I Remember

I go to the Good Friday service to remember. I want to remember. I want to see The Cross again. Not the sanitized cross, the one without a body hanging on it. I want to see The Cross. I want to kneel there and remember. Remember that this was torture, this was pain, this was sacrifice.

I kneel there and I see Him, the Son of God. This is not the cleaned-up Jesus that is usually depicted hanging on the Cross. No, this is the brutalized and bloodied Jesus, the One who was shredded by the cat-o-nine-tails as He was flogged until He was senseless. This is the exhausted, dehydrated Jesus. The Jesus who was beaten and mocked, who had His beard torn out. This is the Jesus who hangs in agony and torment, covered in blood, sweat, and dirt, surrounded by flies, baking in the hot Israeli sun. I remember. And I cling to that Cross, that cruel instrument of torture, and I let His blood run over me.

I see His twisted body, spread eagle and immobilized by the nails piercing His hands and His feet. I imagine the shame, the humiliation. I hear Him gasping for breath. I try to imagine what it must be like to die agonizingly by asphyxiation, suffocating slowly, unable to expire. I try to imagine what it must feel like to have every nerve ending exposed to wind and sun and sand, as layers of flesh were ripped off by the flogging, leaving every pain receptor bare to the elements.

I see His head, his beautiful, splendid head, now with thorns crammed into the brow. His head - beaten and swollen, unrecognizable. Jesus, You are the Perfect One, The Holy One of God. You alone, of all humanity, never rebelled against the Father. You alone. You alone could be the Lamb of God, the sacrifice for the sins of the world. You did this for me. My sin. I sent you to that hill, I drove in the nails, my sin held You there. I remember.

I hear You cry, “I thirst.” O Jesus, do You thirst for water, or do You thirst for Your Father who has forsaken You? You alone are The Obedient One. You alone always obeyed the Father, and You obeyed Him in death, becoming nothing, and willingly became the sacrifice for the sins of the world. It was Your Love for Him that led You to the Cross. You died so He could spend eternity with us, with me. I remember.

I hear you gasp and cry out, “It is finished.” The Great Tragedy has ended. The sorrow that began in the Garden of Eden is over. Sin has been atoned for. Death is defeated. Satan is vanquished. The fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil is replaced by another tree, another Fruit, The Tree of Life. The sin of the first Adam is forgiven because of the sacrifice of the second Adam. I remember.

This is The Cross I want to remember. I do not want a sanitized cross, a cross without a body, a cross without blood and gore and dirt and sweat. I want to remember. I want to remember that this was a sacrifice. A sacrifice. It was suffering, it was horrifying, and -  it was Love.

I need to remember. We need to remember. The Church. We are His Body. Are we willing to suffer and die for the world as Our Savior, as Our Master did? Are we willing to carry our cross and become like Him? I want a Church that remembers. That follows. Not a clean, happy church that just wants to feel good about itself, with nice, neatly organized little Sunday services with songs and messages that make us feel good about ourselves, not a church that wants to stay safe and secure and comfortable, but a Church that is willing to follow Jesus to Golgotha. A Church that is willing to suffer so that the world may know they have Savior, that they have a Father who loves them and wants to be reconciled to them. A Church that remembers that our salvation was bought at a price. That remembers we were ransomed. A Church that remembers that “grace is not cheap (Dietrich Bonhoeffer).” Grace is costly. It cost Jesus His life, it cost the Father His Son. The grace that covers me, that covers you, that gives us eternal life, is not cheap. It is not a trinket. It is a costly gift - a pearl of great price. A treasure hidden in a field. It cost God everything. I want a Church that is willing to give everything, because He gave everything.

I need to remember. I need to see Love hanging on that tree so that I do not become complacent, so that I do not seek out the easy life, the life that is without suffering or pain. I need to remember that following Jesus is about obedience, about love, about sacrifice, about giving away your life for the sake of others. A life of grit, and dirt, and tears, and sweat, and exhaustion, and heartache, of giving yourself away, as He did for us. I need to remember, so that I have the courage to follow and to seek and to ask for the power to die as He did.

O God, I pray, keep me from a complacent life, an easy life. Teach me to love as You loved, to obey as You obeyed, to serve as You served, to become nothing as You became nothing. Give me strength to take up my cross and to follow You and to love those You send to me, to the very end. Save me from my Self, teach me to die so that I may truly live. Revive Your Church. Remind us. Renew us. Sanctify us. Send us.

I remember. May I never forget.