Holy Week Good Friday Meditation "Pilate Knew the Truth"

 Pilate knew the truth.  But did he know the whole truth?

 Pilate knew that Jesus was a king, identifying him on the cross as “The King of the Jews”, much to the dismay of the religious leaders. When they asked him to change the inscription to read, ‘This man said, I am the King of the Jews’, Pilate famously replied, “What I have written I have written.” (Read John 18:1-19:42)

 Did Pilate know that this King was the final offering for the sin? Did he know that the blood of the King would create the opening in the curtain (‘that is, through Jesus’ flesh’) which would allow us to approach with confidence the house of God? (Read Hebrews 10:16-25)

 Did Pilate know that the torture he ordered, the beatings which resulted from his sentence of this King, would fulfill the prophetic words that his appearance would be ‘marred…beyond human semblance, and his form beyond that of mortals’?  That this King’s crucifixion would fulfill the promise that the servant ‘shall be exalted and lifted up and shall be very high’? That this King’s Friday death would forever be marked because in it ‘he bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors?’ (Read Isaiah 52:13-53:12)

 Did Pilate know that by sending this King to his death he was writing the final scene in salvation’s story? Did he know that this King is the one of whom ‘future generations will be told…and proclaim his deliverance to a people yet unborn, saying that he has done it?’ (Read Psalm 22)

 Did Pilate know the truth that this King’s death was not a bad ending but a Good finish, because he was not only King of the Jews but also King of the Universe?

 Did he know that this is what the cross’s inscription meant to the angels waiting and weeping, to the generations of a people yet unborn?

 Do you?

Surprise Endings

I am reading a very long tome called Team of Rivals, about Abraham Lincoln and his compatriots. It is something like 750 pages long. It’s a good book, full of fascinating characters, and a story which holds up a mirror to our current national divisions. So, don’t get me wrong, I enjoy reading it, but as I got to page 150 I was thinking, ‘This story is never going to end!’

We live for the end.  We love good endings.  We love to read the book that is full of mysterious twists and turns and our minds begin to imagine the end.  “How will this end?”, we wonder, and the temptation to turn to the last page can become overwhelming.  How can the author bring together all of these plot lines and solve all of the main character’s dilemmas in the remaining pages? 

Sometimes the story is so good that we don’t want it to end.  We would rather stay lost in the writer’s imagination. We don’t want the story to end, because, well, this is the life we want to live and, even though we cannot live that life, we can imagine it. So, we slow down our reading pace, drinking in each word, like the first sip of morning coffee or the last sip of evening wine. 

Today is the Sabbath before the Sunday on which the crowds adored the main character. They loved His story. The king is coming! They couldn’t wait to see how his story would end.

But wait, is he a king or criminal? Who could have dreamt that this is what the Author had in mind? Their songs become jeers,  their palms become swords. He’s dead. End of story. Or is it?

We live for the end. We love good endings. But we are all writing His story into our own stories. In your life, is Jesus an irrelevant, dead man or a living King?  How do you want the story to end?

This Holy Week  don’t skip to the ending.  Live the whole of the journey. Perhaps you will discover that that the ending is still being written, that, SURPRISE, His story is your story. Keep on writing.

Holy Saturday, Holy Week "Also Present in the Grave"

Reading Jeremiah 23:24b (NIV) "Do not I fill heaven and earth?" declares the LORD.

Jesus is dead. He lies in a grave.

"Low in the grave he lay...."

But, he was not alone. Grave sites, be they tombs carved in the side of stones; holes dug in the earth; urns filled with ashes; whether the ocean depths or the summit of the mountain, the dead do not lie alone.

The LORD fills the earth. His presence is unseen, but in some mysterious way, not unknown, not 'unfelt'.  The LORD's life force is stirring this Holy Saturday.

Jesus is really dead, but he died in this knowledge:

"...my body will rest secure, because you will not abandon me to the realm of the dead...you will make known to me the path of life... ." (Psalm 16:9-11)

"...waiting the coming day, Jesus my Lord."

Just you wait.

Good Friday, Holy Week "The Revealing of God's Arm"

Reading Isaiah 53:1b "...and to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed?"

I wonder if that is something to be desired or feared?

On this holy night our Lord, Jesus Christ, was dead. Really. Dead. "He was assigned a grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death."

But here's the thing, Isaiah explains: "...he had done no violence, nor was any deceit in his mouth."

Why, God, did you forsake your Son? "Yet it was the LORD's (Yahweh's) will to crush him and cause him to suffer... ."

Is this what is means to have be on the revealing end of the LORD's mighty arm?

Or is it this?  "After he has suffered, he will see the light of life and be satisfied... ."

I choose to believe, or I believe by the power of the Spirit, that earth and heaven will be one and that this is when Jesus will be satisfied, all because of a Friday afternoon in which he died an unspeakable death and dwelt in his grave for what must have been in heaven an unbearable three days. Unless you knew how it was going to end.

And this is how the arm of the LORD has been revealed to us.

Wednesday, Holy Week "Only Jesus Was Silent This Day"

Reading Matthew 26:15 "What are you willing to give me if I hand him over to you?" (Judas)

Wednesday of Holy Week is remarkable for what does not happen to Jesus.  Scholars call this day "Silent Wednesday" because we don't know what Jesus did today.  The speculation is that that he and his disciples spent time in fellowship, perhaps with other friends, just enjoying each others company one last time.

But I don't know.  Jesus had to know by now what was about to unfold.  I know how I feel the day before a major event in my life, and I have had no life event even approaching  the trials and trauma of the next two days in Jesus' life. I pretty much want to be alone.  My intestines roil. I don't want to talk to anyone.

Jesus was about to be "dead man walking". Did he really attend a party?

I think he spent time thinking about where Judas was and what he was doing.  Either Jesus had spies, or he had divine knowledge of what Judas did on Wednesday, offering to help capture Jesus for a price. Because on Thursday night, Jesus will tell Judas to go do what he planned. No one else seemed to have a clue what was going down.

Jesus rested? Maybe. Jesus wrestled with his betrayal by Judas? Maybe. Either way, while Jesus was "silent" this Wednesday, evil was not. It never is.

Jesus could be silent on Wednesday because he knew Friday was coming, and so was Sunday.  Still, the day's events had to trouble him as he tried to fall asleep for the last time before his death.