The Great Exchange

As some of you may know, I get up very early every day to read the Scriptures. This is my way of meeting with Jesus and just learning about how I can glorify him, where I am falling short, where I am doing good, etc. I keep a file on my computer of my daily recordings of my readings. I write an analysis on every single verse, which helps me study deeper, learn more, remember more, and glorify my Creator.

Today I was brought to tears, which isn't a rarity most mornings, but I just really wanted to share a bit with you today from a specific passage. Please enjoy...and think!

Luke 23:25

Barabbas is a violent, grotesque animal that when we read through the lenses of our current salvation, we tremble at the fact of this murderer being released in exchange for Jesus. We must take off our bias lenses and look what is really happening here. Who is Barabbas? We are Barabbas! We are the robbers, the insurrectionists, the murderers. We have sinned and been released!

Pilate can almost be seen as the Father here. He let us go, while we were once guilty, but the innocence of the sinless Christ is now applied to us. We are free to go, from all condemnation. But, Christ is then punished for our innocence. Taken captive as a criminal, beaten, mocked, flogged, and crucified, to DEATH! This is quite an exchange!!! Sad, amazing, not worthy, loved, these are only a few emotions that can be expressed.

You have killed!!!

MURDERED!

There was a day, as I took my walks abroad,
when I came by a spot forever engraven upon
my memory, for there I saw this Friend,
my best, my only Friend... MURDERED!

I stooped down in sad affright, and looked at Him.
I saw that His hands had been pierced with rough iron nails, and His feet had been torn in the same way.
There was misery in His dead countenance so terrible
that I scarcely dared to look upon it.
His body was emaciated with hunger, His back was red with
bloody scourges, and His brow had a circle of wounds about it:
clearly could one see that these had been pierced by thorns.

I shuddered, for I had known this Friend full well.
He never had a fault; He was the purest of the pure,
the holiest of the holy.

Who could have injured Him?

For He never injured any man: all His life long He "went about
doing good." He had healed the sick, He had fed the hungry, He
had raised the dead: for which of these works did they kill Him?
He had never breathed out anything else but love - and as I
looked into the poor sorrowful face, so full of agony, and yet
so full of love, I wondered who could have been a wretch so
vile as to pierce hands like His.

I said within myself, "Where can these traitors live?
Who are these that could have smitten such an One as this?"

Had they murdered an oppressor, we might have forgiven them;
had they slain one who had indulged in vice or villainy,
it might have been his desert; had it been a murderer and a rebel,
or one who had committed sedition, we would have said,
"Bury his corpse: justice has at last given him his due."

But when You were slain, my best, my only-beloved,
where did the traitors hide?
Let me seize them, and they shall be put to death!
If there be torments that I can devise, surely they shall
endure them all. Oh! what jealousy; what revenge I felt!
If I might but find these murderers, what I would do to them!

And as I looked upon that corpse, I heard a footstep,
and wondered where it was.
I listened, and I clearly perceived that the murderer was
close at hand! It was dark, and I groped about to find him.
I found that, somehow or other, wherever I put out my hand,
I could not meet with him, for he was NEARER to me than my
hand would go.

At last I put my hand upon MY BREAST. "I have you now"
said I - for lo! he was IN MY OWN HEART - the murderer
was hiding within my own bosom, dwelling in the recesses
of my INMOST SOUL.

Ah! then I wept indeed, that I, in the very presence of my
murdered Master, should be harboring the murderer - and I
felt myself most guilty while I bowed over His corpse, and sang
that plaintive hymn...
"Twas you, MY SINS, my cruel sins,
His chief tormentors were;
Each of my crimes became a nail,
and unbelief the spear."

Amid the rabble which hounded the Redeemer to His doom,
there were some gracious souls whose bitter anguish sought vent in
wailing and lamentations- fit music to accompany that march of woe.

When my soul can, in imagination, see the Saviour bearing
His cross to Calvary, she joins the godly women, and weeps
with them; for, indeed, there is true cause for grief, cause
lying deeper than those mourning women thought.
They bewailed innocence maltreated, goodness persecuted,
love bleeding, meekness about to die - but my heart has
a deeper and more bitter cause to mourn.

MY SINS were the scourges which lacerated those blessed
shoulders, and crowned with thorns those bleeding brows;
my sins cried -
"Crucify Him! Crucify Him!"
and laid the cross upon His gracious shoulders.

His being led forth to die is sorrow enough for one eternity;
but MY having been His murderer, is more, infinitely more
grief than one poor fountain of tears can express.

If Christ has died for me, ungodly as I am, without strength
as I am, then I cannot live in sin any longer, but must arouse
myself to love and serve Him who has redeemed me.

I cannot trifle with the evil which slew my best Friend.

I must be holy for His sake.

HOW CAN I LIVE IN SIN WHEN HE HAS
DIED TO SAVE ME FROM IT?

Charles Haddon Spurgeon

Shaping our Culture

The other day in one of my classes, we were discussing how much shapes have shaped cultures views, leadership, and even community. In early Egypt, they had a dictatorship style government where the leader was at the top, picture a pyramid, and the slave class was a large amount of people at the bottom. Oddly enough, their architecture was....you guessed it, pyramids.

America, especially in the 50's to know, has a mixture of the pyramid/square culture. We would say democracy is our goverNments approach, but face it we really don't have a say. Anyways, our land is always layed out in squares. Take a flight and look down sometime; square land plots, square buildings, etc.

Stick w/ me here, almost done w/ the illustration!

The Indians have a circle culture. They have a circular government where when a war leader is needed, that specific leader steps in the middle of the "circle" and is in charge. Then, when it's time to move villages, the leader who is best at moving the tribe moves to the center of the circle while the other leader exits. Guess what kind of structure they lived in? A circular Teepee.

As I thought through this in our culture today, especially the church, I had to be honest with myself and realize that, for the most part, it seems that most churches are led in a pyramid/square style. Sometimes, especially in a lot of the mega churches (not all of them), decisions come down to one man. As I thought through this, I thought about Romans 12 and how it can coincide with the circle shape that the Indians trusted in. If we have a body of believers, we can depend on those whose gifts are needed at the time and continue the cycle effectively.

These are just some random thought and hope they open up a discussion of some sort.