Tears flooded up from deep within me. Agonizing sobs broke through my lips. Through blurred vision I shoved my way past those who blocked my exit and fled into the darkened street. I ran until at last I found some ancient, deserted alleyway, a place reserved for the filth and refuse of the city. Several curious rats squeaked their concern at my intrusion. It seemed a fitting place in which to live out the remainder of my existence—just another piece of worthless garbage in among the rest.
I sobbed my anguish until I could sob no more. Then at last I slept and in that sleep entered the only world in which I knew I could ever again find some measure of peace.
24
I don’t know what woke me. Perhaps it was the growing stench of the surrounding filth as it warmed in the morning sun. Perhaps it was the increasing noise from the street at the end of the alley. I do know, however, that the world to which I returned was unlike any I had ever known before. It wasn’t the filth. It wasn’t the odor. It wasn’t the noise. It was something else altogether, something deep within me, at the very core of my being.
Simon was dead. My heart continued to beat. My lungs continued their endless expansion and contraction. My senses continued to relay information to my brain. But whereas once there had been hope and life and aspirations and desires and a purpose for being, now there was only pain and shame and emptiness and death.
It was far more than simply regret for my failures or anxiety over the fate of my Master. Regret I understood. Failure I understood. Anxiety I understood. This was none of these. There was simply no longer any life within me.
Each of us constructs our lives on beliefs we accept as unshakable. These beliefs form the great support pillars of our existence, pillars on which everything else is built. We rarely or perhaps never acknowledge their existence in our conscious minds. Yet every choice we make, every word we utter, every goal we hold for the future, assumes their certainty.
For me, the greatest of those pillars, the one upon which all the others depended, the one rooted in the deepest core of my being, was the understanding that Simon Barjona would always ultimately prevail. If I tried hard enough, if I worked long enough, if I learned from my mistakes, if I regrouped following my failures, I could and I would succeed. This was not simply something I hoped for; it was the foundation of my life.
When this man, this Jesus, entered my world almost four years earlier, he brought massive changes with him. When I finally submitted to his lordship, he became my reason for being. His goals became my goals. His successes became my successes. His techniques became my techniques. His affirmations became my greatest joys, and his reprimands pierced me deeply. In a word, he became the center of my world.
But even though I had forsaken all and followed him, the central pillar of my life was still undisturbed. My goals were different. My techniques were different. My hopes were different. My reason for living was changed. But the means by which I pursued all of these remained unaltered. Whereas once my determination, my strength, my wit, my charisma, indeed, all my fleshly attributes had been focused on becoming Simon the great fisherman, through Jesus all those fleshly attributes had been refocused on becoming Simon the great disciple. The goals were radically different, but the means were identical—me.
Then, in one terrifying instant, at the very moment when he knew all my weight rested upon it, Jesus reached his almighty arms around that pillar and wrenched it out from under me, and everything that rested upon it came crashing down. Now there was only the shattered ruins of my existence surrounding a cold, black, gaping chasm where once my pillar had been.
If you have ever been there, you will understand. It wasn’t just that I had failed. Failure I understood. Failure was simply a call to try harder and reach higher. This was not failure; this was death. The foundation of my life had collapsed, and now my spirit wandered aimlessly through the piles of rubble, through the broken bricks and crumpled mortar, listening to the wind whistling through the ruins of my life.
The increasing turmoil from the street at the end of the alley finally broke through my pain. I stood and then wandered toward the commotion. There seemed to be some sort of a parade in progress. Both sides of the street were lined with people yelling and pointing at something passing by in front of them.
At first all I could see were the mounted Roman soldiers, swords drawn, pushing their way through the multitude, making a path for those following behind. Then I turned and saw the reason for this procession. Three men stumbled along behind, flanked on either side by armed guards. Each one carried a large wooden cross on his shoulders. It was another one of those hideous Roman executions in progress.
The first two men were keeping pace with the demands of the soldiers, but the third man was having trouble. Even from this distance I could see what appeared to be streams of blood running down his face and neck and onto his naked shoulders and chest. He was wearing something on his head. He was bent nearly double, so I could not see his face. Then, just as he approached the entrance to the alley, he collapsed under the weight of the cross and fell face first into the dirt. The cross fell to the ground at his side, and for the first time I saw his back, or what was left of it. The flesh hung in shredded strips of what had once been skin and muscle. The brutal beating must have taken place several hours ago, for much of the blood was now dried and caked, though numerous red streams still oozed from the deeper wounds. I could now see that the thing on his head was actually a kind of mock crown, woven from the branches of some sort of wicked thornbush. The long spikes pierced deep into his head, causing the blood to run freely down his forehead.
Never had I seen a man so brutalized prior to his execution. I could not imagine what his offense must have been to justify such treatment. For several seconds he did not move. Then he groaned and rolled onto his side, and I looked into the bruised and swollen face of my King.
The soldier nearest him walked over and gave him a sharp kick in the side, demanding that he pick up his cross and continue on. Jesus brought himself to his hands and knees and then tried to hoist the wooden cross beam back onto his shoulders, but the loss of blood and the damage inflicted on his back and shoulder muscles made it impossible for him to support the weight. He dropped once again to his knees, allowing the rough wooden surface to scrape across the raw flesh of his back as the cross fell to the ground.
