darkness enshrouded the earth
so a couple or more or so of centuries ago today, thereabouts, jesus died.

last night, i heard some stuff and felt some stuff i'd never heard nor felt before.
my good friend greg, the youth leader at our church, was leading the junior high kids through this whole "let's see what it was really like to be jesus" thing.

i thought, sure, whatever, that'll be pretty cool, feet will be washed, blah blah blah. yeah, i'll help out. good times. go jesus.

after the maundy thursday service, we young adult helpers and the junior high schoolers gathered in the very dimly-lit, very stripped-down church. a black veil had just been draped over the large, architecturally beautiful cross at the back of the church, usually a source of amazing warmth, modernity, and focus in our building, if that makes sense. the altar had been stripped. fully stripped.

we sat down. greg began talking about crucifixion, and then we read the "last rites" service aloud to the kids, annointing them with oil as they lay there on the cool sanctuary floor, holding steel nails in their tiny adolescent hands.
but the description of jesus' death really gripped me. of course we knew it wasn't a walk in the park, but we're conditioned by the pictoral and poetic images of jesus hanging limply but gracefully from the cross, as dashingly handsome as ever. chances are, he wouldn't even look recognizable.

beating.
i had envisioned a few whip marks here and there, maybe some bruises and a little blood on his brow where the thorns scratched him a little.

first beating: ping-pong-sized balls of lead, attached to whippy things. 39 strokes. this pummelled the body, the muscles, the bones. jesus would be bruised, tender, numb.
second beating: pea-sized balls of lead, attached to whippy things. 39 strokes. these broke the skin, rendering his body a bloody mess.
third beaing: shards of glass and animal bones, attached to whippy things. 39 strokes. these cut deep into the skin, piercing his body, tearing his flesh.

cross.
chances are, they didn't have fine grade sandpaper. he had to pick up this rough, axe-carved 100 lb+ piece of wood, carry it on his torn, mangled, bleeding shoulders, and walk the length of about 6 or 7 football fields. he stumbled. several times.

crown.
we all had the image of a cute little woven renaissance-esque headpiece made from cute little twigs with a few thorns.
it was probably more like a helmet-shaped thing, placed on his head, pushed downwards, and twisted a little to the side so it would stay on. this pierced the scalp completely.

crucify.
scholars have countless theories about where the nails actually pierced jesus as he hung on the cross. the nails were probably a half inch in diameter, and nine or so inches long.

a half inch thick.

they possibly pierced his wrists - between the two forearm bones - rather than the palms of his hands. the delicate bones in the hands wouldn't have supported the weight of his body for hours on end. they pierced his feet with one nail.

death.
hold your arms out. stand up. breathe. your shoulders lift up, and you push down through your feet. if you can't move your shoulders because nails rip into your flesh too much, or you can't push down with your feet because they are hanging, nailed to a plank of wood, the only breathing you can do is small gasps of inhalation. you probably can't exhale very well.
your lungs fill with fluid. you suffocate.

jesus hung there, dying, for probably about 5 hours. any longer, and they would have clubbed his shins, breaking them, and he would be completely incapable of pushing with his legs to breathe at all - quickening the death.

darkness covered the sky. earthquakes shattered the soil. a tapestry ripped like paper.

this man died a cruel death. torture.
for me.