01/05/2018
I sat waiting and in disbelief, with great fear and trepidation, as to what I knew was forthcoming. Yet my greater focus was not so much on me, but for the other man, beaten horrifically beyond recognition. He was bleeding profusely all over his body; his flesh had been ripped off and away exposing his inner tissue, his tendons, his muscles and his bones. He was in great pain, shaking uncontrollably, as the dirt floor became saturated and stained with the crimson red pouring forth from his body.
The soldiers, preparing for our punishment, were frustrated and angry that there was now a third prisoner that would require a cross of crucifixion. I could barely watch as they now, the entire band of soldiers, began to abuse him mercilessly. “They plaited a crown of thorns, they put it upon his head, and a reed in his right hand: and they bowed the knee before him, and mocked him, saying Hail, King of the Jews! And they spit upon him, and took the reed, and smote him on the head.” I was astonished when his blood and fragments of his flesh traveled the distance between us and found their way upon me; they both peppered my body with their heat. My first inclination was to wipe and rid myself of this intrusion, but for some reason, I could not and simply allowed it to remain untouched.
I sat, dumbfounded, as he held the agony of pain within; he seemed resolute, beyond any man I had ever encountered, to portray nothing less than an inner peace, to hold his anger, and carefully hold any indication of judgement to those that railed against him. He uttered not a single word, refusing, with the same resolve, not to stoop to their level of unhinged madness. It was all too much for me to take in, too much to consider, too much to understand and for the first time, in many years, tears puddled in my eyes. They soon, without capability of being bound any longer, eventually overflowed unhindered down and into the crevices of my aged face leaving a trail of warmth that equally matched that of his blood; they felt good. I wondered, in the midst of the turmoil and chaos that surrounded our last hours, who this man was?
As they dropped the cross upon my shoulders and back I nearly buckled under the immense weight that now became an unwanted part of me. My flesh screamed with pain as the splintered fragments of wood from previous uses pierced me relentlessly. Now carefully balancing the cross and gaining a sure foot hold, my eyes were fixed upon the man that had captivated my thoughts; how could he bare such a weight in his condition? I saw and heard him gasp as they too dropped the ornament of pain upon him; he fell instantly to his knees as he unsuccessfully tried to steady the weight upon his gaping wounds. I could no longer simply stand by without action; I immediately dropped my cross and went to him. I lifted his cross while he, once again, stood slowly to his feet. The loud threats and stings of the whips from the soldiers did not deter me. I assisted in placing the cross gingerly on his back and withstood the onslaught of further beating until I was certain he had the cross in balance and under control as we stood together.
Walking slowly towards the place of the skull, that of Calvary, and the crucifixion that awaited us, my thoughts were overcome with him; if all he had been through at the hands of the Roman soldiers were not enough he now withstood the mass abuse, from his fellow countrymen, along the streets leading out of Jerusalem. Some were yelling and screaming, almost in unison, “crucify him!” Others threw rotten fruit while still others spit upon him as he passed near and by them.
I heard, through the mass of hysteria, someone shout his name; Jesus! Yet it was not in a tone of disdain but in one of compassion. I looked to the place of the herald and saw a woman crying without hindrance and uncontrollably, reaching as she repeated his name, Jesus, this time now with greater volume, with groans of disbelief as he passed by. She fell, unable to stand, as she witnessed the horrific state of his physical being and the dreadful scene playing out before her very eyes.
Suddenly and without warning time slowed and an eerie quiet fell upon me. I began to hear my father’s voice absent so many years from my life; I was instantly transported back in time, to a place of total comfort, as my father recited passages from the handwritten scroll that consumed his free time. I was too young to understand the words that he spoke but somehow, they brought me comfort. I watched, somehow in a time warp, as my father, sitting beside my bed, began to tear up, his voice cracking, over and over again, until he cleared his throat with a great cough. He paused for a moment, trying to gather his composure, wiping the tears now cascading upon the old scroll, and repeated once more what he had just read, with a very quiet but clear tone; yet this time he read it slowly as each word hung on his lips…
“behold, my servant will prosper, he will be high and lifted up and greatly exalted. Just as many were astonished at you, my people, so His appearance was marred more than any man and His form more than the sons of men. Thus, He will sprinkle many nations, kings will shut their mouths on account of Him; for what had not been told them they will see, and what they had not heard they will understand. Who has believed our message? And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? For He grew up before Him like a tender shoot, and like a root out of parched ground; He has no stately form or majesty that we should look upon Him, nor appearance that we should be attracted to Him. He was despised and forsaken of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; and like one from whom men hide their face He was despised, and we did not esteem Him. Surely our griefs He himself bore, and our sorrows He carried; yet we ourselves esteemed Him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But He was pierced through for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, and by His scourging we are healed. All of us like sheep have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; But the Lord has caused the iniquity of us all to fall on Him. He was oppressed, and He was afflicted, yet He did not open His mouth; like a lamb that is led to slaughter, and like a sheep that is silent before its shearers, so He did not open His mouth. By oppression and judgment, He was taken away; and as for His generation, who considered that He was cut off out of the land of the living for the transgression of my people, to whom the stroke was due? His grave was assigned with wicked men, yet He was with a rich man in His death, because He had done no violence, nor was there any deceit in His mouth. But the Lord was pleased to crush Him, putting Him to grief; if He would render Himself as a guilt offering, He will see His offspring, He will prolong His days, and the good pleasure of the Lord will prosper in His hand. As a result of the anguish of His soul, He will see it and be satisfied; by His knowledge the Righteous One, my Servant, will justify the many, as He will bear their iniquities. Therefore, I will allot Him a portion with the great, and He will divide the booty with the strong; because He poured out Himself to death, and was numbered with the transgressors; yet He Himself bore the sin of many, and interceded for the transgressors.”
