7-11 The Jews answered him (Pilate), “We have a law, and according to that law he ought to die because he has made himself the Son of God.” When Pilate heard this statement, he was even more afraid. He entered his headquarters again and said to Jesus, “Where are you from?” But Jesus gave him no answer. So Pilate said to him, “You will not speak to me? Do you not know that I have authority to release you and authority to crucify you?” Jesus answered him, “You would have no authority over me at all unless it had been given you from above. Therefore he who delivered me over to you has the greater sin.”….16-19….So he delivered him over to them to be crucified. So they took Jesus, and he went out, bearing his own cross, to the place called The Place of a Skull, which in Aramaic is called Golgotha. There they crucified him, and with him two others, one on either side, and Jesus between them. Pilate also wrote an inscription and put it on the cross. It read, “Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews.”.….28-30….After this, Jesus, knowing that all was now finished, said (to fulfill the Scripture), “I thirst.” A jar full of sour wine stood there, so they put a sponge full of the sour wine on a hyssop branch and held it to his mouth. When Jesus had received the sour wine, he said, “It is finished,” and he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.…32-32…So the soldiers came and broke the legs of the first, and of the other who had been crucified with him. But when they came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. But one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and at once there came out blood and water.……38-40….After these things Joseph of Arimathea, who was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews, asked Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus, and Pilate gave him permission. So he came and took away his body. Nicodemus also, who earlier had come to Jesus by night, came bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about seventy-five pounds in weight. So they took the body of Jesus and bound it in linen cloths with the spices, as is the burial custom of the Jews.
Comment: Today is Saturday, I am writing about what happened yesterday, many years ago, on a day which Western culture calls Good Friday. The record is of a very long day, 24 hours the same as every day but filled with horrendous injustice and cruelty. Preceded by a sleepless night of questioning and spite, it began with a trial before a gutless Roman judge. I say gutless because he saw innocence and, for political safety, ordered a cruel murder. Then a whipping, mocking, a fairly long walk carrying His own cross, before the horror of being crucified. At last at rest in another’s grave plot, the One who claimed to be the GodMan dead, but where was the real He at this moment?
We are left wondering why it is called Good Friday. Jesus’, from the Cross, only recorded words, in this record, are ‘I thirst’ ( the Man exhausted), and ‘It is finished.’ I would suggest that the latter rather than meaning ‘I’m dead’, meant that all the promises of the Old Testament Scriptures about God dealing with the results of sin had been enacted and God’s plan finalized. It was God who was behind the death of His Son. The Cross is the answer, we now need to find out how it works!
Prayer: Please help me to see these holidays as very Holy-days, and treat them accordingly.
As I read it! 