Some thoughts from the Vicar -
It is only recently that I have been able to listen to sermons; over the last fifteen years or so I have been giving them. As I listened last week, I have to confess that my mind wandered (just for a moment or so) - what has it been like for all those who have listened for hundreds of hours to me? I estimate that a majority of my sermons have been around the person of Jesus. He has been explored from every possible angle. The divine child, the pre-existent word, the second person of the Trinity, the perfectly perfect person. I suppose at some level I'm saying how unlike Him I am, and yet I will often attempt to also say just how human He is, touched with every frailty and temptation that I have experienced and failed to overcome. But He did; well, just how perfect can you get?
I wonder if His contemporaries saw Him as I have preached Him? Was Jesus so, so, obviously perfect to them, as He stubbed His toe on a rock carelessly kicked up by a passing camel or when He slammed His thumb with a first century hammer whilst working as a carpenter? Or is it just possible that His mates thought Him to be just like them, until He began to develop a personal relationship with them, and then they began to see something, obscure at first, which very gradually became so compelling that they were prepared to join His gang?
The problem with my sermons (perhaps) is that the everso perfect Jesus is lost in explaining Him away as the perfect God man Jesus. There is no doubt in my mind, that He is caring, sensitive, understanding, a totally together person. But He also ignored His relatives, He was annoyed with His disciples and was painfully stringent with those who didn't agree with Him. He was also powerless with those who didn't want His assistance. He enjoyed His own company, and loved to party. His acquaintances were very strange. Whilst friends with Jewish society, He also spent a lot of time with the criminal subculture and shared His sandwiches with people we'd rather donate them to.
I think I need to hear about Jesus who identifies with me, in my situation. Not the continual success story, the blinding brilliance of His Divinity, the perfect embodiment of His pastoral work. It's not that I in any way dismiss or deny that He was all that. I just need to meet with Jesus, who really can empathise with my struggle, to be identified with me, and yet to know that He is far more than that, Jesus is Lord! as well.
I would rather be gently led into confessing that Jesus is Lord, that God really took on this frail flesh, felt it and died with it, rather than being overpowered by God who could do it all.