The Joy Set Before Him

It's Thursday before Easter.  Last night I went to church.  Once a month our church has a Refuge Service which is an extended time of worship and communion.  As we are heading into Easter, the service centered around Jesus's last days.

Pastor Kip asked us to read Mark 14, 15 and 16 focusing on the events leading up to the resurrection and camping out in the story.  This morning, Thursday, I did just that.  Well, 9 verses anyway.   I got through 9 verses.

Mark 14 begins with the religious leaders plotting to kill Jesus.  Back door meetings, quiet whispers, covert operations to create a plan to kill Someone the people adored.   Extremely powerful men plotting to kill a poor rabbi loved by the very people the powerful men led.

The first verse tells us the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread are 2 days away.  In reading I realize the Passover would begin on a Thursday at sundown.  Today is Thursday.  Today at sundown Jesus would begin the Last Supper.

The Last Supper.  A sacred event I have celebrated hundreds of times.  The disciples hadn't.  They didn't even know it was the Last Supper.  They only knew there was something different about this meal.  Jesus told them to break bread and drink wine in remembrance of Him.  But He was standing right in front of them.  I imagine the heaviness in Jesus's voice; the questions running through the disciples mind yet no one uttering a single one of them.  What could He possibly mean by this?

Today is Thursday.  Jesus begins the Passover.  I've only read one verse of Mark 14.

It's hard to comprehend the horrific details of the execution.   The betrayal, the beatings, the nails.  I've never been hit, but I have been betrayed.  The pain of betrayal pierces; shaking everything you know to be true.  Your very core is rattled.  The emotional toll is heavy.

Jesus experienced both pains; physical and emotional.  And it began on Thursday.  Today.

My contemplation is on the disciples.   As the night grows dark and violent, fear grips their soul.  I think back to the most traumatic event in my life.  How many moments I stood there questioning what was happening, doubting any of it could be true.  Confused.  Scared.  Yet I was never terrified for my own life.  

The disciples were.

Their rabbi who had done no wrong was being beaten and tried and sentenced to die.  If the Teacher faced this, then surely they could too as they were His closest  friends; His students.  

They ran.  They hid in fear.

They didn't have Mark 16. They didn't know about the resurrection.  There was no fast forwarding to the good parts.  The disciples only knew the terror around them.  And it was real.

Hope was gone.

They didn't know the joy waiting for them on Sunday.  Right now, they only knew hopelessness.  And fear.  Great, deep fear.

My mind drifts to Jesus.  His willingness to being scourged by a Roman soldier.  A military man taught how to punish using methods to bring the greatest amount of pain.  This wasn't a bar room brawl.  This was torture by a trained killer.  What horrific pain and agony He endured.  

A verse comes to mind, "...who for the joy set before Him endured the cross..." (Hebrews 12:2b). 
 
What joy could be so great as to shadow such deep agony?

You.

Me.

The joy so great as to make the agony pale in comparison was the thought of us spending forever with Him.  

For the first time in 49 years I completely understood depth of that thought.   I felt it.  I swam in it.  In humility and disbelief I let it sink in how intensely He wants to share life with me.  The joy of me - of us - drowned out the pain inflicted by a trained killer.  I am far from perfect, my heart is messy and at times I'm not even nice.  Yet the thought of me brought Him joy.

As I celebrate Easter on Sunday, I will sing a little louder knowing the resurrection brings me a taste of that very joy Jesus contemplated.  A joy to be made complete on the day we meet.