• Read: Mark 15:21-32
The principal events of the day seem too uncomfortable for us to watch for long. So, for the present, let us look around, to see what we might see.
There are passers-by. They go back and forward, in lives too busy to stop and consider. Among them is a pilgrim from North Africa; soon, but reluctantly, compelled to take his part in history.
Soldiers perform their gruesome task. And then, with their day’s work only half-complete, they settle down to gamble. They seem to care little about the importance of what is happening.
Chief priests and religious teachers are present, demeaning their sacred roles, mocking a dying man on their most holy feast day.
And here are two thieves, condemned to suffer the same fate. Their cries of anguish alternate with insults for the man alongside them. Their mocking attitude reveals the hearts of men unwilling to suffer for their own sins - let alone the sins of the world.
But only the central cross bears the one whom John the Baptist called ‘the lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world’. And now, on the Passover, when it was the custom to sacrifice the Passover lamb, he too was dying for sins that were not his own.
Read at Bible Gateway: Mark 15:21-32 KJV / NIV / ESV / Good News
Read at Blue Letter Bible: Mark 15:21-32 KJV / NIV / ESV
Next part: Dying - Day 37 - Mark 15:33-41
From the series: Understanding Mark's Gospel
© 2019 K Simons