I felt the heat of the nail near to my wrist and then heard the loud clash that brought hammer to nails head. It was the extreme pain that ushered me back and in to my circumstance. The next nail, it too hot from sitting in the sun, penetrated my flesh with the same intensity. Looking down, as they placed my feet, one on top of the other, I saw the larger nail, twice the size of the other two being carefully placed upon my foot. I watched fearfully as the soldier raised the hammer much higher and with greater concentration. The clash, of hammer and nail, once again, resonated throughout my entire being and I quivered with pulsating pains as the second and third swing brought a sure fastening of my feet to the foothold of the cross. My entire body now shook with pulsating shockwaves of relentless, persistent, unyielding agony.
Lifting my head, gasping for air, I saw, in the distance, the man, Jesus, now being assisted by another man towards us. I, unfortunately, relived my earlier experience as they, methodically and void of any mercy, fastened Jesus to his cross of crucifixion! I closed my eyes tightly, unwilling to witness the savagery being released, yet, the sounds refused to be muffled. The hammer to nail experience, through bone and tissue, once more reverberated upon the hill, and it only ceased when the securing of man to wood was sure.
I could not help but cry out as tears flowed freely and without interference and I felt their warmth running down the front of my body. Looking over at Jesus, through eyes partially blurred and distorted, I saw him lift his head and eyes up towards the heavens. I thought he too was gasping for air, yet he began to speak softly through the turmoil that held us in close proximity to one another; our arms seemingly stretched out and reaching towards each other. “Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.”
My heart felt as if it exploded and I simply broke!
Broken not for the circumstance that held me fast with its excruciating pain, but because the words of my father echoed once again within the confines of my mind and with a clarity that now shook me to the very core of my existence. “He will be high and lifted up,” “his appearance marred more than any man and his form more than the sons of men,” “he will sprinkle many nations,” “he was despised and forsaken of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief,” “He was pierced through for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, and by His scourging we are healed,” “He was oppressed and He was afflicted, yet He did not open His mouth; like a lamb that is led to slaughter, and like a sheep that is silent before its shearers, so He did not open His mouth,” “by His knowledge the Righteous One, my Servant, will justify the many, as He will bear their iniquities,” “He poured out Himself to death, and was numbered with the transgressors; yet He Himself bore the sin of many, and interceded for the transgressors.”
I began to cry, with full understanding, that the man that had earlier in the morning “sprinkled” me with his blood, was the same man that caused my father to cry and contemplate so many years before the words that dripped with truth. I could only muster a couple of words as I felt small, I felt ashamed, I felt guilty, I felt dirty, and more than unworthy in his presence. I opened up my hand towards him, fingers reaching for him and said, “Lord, remember me when you come into thy kingdom.”
Jesus, lifting his head slowly and now looking back at me, with eyes not of this world, with outstretched arms fastened willingly, his fingers also reaching towards me said, “Verily, I say unto thee, today shalt thou be with me in paradise.”
Father, what more could be written, of old and in the present? Men tried to stifle your words as they crucified you, thinking, incorrectly, that death would or could somehow silence you. History, that too written by men, attempts to asphyxiate the words that you so eloquently spoke years ago and it too failed and fails. The desires of men, not kind to your love, have tried for years, and still today, to diminish the love that you possess for us with untruths, lies, misconceptions, and any vile means available to thwart, the truth. We find ourselves contemplating, with greater depth, the wonder of the words of your Son today and His Passion; “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” Oh Lord, how very precious can the simplest combination of words be in the lives of those that would seek your face and to a greater extent to those that do not know, in its entirety, the love which you embody specifically for them? The thoughts of Isaiah, written thousands of years ago, begin to unveil the mystery which is that of your Son. “For as the rain comes down, and the snow from heaven, and returns not thither, but waters the earth, and makes it bring forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower, and bread to the eater: so shall my word be that goes forth out of my mouth: it shall not return to me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.” Forgive us Father, we confess that we have not hidden your words in our heart, ever ready to be spoken to the “one” in need of refreshment. Who might the “one” be Lord in a land filled with a mass of humanity yet so very near to us in our small circle of influence? He or she is waiting, looking, longing for something not of this world, floundering in circumstance, dying a slow death filled with anger, with despair, with depression, and an utter lack of love. Oh Lord, hear our prayers this day, give us opportunity to reach with outstretched arms, with nothing less than the love you embody, to the “one” chosen for an encounter today and let us, with humility and compassion, speak “your words” of truth and “your words” of love unconditional. Why now, why the urgency? Simply because just the “one” is of great value, he or she is worth the cost paid upon the cross by Him who willingly offered, willingly hung, willingly suffered, and ultimately overcame death by His limitless love. I wonder what more you can do Father, to express to those of us here on earth, as each day passes, your love for us? Your plan of redemption was and is beyond anything we could have ever considered in the limits of our flesh. We find ourselves, hopelessly at your feet, desiring more of you Lord, more of what you desire for our lives, yet, and most humbly, not for self any longer; pour out through us and to the “ones” of your choosing today and every day that we have breath. Let our last words mimic those of Christ as noted by John, the one and only disciple present at His crucifixion, be “I thirst.” That thirst, surely, is not for that of fluid, but for just “one” more that might come to know thee even at the end of our lives!
Daniel