Holy Week Devotion: Scourged

Then Pilate took Jesus and flogged him. (John 19:1 ESV)

The description of the cruelties which Jesus endured before going to his cross are quite brief. Jesus had predicted his flogging in in his predictions of his Passion and Resurrection (Mt 20:19; Mk 10:34; Lk 18:33). But in each gospel we are simply told the fact: Jesus is whipped, scourged, flogged. It has none of the details we read in Josephus, of flesh torn away, of organs exposed to sight. The gospel writers count on their audience's knowledge of Roman practice, punishment done in the public square for all to see.

This moment is another blow in the humiliation of Jesus as he goes to the cross. He has suffered greatly as this one long day has progressed. In Gethsemane, he was scourged in his spirit, agonizing before his Father about the cup that was to be his. God's cup of wrath against the sin of the world was Jesus' to drink, and he prayed, his face on the ground, for the cup to pass. His soul saw the moment on the cross when God would forsake him. And the anguish became real.

He was scourged by his disciples as they fled from his sight as he was arrested. They had promised to stand by...but failed. They lifted their swords...then dropped them and ran. The days of walking beside Jesus, the dream of ruling with him in his kingdom, the talk of joining him in his death, all drifted away as they scattered like rats from a sinking ship.

And now his body is racked with pain as the whips hit their mark The Romans are efficient. The Romans know what they are doing. Each strike has its purpose..."this troublemaker will not bother us any more and let this be a lesson to you out there."

Jesus has told each one of us, "Take up your cross and follow me." To follow him is to go where he goes, to go through these moments of anguish, of abandonment, of pain and suffering. This is not a glamorous happy-clappy faith. Faithful words will not always be heard with happiness. Faithful actions will not always be accepted. But we stand on the other side of the cross. We know the scourging did not work. We know the cross failed in its task. We know our Lord is not silenced, and he no longer cries out in pain, but in victory.