the    sides

This is part of our e-journey through the gospel of John. This week’s from John 19:15-42.

I wonder what was going through Nicodemus’ mind as he went to help bury Jesus’ body? I wonder if he and Joseph of Arimathea were close? Were they closer after this day? Did Nicodemus know that Joseph was a follower of Jesus? Did Joseph have regret or relief that he had kept his love for Jesus a secret? What was Pilate like when Joseph asked him for the body of Jesus?

Was Nicodemus nervous as to what his peers in the San Hedrin would think of him? Was he so overcome with grief, he didn’t care? Was it all a fog and he was in shock? What was burying Jesus like? The last time we saw Nicodemus was in John 3. Did he ever decide on the validity of Jesus? Was he still wrestling with it when this happened?

The 19th chapter of John is just dark. It’s full of questions and despair and it ends with the words…”they laid Jesus there.” There had to been this sense of hopelessness. This is the one we thought God promised us. This is the one we have waited for. And it’s dark.

And God is silent.

The disciples are scattered.

The secret followers are confused.

Hope is dead.

God is silent.

Everything is dark.

Or is it?

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
Why are you so far from saving me,
so far from the words of my groaning?

O my God, I cry out by day, but you do not answer,
by night, and am not silent.
…

All who see me mock me;
they hurl insults, shaking their heads:

“He trusts in the LORD;
let the LORD rescue him.
Let him deliver him,
since he delights in him.”

Yet you brought me out of the womb;
you made me trust in you
even at my mother’s breast.

I am poured out like water,
and all my bones are out of joint.
My heart has turned to wax;
it has melted away within me.

My strength is dried up like a potsherd,
and my tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth;
you lay me in the dust of death.

Dogs have surrounded me;
a band of evil men has encircled me,
they have pierced my hands and my feet.

I can count all my bones;
people stare and gloat over me.

They divide my garments among them
and cast lots for my clothing.

But you, O LORD, be not far off;
O my Strength, come quickly to help me.

…

They will proclaim his righteousness
to a people yet unborn—
for he has done it.

From Psalm 22

So in the middle of the death of hope there are glances, hints of something greater, something more beautiful, more astounding than one could possibly imagine. Glimpses of a fulfilled promise.

It’s almost as if God was in fact screaming to His children - IT’S NOT OVER. LOOK AT MY HAND. I wonder if Nicodemus remembered Psalm 22 on that Friday?