Good Friday – Let Him Be Crucified
Good Friday – Let Him Be CrucifiedApril 13, 1990By Rev. Ernest F. Campbell
In a church I served in Minnesota there was a full size, rude beam cross hanging in front of a white brick wall over the main alter. Into its arms and base were driven three large steel spikes. It was awesome, but over the months and years, you …. got used to it. Except, I noticed as the church year approached Holy Week and Good Friday, it became more and more difficult to even glance at that ‘life-sized’ cross. If it is true that ‘the message is in the medium,’ looking at that cross on Good Friday was all that was necessary to understand how fiendishly cruel death by crucifixion was calculated to be.
I found an article written by a medical doctor titled, “The Physical Death of Jesus.” in the article, he described the process and effect of crucifixion. First, there was the flogging. Flogging was intended to weaken the victim to a state just short of collapse or death. When Pilot ordered Jesus to be flogged, it was a thirty-minute sentence to hell! Small iron balls and sharp pieces of sheep bones were tied at intervals into the short leather whip. The whip’s heavy blows were intended to cut into the skin and underling skeletal muscles, and produce quivering ribbons of bleeding flesh.
Scripture would indicate that the scourging of Jesus was particularly harsh. I can see, in my imagination, the Roman soldier or soldiers laying on the blows – venting their own frustrations – their own resentments – their own hostilities onto Jesus’ bare back. “The Lord, has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.” (Isaiah)
In 1st Peter, we read, “He was bearing our faults in His own body, on the cross, so that we might die to our faults and live for holiness; through His wounds we have been healed.”
I found in this same physician’s article a detailed description of the nails that were customarily used to hang the victim on the cross. I asked a local machine shop to make one [holds up the nail]. It is believed that the nail was driven between the wrist bones, where it would crush or sever the rather large median nerve. The stimulated nerve would produce excruciating bolts of fiery pain in both arms. As the victim pushed up to allow breathing, his raw back would crape over the rough wood, and his wrists would pivot on the unyielding nails.
Each wound was intended to produce intense prolonged agony. Execution by crucifixion was not merely punishment but public humiliation and revenge.
Even the pit, the mocking, and the insults were meant to sting and burn like the acid of evil.
The Jews also knew that a “crucified Christ” would be a contradiction in terms. According to Deuteronomy 21:23, “Anyone who is hung on a tree is under God’s curse.” Hanging on a tree symbolized divine judgment and rejection. When Christ’s enemies cried out, “Let Him be crucified,” they knew what hanging on a tree would communicate. If that is your Messiah…God has turned His back on Him.
In addition to the physical punishment and public humiliation, Christ took upon Himself, God’s curse for us, by being hung on a tree.
We can believe that it was because of that curse, and God’s rejection, that Jesus cried out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
We wonder why? Archbishop William Temple write, “The principle of sacrifice is that we choose to do or suffer what, apart from our love, we should not choose to do or suffer,” in the garden of Gethsemane our Lord prayed, “Let this cup pass from me, but not my will but thine be done.
God gave us, at great risk, the gift of free will. We could choose obedience or defiance. The choice of our self-centered nature was defiance!
In the garden of Eden, the price of defiance was spelled out – Eve spoke the words, “If we eat of the forbidden fruit, we shall surely …. die.” Authority must deal with defiance. Authority and defiance can not co-exist.
Example) Parents – police – kings
All have fallen short of the mark – because all like sheep have gone astray, because all have been defiant – all deserve to die. The wages of sin is death. we are paid wages because we have earned it.
Who will deliver us from our defiant spirits and our inevitable sentence of death?
It is the man, the God-man, Jesus Christ who willingly took on our human nature, who willingly, though He was perfectly obedient, took upon Himself the punishment we deserved for our disobedience.
His wounds, His scares, His searing pain – have now in the risen Lord become instruments of triumphant intercession at the right hand of God.
That is why it can be said that the cross summarizes the totality of His ministry. The humiliating – shameful – painful – cross.
In Romans, Paul writes, “I am not ashamed, because in spite of its incomprehensible shame and stigma” it is the power of God for salvation” to both Jews and Gentiles. In the crucified Christ, the weakness of God is revealed as the staggering power of God to save. Imperial Rome will not reign. Caiaphas and the crowds will not reign. The law, which necessitated His death, does not reign. The scribes and the Pharisees will not reign. But there, with dried Roman spit on His face, looking like something out of the slaughterhouse, is the foolishness of God, and the weakness of God, which is wiser and stronger than the Gates of Hell.
Paul wrote in Col 2:15
“On that cross He discarded the cosmic powers and authorities like a garment; He made a public spectacle of them and led them as captives in His triumphal procession.”
Among those precious few words Christ spoke from the cross are these: “It is finished!”
The price on our heads for our defiance has been paid in full.
Christ took our sin
He took our curse;
He took our punishment;
And He took our sentence of death.
By His sacrificial gift, He set us free. As He was raised in Glory, so we are raised in the hope of new beginnings, and to eternal life.
We can only say, “Thank you Jesus,” and pray that our gratitude will be lived out in loving service to this beautiful world God has given us to savor and enjoy.
Thanks be to God!
Let me conclude with a prayer that in my opinion sums it all up – page 282 in the book of Common Prayer.
Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the living God, we pray you to set your passion, cross, and death between your judgment and our souls, now and in the hour of our death. Give mercy and grace to the living; pardon and rest to the dead; to your holy Church peace and concord; and to us sinners everlasting life and glory; for with the Father and Holy Spirit you live and reign, one God, now and forever. Amen.
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