Focus: Behold The Man

Text: Jh.19:5

"BEHOLD the man!"

Pilate brought forth the Lord Jesus Christ to the people, and said, "Behold the man!" It is time for you to take a good look at Jesus Christ the man. It is time for spiritual contemplation of our Master and Savior. When you look at Jesus Christ, what do you see?

The writer of Hebrews is tasking us to consider Christ: "Wherefore, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling, CONSIDER the Apostle and High Priest of our profession, CHRIST JESUS… For CONSIDER HIM that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself…" (Heb.3:1; 12:3). In the Greek, the word 'consider' in Heb.3:1 is katanoeo, and in Heb.12:3, it is analogizomai. They are mind-related words and invite us to use our mental capacities to investigate, contemplate, behold, analyze and discover Christ. Take a closer and clearer view of Christ and His infinite values will begin to unfold before your eyes.

Watching the Lord Jesus Christ hush the storm, the disciples were seized with shock. Luke reports, "And they being afraid wondered, saying one to another, What manner of man is this! for he commandeth even the winds and water, and they obey him" (Lk.8:25). They saw Him in action, commanding the elements, and they stood out of themselves. They didn't exclaim, 'What a God is this!,' but, "What manner of man is this!' What brand or sort of human is this! What species of a man is this! He was strangely human. He was certainly human, but remarkably different from us. They didn't say, 'What muscle of a man!,' which would have suggested that being a man is about having muscles. But being a man is surely about having manners. Man exists to mirror his maker and reflect His character. David Starr Jordan has rightly said that "be life long or short, its completeness depends on what it was lived for."

Jesus as man fully manifested the glory of God in the way that He lived and conducted Himself while here on earth. Vice and virtue did not mix in Him. His words were authentic and powerful, and His life, splendidly spotless and sinless.

Examining Jesus Christ, Napoleon said, "Everything in Christ astonishes me. His spirit overawes me, and His will confounds me. Between Him and whoever else in the world, there is no possible term of comparison. He is truly a being by Himself… I search in vain in history to find the similar to Jesus Christ, or anything which can approach the gospel. Neither history, nor humanity, nor the ages, nor nature, offer me anything with which I am able to compare it or to explain it. Here everything is extraordinary."

That is Jesus, the flawless man from heaven! On every side you look, you see man as He was meant to be. From every vantage point you look at Jesus Christ, you would see the beauty of purity, the kind that made the psalmist declare, "Thou hast LOVED righteousness, and HATED iniquity; therefore God, even thy God, hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows" (Heb.1:9). He was truly a man of inward perfections and of moral excellence. He was fun to be with, and still is. In His presence you feel at home.

Jesus operated with simplicity, sanity, purity, humility and dignity, and manifested holy humanity in all His actions. Everything about Him is truly extraordinary.

Behold the man you were meant to be! Consider Christ Jesus!

by Bishop Moses E. Peter