Crucifixion
It's Easter this week, and while some (most) of us have our thoughts turning to eating copies amounts of chocolate, including bits shaped like animals we would never eat in real life - who'd eat a Bilby?! - the actual and holy basis for the season has gained some new meaning for me after the message from Sunday night at church.
One of the young adults (Aaron Lee) who attends SDBC is studying his masters in ancient history, with his paper being on crucifixion. He shared the 'church-ified' version with us of the presentation he gave at Uni. What I found to be most interesting is that in his research he had determined what would have actually been the cause of death of Jesus Christ. It's not suffocation as many would have you believe, but rather exsanguination (bled out) leading to cardiac arrest. His rationale was that being crucified in the expected 'T' shape that we have understood crucifixion to take the form of would not cause the victim to struggle for breath, but rather the severe trauma and blood loss due to the whipping beforehand each victim faced would have meant that all sorts of things went on in the body that meant the body could not keep up with the required blood replacement needed to sustain life.
Furthermore, the commonly held belief that the victim's legs were broken to stop them lifting themselves to help them breathe is also unlikely. It is more probable that the legs were broken to impact a severe trauma to the victim to hasten death. Because of what was happening to the person being crucified what little blood left in them would pool around/within their vital organs and in the lower extremities, and all this would lead to them having a heart attack. One other thing Aaron pointed out was that it was most likely that victims of crucifixion had their heels nailed together with their legs in an open/bow-legged position to: (a) cause them a lot of pain; and (b) bring them a great deal of shame by exposing their genitals. Oops - almost forgot - it is most likely that the victim's hands were nailed through the forearm between the ulna and radius because not only would the palm rip off a nail in this context but that also in those times the 'hand' was considered fingertips to half-way up the forearm.
While I am sure you appreciate that I haven't done his months of study justice and I have paraphrased him wildly, you get the picture.
The main thing that it rammed home to me was the depth of the sacrifice offered for us... This was no simple lethal injection, firing squad or simple noose (such is life), but rather a monumental humiliation of the Creator and possibly the most intense pain known to man... And the crime of the Christ? He came to save the world from itself and sin, proclaimed love, sent to offer us a reconciliation with God the Father and provide us with true love, compassion, grace and forgiveness.
Cynics could say it as just an attempt at getting our attention and that if he was truly God he would not have been allowed to suffer, kind of like a roman David Copperfield. Sounds like a crazy thing to do if that was the case. No, this went to God's script... That He offered his son as the greatest and final sacrifice of atonement on our behalf. Jesus Christ died is this terrible way and then defeated even death by coming back to life 3 days later so that we can experience the fullness of a complete and personal relationship with the God who created us and knew us even as we were a single cell in our mother's womb.
If you are looking for something more this Easter, something more that the warm fuzzy feeling of new life represented by baby chicks and chocolate, then try looking to the risen Christ... The one who gave up his life for you, and because He wants a personal relationship with you.
That's all very straightforward and somewhat comfronting, isn't it?!
