But we do see Jesus

A confident life in disordered days

Do you know how much you were made for, how much you were intended to be? The writer to the Hebrews picks up the witness of Psalm 8 and lays its ambitious agenda for humanity before our waiting eyes:

What is mankind that you are mindful of them,
a son of man that you care for him?
You made them for a little while lower than the angels;
you crowned them with glory and honour
and put everything under their feet.¹

Truth to tell, though, it seldom ever seems or feels like that. In fact, hardly at all. And that’s a perspective the writer also shares. With such a prospect of meaning and purpose he laments that while “God left nothing that is not subject to them…yet at present we do not see everything subject to them.”²

That’s not a destructive impulse wanting to express itself in reckless dominion, to have everything subject to you. It’s the taste of tragedy lingering long on the tongue: made for so much, we achieve so little, of beauty and goodness that lasts and is not subject to agonised decay. We do not see. Set within God’s good world, humanity was tasked with harnessing its hopes into a harvest of praise, the inarticulate being gathered into a grammar for the glory of God. Lives lived under the law of love, suffused with solid joys and lasting treasures. And it just isn’t what we see nor how we experience it. Not now; not yet.

We encounter tragic circumstances and might want to say with Steven Curtis Chapman that

This is not how it should be,
This is not how it could be,
But this is how it is…
This is not where we planned to be
When we started this journey
But this is where we are…³

Sickness and sorrow, distress and devastation. Creation in turmoil, human lives torn apart, all dreams destroyed and all bets off. This is how it is and this is where we are. Death weaponised by the devil to cause us to cower in complete and paralysing terror. A fear that clouds every day and corrupts all it touches.

Take a moment to survey the wreckage. Because it’s there. Everywhere. And in the face of it all it’s easy to quiet quit on the life of faith, to allow the understandable weariness to morph into a confounding cynicism.

Which is likely where the first readers of Hebrews found themselves. So the writer wants to encourage them to allow their eyes to take in a greater sight, a transforming reality: No, we don’t see humanity thriving and blossoming, he agrees; “But we do see Jesus.”

Words that have the power to change lives and turn them around. When we look, when we take the words of scripture seriously, when we immerse ourselves in the accounts of Jesus we begin to see that our frustrated hopes are no longer futile. Because we discover the God who became fully human, taking on our hurts and tasting our tears, shouldering our shame and bearing our sin, finally sinking into the death that was ours and emerging victorious from the grave, systematically disarming the one who imprisoned and intimidated each of us. A merciful and faithful high priest, one who feels with us and for us when tempted, because he went through it too. One who is ready to lift our lives in the most complete act of grace.

Perhaps you find this so very hard to believe?

The English pop/rock duo, Tears For Fears, in a recently-released song, Say Goodbye to Mum and Dad, lament that

Everything is up for grabs
Go tell all your friends society's gone mad
It's no life, this island of fear
Inside, outside, nowhere to hide
When tomorrow comes
We'll face the great divide
It's a dusty road of faded photographs
Things are broken and they're never coming back⁴

They always were a downbeat band, you might say. Well, true enough, But in between the verses they sing that “God is wise and Jesus loves us all”. How does that relate to the fear, to the great divide? Is it sincere? Ironic? Or perhaps plain cynical?

If I had to guess I’d opt for somewhere between irony and unbelief (or perhaps just uncertain)—and the fact is it does seem too be good to be true. You’re not alone in wondering if God is really wise and Jesus truly loving, guys. But when we humbly and honestly do all we can to “see Jesus” things begin to change, to clarify into a belief that is not bravado but a confidence that emerges into the light of a new day from a now and forever empty tomb.

Steven Curtis Chapman’s lament quoted above has within it the answer we all long for and are offered in Jesus:

This is not how it should be
This is not how it could be
This is how it is
And our God is in control

This is not how it will be
When we finally will see
We'll see with our own eyes
He was always in control

This is not where we planned to be
When we started this journey
But this is where we are
And our God is in control

Though this first taste is bitter
There will be sweetness forever
When we finally taste and see
That our God is in control

And we'll sing holy, holy, holy is our God
And we will finally really understand what it means
So we'll sing holy, holy, holy is our God
While we're waiting for that day

Our God is in control. A control that is not an impersonal imposition but the loving embrace of our good and great Creator, ever-gracious in his all-glorious Son. Yes, we do see Jesus.

1. Hebrews 2:6-8 — see also Psalm 8:4-6

2. Hebrews 2:4,5

3. Our God Is In Control

4. Tears For Fears, Say Goodbye to Mum and Dad