Hi ~

Happy Resurrection Day!

In Stuart Townsend’s beautiful hymn “How Deep the Father’s Love for Us,” one part has bothered me for a long time:

Behold the man upon a cross,

My sin upon His shoulders;

Ashamed, I hear my mocking voice

Call out among the scoffers.

Let’s go back to the actual event.

Was everyone there a scoffer? Was everyone calling out in a mocking voice? If I had been there, was there no other option but that?

Hmmm.

A few different and distinct groups of people were in that scene at the time of the condemnation of Jesus and His crucifixion.

There were the Jewish leaders, sons of Satan, workers of iniquity, who wanted Jesus dead, and not only dead, but dead in the most painful and ignominious way possible.

There was the crowd who fell prey to propaganda and mass hysteria. (It’s absolutely stunning how easy this is to do to a crowd if the manipulators know what they’re doing.) They fairly easily fell into line with the command to yell, “Crucify Him!”

And there were those who loved Him. Those who loved Him and were horrified at His death, like they were witnessing the worst of all possible nightmares being played out before their eyes.

There may also have been a fourth group. The Bible doesn’t mention this group, so it’s only conjecture, but it’s conjecture that makes sense to me.

It was Passover, so crowds of people were there from everywhere in the surrounding world, Jews and proselytes who wanted to worship God at this holiest of times. I believe it’s safe to say that many of those would not have heard of Jesus and would have had no idea what was going on.

Some of them most likely did fall prey to the mass hysteria and join the jeering, scoffing crowd calling for his death.

But would that have been true of 100% of them? Surely not. Surely there would have been some who would have said, “I don’t know what’s going on, so until I’m better informed I‘m not going to participate.”

And perhaps a few of those foreigners would have said, “Oh, yes, I heard about Jesus, this prophet who healed the sick, raised the dead, and taught with such great wisdom. I’m also aware that the Jewish leaders are hypocrites. Maybe there’s more here than meets the eye . . .”

For Jesus to have died for us . . .

To bring us to the Father, as He so beautifully invited us into the holy of holies with the tearing of the veil upon the moment of His breathing His last . . .

Does it necessitate that we would have been among the scoffers?

Can we perhaps think of ourselves as being among those who loved Him? Is that too arrogant of us?

Can we perhaps think of ourselves as being among those who didn’t understand what was going on and wanted to weigh the evidence and listen and observe and better understand?

There are those of us in the Kingdom of God who were indeed scoffers in our former lives. We are so grateful that the Lord lifted us out of that place to shine the light of truth and love for us. Those of us who identify that way can sing this part of this hymn with deep, heartfelt meaning.

And then there are those of us who can’t even remember a time when we didn’t love Jesus. When we sing this hymn, we may feel some measure of discomfort, thinking, “Would I really have done that? Would I have participated in that worst of all possible nightmares?”

I think there’s no necessity that to be a good Christian we have to claim that that’s what we would have done.

Mary Magdalene, who wept at the tomb, crying, “They have taken away my Lord”—I cannot even imagine her claiming that hers was one of the scoffing, mocking voices calling for His crucifixion.

We may have stumbled a good bit on the path of our Christian life, we may have had much to learn, much to detangle from, many questions, and much confusion.

But considering ourselves as former scoffers who mocked Jesus and called for His death isn’t a requirement to be a good Christian.

We want to live in truth and integrity, not false humility.

If scoffers and mockers are what we were before the Lord saved us, we can own it.

If we came to the Lord at a young age and have loved Him and wanted to follow Him ever since, we can own that too.

Praise God, and thank you Lord Jesus for suffering, dying, and rising again in order to open the way for us to be in joyful relationship with the Father!

No matter where we were in our former lives, this is the greatest reason to rejoice.

Happy Resurrection Day.

Rebecca

Untwisting Scriptures at heresthejoy.com

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