I woke up at 2:30 this morning, after going to bed at 11. I think the jet lag is getting to me much worse than I originally thought.

But since I was up, I started to think about Jesus, and the idea that He understands every suffering we go through.

I think this is the uniqueness of the King we serve. In no other religion do we have one who was tempted with the same temptations, and experienced the same challenges and losses, and still lived a perfect life, in obedience and love. In other religions, we are presented with deities who are either so far above or so far removed from human sufferings that they have no concept of it whatsoever, or we have deities who are entirely imperfect, indulging their every human-like whim to the fullest.

Instead, we have what Hebrews 2 tells us:

17 Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. 18 For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.

Isn't that weird?

We have a God who actually knows what the suffering is like for the person who is depressed and on medication. We have a God who knows the suffering of the widow, the orphan, the one who lost their child, the one who's spouse left them, who has been rejected by society, rejected by everyone He could be rejected by, rejected by His own Father, with whom He's had a perfect relationship with since the beginning of eternity.

And He experienced all this for us, so that we would know Him. In fact, we know Him even more so in our suffering because of it.

Isn't that grand? That when we're suffering, God made it so that even that is drawing us closer to Him?