Station 11
It seems impossible to understand how crucifixion was invented as a means to kill someone. it is a slow and painful death which makes it difficult to breath until eventually you are too weak and you suffocate. You can live for a few hours or even a few days. That is why in the story they come to break the men’s legs to speed up the deaths.
Jesus has been stripped naked and now he has his hands and feet nailed to the cross – the ultimate vulnerability and you can do nothing to protect yourself from the shouts and curses of the people below. They may even have been throwing things at him.
This is what God has done for us – suffered the most painful of deaths so that we might have fullness of life. Everything we have done wrong in the past is forgiven, so long as we have repented and try to live a new life in his ways.
‘No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.'(John 15:13)
Crucifixion is still carried out in the world today.
I have seen big bullying men crack up into weeping when shown the film of nails being hammered though the hands to the crossbar.
Ultimately painful physically and as the mental state deteriorates, with all hope disappearing, made ultimately worse.
And after all this, by someone who could not be faulted at all, we carry on with our pet naughtinesses thus missing the opportunity offered to us.