Mr Average Christian

Far too often, when I take it communion, I let the whole experience wash over me. Not that anything magical happens in taking communion, but it’s a time of remembrance – of what Father God allowed on our behalf and of what Christ carried out and endured because of what we have done, because we needed a way out of our sin infested lives.

And yet there I sit, wanting to rush off home – “it’s been a long week”, “I need some ‘me time’”. Shame on me, missing the whole point of why we have communion, willing to brush aside the very foundation of my faith! The best I can muster is a couple of minutes reflection and a thankful prayer, but lets face it as soon as I get home it will be forgotten as I am consumed with thoughts of the week ahead.

So this post on the reality of the crucifixion is for those who easily gloss over what it cost, for those who take for granted what took place, for those like me:

Pilate had Jesus flogged. The usual procedure was to bare the upper body and tie the hands to a pillar before whipping with a three-pronged whip. Then Jesus was led away and turned over to a group of soldiers who stripped him and put on a robe. They twisted together a crown of thorns and placed it upon Jesus’ head, though I wonder if it was so much placed as pushed into his head, lets face it he wasn’t exactly favoured! He was then struck time and again, resulting in a face covered in bruises.

In Isaiah 50:6, the Lord said, “I offered my back to those who beat me, my cheeks to those who pulled out my beard; I did not hide my face from mocking and spitting.”

The plucking out of the beard and hair would cause great pain and these soldiers would be very vindictive, so I believe it is likely that the man on the cross did not have much beard or hair left. If you have ever seen the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe I think this gives a good picture of it.

Due to the punishment that Jesus received, He could not carry the cross all the way to Golgotha..

And they compelled a passerby, Simon of Cyrene, who was coming in from the Country, the father of Alexander and Rufus, to carry his cross. Mark 15:21

Mark is writing to those who knew all about crucifixion. They knew that the condemned carried their own crosses to the place of execution. So, why the change here? Why didn’t Jesus have to carry His own cross and another man was ‘compelled’ to carry it? Jesus was simply unable to carry his cross because he was beaten so badly. From what Mark has told us before it leaves us with no doubt. Here, Mark is letting us know that, even before the actual crucifixion, Jesus suffered greatly.

And they crucified him and divided his garments among them, casting lots for them, to decide what each should take. Mark 15:24

Most, if not all, of the pictures of the crucifixion that you have seen are significantly inaccurate. In them you see a man clothed only in a loincloth, hanging on a cross. In reality, there wasn’t even a loincloth. The condemned were completely stripped and then put on display to all passers-by. And that was in a culture that was far more modest than our own. Do you see what Mark is saying by this detail in the picture? Jesus not only suffered great physical pain; He was also humiliated by the cross.

‘And it was the third hour when they crucified him.’ Mark 15:25

Mark is quite simple here. He just mentions the fact of the crucifixion without any details. Yet to the first readers this simple statement was filled with anguished meaning. If you were condemned to be crucified you would be laid on a couple of pieces of wood with your arms spread wide. The soldiers would then take a nail and drive it through one of your wrists and into the wood. Then they would do your other wrist. They would then take your feet and lay one on top of the other and drive a nail through the ankles into the wood. I think that the goal was to drive the nails through bone since that would support the weight of your body better. Then they would hoist up the cross with you nailed to it and drop the end into a hole in the ground.

Your body would viciously pull at the nails. Now death was not a quick affair caused by loss of blood or the like. Instead, it was a slow matter brought about through exhaustion and ultimately suffocation. If you let your body hang from your arms your diaphragm could not work.

As a result, you could not breathe. And so, you would push up with your feet. Actually, you would push against the nails with your ankles so that you could breathe. But the pain in your feet would get to be so bad that you would have to stop pushing and hang from your arms. But then you had to breathe and so you would push once more from your ankles.

This would continue until you were so exhausted that you could no longer push with your feet. Then you would die a suffocating death. It was a slow process. Jesus took six hours to die. Pilate was surprised that He died so quickly. Do you understand what Mark was painting with those words, ‘… and they crucified Him’?

And they offered him wine mixed with myrrh, but he did not take it. Mark 15:23

The treated wine was offered to the condemned in order to dull the senses so that he wouldn’t feel the pain quite so much. It was the closest thing to a shot of morphine or a dose of some pain pills. But Jesus refused the wine. He refused the opportunity to be relieved of some of the suffering. Why? Wasn’t He aware of how painful it would be? Oh, He was quite aware. But Jesus also knew that He needed to suffer the full torment of the cross.

The point of the cross was not the physical suffering for Jesus. It was not His physical torments that paid for our sins. The penalty for sin is not merely physical suffering. The penalty for sin is hell, eternal death, which is physical, emotional and spiritual suffering.

Hell is the undiluted experience of God’s wrath against sin. It is much more than just physical suffering. The cross is only a picture of the endurance of that wrath. But because it needed to be an accurate picture of that experience Jesus’ physical suffering could not be blunted by some drug. The cross pictures Jesus’ spiritual suffering of God’s wrath and that suffering was not blunted in any way. Jesus had to pay the full price for your sins. He had to experience the full wrath of God. And that’s why He refused to take the wine.

So also the chief priests with the scribes mocked him to one another, saying, “He saved others; he cannot save himself. Let the Christ, the King of Israel, come down now from the cross that we may see and believe.” Mark 15:31-32

This sounds like the words of ridicule. But they are much more than that.They are the words of temptation. These are the words of Satan.

