A LENTEN ADVENTURE for 2024 - Tuesday March 19

 

When we think of thorns, what comes to mind?  We think of pain, wounds, thorn-marks, blood and suffering.

The Scriptures also speak of thorns.

John 19:2 says that the Roman soldiers wove a crown of thorns and placed it on Jesus’ head when Pilate was questioning Jesus in the Pretorium.

Genesis 3:17,18 says that Adam’s sin resulted in a cursed ground that would produce thorns. 

Numbers 33:55 says that if the people of Israel did not expel the pagan people of the land they were to conquer, these pagans would become thorns and a source of affliction for the people of Israel.  

Hosea 10:8 says that thorns would grow on the altars of the destroyed places. 

Proverbs 22:5 says, “Thorns and snares are in the way of the perverse …”.

Proverbs 24:30,31 says that thorns grow in the field of the lazy and in the vineyard of the fool.

Hebrews 6:8 says that “land that produces thorns is worthless and in danger of being cursed” and that in the end will be burned (speaking of people who knew Jesus and later rejected him).

“Throughout Scripture thorns symbolize, not sin, but the consequence of sin …Brambles on the earth are the product of sin in the heart.”  (ML)

Jesus, the Son of God, lived a sinless life here on the earth. Hebrews 7:26 says that he is a high priest that “truly meets our need:  holy, innocent, blameless and set apart from sinners”.   As a result, because He loved His creation, He took upon Himself the sin of the world and suffered the consequences and the payment of sin  in our place: in other words, He died on the cross of Calvary instead of us.   The Apostle Peter declares, “He himself bore our sins in his body on the cross, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness …” (1 Peter 2:24)

So the crown of thorns placed on Jesus’ head represents the fruit of our sin that He took upon Himself.  What we suffered as a result of our sin – guilt, shame, fear, anxiety, anger, greed, evil, etc. – Jesus also felt it when He took the sin upon Himself. 

“Jesus never knew the fruits of sin …until He became sin for us.  And when He did, all the emotions of sin tumbled in on Him … He felt anxious, guilty, and alone.  Can’t you hear the emotion in His prayer? ‘My God, my God, why have you rejected me?’ (Matthew 27:46). These are not the words of a saint.  This is the cry of a sinner.” (ML)

The Apostle Paul explains it this way: “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.”  (2 Corinthians 5:21)

When Jesus permitted the crown of thorns to be placed on His head, He left behind the heavenly crown that He had worn for all eternity.  And He did it for you. 

+ REFLECTIONS