The frustrated guard looked at the spectators along the side of the street opposite me, then laid his hand on a man nearly my size, pointed at the cross, and told him to pick it up. The man stepped into the street, hoisted the cross beam onto his shoulders, then reached down and helped Jesus back onto his feet. With the weight of the wood off his back, Jesus was able to continue on, and the gruesome procession once again moved forward.
When the last guard passed by me, I stepped out into the street and fell in line. I suppose I should have feared recognition, but I was far beyond fear. The depth of unrelenting, inescapable anguish within me eclipsed every other emotion throughout the remainder of that day. It no longer mattered whether or not I was recognized. It no longer mattered whether or not I too was executed. Nothing mattered anymore. The source of all life would soon be dead. How could it possibly matter whether or not my body continued to live?
I saw a number of familiar faces around me as we moved through the streets. Jesus’ mother followed as close as the guards would permit. John walked beside her, his left arm around her, holding her close. Lazarus, Martha, and Mary were there together. A short distance away I saw my brother, Andrew. Our eyes met, but neither of us spoke. What was there to say? His eyes too were dark, swirling pools of pain.
When the procession finally reached Golgotha, the designated place of execution, the crowd fanned out at the base of the hill, watching the final steps in the execution process. The holes in which the crosses would be dropped had already been dug. The three crosses were laid on the ground, the three prisoners were laid on the crosses, and large metal spikes were driven through each hand and each fo
ot. The soldiers then lifted each cross in turn and dropped them into the holes. Jesus’ cross was in the center.
Of all the images I retain from that day, it is the memory of the Master’s hands I recall most of all. I knew the touch of those hands as well as I knew the sound of his voice. I remembered the first time he placed his hand on my shoulder. I remembered the strength and the acceptance and the comradeship it communicated. I remembered the relief of feeling his hand gripping my arm as I sank below the waves that night I attempted to walk on the water. I recalled the countless times I was privileged to stand beside him, watching as he reached out and touched blind eyes, deaf ears, broken and deformed bodies, bringing sight, and sound, and wholeness with each touch. I remembered fixing my eyes on those fingers the day he took that little boy’s lunch and kept breaking and breaking and breaking the bread and fish. I kept trying to see how he was performing the wonder taking place before me. In my mind I saw him once again as he stretched out those hands from the bow of our boat the night I knew we were all going to perish on the sea. I remembered the instant calm that followed, the peace, the rest.
And now I stood at a distance and looked up at those hands, crushed and bruised, blood flowing freely down his palms from the jagged wounds surrounding the spikes driven through them. And these drunken fools gambling below him had no idea what they were destroying.
For nearly three hours I stood in silence and watched. No one spoke to me; I spoke to no one. There were many in the crowd who were mocking him. The priests and other religious leaders obviously considered this a cause for great celebration. Others, like myself, clothed themselves in their private shrouds of grief. At one point I saw Mary and John approach the cross together. Words passed between them and Jesus, but I could not hear what was said.
Then, when the sun was at its highest point, beating down directly above our heads, a sudden eerie darkness crept across the land. Those who came to celebrate his execution were disturbed. They tried hard to pretend it was just a coincidence, but it made them all uneasy. Boisterous laughter and ugly jests were replaced by subdued conversations. Those who viewed this as their victory seemed more reticent to look directly at the dying figure before them. If there was any possibility this man’s death was bringing darkness on the earth, was it possible he might bring even worse on those who were responsible?
For the next three hours, the darkness remained. Then, just as the darkness began to lessen a bit, I heard him speak his final words.
“My God! My God! Why have you forsaken me?”
His cry pierced the silence that now surrounded the cross.
And then, “I thirst!”
And then, finally, “It is finished!” followed by one great sigh and then nothing more.
He was gone.
His body now hung unmoving on the cross, and the only world in which I wanted to live instantly ceased to exist. My future was gone. My great hopes and plans were no more. But in the end it was not the loss of my future, it was not the death of my hopes and my plans that brought me this endless pain. It was knowing that tomorrow morning I would wake to a world in which he no longer existed. I missed him more than I had known it was possible to miss anything or anyone. How strange! As long as he still breathed upon that cross, I continued to draw some comfort from his presence in our world. But now a great sea of loneliness flooded into my soul and mingled with my pain, bringing new poignancy, new dimension to my agony.
As I stood there in that strange half darkness, I suddenly felt the ground beneath my feet rumble and churn. It was as if the earth itself shuddered uncontrollably in its grief. There was nothing more for me here. There was nothing more for me anywhere. I turned and walked away into a night that would never end.
25
The love of God is poured out within us in so many different ways. At the time, walking the streets of Jerusalem that evening, unseeing and now almost unfeeling because of the numbing narcotic of ceaseless pain, the concept of the love of God was to my mind the ultimate absurdity. If ever I thought I had needed the miraculous intervention of a loving God in my own life, it was in that garden as I fought for the release of my King. If ever I knew with absolute and unquestioned certainty that our world desperately, urgently needed the miraculous intervention of a loving God, it was as I stood below that cross, watching Jesus die. And yet, there I was, having just witnessed what I would later come to recognize as the two greatest expressions of the love of God I would ever know yet possessing at the time not a glimmer of that love.
