Vince Deagler

since it is good friday tomorrow, i have been thinking about what jesus did and what it means to me personally an awful lot lately. but first i have to get past that name…good friday. why do we call it good friday anyway? it doesn’t strike me as good. in fact it strikes me as perhaps the most evil day in all human history. i know the outcome…the redemption that comes out of good friday is certainly good…but the crucifiction itself is anything but. but i’ll leave that for another time. right now i have been thinking about what jesus said while on the cross. i think those words give us a real clear picture of who jesus really is and what he was all about. i have blogged on this before, but i am a little tired of the way jesus is always being hi-jacked as a celebrity sponser of so many different agendas. because we see him from so many different angles, in so many different circumstances it is easy to see him in part, and mistake this part for the entirety of his identity. but that is not jesus, we need to see the real jesus, the whole jesus, not just a glimpse here and there. now i know even what i am about to write will not give the complete picture, and so in a way i am guilty of what i just criticized. yet, i do think the words of jesus as he was being crucified give a very clear picture of who he really was and what his life was all about. so here goes. as far as i can tell, jesus spoke at least 7 times as he was being crucified. he may have said more, but if he did it is not recorded in the gospels. each gospel records a few statements, but none record all. i think it is hard to be dogmatic on the order of these statements as a certain amount of speculation is needed to do this. but i also think when common sense is applied it is not that difficult of a chore. another thought i have is, the order isn’t what is important anyway, it is the content that matters. when i loook at the different texts, i conclude the first thing jesus said was “father forgive them, they do not know what they are doing” luke 23:34. it just seems to make sense to me. what that shows is the depth of god’s ability to forgive, how great his capacity to forgive actually was. the implication is there is no one/nothing he cannot forgive. now if he can forgive something as egregious as the crucifiction, don’t you think we ought to be able to forgive a lot better than we do. to be like jesus, the real jesus, means i must move in that same forgiveness direction. next i believe jesus said “woman, there is your son, (to john) there is your mother” john 19:26-27. i think this shows just how responsible jesus was. most people feel joseph, marys husband must have died some where after jesus was 12 years old since he is not mentioned after the account where jesus visited the temple and dialogued with the leaders of judaism at age 12. if that is true, then the responsibility to care for his mother would fall on jesus as the eldest son. otherwise this statement really doesn’t make sense, as joseph would be caring for mary, john wouldn’t need to do this. but if joseph is gone, then it was the responsibility of jesus to care for mom. and that is exactly what we see him do, even though he is literally dying at the that moment. what that implies to me is just how important it is to be responsible. no matter what is going on, do the next right thing. and that isn’t easy when you live in a rationalizing, blameshifting, excuse making, mitigating circumstances kind of culture as we do. even in death i see jesus being careful to do the next right thing…being responsible. the next thing he said, i believe, is directed to the repentent thief who was crucified with him. luke 23:43 records he told this thief “today you shall be with me in paradise”. in this statement i see hope…his hope…real hope. now i don’t want to get all political, but you cannot use the word hope today w/o thinking of president obama and his hope and change campaign for president. well we have had some time to figure out the kind of hope he is offering, and this may just be my slant, but what i see is a hope that takes from the most prosperous of america to re-distribute those resources to the least prosperous. that is nothing like the hope jesus offers. he offers paradise. true paradise, not some gov’t redistribution of wealth program which guarantees no one but the governing class is gonna have anything like paradise. and he offers it to everyone, even this criminal. the implication is far reaching. shouldn’t i live and relate to others with this same degree of grace? and i certainly should get my focus off the here and now. we get way too attached to here and now, as if that was what was important. but that is not the message of jesus. his message was, you may be first here and now, you may be last here and now, but here and now is not the important thing. eternity is the important thing, and guess what, there the first are last and the last first which is why a criminal can be in paradise that very day. i don’t know about you, but for me it is hard to live with this kind of grace and it is hard to keep my focus off here and now, but this is where jesus would take us. jesus then said “my god, my god, why have you forsaken me?” mt.27:47, mk.15:34. here i think we see the depth of connection, dependency, submission that existed between jesus and the father. never in all eternity had jesus experienced even a moment like this. there had always been a oneness, a unity, an intimacy between them…never a seperation, never any distance between them…until this moment and it was devastating. how that speaks to me is first a moment of sobreity because it takes a while for me to recognize when i am distant from god, and it doesn’t really bother me to the same degree as it appears to have bothered jesus. secondly, i find myself thinking that if jesus needed this connection, how much more do i. again, this is the real jesus. he lived in constant communion with the father and when it was broken, even for a short time, it was devastating. how much more should that define me. next he said “i am thirsty” john 19:28. here we see his humanity. this comes at the end of a long grueling ordeal that started in the garden the previous evening. that resulted in the loss of many bodily fluids and undoubtably left him dehydrated. of course he was thirsty, who wouldn’t be. (john also references this was a necessary statement to fufill o.t. scripture) this shows me jesus was truely human. (i am not negating or minimizing his deity by saying this) he got tired, hungry, thirsty, experienced pain, etc. i think this shows me it is okay for me to be human…god does not expect me to be superhuman as we christians sometimes expect from ourselves and others. it is okay to be thirsty, it is part of being human. and this weakness (and we humans are weak) is all the more reason to depend on god, look to him for answers and strength to deal with all the stuff life throws at us that leaves us hungry, thirsty, and tired. next he said “it is finished” john 19:30. that tells me jesus was very much focused on his mission in life. a huge part of that mission was about to be accomplished so he cries out…it is finished. in secular literature this word is sometimes used to describe when a debt is paid in full, elsewhere it is used as the shout of a military champion when a great victory has been secured. both are highly applicable. satan is being defeated b/c the debt of sin was being paid in full. now redemption was not yet complete, the resurrection was yet to come. but this part of the mission had been accomplished. that causes me to evaluate my own life and ask questions like…what is/are my mission(s)? and how is that going? why? b/c jesus was mission oriented, and b/c that is true, i should be too. the last statement jesus speaks is “father, into thy hands i commit my spirit” mt.27:50, mk.15:37, and lk.23:46. this shows me how submissive jesus was. even though he was fully god and fully man he was totally dependent on and submissive to the father. (i do not see this as an authority issue, to me it is a functional issue) so, as he is about to die, he commits his spirit (the real individual) to the father…affirming his trust in the father…demonstrating his submission to the father. now, if that is true of jesus…and it seems to be true to me…shouldn’t it be true of me as well? i think so, thus it causes me to move in that direction. now, as i said earlier, i don’t think this can possibly describe all that is jesus. but it gives me a pretty good picture. a picture i can use in my personal journey, to be like jesus. my, i have a long way to go. but at least i have a clearer picture today b/c of what jesus said on the cross. i hope this has helped you, like it has helped me. let me know what your thinking. email me at pefcvince@sbcglobal.net if you have any questions or comments. thanks for reading, have a great easter celebration, blessings. vince