Climax to The Greatest Story Ever Told

Climax To The Greatest Story Ever Told Part 6

Suddenly Christ had lost control of His body. It was time.

In the physical realm it had been 6 hours. Six brutally agonizing hours hanging on a wooden cross. For all that time, soft, delicate flesh had been impaled and pegged to a rough surface by cold, hard nails inches long. His back had been shredded raw by the whip of those who had scourged Him. Hanging on almost nothing, He had suffered, unable to decide which was worse: abandoning His weight to the nails holding Him up for the sake of His back, or to abandon His back to the cross for the sake of supporting the rest of His body. For 6 hours it had been like that.

Now, at the end of everything, He had finally reached His physical limit and was drifting away into the darkness of the netherworld, taking His first steps on the lonely road called death. He, God-made-flesh, was about to do the unthinkable and actually taste death. The idea itself seemed preposterous—no wonder no one had believed Him when He had repeatedly predicted the dark event. Not even those who had been with Him for 3 and a half years. But death was actually coming to take Him away. He would finally pass on. But not before this...

In the spirit realm, there remained one thing to clinch the sacrifice He had made—the one thing worse than the entire ordeal of physical torture He had endured since the night before. The one thing that had Him literally terrified. Nothing in all the physical realm could ever hope to attain to the level of horror that He was now about to endure.

His body was rising, independent of His will. He was being taken away from the battle. Away from hideous demons and their supreme hatred. Away from the bloodlust. Away from the danger. And into something far worse.

Suddenly all around Him was blackness. It was a perfect blackness, devoid of any light whatsoever. He was ascending at unimaginable speeds, He knew, yet it felt as if He was perfectly immobile. The seconds flew past and part of Him wished earnestly that they would slow down, the other part urging them on, anxious for all to be finally fulfilled. His mind drifted back to His request the day before: Father, if it's Your will, let this cup pass from Me... Let it pass! He had prayed along these lines with such fervour and desperation that His sweat had become blood. That cup had now been almost fully drained but He would not be allowed to leave even the dregs behind. And the time for the dregs, for the worst part, had come.

Yet He remembered His conclusion and knew He had been right: Nevertheless, not My will, but thine be done... He knew He couldn't give up now, and He didn't want to, anyway. He'd come this far out of love. Pure love. He'd known all along that it would end like this. But He'd also known all along what would happen if He chose not to do this, as well as the unspeakable joy that would come about if He were to do this and finish it. And that bright future was far too exciting a prospect to allow even the steepest price imaginable to get in the way of its attainment. He would gladly pay it all again and again. For His Father. For Himself. For them.

His last thoughts as a free man drifted to them. Humanity. The crowning piece of all creation. What perfection He had given them in the beginning! Brightness of countenance. Superior intelligence. Limitless joy and peace and love. A paradise to inhabit and rule over with never a shadow of darkness, sorrow or fear. And then what a blunder they had committed and thrown it all away, all for a lie.

Sinning. Separating themselves from Him. Embarking on a sad and rapid decline into pain, sickness, war, decadence and death, far away from His protection and stability, far away from their destiny. But then what a redemption awaited them after He had completed this sacrifice! What an incredible reality, far exceeding their wildest imaginations and boldest dreams! All of it was a mere few moments away, with only His final agony standing in the way. He kept His thoughts fixed on that future and managed a genuine smile amid His distress.

He stopped moving abruptly. The first thing He noticed was that His strength had left Him totally. He was being held up by an unseen force but if it were not for that, He would have collapsed long ago. Then the pain slammed into Him. Sharp, unrelenting, excruciating pain. In every single area of His being at once. It was maddening. He wanted to cry out but His lips and tongue had lost their strength. The cry, born in the depths of His being, died behind closed lips. Air had become inexplicably scarce. Breathing was a veritable struggle. He had just enough to subsist, yet not enough to be at ease. He felt as if He was actually suffocating, yet He wasn't really. Fear wrapped cold fingers around His heart and squeezed ruthlessly.

His lips finally parted but hung limp, lifeless. He found He couldn't form words with them at all. He hyperventilated. The sound of air frantically rushing past His throat filled His ears. A profound weakness characterized every fibre of His being; weakness added to horrible pain and an utter inability to move at will. He was crying and screaming inside but neither the tears nor the cry could get out. And His eyes widened as He finally saw the light approaching, the light of His beloved Father. It was extremely bright, blindingly pure and beautiful to behold, radiating power and holiness to degrees that defied comprehension. His Father was coming!

But the joy He should have felt, the hope of being rescued which should have flooded His being, was nowhere to be found. In fact, for the first time ever, this light brought Him to heights of dread bordering on the very brink of insanity. Yet it never totally relinquished Him to the comparative bliss and relief that that insanity would have offered Him. There could be no comfort, because this light was the reason for His sudden fear and pain and weakness. There would be no refuge, not even in insanity.  

He wanted with all His heart to hide Himself, for in the presence of this light He felt utterly soiled and unclean. He could sense pure, infinite, divine wrath aimed fully at Him—only at Him—and He cowered inside, praying for escape but knowing there would be none. One does not hide from or escape Almighty God.

The light was right before Him now and suddenly all His symptoms lessened. They didn't disappear, but they lessened considerably. Now He felt only mildly uncomfortable. The light parted to reveal the face and figure He had known and loved for an eternity.

Incomparable beauty. Trying to describe it would be pointless and would not do justice to the One clothed in light.

The Father was dressed for war, fully armed and awesome in all His glory, and Christ knew that in this war He was to be the unfortunate opposition. But for a fleeting few seconds before the end, He would not be the Sin-Bearer of the universe destined to face the wrath of the Sovereign God. For just these next few seconds He would be the Beloved Son again. It was an act of mercy, and even more so an act of love. His Father loved Him even now—especially now. His Father was proud of Him. He had achieved Their Plan, the Plan They had mapped out from before the foundation of the world. They would both allow Themselves just a few seconds to acknowledge that powerful truth as Father and Son before the end.

The face offered Him a warm smile. "My Son."

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