The Soldiers Mock Jesus27 Then the governor’s soldiers took Jesus into the Praetorium and gathered the whole company of soldiers around him. 28 They stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him, 29 and then twisted together a crown of thorns and set it on his head. They put a staff in his right hand. Then they knelt in front of him and mocked him. “Hail, king of the Jews!” they said. 30 They spit on him, and took the staff and struck him on the head again and again. 31 After they had mocked him, they took off the robe and put his own clothes on him. Then they led him away to crucify him. ( Matthew 27:27-31 )
Over the past year, I have been wrestling with the idea of suffering. I’ve not actually suffered, truly, like a lot of people I know have, but I have seen (and felt) the pain from it, from their sufferings. I am not ready yet to write a blog about this, as I would have liked to, especially for Good Friday. But as I sit here and read Matthew 26 – 28, and I am filled with sadness and grief. So many people are still like this, still ready to crucify rather than simply attempt to open themselves up to the possibility Christ is who He says He is. That all of this isn’t just a bunch of stories. They’d rather risk their eternal soul to damnation. I feel so much sorrow for them, so much grief. (That is what you are hearing when I say these things, sorrow and grief. Not judgment for who am I to judge you? I do not judge you. I cannot pretend to be in your shoes.)
I am a rescuer. I want to save everyone from themselves, but I can’t. There’s only one that can. I pray, if you’re reading this, you just give Him a chance.
I also read the verses I quoted above, Matthew 27:27-31 and I think about suffering once again. I consider the questions I’ve asked:
→ Why couldn’t the death have been painless?
→ Why did she have to suffer?
→ Why did she have to live for two weeks of pain and suffering before she lost the battle?
→ Why did the family have to suffer the guilt, the loss, the psychological trauma
→ Why did this have to happen, now? This was the worst time for this family.
Then I think about how Christ suffered. An innocent. More innocent than anyone else. He didn’t just suffer. It wasn’t as simple as that.
He suffered. Brutally.
It wasn’t quick. It wasn’t painless. Add to that, He was mocked; tortured. Yelled at. Spit on. Embarrassed. He was treated like scum.
Imagine that. The Son of GOD… was allowed to be treated like He was worthless.
→ Do I have the answer as to why? No.
→ Do I, therefore, question God’s love for me or anyone else? Honestly, I don’t.
→ Do I continue to wrestle with God as to why He’d let His son and His children suffer so?
Yes, Yes, and Yes.
I serve a truly loving God.
If He asks His ONLY Son, a son He loves more than anything, to be willing to go through what He went through, in order that we may live with Him someday? How can I turn away from Him when I see suffering in this world? How can I say “God isn’t a loving God” when He gave up his ONLY son for me? How is that not love?
“If my house has collapsed at one blow, that is because it was a house of cards. The faith which ‘took these things into account’ was not faith but imagination. The taking them into account was not real sympathy. If I had really cared, as I thought I did, about the sorrows of the world, I should not have been so overwhelmed when my own sorrow came.” – A Grief Observed, pp. 36-37 (C. S. Lewis)
The Nashville Wife 