"Because of my flesh."

I fully recognize that it has been over two months since I have posted anything here. In a logical world, I would try to give some sort of an update on the last two months, but I want to skip that. Instead, I want to talk about the thoughts and revelations that I've had and received over the past few months that have prompted me to write this post at all.

A few weeks ago in Sunday School, we briefly discussed 3 Nephi 1:14. This is Jesus speaking to Nephi, announcing that His birth was only one day away. In so doing, he says:

"Behold, I come unto my own, to fulfil all things which I have made known unto the children of men from the foundation of the world, and to do the will, both of the Father and of the Son--of the Father because of me, and of the Son because of my flesh."

Now, I for years have read this verse as yet another confusing example of Jesus claiming to be the Father and the Son. While I believe that He indeed can be both without conflating the LDS doctrine of the Godhead, it hit me that Sunday that this verse not only doesn't mean that, but that it means something that for me was personally very touching.

See, Christ here is saying that he will have to follow two separate wills: His Father's will, and His own will. Why? Well, He has to follow the will of the Father "because of [Him]" -- because He is the Son of God, who came to Earth for that very purpose. He would be the Messiah, and His entire foreordained role in the plan of salvation was for Him to follow the will of the Father.

But here is what hit me: He also had to do His own will while He was on Earth, "because of [His] flesh." He was going to be mortal. That means He would have to take care of Himself and be faced with real appetites, and perhaps even -- in a certain sense -- real weaknesses.

Throughout Christ's ministry, He would need to take a nap. (Mark 4:38)

He would seek solitude. (Matthew 14:13)

He would cry. (John 11:35)

He would plead for an easier path. (Luke 22:42)

He would receive comfort from someone else. (Luke 22:43)

Now, this is not to counter the fact that Christ is perfect. He most certainly was that. But perhaps it could help us redefine what we mean by perfection. See, Christ healed and taught and served and loved in the most amazing ways, but there were still people who remained blind and sick and unlearned and unhelped and uncared for. Maybe "perfection" in a mortal sense takes into account our "flesh," or our mortality, our inabilities and limitations.

When Isaiah teaches that Christ bore our griefs and carried our sorrows (Isaiah 53:4), or when Alma suggests that Christ suffered pains, afflictions, and temptations of every kind (Alma 7:11), this verse in 3 Nephi brings a certain level of realness to it. Christ didn't just feel these agonies of mortality in some supernatural way; Christ felt it because He was human. Certainly when He "gave no heed unto them" (Doctrine and Covenants 20:22), there was a level of supernatural involved. But His feelings -- those feelings that enable Him to be the perfect Empathizer -- were felt, they were human.

This gives me hope that I don't know if I can really convey in a blog post.

It gives me hope that my human frailties -- and stupidities -- might not be as markedly disgusting to God as they so often feel to me. And it gives me hope that Jesus truly knows what I am feeling, struggling with, yearning for, caving under, and seeking, because He too has gone through life in a situation where He had no choice but to, at least at times, respond to His own will.