A Bridge over troubled waters:

Bridging the gap: in our assembly the pastor has instituted a Bible study/prayer time that he calls “in the gap”; it is a great way to spend an hour on Wed. morning.
This is a series on “Bridges” and we know that is what a bridge does…it “bridges” or stands in …the gap. Now that the little lesson is over on word descriptions, I’ll get down to business. There is a song that the Gaither vocal band sings that I love to listen to that says “He came down to my level when I couldn’t get up to His, With a strong arm He lifted me up to show me what living is” That is just what Jesus did on the cross for anyone who will believe on Him. There was a great gap between God and Man and it was impossible for man to cross that gap. So God looked for a man because it would require a man to die on the cross, to bear your sin and mine. There is a similar situation found in Ezekiel ch. 22 verses 29,30 “The people of the land have used oppressions, committed robbery, and mistreated the poor and needy; and they wrongfully oppress the stranger. So I sought for a man among them who would make a wall, and stand in the gap before Me on behalf of the land, that I should not destroy it but I found no one.”
The Man who would go to the cross had to be perfect in order to bear your sin and mine and that was an impossibility, so God became a man, put on flesh just like your flesh and mine, was tempted in His flesh to do evil just like we are tempted, yet He was without sin. You say “yes but you said He was God, therefore He could easily be perfect and not sin.”
The Bible says in Philippines ch. 2 verses 5-8 “Let this mind be in you that was also in Christ Jesus, who being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bond-servant, and coming in the likeness of a man. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.”
What does all this mean in regards to His being able to suffer and die and take all of my sins and your sins? After all He was God wasn’t He? True, but He laid aside all of His privileges as God when He became Man. He endured the cross, He despised the shame but He did it to bridge the gap between God and man. He laid aside His Deity to become one of us. In the first epistle of John; one of his letters to the church, he declares in ch. 2 and verse 1 “And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.” An advocate is like a lawyer, i.e. one who will stand up for you, one who will bridge the gap, if you please. Verse two goes on further by saying that “He himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but for the whole world.” He earned the right to be an Advocate by firstly becoming the “propitiation” the substitute when He bridged the gap on the cross. Back in Philippians ch. 2 where I left off, in verse 9 it says “Therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every other name. Verses 10 & 11 carry on with these words, “that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven and of those on earth and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”
There is an old secular song that was popular a few years ago that said “like a bridge over troubled waters, I will lay me down” and that is precisely what Jesus did on the cross for each and every man, woman and child on the face of this earth … He became a bridge over troubled waters…a bridge between God and man.