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Archives: April 2009
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Archives: April 2009
When you say Easter, I say...
By Dan Etheridge
Lets play a game. It’s a word association game. You mustn’t pause, you mustn’t hesitate, and if you do you’ll get a bash on the head like this, or like this*. The word is Easter. So what words come into your head? Chocolate? Bunnies? Jesus? A cross? An empty tomb? Don’t worry, there is no right answer. It’s not a test.
Personally, when I hear the word Easter, more often than not, I think of thorns. Not a nice pruned rose bush, but a twisted crown of barbwire-like thorns. I know, it’s a bit dark and depressing, but it’s true. Fortunately it’s an ok connection to Easter as we’re told in Matthew’s gospel that as Jesus is led away from his trial he is mocked and beaten by a company of soldiers who give him a crown of thorns…
‘They stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him, and then twisted together a crown of thorns and set it on his head. They put a staff in his right hand and knelt in front of him and mocked him’
Matthew 27v28-29
What’s that about? A scene of torture in the New Testament? It’s not pleasant is it? Give me the story of the prodigal son any day! But wait. If we look further at just these two verses and and specifically focus on the thorns we get an indication of exactly who Jesus was, what he was about to do and why.
The thorns show how far Jesus came…
The thorns, the staff and the robes the soldiers dress Jesus up in are the ultimate insult. There is no honour being given to Jesus in this scene. They are ridiculing and deriding him. They are screaming: ‘you’re no king. Think you’re special, just look at yourself now’. The fake kingly garments are ways they are trying to ruin Jesus, to break him and shame him.
But the thing that makes this dehumanising setting even worse is that we know, beyond the 1st century AD context, that Jesus is a king. He’s honoured in heaven. He’s God become man, the creator of all being shamed, spat on, kicked and beaten by people he could crush in an instant. He’s not just innocent, but the ultimate example of perfect humanity being tortured and crushed. It’s devastating.
It’s a deeply ironic scene. Jesus is being mocked for being a king, but he is in fact a king… he’s due the honour that the soldiers and world are taunting him with. The thorns show us, the king Jesus was and is: a king of love and perseverance who would give all and suffer all.
The thorns show how far he would go…
But the crown of thorns are also an indication of what Jesus was about to do. They allude to the meaning of his death on the cross. After a bit of digging around (and some help from Max Lucado), you can find thorns in other bits of scripture too.
Thorns are in Genesis, a result of the curse of sin. When Adam and Eve fall, they are told that the earth will be hard to tend and thorns and weeds will fill the ground (Gen 3v17-18). The wisdom of Proverbs says that thorns lie in the path of the wicked (Prov 22v5) and Jesus says that thornbushes don’t produce good fruit, alluding to the words of false prophets (Matt 7v16).
Thorns are used as a picture of what happens when we do wrong and stumble away from God. In these senses thorns are a result of sin, a sign of sin; they are the fruit of sin.
So, why is Jesus wearing a crown of thorns? He is holding and bearing the result of our sin. The crown of thorns on his head are a symbol of our shame, guilt, depression, cynicism and much more. He’s taking the result of all our sin and mess on himself. The perfect one is taking all our imperfections and within hours he’d be dying to forever free us from all the separation from God that sin causes.
Of course Easter doesn’t end with a crown of thorns. Easter ends with an empty grave and with a risen king who gets the honour he deserves. But the thorns show us a bit more of the God who suffers because he loves us, the God who makes a relationship with him possible.
Easter. Thorns. See it now?
Extras...
*Remember Mallet’s Mallet with Timmy Mallet? If not do a quick YouTube search, it’s the stuff my Saturday mornings were made of back in the 80’s.
To read more on the crown of thorns and other bits associated with the Easter story try Max Lucado’s book ‘He chose the nails’. It’s good.
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