Have you ever heard a well meaning Christian tell you, “He’s been where you’re going…”?

When I went through divorce about 18 months ago, I couldn’t imagine how this was true. Seriously? Jesus wasn’t married. He doesn’t know what it feels like to feel this EXACT pain I’m feeling right now. He never failed, He couldn’t possibly understand how much like a failure of a man I feel like right now. On the outside, as a pastor, I was putting on a brave face. On the outside I was a rock. Inside, I was lost. The last person I felt like understood my pain was Jesus. Yeah, I just reread that sentence I typed too…

I am a pastor and I failed to see how Jesus could understand my pain and my failure.

Have you ever been through something with a friend that helped you better understand someone else’s pain? I mean like you were there every step of the way for someone you really care about as they walked a dark and painful road back to wholeness?

Jesus is a friend like that. Let’s be honest, Jesus hasn’t personally experienced every situation you face. Don’t get me wrong, he has experienced loss and hurt and pain, unimaginable pain, but there are just some situations Jesus never faced as a human being.

Here’s the hope part, He has always been. Do you catch where I’m heading? In John’s Revelation, he sees these four creatures that are proclaiming this same truth about Christ,

“‘Holy, holy, holy  is the Lord God Almighty,‘ who was, and is, and is to come.” (4:8)

What does that mean for me? It means there is not a single situation, circumstance, disease, broken relationship He hasn’t witnessed from moment 1 of the universe to the breath you just took. And here is the part I’ve failed to really comprehend until recently…He also lives in the future. He has already seen and walked through what I have yet to walk through. There are no blind corners or unexpected turns for Christ. He literally knows the road we’re walking and is intimately knows all the bumps, turns and hills we’ll climb because He’s already been there.

I don’t know about you but that actually gives me more comfort and hope than having a Savior who has actually physically experienced everything I’ve been through. Our God holds the world in His hands and he literally does know the outcome of all of this. Take hope in that truth!