Until: Good Friday

They called him “The Teacher,” a term of endearment that moves me every time I see or hear it about Him.

Until. . .

Jesus, Who Scripture tells us was there at the start of the Earth, Who lived a life of perfect holiness, Who never acted from wrong motive or deceit, about Whom Christians believe the entirety of the Bible tells, Jesus, the Son, one-third of the Godhead, Whose first described miracle is to relieve embarrassment for a host at a wedding, Who brought to life the dead son of a widow even at the boy’s funeral in that land where having no man to care for her left women bereft in ways we cannot understand, Who told stories of leaving a group of comfortable, safe sheep to go and find the one frightened, lost, lonely lamb, Who could, even on that last minute, have called to His Father and had legions of angels come for rescue, angels who no doubt looked from the heavens, yearning to be released and end the treatment of Jesus in such despicable fashion, Jesus, who wept at the tomb of His friend just before calling that friend out of a tomb, THAT Jesus lifted the crossbar of the cross on which He would die, having been beaten and battered, torn and bloody, and firmly, willingly, from love and eternal purpose set His face to a hill outside the city of Jerusalem, step by step until He fell from the physical toll of it, and a passerby helped him carry the load to that Place of the Skull. . .

where He was crucified, a death so horrible that those who knew it was coming fought and tried to flee, begged and cried, had to be held by the soldiers as the large nails came pounding down into the flesh of human beings, then a cross lifted and dropped with the thud! of the hitting of the bottom of the hole, more flesh torn, more agony, trying to breathe in a completely unnatural position. . . . and he hung above the world.

He offered forgiveness and grace to a criminal at His side, looked with love at His friends below, made sure His mother had a home and care for the rest of her earthly life, endured for three dark hours, a darkness the world shared, separation for the only time of eternity, separation from the Father with Whom He shares that Godhead, so dear, so loved (“My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?”), He asked that same Father in Heaven who so loved Him, co-sacrificer at that unspeakable time, to forgive the ones so treating Him this way, watched those below gamble for the robe that Pilate had placed on Him and, sooner than might have happened, blessedly, crying out, “It is finished!”

And He died.

The Earth quaked.

The curtain in the Temple split.

A Roman centurion who saw the whole thing said, “Surely, He was the Son of God.”

His friends hastily retrieved His body, to get it from that despised cross before the Sabbath started and they would have had to leave Him there for three days. They tended that broken, beloved body, placed Him in a tomb of wealth, a position He never knew while living a man’s life on Earth.

A large, thousands-of-pounds stone rolled in front of the opening of the grave, then Roman guards were placed to keep any made-up story about His coming back to life from happening. After all, those scallywags who had walked with this Man, who could know what stunt they might pull?

His dispirited disciples went home, Peter lamenting his denial of Jesus during those mock trials, unable to believe his failures.

Judas hung himself, his guilt and grief finding no comfort anywhere.

Pilate slept—or didn’t, as his wife’s admonitions no doubt played over and over in his head. “Have nothing to do with that righteous Man; I have suffered greatly in a dream. . . Have nothing to do with that righteous Man, I have suffered. . . . Have nothing to do. . . . Have nothing.”

The religious leaders celebrated, all their wishes won.

The world slept.

In that whole day, I think no one called Him, “Teacher.”