And the soldiers led him away into the hall, called Praetorium; and they call together the whole band. And they clothed him with purple, and platted a crown of thorns, and put it about his head, and began to salute him, Hail, King of the Jews! And they smote him on the head with a reed, and did spit upon him, and bowing their knees worshipped him. And when they had mocked him, they took off the purple from him, and put his own clothes on him, and led him out to crucify him. (Mark 15:16-20)
We mock that which we do not understand. They did not understand him, so they mocked him. He says he’s a king. He thinks he’s a king. OK, then give him a purple robe and hammer a crown of thorns into his scalp and let’s pretend to worship. Maybe that will make him happy. Give me what he wants, and then kill him. The abuse that Jesus endured in the Praetorium was both physical and psychological, and it was brutal. Nothing is as degrading as mockery. Mockery is the ultimate indignity. Mockery is a way of saying “We no longer take you seriously. We don’t value you enough to take you seriously”. It’s easier to mock a person whom we don’t understand than to try to take him or her seriously. After all, if we take him or her seriously, we may need to look into the mirror and see something about ourselves that we don’t like about ourselves and that we’d rather not see. That’s too painful. It’s easier to mock. The higher and more noble the character of the one is who is being mocked, the more painful the mockery. The more truthful the words of the one who is being mocked, the more blasphemous the mockery. Here was God himself who had come to save his people from their sins and from themselves by telling them the truth. The one whom they were mocking was indeed Israel’s God and King, who deserved Israel’s worship and the world’s worship, and your worship and my worship. The true King was mocked as though he were a counterfeit King, and the King is none other than God himself. This is the ultimate mockery. Some of us know the words of the song: “Ashamed, I hear my mocking voice call out among the scoffers”. Those words are very perceptive. We need to see ourselves among the mockers. After all, it was our sins that put Jesus on the cross as well as anyone else’s. He died for the ones who sinned, the ones who mocked, the ones who put him on the cross. That includes all of us. We don’t remember the events of “Good Friday” as the day they killed our Savior. We remember them as the day we killed our Savior. He died for the very ones who were mocking him. He died for the very ones who nailed him to the cross. He died for the very ones who sinned against him. Us. He died in our place. He died wearing our name tag. He died bearing our name. He died as though he were you. He died as though he were me. “Substitutionary atonement” is more than just a doctrine. It means he loved us enough to die in our place, for us, as us, as though he were us. He took our death penalty. He suffered the execution that we deserved. We cannot dare to call ourselves Christians if the death of Jesus for our sins leaves our emotions untouched. We need to see ourselves among the mockers. We need to know that the cross that Jesus died upon is the cross that was intended for us. And when they had mocked him, they took off the purple from him, and put his own clothes on him, and led him out to crucify him. And they compel one Simon a Cyrenian, who passed by, coming out of the country, the father of Alexander and Rufus, to bear his cross. (Mark 15:20-21) The mocking is over. Now the cruel work of execution by crucifixion begins. Simon is conscripted to carry the cross for Jesus. We do not know whether Simon was a friend or a foe of Jesus or if he even knew who Jesus was. Whatever he was planning on doing that day as he was traveling out of the countryside, his plans were suddenly changed at the whim of a Roman soldier who commanded this passerby to carry the cross of the Son of God. And now Simon must bear the heavy weight of the cross on his shoulders, knowing that he is bearing the means of execution for the weary, thirsty and pain-ridden man who is stumbling up the hill alongside of him. (As I am writing this I’m reminded of how beautifully this scene was portrayed in Mel Gibson’s movie “The Passion of the Christ”). Simon saw the sights and heard the sounds and smelled the smells and felt some of the pain that Jesus was feeling as they climbed the hill together. What kind of bond might have been forged between Jesus and Simon as they silently made their way together up to the Place of the Skull? Did they make eye contact? What did they see in each other’s eyes? Was Simon ever the same after his participation in that dark death march? We have no way of knowing, but history forever links the name of Simon to the event of the crucifixion of Jesus. We cannot tell the story of Jesus of Nazareth without also telling the story of Simon the Passerby who carried the cross of Jesus. And so it is with many of us. We think we are passers-by to the unfolding drama of Jesus of Nazareth, but suddenly we discover that we are in the story. Suddenly we discover that the story is not only about Jesus; it’s also about us. We become bearers of the cross of Jesus. His cross becomes our cross. We become identified with Jesus in a way that what happens to him affects us, and what happens to us affects him. The Jesus story becomes our story. Something in our spirit is awakened that enables us to cross the line from being Simon the Passerby to becoming Simon the Bearer of the Cross. It takes a spiritual awakening. On another occasion Jesus explained it this way (this is paraphrased): Humans can reproduce only human life, but the Holy Spirit gives birth to spiritual life. So don’t be surprised when I say, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows wherever it wants. Just as you can hear the wind but can’t tell where it comes from or where it is going, so you can’t explain how people are born of the Spirit.” (John 3:6-8 NLT)
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