As I pondered the Easter season this year, I've been moved on more time to a deeper appreciation of
the depth of God's love for me.
I've seen pictures and imagined in my mind what it must have been like to have seen the man they
called Jesus hanging on a cross. Whatever people think when they see a portrayal of Jesus hanging on
a cross it usually doesn't include the fact - that's God. What   I think that escapes the reality of most
people's thinking is the brutality that God himself endured to demonstrate His love to the world He cre-
ated. When we read in John's Gospel that God so loved the world it sounds pleasant but the reality of
how He proved His love for mankind was anything but pleasant. John's Gospel tells us that the God
that created the world wasn't recognized when He came and dwelt among us. Paul wrote about Jesus
that He is the image of the invisible God. Jesus said that if you have seen me you have seen the Father.
Have you ever pondered the thought of that horrible bloody mess of a man hanging on the cross is
God? The horror of dying on a cross is beyond comprehension for me. As I've looked again at the
events prior to the crucifixion, I see the long suffering patience and love of God like never before. The
Roman governor Pilate hoped the Jewish religious leaders and the mob they had incited would be satisfied
with the cruelty of having Jesus flogged. The God that spoke the world into existence was sentenced to
torture. Handed over to a trained expert, the god that the Bible tells us so loved the world, was bent
over a stump, chained in an inescapable position to receive undeserved punishment. The instrument of
brutality was a whip of leather tails that included on them items like metal weights and bits of sheep
bone. The sheep bones would cut into the skin and tissues. The iron balls would cause deep contusions.
As the flogging continued, the lacerations would tear into the underlying skeletal muscles and produce
quivering ribbons of bleeding flesh. All of this would result in rib fractures, serve lung bruises, bleed-
ing into the lung cavity and partial or complete collapse of the lungs. The Romans were experts in the
art of torture and knew exactly how to beat a man within an inch of his life. If that weren't enough could
you imagine being struck on the head again and again with a staff or having a crown made
of thorns shoved on your head? The staff that they beat Jesus with was the same one that they put in
his right hand as they mocked him saying, "Hail, king of the Jews." The stories of Jesus life and ministry
as recorded by Matthew and Mark both tell us that his torturers spit on him. Think about it for just one
second... They were spitting on God. If the story of the crucifixion and resurrection is all too familiar to
you and it doesn't move you, please think about the fact that God allowed himself to be humiliated and
allowed people to spit on Him. I don't think you will ever be able to read or hear John 3 : 16 again with-
out thinking that God so loved the world that He wash his traitors feet, endure undeserved torture, allow
himself to be spat upon, listen to lies that weren't true and then lay down to be nailed to a cross and
still cried out, " forgive them because they don't know what they are doing" Simply put by writer of
three books that bear his name in the New Testament...This is love; not that we loved God, but
that he loved us. 1John 4 : 10  NIV