The Bigger Pain

I was reading in a Sproul book, which is always a good idea. He mentions that the tool that killed Jesus was the cross. I stopped and thought about it again. It came to me that the cross was indeed a tool, but it was the hammer and the nail that did the killing, of course there is the guy who was actually doing the hammering. So I thought about looking up how big the nails were, to then figure out what kind of hammer you need, and what kind of biceps.

But Sproul continues by saying that the death on the cross indeed was gruesome, obscene and incredibly painful, but it is in no way to be compared with the real pain. Thousands died the same death. So yes, unspeakable, but no, not the only one ever.

Jesus being away from the Fathers presence. For the first time ever. The relationship between the Father and the Son is/was/will always be unique. And that one broke. Sproul wonders if He even still noticed the nails and the thorns, since He was going through the bigger pain. At the same time, the lights went out. As the Father turned His back on the Son, the whole earth went dark. 

Imagine living in Belgium at that moment. Somewhere in the afternoon, all the lights go out. Well… all the lights… The light went out. No more sunshine.

I can see the whole earth freaking out because the light just went away. The most important moment in history was happening. If there was a spotlight, it would have been directed at Calvary. But in that moment, there was no honour, no praise, no glory. The universe so to speak closed its eyes for what was happening, it was too harrowing to highlight. That cross-moment was important, Jesus’ death was important, the curse being on Him was needed. 

But can we look away from the cross? The sun did. The Father did. I have always struggled with accepting rules and habits without understanding them. The crosses in our worship experience are an example of this. Why do we have them? We say we have an empty cross and not a crucifix {(one) fixed to a cross}, because we commemorate His rising from death, but the real way to do that is with an image of an open and empty grave.

I don’t want to make too big a point of this whole cross-culture we have. So back to the topic.

Can we instead of looking at the cross, look at Jesus? This morning in church, we sang about wanting to desire Jesus more and more. It told me the writer of the song understood he wasn’t desiring Jesus a lot. If we don’t desire Jesus a lot, it means we don’t understand Him enough. Because if we understood Him more, we would abandon all else more. 

The death on the cross was one thing. The sins of all mankind thrust upon Him, the separation from the Father, the bearing of the curse for sin… is something else. Can we look at Jesus and keep looking to see Him more, see His sacrifice more, see His love more?

And if we get bored or pre-occupied or distracted or tempted away or forgetful or satisfied or come to a point where we think we fully understand now… May it be a trigger to remind us that in all these scenario’s: 

We don’t understand Him enough.

Look at Jesus.

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