For several hours I wandered the city streets, speaking to no one, recognizing no one, having no longer any place I wanted to go and nothing I wanted to do. I considered returning immediately to Galilee and to my beloved Ruth. But what would I say? Could I share with her my shame? Could I tell her of my repeated denials of my Lord? Could I explain to her how our great march to victory culminated not in Jesus’ coronation but rather in his brutal, bloody execution? No, it would be best for me to stay on here for a few more days.
As the piercing agony of the crucifixion gradually dulled into a silent, throbbing fog of pain, I became aware of my fear. How far would the high priest and his cohorts go in their efforts to cleanse their kingdom of the one they hated above all others? Would the Master’s blood satisfy their lusts? Or would a dozen bloody crosses serve their purposes better? I must find Andrew and James and John and the others. We needed to discuss what steps should be taken to insure our safety.
I checked out several of our favorite gathering places in the city but found no one. In the end my wanderings took me back to Golgotha. If the others were gathered anywhere, it would be there. I would be safe enough now. The sun would soon be setting, bringing with it the onset of the Passover Sabbath, and even the Jewish leaders’ seething hatred would not drive them to risk tarnishing their public image through violation of this sacred day of rest. I wondered too what the Romans would do with Jesus’ body.
I arrived back at the hill just in time to see the outlines of two men carefully lifting Jesus’ cross from the hole in which it had been placed for the crucifixion. The dead form of the Master still hung from the spikes. I watched as they gently laid it upon the ground and then began the tedious task of removing the spikes from Jesus’ hands and feet. At first I thought they must simply be members of the execution guard completing their duties. But the obvious care with which they went about their work soon caused me to change my mind. There was a respect, a gentleness in their manner and actions. They laid the cross on a spotless sheet of white linen. They removed each spike, taking great care not to cause any further mutilation to the Master’s body in the process. Then, when the body was finally freed from the wood, they lifted it up and placed it not on the ground but rather on a second clean linen sheet spread out next to the now empty cross. It was obvious these men were not Roman soldiers sent to carry out a duty. These men were disciples of Jesus, engaged in a work of reverent compassion.
I drew close enough to see their faces. One of the men I knew. It was Nicodemus, the man who became a follower and staunch supporter of Jesus after a late-night conversation with him. Nicodemus was a member of the Sanhedrin, the governing religious body of our people, and was among the wealthiest men in the city. The other man was Joseph, originally from Arimathea, a town about twenty-five miles northwest of Jerusalem, in the hill country of Judea. I did not know him at the time, but his clothes identified him as a person of great wealth as well. Nicodemus saw me hovering in the shadows. He did not speak, but his respectful nod in my direction told me he knew who I was and assured me I had nothing to fear. Joseph and Nicodemus wrapped the body of Jesus in the linen cloth and then placed it on a cart standing nearby.
As the two men moved the cart away from the base of the hill and into the streets of the city, I became aware for the first time that I was not the only one watching these proceedings with more than casual interest. As I fell in step behind the body of my Lord, I found myself a member of a procession of at least twen
ty-five or thirty men and women. Nearly all of the faces were familiar to me, most of them well known. There was Jesus’ mother, with John still at her side. There was James and Simon the Zealot. Andrew was in the group, as was Lazarus and his sisters, Mary and Martha. The funeral procession trailed along behind the cart until the two men stopped outside a luxurious home in the best part of the city. They carried the body into a spacious, well-lighted front room and laid it upon a table prepared for the task ahead. Several large rolls of white linen cloth stood beside the table along with what must have been at least a hundred pounds of a paste mixture of myrrh and aloes. The sweet, pungent fragrance of the mixture filled the room as we all filed in to watch the proceedings.
Little conversation passed between those present throughout the next hour as Joseph and Nicodemus prepared Jesus’ body for burial. It helped, though, being there with these others who understood. We watched as the body was carefully washed and dried. Then the wrapping process began. At first a single wrapping of the white linen was placed around the entire body from the feet up to the neck. Then a thin layer of the myrrh and aloes mixture was spread over the linen, followed by a second layer of cloth, followed by another layer of the mixture, and then another layer of cloth, and so on until all the myrrh and aloes mixture was used and a thick, firm paste and linen cocoon encased the body. The head was then wrapped tightly in a separate long, unbroken length of linen.
It was getting late when the process was finally complete. The body of Jesus was now considerably heavier, and Joseph and Nicodemus solicited the help of several more hands to move it back out to the cart.
The procession then moved out again, following the cart to a tomb that only the wealthiest could have afforded. It was to have been Joseph’s tomb, a vault chiseled out of a solid rock wall with a stone bench inside providing what we assumed would now be the final resting place for our Master. The door of the sepulcher was formed by a massive, round slab of stone, expertly crafted to seal off the entrance once it was rolled into place. It took eight men straining on the slab to finally move it into place.
The Fisherman Page 20