The Greatest Paradox Series

Jesus was a paradoxical person. How could He not be when He was both God and

man? He was the most unique being that has ever been, and the result is we see Him

exhibiting opposite characteristics at the same time. He was a man of sorrows and

acquainted with grief as He went through the experience of Gethsemane and Calvary. It

was literally hell he went through as He bore the sins of the world and endured the agony

of separation from the Father. And yet at the same time we read in Heb. 12:2, “…who for

the joy set before him endured the cross….” No one but the Son of God could experience

both heaven and hell at the same time, for no one but the Son of God was also the Son of

Man. Jesus was a person with two natures so that He could experience the greatest

sorrow and the greatest joy simultaneously.

Because we have a problem in grasping the dual nature of Jesus we tend to focus on

one aspect of Him and neglect its opposite. This is especially true when it comes to the

matter of sorrow and joy. Historically the focus has been on the sorrow of Jesus because

the cross is so central to Christian theology. Artists through the centuries have portrayed

Jesus in a state of agony as He sweats drops of blood in Gethsemane, or when crowned

with the ugly thorns that pierce His forehead, or when carrying the cross with His weak

and bleeding body due to a severe whipping, or when He hangs God-forsaken upon the

cruel cross. All of this is a true picture of the price Jesus paid for our redemption, but

the truth of it has been so overwhelming that it has blinded our minds to the other side of

the experience of the God-Man. This brings us to our text in Heb. 1:9 where we get an

insight into the paradox of the Man of Sorrows being also the Man of Joy.

This text goes beyond saying that Jesus was a man of joy to saying that He was the

most joyous person to ever live. He was the happiest man alive, even as a man of sorrows.

Listen to this text: “You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness; therefore God,

your God, has set you above your companions by anointing you with the oil of joy." It

was by means of the oil of joy that Jesus was set above His companions. In other words,

His joy was the greatest, and there is none who can compare with Him when it comes to

joy. Jesus is only hours away from the cross, but we hear Him saying to His disciples in

John 15:11, as He is teaching them to love Him and to love one another, “I have told you

this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.” Jesus was heading

to Gethsemane and Calvary, and all that led Him to be the man of sorrows, but it was

with complete joy. He was the greatest of paradoxes. He was the happiest sad man in

history. What He had he wanted to pass on to His disciples, and so He prays in John

17:13, “I am coming to you now, but I say these things while I am still in the world, so

that they may have the full measure of my joy within them.” You do not get any greater

joy than the joy of Jesus.

This verse starts off with the paradox of Jesus being a person of great love and great

hate. Again, we tend to focus on the love of Jesus and forget that He was also a great

hater. We forget that if you really love righteousness you must hate its opposite, which is

wickedness. Opposites have to coexist in all of us, for you cannot be truly loving if you do

not hate what is unloving. Hate of evil is a part of love for the good. If you love peace,

you will hate violence. If you love generosity, you will hate greediness. If you love loyalty,

you will hate betrayal. If you love truth you will hate falsehood. You can go through

every virtue and see that you cannot truly love any of them without a hate for their

opposites. Love cannot be complete without hate of what is not love, or what hinders and

destroys love. The more we love Christ and what He loves, the more we will hate what He

hates. It is a paradox but a fact that hate is a part of love. Not understanding this leads to

a superficial understanding of the statement that God is love. Yes He is, and that is why