“Whom do you seek?”

With these few, simple words, the first Good Friday exploded in intensity, sometime in the early morning hours, when it was still dark, when it was still cold, when the sleeplessness of an agonizing night of prayer lay heavily on shoulders that would soon bear the sharp splinters of a Roman cross.

“Whom do you seek?”

It was the question of the moment, the question everyone knew the answer to, and the question that all of us must, and will, answer, whether by actions, or words, or thoughts.

“Whom do you seek?”

There, in the flickering light and pungent smoke of lanterns and torches, standing before soldiers, priests, and even His betrayer, the One who created them all asked the question they were destined to answer. The Bible is silent on many things, as it is here, but in my mind’s eye, I believe that as these words came from Jesus’ lips, His eyes were fixed intently upon the one who would betray Him with, of all things, a kiss. Just as He would later turn and look at Peter upon his denial, He would surely have looked upon Judas with pain, tears, and even love.

“Whom do you seek?”

The events now set in motion were unstoppable, not because of any lack of power or inability to call legions of angels to His defense, but because this was the will of the Father, the crushing, searing, loving will of the Father, and because of the great love He has for all of us who have no other way to escape the penalty for our sin, small or great, known or secret, acknowledged or ignored. There was a debt to pay, and the One whom they were seeking would pay it, and the world would never be the same.

“Whom do you seek?”

In the pre-dawn hours came the sham of a trial, the lies of false witnesses, the first of the beatings, and the crowing of a rooster.

Then came the accusations before Pilate, the mockery before Herod, a scourging to appease a bloodthirsty mob, and a coronation complete with a crown of thorns, a purple robe, and a fool’s scepter with which He would be beaten over the head. It takes but little imagination to know that by the time He stood once more before Pilate to hear him sneer, “Behold the Man,” Roman brutality had taken its fearful toll on bone and flesh.

“Whom do you seek?”

Enduring the weight of rough wood on open wounds, enduring the carnival-like atmosphere, enduring  the jeering from many, who just days before, had praised Him, enduring as much as He could endure before soldiers pressed another into shouldering His instrument of execution, He arrived at the hill that had always lay in His future, even from the time from when He was in His mother’s womb, even before He spoke the universe into existence.  His road had taken Him to the place where all of human history would pivot by the end of this day’s horrible events.

Through the pain, abandonment, and humiliation of crucifixion, as darkness covered the land and curiosity seekers pressed in, the great exchange occurred. “For our sake He made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.” II Corinthians 5:21

His mission accomplished, His Father’s will completed, the King of Kings spoke the greatest words of love the world has ever known: “It is finished.”  Then He bowed His head, and He gave up His spirit.  “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.”  John 15:13

“Whom do you seek?”

Were this all just a simpleton’s story, a made-up excuse for empty religion and false hope, no one would even bother to remember the crucifixion of one Jewish man outside the walls of Jerusalem. No, He would be just one more faceless and nameless victim among the unknown thousands who suffered the same fate at Roman hands. Why would anyone ever bother to seek Him? What would be the point?  The show was over, with nothing more to see.

But on the third day, everything changed.

He is risen. Death was defeated. And the price has been paid for all who will believe and place their trust in the One who still asks,

“Whom do you seek?”

May you have a blessed Good Friday and Easter.