gives us his own holiness.
Without that, we have no hope of eternity.
Flesh and blood cannot inherit the spiritual realm.
Only by giving us his own holiness do we become ready for eternity.

And in the meantime we live in exactly the same position on earth as Jesus did.
That is, we have the ear of God just as Jesus had it.
Just as Elijah had it, if you remember last week's teaching.
I think this is something we really do not comprehend.
If in faith and in obedience we ask God to act in our world, He will.
According to what is best and what His own plans are to be sure.
But God will act.

What we have to do is live in Jesus holiness.
That means staying close to him day by day.
If you drift and think to yourself that you can do by your own willpower what needs doing, you will fail.
Pure and simple. You will fail.
Only when we acknowledge our total dependence on God every day, will we have heaven's resources.
Go it alone and you will not hear his voice directing your actions.
That is a recipe for bad choices and their consequences.

Listen to him day by day and cultivate a life of closeness and you have his guidance available to you.
Psalm 25 says, "God confides in those who fear Him"
Jesus says the same thing in John 14. He says that whoever loves him, obeys what he says, then he says that person will be loved and that Jesus will reveal Himself to that person. He says, in that day we can ask of him what we will and that He will do it.

When Jesus is your brother, is there anything in life that we should fear or be stopped by?
We will be stopped if it is not God's will.
But if it is God's will then He will see to it.

There is another implication that the writer C.S. Lewis points out.
He says:

Remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would strongly be tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal.¹

And as C.S. Lewis puts it, this may be our greatest calling--that is encouraging one another to remember who we are.
How many people do you know who truly grasp the significance of who they are in God?
How many of us do?

Lewis is right.
Others are far more than they appear to be.
Jesus lived the life of a mortal, but he was no 'mere mortal'. And he has transformed out lives.

We are no longer mere mortals. We are brothers and sisters of the king and citizens of heaven.
By courtesy of the King of Glory.

Preached October 4, 2009
Dr. Harold McNabb
West Shore Presbyterian Church
Victoria, British Columbia

Notes
¹ C. S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory (HarperOne, 2001), p. 46

Online Resources Consulted
http://www.preachingtoday.com/

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