This blog post will sort of break tradition with normal posts on here...no pictures of Elise and Ian, stories or pictures of flying in Papua. I had a realization today I wanted to share (for whatever its worth)...I will get to it in a minute.
I remember when our daughter Elise was born, two weeks before Christmas in 2008. I remember how helpless she was.....and how dependant on us for everything. With all that imagining that goes on around Christmas of what it was like for God to come in to the world as a baby, it added "color" to my imaginings. I remember after changing a handful of diapers one day having the jaw-dropping realization "wow....Jesus had to have his diapers changed." Im sure it wasnt Huggies or Mamy Poko (Indonesian brand we use now)...but his parents surely had to do something about it.
Ive been reading a book by John Eldredge called "Beautiful Outlaw" about the humanity of Jesus and about his personality as far as we can tell in the Bible.....about his playfulness, sense of humor, and just "human-ness". There's more in there about that than you would think. John points out that we have a natural tendency to not think about Jesus' humanity, that he struggled with alot of the illnesses, emotions, and trials that people go through. We tend to "stain glass window-ize" him. And we dont see his personality that sticks out at times in the Bible that would help endear us to him if we recognized it.
So today as I was reading the book, I was exercising on the elliptical. Heather came in and said (pardon the crudeness here) "man, you smell!" "You mean B.O.?" I replied. "Yeah." (no big surprise...I was working out). That got me thinking about the distinct smell of body odor that I often smell around Papuans, especially those that live in interior villages. There is no mistaking it, in every village, you are greeted by a very strong smell of the B.O. nature. Sometimes it can be almost overwhelming.
It makes sense though doesn't it. They live in jungle isolated from civilization, no roads in. So they're not using degree antipersperant, old spice, axe, etc. Don't really have it available. And the last I checked...they werent having us fly it in for them. Not a big priority to them. We're flying a lot more food items on a lot of these flights, like rice, "Mie" (noodles), live pigs, sometimes eggs. "Keperluan kehidupan"....the "needs of life." No deoderant that Ive seen yet. And its easy to see why its not a priority for them. And As I learned by working on a forest fire crew quite some time ago, after you and the people around you haven't bathed for a couple weeks (and youve been doing hot sweaty dirty work the whole time), the smell sort of just "goes away" (or our noses get used to it). I remember the looks on the faces of the folks in a Tucson cafe as we came in there after two weeks straight working in the woods without a shower...it seemed very clear by the looks on their faces that the smell had not "gone away".
So then it hit me on the eliptical......wait a minute! Did Jesus smell like Papuans? I can be sure he didnt have access to deoderant as we know it here. Maybe im not keen on the bathing/soap habits of first century Jerusalem/Israel, but Im willing to bet they smelled a little bit. Jesus spent a lot of time with his disciples in remote places, and on long journeys. I would imagine the smell increased at those points.
So wait a minute what's the point here anyways? Jesus smelled? Is that worth writing down on your blog? I thought it was really cool to make this association and realize that when I get off the airplane in the interior and are greeted by a group of locals, that un-pleasant smell that accompanies them might be the same among Jesus and his disciples! Maybe it's the smell of Jesus!
Also, in this book by John Eldredge, as I learn things like this, I am realizing more and more how Jesus identified with us in many many ways. It wasn't, as John says, Albert Einstein coming down to add 2 plus 2. Or Lebron James coming to the Y to play a pick up game. It wasnt easy for Jesus. He felt things, like grief, empathy, compassion, and maybe fear. He experienced temptations that we experience (though he never gave in). Like it explains in Philippians 2, though he was God, he laid his privileges aside and became a servant while he was here. He was fully human like it says in Hebrews.....Jesus is our "high priest" who is able to empathize with our weaknesses......because he experienced them too!
