There are not many moments out of my day that I don’t think about My Friend. I talk about him a lot, and I don’t believe I’m alone too say, we all talk a great deal about people we love.
I’ll talk about some of anything, and in the conversation somehow drift into voicing something interesting about My Friend; that’s how much of an influence he’s made on me, and it puzzles me how so few relate; that’s amazing. So, what about you? Let me share.
First let me say this so you can get a picture. There wasn’t anything unusual, or special about My Friend’s appearance that he’d stand out in a crowd. As a matter of fact, if you looked at him, honestly, he wasn’t an eye catcher. I’d have to say though, what he lacked in looks, he had in smarts. My Friend may have seemed shy, even withdrawn, but I will say this, My Friend knew something about everything. I don’t know where he was learning it, but it surely wasn’t from us, or from our surroundings, but me, and a lot of others folks, enjoyed what he was saying when we’d listen. He did not waste words.
When we were out and about and engaged in casual conversation, we never really included My Friend. So many times, it seemed as if he was never there, and we were just talking over him; he’d soon just walk away and be by himself. Man, I’d get so angry with people who prejudged him. When they did address him, their expression looked like it pained them, and they’d talk down to him, or worse yet, just passed over him as if he didn’t exist. I know this had to hurt My Friend’s feelings, because it hurt ours.
People can be so cruel. For some reason we’re so quick to judge a book by its cover.
People treated him as a joke; they even questioned me; regardless, I knew My Friend suffered. People didn’t care if they hurt his feelings or not; they could care less of his pain. At times I just felt like shouting, LEAVE HIM ALONE, but he’d lead me to believe, he’s alright.
Folks were so rude to him, and what for. He’d tried to fit in to a point, but they’d turn and walk away as if he was invisible, and if it weren’t that, they’d yell and scream at him.
Too, it seemed as if he was aging before his time; everybody could see it, but they’d just say, he must be doing something wrong that we don’t know about. but little did they know, is what I know today.
Those looks of pain and grief on My Friend’s face, we’re actually mine. The disfigurement we thought was because maybe he was doing something wrong, was all the things wrong with us. We were so naïve believing God was punishing him because of something he did, No, it was what we did he was carrying that was doing that to him; today I know, My Friend was suffering for me instead. Everything wrong with me and our group, he was feeling, and it was tearing him apart, but I felt nothing.
And if this don’t beat all, My Friend was arrested one day and charged with crimes he never committed; why? Was it because he was easy, or the runt of the group, or was he selected, and falsely convicted because he had few friends, and little defense.
When they removed him from the courtroom, into the courtyard, they bullied and beat him while he was defenseless? He was so bruised; then they scourged him mercilessly with some type of razor-sharp whip called a cat of nine tails, some of their blows so forceful and brutal, they were exposing bone until he was unrecognizable as even being human, as his flesh and blood was ripped from him and scattered all over the courtyard, but through all that, he never tried to defend himself.
It should have been me; what was My Friend doing? And if this wasn’t bad enough, they tortured him. they even grabbed his beard with their fists and ripped it from his face, how painfully agonizing that must have been on top of everything else. … Enough already.
No, it wasn’t enough. They practically dragged him to a place to publicly kill him, and on a top of a hill, they stripped him naked to shame him, and nailed him to a cross, then they erected it for all to see him die slowly of the most inhumane execution known to man.
Why did this happen to him, nobody knew at the time because he never hurt any anyone. And his Mother, she did nothing, because only she knew and understood the reason. This was the worst day of my life.
Three days later as I was still grief stricken, and horrified by what I’d witnessed, and in one of my moments, I kind of glanced up teary eyed, and there was My Friend, Alive. I fell to my knees crying, JESUS, JESUS, JESUS, but all He said was, come on; look at Me. He let me know it was God’s plan all along for Him to suffer the way He did, but not just for me and our group, but for the world, and all of mankind once and forevermore.
He reminded me of what He told me, that He was sent by His Father – God, to offer Himself as a Living Sacrifice because He was the only one qualified to do it, He said, He wasn’t murdered, and now through Him I was cleansed and forgiven of my sins, and will live again just as He when I die, and that where He is, so will I be, (John 14:3), if that’s what I want. He also said, He will not force it on me. He stressed He was telling the truth, and it’s His Promise to me and all who’d receive Him and what He has done, remember His final meal, and eat of His body, and drink of His blood in remembrance of Him; repent, be healed, follow Him, and be His Disciple.
What a friend I have in Jesus, My Friend.
Gaidi
Word of note: This illustration was taken from, (Isaiah 53).
The capitals missing in the first part of the text referring to My Friend were for affect.
The narrative of the story was not from a Disciple, or Isaiah; but for effect, a believer who was an acquaintance with the group.
(Luke 22:63): They mocked and beat Jesus.
(Matthew 27:30): They struck Jesus with a staff repeatedly on His head and spat on Him.
(Mark 14:65): They blindfolded Jesus slapping and hitting Him in the face with tier fist.
(Isaiah 50:6): They ripped off Jesus’ beard.
(Isaiah 52:14): Jesus was so marred; He did not resemble a human.
Gaidi