With His Stripes We Are Healed

With His Stripes We Are Healed (22×28 mixed media)

The physical death of Jesus was a horrific thing. The physical abuse and pain of the beatings and scourging He received, the scorn and suffering of death by suffocation on the cross is impossible to imagine. However, His physical death was not the worst that has ever been suffered by a man. What Jesus suffered, and willingly sacrificed for our sakes, was going through physical death (which He could have chosen to walk away from at any point), but so much more — separation from God. Being part of God come into flesh to walk among us and show us the way, He who was without sin took upon Himself all the sins of mankind. At that moment (when He said: “Father, why have thou forsaken me?”), He had become the thing that God cannot abide, so God had to turn away – He became separated from Himself and became selfless, so that we might be redeemed. He became the ultimate perfect sacrifice for us.  Then he said: “It is finished.”  He had completed his purpose in coming here. God’s perfect plan had been put into place.

His tear is not from physical pain or His own suffering, it is for us. It is that tear of love and compassion so great that it makes you cry, multiplied billions of times.

Isaiah 53:1-7

“Who has believed what we have heard? And to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed?
For He grew up before Him like a young plant, and like a root out of dry ground; He had no form or comeliness that we should look at Him, and no beauty that we should desire Him. He was despised and rejected by men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces, He was despised, and we esteemed Him not. Surely He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed Him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; upon Him was the chastisement that made us whole, and with His stripes we are healed.
All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD has laid on Him the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed, and He was afflicted, yet He opened not his mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is dumb, so He opened not His mouth. ”

This scripture is the only place in the Bible where Jesus is physically described.  Throughout time, artists who know and love God, have generally painted Jesus as this strikingly beautiful man, because through love’s eyes, that is how they see Him, just as anyone who is in love sees their beloved as beautiful.  In fact he was just an average looking Jew, with no imposing physique or physical beauty that would make people want to follow him.  They followed Him because of who He was, just as people do today.

I found it interesting that my assigned post time is 3:00pm, scripturally called the 9th hour, the exact time that Jesus is said to have uttered His final words and died, and so most appropriate for this post on Good Friday.

E.J. Lefavour

www.hobbithousestudio.com