The Scene

The scene around the cross that dark Friday afternoon was not a pretty picture.  It was a moment when humanity was at its worst.  One man drove iron spikes into another man's hands and feet nailing him to the wooden cross upon which He was stretched.  When the cross was pulled up and dropped violently into a hole, the pain experienced by the One destined to die was simply unthinkable.  When the One nailed to the cross screamed at the jarring pain, those who put him there laughed and called Him unspeakable names.  And, then the tormentors settled down with their wine and gambling as if a man was not dying right there before them.  Humanity at its worst is what we see when we look.

But, we also see the power of God being worked out in what seems to be a picture filled only with despair and hopelessness.   If God could work in that place and in that moment to bring about good, then there is no horrible place beyond the reach of His divine redemption.  It is a thing worth remembering for we have all stood in terrible places in our own journey of faith.  We have gone through the loss of children and parents, the loss of marriages, the loss of what we thought spoke of our future, and the loss of our own sense of personal worth.  We have been in places where it seemed impossible for us to consider that life had a future. 

In those times we have hung on to that verse from Romans which says, "...all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to His purpose."  (Romans 8:28)  Those outside of the circle of faith say that such is our grabbing a simplistic word which has little meaning in the real world, but we know it to be the Word of God.  We know that God can bring about good in the worst of things because we have seen Him at work on Calvary.  If God can work for God in that horrible place, then He can surely work in the unthinkable circumstances of our life.