A different concept of pleasure and joy

I was supposed to give a "Good Friday" message last week, but I was too sick to do so. "Good Friday" is typically when we remember the crucifixion in preparation for remembering the resurrection on "Easter Sunday". In thinking about the message ahead of time, I began to contemplate a couple of different verses regarding the crucifixion.

The verses I was thinking about were both quotes from God. One is a quote from God the Father, while the other is a quote from God the Son. Both are quotes about the crucifixion, and both say something similarly dark and complex, difficult and curious.

In Isaiah 53, as we read the famous prophetic words of God the Father about the substitutionary death of His Son, we come to verse 10. Here we read that it PLEASED the LORD (Yahweh) to CRUSH Him (Jesus). It was God's will, and therefore it pleased Him, to CRUSH His one and only Son. Have you ever in your life thought of relating the act of CRUSHING the innocent with PLEASURE. This is a difficult juxtaposition of action and emotion: CRUSH and PLEASURE. We're not talking about a mean little kid who thinks it's fun to crush a bug under his boot! We're talking about a perfect, holy, loving, righteous God who was PLEASED TO CRUSH HIS ONE AND ONLY SON!

In Hebrews 12:2 we read a famous verse about the passion of Christ. It says that Jesus endured the torture and shame of the cross FOR THE JOY that was set before Him. The joy? Again, the precarious placement of the unobvious is thrust before us! Enduring the torture and shame of the cross is equal to JOY! How can this be?

How can it be that our Heavenly Father was PLEASED to CRUSH His one and only Son? How can it be that Holy Son of God could count the PAIN and SHAME of the cross as JOY? While the two personages of the Godhead are in agreement over their mutual emotion regarding the crucifixion, we are left to look upon it with horror and grief and wonderment and pain, wondering, "How is this PLEASING? How is this a JOY?"

When we look upon the cross with honest eyes and tender hearts we can literally feel the weight of the hammer in our hands. Our elbows ache and our hands cramp with pain from swinging the death blows that forced the nail through the flesh and bone of our Saviour. We see the torture and pain for what it is, because we were the perpetrators of the crime who deserved the punishment that was carried out upon this innocent man in our own place.

And yet... HE TAKES PLEASURE... HE COUNTS IT AS JOY. With all the irony Heaven can bring to bare, with all the might of God's righteousness, with all the might of God's love, with all the pain of sin, and all the power of grace, as we each grasped that hammer and pounded the nails in, our Heavenly Father and His Holy Son were pleased and joyed TO REMOVE THE GUILT THAT WAS KILLING US AND ALLOW US TO KILL HIM INSTEAD. BY DOING THIS HE EXTENDS HIS WOUNDED ARMS AND INVITES US TO JOIN HIM IN HIS DEATH AND RESURRECTION. HE HAS BORN THE TORTURE AND PUNISHMENT THAT WAS DUE TO US SO THAT WE CAN DIE TO WHO WE USED TO BE - SOULS BOUND BY SIN AND DEATH - AND RISE AGAIN WITH HIM INTO A NEW AND ETERNAL LIFE, EMPOWERED AND LEAD BY HIS SPIRIT.


This incredible free gift is indescribable! It's overwhelming! It's truly awesome! But lingering in my mind now is still this reality: the one that sent His only Son, and the only Son that was sent, both saw this torturous, crushing pain AS A GOOD THING. And knowing who I was without Christ - what manner of person I was and would be - it is abundantly clear that IT WAS A GOOD THING; for me and millions of others who would drown in darkness and death and be eternally separated from our Blessed Creator!

But a greater lesson still remains for those of us who have truly GIVEN OUR LIVES BACK TO Him as "living sacrifices, holy and acceptable to God, which is our reasonable service." The lesson of suffering still remains. The lesson of learning how crushing pain and shame are part of a plan of pleasure and joy! I don't claim to completely understand it, but I am confident that the more I know Christ, and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His suffering (Philippians 3:10), the better I will understand what real pleasure and joy are, and how they often involve crushing pain and shame. I have a sneaking suspicion that true pleasure and joy have very little to do with our everyday, American definitions, and very little to do with anything in our own will. Rather, when we begin to grasp the heart of the Father and gain the vision of the Son, we will see what TRUE pleasure and joy are, and what is required of us to attain them.