Thoughts from the book In the Footsteps of Jesus by Bruce Marchiano

I mentioned in an earlier post http://teachingsundayschool.blogspot.com/2008/04/understanding-jesus.html an article I read about the author of this book. The article had some exerts from the book, which I shared with the Sunday School class I was teaching the next week. I mentioned I wanted to get the book and my husband bought it for me for my birthday a couple days later.

One of the things Bruce talked about that really struck me was we shouldn’t think Jesus was a victim when they hung Him on the cross. He said the soldiers didn’t drag Jesus to the cross; Jesus crawled to it with every last bit of strength He could muster.

Bruce wrote that first: Jesus was very strong and physically fit. He was a first century carpenter and back then they didn’t have power tools. It was a lot of lifting and hauling and using and building muscles. He said that might have been why God chose that profession for His Son. Most people who were flogged and tortured by the Roman soldiers didn’t last long enough to hang on a cross. But, Jesus did.

Also he pointed out that when Jesus was on trial he said nothing in His own defense and very little at all. What He did say was in answer to “Are you the king of the Jews?” and He said He was. Why did He answer that question out of all of them?

Bruce says, “Because it’s the one that would get Him killed. The Jews would consider that blasphemy because basically Jesus was saying He was the Messiah here.”

Jesus was in complete control of the situation. His time had come and He was making it happen. Jesus wasn’t forced to the cross – He chose the cross.
Don’t ever think of Jesus as a victim!