He is Acquainted with Deepest Grief

 He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not. Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows.  (Isaiah 53:3-4 ESV) 

    We sometimes think God is "out there somewhere", being far removed from human pain.  Yet in the darkest places of the human condition where death and chaos reign, He is present in the crucified Christ.  God carried humanities' grief and sorrow as the creation wept along with Him.  God is not unmoved by our pain, the idea of a god detached from empathic love is from Plato and Greek Philosophy, not the Bible.  The God of the Bible came to serve people and carry their suffering.  On the cross this finds the most intense and personal expression.  The cross was God carrying every broken heart, every broken body and dying covered in its sadness.  The cross is the sorrow of God:  The Father wept to see His Son suffer, The Son suffered the pain of all of us, The Spirit groaned and wept with The Father and Son.  Creation itself was torn apart with grief as the sky grew dark and the earth cracked under its own despair.  The Innocent God was murdered by the religious establishment of Judea and the political force of Rome.  Naked and alone Jesus cried out to The Father a Godforsaken lament from Psalm 22:1.  He was truly a man of sorrows and knows completely our deepest pain.  

    The cross is described as God's victory over darkness (Colossians 2:15), yet to those present to witness the crucifixion it did not seem so.  As Jesus hung there it looked like innocence and goodness were unjustly murdered with Him.  How could anyone at that time truly grasp what was happening; the God Who created everything was naked and vulnerable on the cross.  God in Christ Who only did good (a healer and deliverer) let Himself be wounded and held captive.  Every messianic expectation of a political savior who would overthrow Rome died with The Lamb of God.  He did not come to us to save us by our own devices.  The cross is the wisdom and power of God (1 Corinthians 1:18-25) not the conventional wisdom (both then and now) that victory comes by the strong dominating the weak; but by letting the seed of a righteous life fall down dead into the earth.  This seed would burst forth in victory on the first Sunday of a new creation but it first had to be buried.  If we wanted victory over darkness it came by an apparent loss.  This idea was scandalous then, and if we think about it long enough it is still so.  A crucified messiah was now king. The church's first sermon was summarized by declaring, "Let all the house of Israel therefore know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified." (Acts 2:36 ESV).  A God who carries all human sorrow with Him won against evil and darkness.  Therefore He knows our pain and still overcomes it.  He also is not overwhelmed by our weaknesses, distresses, and struggles.  We can take comfort in His care for us.  Jesus was and is with those who suffer.  He is not in outer space indifferent to our plight.  The cross made God vulnerable and so very close to us all.