Christ-killers

Have you ever wondered why Easter changes every year rather than falling on the same date or at least the same week? Naturally we celebrate Easter on Sunday as the resurrection of Christ was on the first day of the week (John 20:1). This would be the equivalent of commemorating the attack on Pearl Harbor on the first Sunday in December rather than on the specific date December 7. What is more interesting is how the week of Easter is chosen. It is the Sunday following the first full moon after the Spring Equinox. I always wondered why there was almost a month’s variable in when Easter rolled around. It is in the cycle of the moon.

However I don’t recall any Biblical reference to the Spring Equinox or the full moon. Historically Christ’s resurrection was on the first day of the week following the Jewish Passover. Over time however the Church, originally considered by the Romans as a sect of Judaism began to desire separation from its Jewish roots. In fact it is shocking how much anti-Semitism shows up among church leaders both Catholic and Protestant until at last the Church claimed no kinship with the “Christ killing Jews”.  

Unfortunately this caused them to loose sight of the fact that the correlation between Passover and the Resurrection was not happenstance, Jesus became the Passover for us all. You see the Children of Israel were in bondage in Egypt and the Lord declared judgment upon all the first born, only if the blood of a sacrifice was upon the door of the house would the angel of death Passover that home. This most important of Jewish feasts was the most important prediction of the coming of the Messiah. So much of Jesus life and work can be understood through the traditions of the feasts of the Lord as given to the Hebrews through the law of Moses, and this concept of the Jews as the murderers of Christ long kept us from it.

So who really killed Christ anyway?

First there was Religion. The Jewish leaders of the Sanhedrin were the Religious leaders of their day; it pertained to them to examine the teachings of any new Rabbi to see if they were accurate according to the law and the prophets. They examined Jesus, as was the custom of the Passover and could find no fault in Him or His teachings. In fact the Pharisees understood Jesus’ teaching better at times than his own disciples did. But religion was corrupted and unwilling to surrender its power to the very Messiah they claimed to long for, unwilling to abandon their misconceptions about who the Messiah should be so they rejected Him. Religion did not have the power to kill the Man so they took him to the Government.

The Government of the day was that of Rome. We as Americans owe much of our governmental structure to Rome and many of our ideas of Jurist Prudence. The Roman Governor Pontius Pilate not a weak vacillating man as a rule and though he was exceptionally harsh with dissent was not an unjust administrator. It was his place to examine the man and see rather he was a criminal or threat to the peace. He did his job, examined the man and found no fault in Him. Alas though men are weak and cannot govern themselves justly. Pilate knew what should have been done, and even his wife warned him, but he tried to “pass the buck” first to Herod, the Roman appointed King of Galilee, and then when that failed he brought the matter before the people. He did not want to condemn an innocent man but the political pressure was so heavy that he feared to do the right thing. It was a Roman tradition to honor the Jewish feast by releasing a prisoner condemned to death so Pilate decided to give the choice to the people.

The people, the decent ordinary everyday people, the hardworking souls of Jerusalem, these are the ones who would decide. Surely Pilate thought, and the Pharisees feared, these people would choose the Lord over the murderer Barabus when offered the choice. It was democracy in action. The final say was in the hands of the populace and they voted to crucify. Every institution of humanity, every level of society conspired to kill Christ, none were blameless: the military and the civilian, the public servants and the private sector, Clergy and the laymen. Who are the Christ killers? Every last one of us.

Perhaps we should not be so arrogant, did we really have the authority to kill Christ? Legions of Angels stood ready to save Him. When they came to arrest him with a great multitude they asked for Jesus of Nazareth and When Jesus said to them, “I am he,” they drew back and fell to the ground. (John 18:5). Had Jesus desired it, he could have struck down the whole of the Sanhedrin with a word the Angels would have laid waste to the Roman Empire from one wide ranging border to the other, and the Angel of death could have emptied the streets of Jerusalem, of the Earth for that matter, and heeded no Passover blood. This was not the will of the Lord. You see God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Rom 5:8) we were not worthy of His sacrifice except that he deemed us worthy, we were not deserving of his love but he gave it anyway. Perhaps the real Christ Killer was a forbidden love, the love of  a king for the unwashed peasant, the love of the Son for the adulterous wench, but in His love the adulteress transformed into the fair maiden, the waiting virgin bride, pure and acceptable to her Lord, and we wait for our Prince to ride in upon his white charger to carry us to a castle in the sky. The death of Christ is the greatest love story man has known, and thankfully it has a happy ending. Death which had held the final victory over every man until it came up against the Man Christ Jesus and the grave itself lost its power and death its very sting.

God be praised for writing his story of redeeming love and resurrection power into our hearts.

Note: I woe you a post about the future of America and that will be next time.

Happy Resurrection day.