The Real Purpose of Easterنموونە

Day 2: By His Stripes, We are Healed

In our world today, the cross is a fashion item, decorated with gems, rhinestones, gold, and silver. Beautiful crosses dangle from necklaces and from women’s ears. Crosses top steeples and adorn altars. The symbol of the cross is even tattooed on people’s flesh. Certainly, there is nothing wrong with adorning ourselves with crosses, but in beautifying it, people have unfortunately forgotten that the Cross wasn’t beautiful or lavishly decorated. It was shocking and appalling.

In Matthew 27:26, we read Pilate “had scourged Jesus” before he delivered Him to be crucified. Even the most hardened criminal recoiled from the prospect of a Roman scourging, and it is essential for you to understand what it meant so you can fully grasp what Jesus did for you and me.

When a decision was made to scourge an individual, the victim was stripped completely naked and bound to a scourging post made of stone. In this position, the victim couldn’t dodge the lashes that were being laid across his body, and his entire flesh was open to the torturer’s whip.

The scourge itself consisted of several 18- to 24-inch-long straps of leather on a short wooden handle, the ends of which were knotted with sharp pieces of metal, wire, glass, and bone. We can conclude that Jesus’ physical body was marred nearly beyond recognition by the beating, but that was only the overture to what was to follow.

As with the religious leaders and Herod’s court, the Roman soldiers guarding Jesus played games with Him. They once again stripped Him naked. They took branches with long thorns and weaved them like a coveted victor’s crown, which they violently shoved onto His head. They dressed Him in a royal robe and put a reed in His hand to complete the picture of their mockery. Then each soldier passed by Jesus, bowed before Him, spit in His blood-drenched face, and then grabbed the reed to strike Him as hard as possible on His already wounded head. After each soldier was done, he would stick the reed back in Jesus’ hand to make Him ready for the next soldier.

After all this, Jesus labored under the 100-pound crossbeam of His cross all the way to a hill that was called Golgotha, a place located just outside the city of Jerusalem. In this death-permeated place, it was common to see vultures flying overhead as they waited to swoop down and devour the dying carcasses left hanging on the crosses. Wild dogs waited in the nearby wilderness for the corpses that the executioners would eventually dump. Everything about the crucifixion site was disgusting and wretched.

Here, a soldier would drive a five-inch (12.7-centimeter) iron nail through each of Jesus’ wrists and ankles. Here, Jesus’ totally naked body was flaunted in humiliation before a watching world. His flesh was ripped to shreds; His body was bruised from head to toe. He had to heave His body upward for every breath, and His nervous system sent constant signals of excruciating pain to His brain. Blood drenched Jesus’ face and streamed from His hands, feet, and the countless cuts and gaping wounds from the scourging. The Cross of Jesus Christ was a repulsive, nauseating, stomach-turning sight.

This is a horrific scene, but it is good for all of us to remember what the Cross of Jesus Christ was really like, for if we don’t choose to meditate on what He went through, we will never fully appreciate the price He paid for us. How tragic it would be if we lost sight of the pain and the price of redemption!

Questions to Discuss:

1. The vicious, sadistic scourging Jesus experienced mutilated and disfigured His body. Consider how valuable you and your body must be to God that He would allow His Son to pay such a price for you.

2. The cross symbolizes one of the most barbaric forms of execution in history, and when we beautify it, we tend to minimize the reality it represents. How long has it been since you’ve reflected upon the horrific death Jesus willingly experienced for you?

3. Since God didn’t spare Jesus from paying such a high price for your sin, have you considered how willing He is to provide for your every physical need through the redemptive work of Jesus?