Now that you Know What you Have

When you know you have something, It changes things.
Sometimes it changes everything.

Like knowing you have cancer.
It changes your future, your choices, your thoughts, your hope. Nothing around you has changed, but suddenly you see everything differently. A little while ago you wanted to bite someone's head off, now you can't even remember why. That morning's irritations  become insignificant, yesterday's quarrels and squabbles become irrelevant.
You wonder how you could have worried about such "mole hills".
Living takes on a new focus, because life has become fragile. Where before, time was twiddled away, now every minute is precious.
Now you know what you have and life will never be the same.

"Now that we know what we have"
says The Message in Hebrews 4:14

The author is telling us we have a Great High Priest, and knowing that should change things.
Maybe everything!

Jesus became like one of us so that He would be a merciful and faithful high priest.
What exactly does a high priest do?
I'm not really used to having one.

The High Priest of old was chosen by God, and He chose only one man at a time to serve at that post.
This high priest prayed for the people, he was the one who represented the people before God, the only man allowed to enter into the Holiest of Holies. Even then, he alone went in once a year to make atonement for the sins of the people. Once a year, he entered through the veil with a blood sacrifice, once a year, the guilt of the people was taken and placed on the scapegoat, once a year, sins were covered.

Imagine having no other access to God except through one man.
What would that man be worth to you?

"sympathesai"
That's the word the author of Hebrews uses to describe what Jesus, my High Priest, can do for me.
It means that he can fellow feel with me.
It means that he is affected with the same feeling that affects me.

I'm best at feeling sorry for myself, but every now and then I can feel sorry for someone else who is going through difficult trials. That's usually what I think sympathize means, to feel sorry for someone.
I can say I'm sorry, but to say I know how you feel would only wound you more. Pity feels compassionate, but it fails to reach the depth of another's pain, agony or weakness.

What a big difference it makes to be able talk to someone who is able to feel exactly what you feel?
You see it in their eyes, hear it in their voice.
You just know that they know,
and instantly you feel comforted, feel like you're not alone, feel like there is hope.

It was the last meeting of the last day at a ladies retreat in the Sierra Nevadas, when someone announced "would you please go to the office, your husband needs to talk to you." As usual, I was talking and missed part of the announcement. Was that my name that had just been called? I glanced at my friend, and her worried look confirmed it. She insisted on walking with me to the office. Along the way, we talked about what it could be, but I couldn't imagine anything serious. I didn't want to believe it was bad news, even though only emergency calls were allowed. I picked up the phone, aware that my friend stared anxiously at me. I stared back, barely able to get out two words, "it's bad", before sobbing became the only sound I could make. I knew now that my dad had died of a massive heart attack and everything had changed. Steel bands gripped my heart and I thought I would never feel again. I thanked God for my friend, for her merciful sympathy when I needed her, but now I felt like something was missing, like I was waiting for something more.
We drove down the mountain to home, and I was waiting.
We got in the car and drove four hours to southern California, I was still waiting.
We flew to North Carolina, rented a car and drove three more hours to Roanoke, and still waiting.
Finally, after what seemed an eternity, we pulled up to the house where my brother lived, where my dad had last spoken, had held the last grandchild he would know, and I knew what I had been waiting for. At the sight of my mom and my five siblings pouring out the door one by one, I breathed again and those steel bands around my heart popped off. I hadn't realized they were there, didn't know that I wasn't breathing. As I felt their arms holding me back together again, I was never so grateful to have been blessed with so many. I knew instantly that they knew exactly how I felt, and the release I experienced was incredible.
They were just as affected by my dad's leaving this world as I was; their loss, their grief, was identical to mine.
We didn't have to say it.
We just felt it.
We were all of the same fellowship of feelers now.
I didn't know that such comfort was even possible.

"we do not have a high priest who cannot "sympathesai" with our weaknesses"

Do you realize what this means?
Can you comprehend the impact on your feelings?
That person you've been longing for actually exists.
You know the one I'm talking about, the one you thought couldn't exist because you have been let down, disappointed, disillusioned so many times by the very ones you've trusted. Now you're afraid to trust again, afraid to let yourself believe.
But believe you must!

Jesus, My High Priest, is full of compassion, understands all my weak points,
never loses His patience with me, even when I act like an idiot.
He loads me up with grace and mercy, all I could ever need to endure hardship, especially when I have nothing left.
My high priest can actually say "I know how you feel", and mean it!

So hey, now that you know,
 just walk up there like you own the place!

^smile^