Jesus could have gotten down from the cross at any time. Remember how He said that He had twelve legions of angels at His disposal? He didn’t have to go through with it. And that’s especially true as the pain, both physical and spiritual, became greater and greater. It was then that He hears these taunting words. He could, at that time, very easily have said, ‘That’s enough of this! I don’t want to have to deal with any of this any longer’, and then just come down off the cross, just as the chief priests had said.

Think of it. No more pain. Vindication before His accusers. Who could doubt him then? But this is exactly what Satan wanted. This was his last chance to thwart the Son of God. Tempting Him to change stones to bread didn’t work. Tempting Him with an earthly kingdom didn’t work. Maybe tempting Him to come off that bloody cross would work.

Thus the taunts. ‘Well, if you really are the Son of God come on down off that cross.’ And yet, He didn’t fall for Satan’s ploy – tempting as it must have been! He had to suffer and die if he would provide our salvation. So, He endured the taunts and the temptation and stayed on that cross.

These are probably some of the most famous words in the world. ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken Me.’ The cry of dereliction. Jesus was betrayed by one of His own apostles, abandoned by those to whom He invested the last three years of His life, denied, not once but three times, by His closest friend. And now, forsaken by His God. His Father left Him to face the horror of the cross alone. But it had to be this way if there were to be any salvation.

But Christ on the cross goes even beyond the physical…

(extract from ‘When God Weeps’ – artistic licence used, but still very effective)

The face that Moses had begged to see – was forbidden to see – was slapped bloody (Exodus 33:19-20). The thorns that God had sent to curse the earth’s rebellion now twisted around his own brow….

“On your back with you!” One raises a mallet to sink in the spike. But the soldier’s heart must continue pumping as he readies the prisoner’s wrist. Someone must sustain the soldier’s life minute by minute, for no man has this power on his own. Who supplies breath to his lungs? Who gives energy to his cells? Who holds his molecules together? Only by the Son do “all things hold together” (Colossians 1:17). The victim wills that the soldier live on – he grants the warriors continued existence. The man swings.

As the man swings, the Son recalls how he and the Father first designed the medial nerve of the human forearm – the sensations it would be capable of. The design proves flawless – the nerves perform exquisitely. “Up you go!” The lift the cross. God is on display in his underwear and can scarcely breathe.

But these pains are a mere warm-up to his other and growing dread. He begins to feel a foreign sensation. Somewhere during this day an unearthly foul odor begins to waft, not around his nose, but His heart. He feels dirty. Human wickedness starts to crawl upon his spotless being – the living excrement from our souls. The apple of His Father’s eye turns brown with rot.

His Father! He must face His father like this! From heaven the Father now rouses himself like a lion disturbed, shakes His mane, and roars against the shriveling remnant of a man hanging on a cross. Never has the Son seen the Father look at him so, never felt even the least of his hot breath. But the roar shakes the unseen world and darkens the visible sky. The Son does not recognize these eyes.

“Son of Man! Why have you behaved so? You have cheated, lusted, stolen, gossiped – murdered, envied, hated, lied. You have cursed, robbed, overspent, overeaten – fornicated, disobeyed, embezzled, and blasphemed. Oh, the duties you have shirked, the children you have abandoned! Who has ever so ignored the poor, so played the coward, so belittled my name? Have you ever held your razor tongue? What a self-righteous, pitiful drunk – you, who molest young boys, peddle killer drugs, travel in cliques, and mock your parents. Who gave you the boldness to rig elections, foment revolutions, torture animals, and worship demons? Does the list never end! Splitting families, raping virgins, acting smugly, playing the pimp – buying politicians, pracitcing exhortation, filming pornography, accepting bribes. You have burned down buildings, perfected terrorist tactics, founded false religions, traded in slaves – relishing each morsel and bragging about it all. I hate, loathe these things in you! Disgust for everything about you consumes me! Can you not feel my wrath?”

Of course the Son is innocent. He is blamelessness itself. The Father knows this. But the divine pair have an agreement, and the unthinkable must now take place. Jesus will be treated as if personally responsible for every sin ever committed.

The Father watches as His heart’s treasure, the mirror image of himself, sinks drowning into raw, liquid sin. Jehovah’s stored rage against humankind from every century explodes in a single direction.

“Father! Father! Why have you forsaken me?!”

But heaven stops its ears. The Son stares up at the One who cannot, who will not, reach down or reply.

The Trinity had planned it. The Son endured it. The Spirit enabled him. The Father rejected the Son whom He loved. Jesus, the God-man from Nazareth, perished. The Father accepted his sacrifice for sin and was satisfied. The Rescue was accomplished.

I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. John 10:11

You’ve heard that phrase, ‘lays down His life’, so many times. But now that you’ve seen Mark’s picture of the crucifixion I hope that you understand better what that means. Think of the shame of being on display, the pain of the nails, eyes swollen almost shut, most of his beard and hair torn from his head. The crown of thorns twisted in his scalp, the Saviour of man hanging on a tree not much good for anything else, struggling to breathe, the abandonment, the wrath. All of that is included in that short phrase.

Jesus says, ‘No one takes it [His life] from me, but I lay it down of my own accord.’ John 10:18

Jesus was not at the mercy of Pilate and the political scheming of the chief priests. Jesus wasn’t tr

apped or forced to the cross. He laid down His life of His own accord. It was His choice. Jesus endured all that the cross meant willingly. Here, remember the taunts and the jeering. ‘Come down from the cross, Jesus, then we’ll believe. Some Messiah you are. Ha!’ But bear in mind why He did this, why He laid down His life. ‘The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.’ He did it for you. For me.

I pray I never forget what took place at the Cross.