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The Cross
For many, Easter is a time, like Christmas, to have some time off work, spend time with family and friends, and eat chocolate eggs. For the believer however, Easter should be so much more.
One of the things that symbolizes Easter for me is the Cross. The Cross, an implement of execution – possibly one of the cruelest ways a person could die. Why? Well, read on and you’ll begin to get a picture as to what crucifixion entailed.
So, what is crucifixion? A medical doctor provides this physical description: The cross is placed on the ground and the exhausted man (usually the man is first beaten and whipped, and forced to carry his cross) is quickly thrown backwards with his shoulders against the wood. The legionnaire feels for the depression at the front of the wrist. He drives a heavy, square wrought-iron nail through the wrist and deep into the wood. Quickly he moves to the other side and repeats the action, being careful not to pull the arms too tightly, but to allow some flex and movement. The cross is then lifted into place.
The left foot is pressed backward against the right foot, and with both feet extended, toes down, a nail is driven through the arch of each, leaving the knees flexed. The victim is now crucified. As he slowly sags down with more weight on the nails in the wrists, excruciating, fiery pain shoots along the fingers and up the arms to explode in the brain–the nails in the wrists are putting pressure on the median nerves. As he pushes himself upward to avoid this stretching torment, he places the full weight on the nail through his feet. Again he feels the searing agony of the nail tearing through the nerves between the bones of his feet. As the arms fatigue, cramps sweep through the muscles, knotting them in deep, relentless, throbbing pain. With these cramps comes the inability to push himself upward to breathe. Air can be drawn into the lungs but not exhaled. He fights to raise himself in order to get even one small breath. Finally carbon dioxide builds up in the lungs and in the blood stream, and the cramps partially subside. Spasmodically he is able to push himself upward to exhale and bring in life-giving oxygen.
Hours of this limitless pain, cycles of twisting, joint-rending cramps, intermittent partial asphyxiation, searing pain as tissue is torn from his lacerated back as he moves up and down against the rough timber. Then another agony begins: a deep, crushing pain deep in the chest as the pericardium slowly fills with serum and begins to compress the heart. It is now almost over–the loss of tissue fluids has reached a critical level–the compressed heart is struggling to pump heavy, thick, sluggish blood into the tissues–the tortured lungs are making a frantic effort to gasp in small gulps of air. He can feel the chill of death creeping through is tissues… Finally he can allow his body to die.
All this the Bible records with the simple words, “And they crucified Him.” (Mark 15:24). What wondrous love is this? (Adapted from C. Truman Davis, M.D. in The Expositor’s Bible Commentary Vol. 8.)
To think that Jesus, the Son of God, was willing to die upon a cross is just mind boggling. To think that he was willing to die this extremely painful death in my place is beyond words. Some say that he could do it because he was God. However, we often forget that he was fully human as well as fully God. He laughed like you and me. He cried like you and me. He felt pain like you and me.
About a month ago I was throwing rocks on the beach with my kids. Being the show off that I sometimes am, I grabbed the biggest rock I could lift and swung it backward to give me some momentum with which to launch the big rock. I didn’t get as far as throwing the rock because one of my fingers got caught between the rock and the tree trunk I was sitting on. The pain was indescribable. All of time and space stopped in that moment and it was if my entire being was focused on that one point, my freshly squashed finger.
Anyone who’s unsure as to what Jesus went through would do well to watch the movie The Passion of the Christ. This movie changed the way I viewed the crucifixion forever. Sometimes it’s hard to envision just what happened to Jesus by reading a handful of verses in the Bible. However, Mel Gibson took these few verses and made a movie that depicts some of what Jesus went through. Be warned, the movie is brutally graphic and filled with gore, but I have yet to meet someone who wasn’t affected by it.
And the same is said of the Cross itself. For when one looks upon the Cross and truly contemplates that a perfect, blameless, sinless man was crucified in their place, one cannot help but be forever changed. Especially when they realize that the One upon the Cross is God.
Christian St John M.Div, BChM, ACS
April, 2009
Picture taken from the movie The Passion of the Christ
