Psalm 22, Isaiah 52:13-53:12, Hebrews 10:16-25, John 18:1-19:42

The Not-Just-Superhuman Priest

We love superheroes. At least, according to the box office. Movies about superheroes have become the most popular and profitable film franchises, grossing billions of dollars in box office receipts. Black Panther grossed $700 million, while Avengers: Infinity War grossed $678.8 million. That doesn’t include Avengers Endgame, Iron Man, Guardians of the Galaxy, and many others. And then there are those heroic Jedi warriors from Star Wars who wield a superpower-like ability to tap into The Force and elevate themselves above their foes.

To be sure, there is something captivating and exciting about watching superheroes do super human things, routing evil and restoring justice, doing good for humankind and saving it from human villainy. Maybe it’s not so mysterious that we are attracted to superheroes. Perhaps we sense and clearly see our need for someone to root out the human inclinations that lead us to express the worse human nature has to offer, to let a lack of love fester until it becomes villainous. Even when we don’t sense our own capacity for sin, according to the Bible it’s there just the same. And it took someone with more than Superhero-type power to right it.

Scripture tells us that the blood of goats, bulls, doves, and lambs lacked the efficacy that comes from a human life for a human life. And even then, not just any human life. Rather, a Savior who would choose to experience what we do, to know what it is to be betrayed (multiple times), or discriminated against, or lonely, or an outsider, or anxious, or poor, or what it’s like to suffer a miscarriage of justice, to not be recognized for who you are. And yet, powerful over it all.

As the writer of Hebrews puts it: “Seeing that we have a great High Priest who has entered the inmost Heaven, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to our faith. For we have no superhuman High Priest to whom our weaknesses are unintelligible—he himself has shared fully in all our experience of temptation, except that he never sinned. Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with fullest confidence, that we may receive mercy for our failures and grace to help in the hour of need.”

This is not swooping down with the quick thunderbolt or crashing through walls and then disappearing until the next crisis. It is infinitely better.

Cheryl Slay Carr, Associate Dean

College of Entertainment & Music Business