{"id":935,"date":"2010-03-16T07:00:03","date_gmt":"2010-03-16T06:00:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.christlutheranchurch.org.uk\/site\/?p=935"},"modified":"2010-02-20T11:53:54","modified_gmt":"2010-02-20T10:53:54","slug":"lent-devotions-2010-tuesday-16-march","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.christlutheranchurch.org.uk\/site\/2010\/03\/16\/lent-devotions-2010-tuesday-16-march\/","title":{"rendered":"Lent Devotions 2010: Tuesday 16 March"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cI gave my back to those who strike,
\n<\/em><\/strong>and my cheeks to those who pull out the beard;
\n<\/em><\/strong>I hid not my face from disgrace and spitting.\u201d\u00a0 Isaiah 50:6<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0As a youngster, the scene from \u201cMutiny on the Bounty\u201d, of a young man being flayed alive for some misdemeanour, appalled me, and my sympathies went to Fletcher Christian and his famous mutiny.\u00a0 Later I read Captain (later Admiral) Blye’s account of the need to keep strict discipline, and justifying extreme punishment.\u00a0 I suppose the high priests too felt justified in their trial of Jesus.<\/p>\n

\u00a0They just didn’t get who they were dealing with.\u00a0 In their mockery of a trial they got Him to admit that He was the Messiah, the Christ; they condemned Him as deserving death, and took their case to Pilate since they were not permitted to carry out the death sentence themselves.\u00a0 First, some began to spit on Him, and cover His face, and to strike Him, saying to Him, \u201cProphesy to us you Christ!\u00a0 Who is it that struck you?\u201d\u00a0 Later, Herod too with his soldiers treated Jesus with contempt and mocked Him.\u00a0 Pilate unwillingly bowed to the pressure of the Jews and handed Him over.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0The film \u201cThe Passion of the Christ\u201d was criticised for the length of the whipping scene.\u00a0 But there Christ, perhaps already half dead, continued to turn the other cheek to those who were so enraged with Him that they were tearing their hair out, or at least tearing their robes.\u00a0 But the disgrace didn’t stop there.\u00a0 The governor’s soldiers called together the whole battalion, clothed Him in purple, plaited a crown of thorns on His head and in mock salute, having spat upon Him and struck Him, knelt in false homage to Him, and led Him away to be crucified.<\/p>\n

\u00a0No doubt the priests sincerely thought they were doing God a favour in getting rid of Jesus.\u00a0 But one can be sincere and wrong, as it were.\u00a0 He had to die – this was His destiny, His purpose.\u00a0 He came to suffer and die in our stead, take all our punishment, and go on to do what only God could do: win victory over death itself, and give new and eternal life to all who have faith in Him.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Thank You Jesus for doing this for us!\u00a0 Amen.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cI gave my back to those who strike, and my cheeks to those who pull out the beard; I hid not my face from disgrace and spitting.\u201d\u00a0 Isaiah 50:6 \u00a0As a youngster, the scene from \u201cMutiny on the Bounty\u201d, of a young man being flayed alive for some misdemeanour, appalled me, and my sympathies went […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-935","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-lent-devotions-2010"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.christlutheranchurch.org.uk\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/935","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.christlutheranchurch.org.uk\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.christlutheranchurch.org.uk\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.christlutheranchurch.org.uk\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.christlutheranchurch.org.uk\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=935"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.christlutheranchurch.org.uk\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/935\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":936,"href":"https:\/\/www.christlutheranchurch.org.uk\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/935\/revisions\/936"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.christlutheranchurch.org.uk\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=935"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.christlutheranchurch.org.uk\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=935"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.christlutheranchurch.org.uk\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=935"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}