W.W.J.D.

WWJD
We see it almost everywhere: printed on bracelets, bumper stickers, rings, and just about any merchandise it can be printed on. But do we really know the full meaning of WWJD: What Would Jesus Do? More importantly, do we actually know WJD – What Jesus Did for us? Do you know just how much He went through for us, to save us from our sins? Allow me to tell you the medical account of what happened (A doctor told of his findings. I’m not sure who the doctor is, but if you want, I could ask around for you J). [Disclaimer: if you thought “The Passion of the Christ” was violent, the real thing is a million times worse]
After Jesus was arrested in Gethsemane by Pilate’s soldiers, He was led to the High Priest to be tortured. We all know that He was scourged at the Pillar, but what we did not know is that the whip, although made of leather, has several implements. At the end of it were attached thorns, animals’ bones, spikes, and metal balls half the size of the circle made by your thumb and forefinger. Jesus was whipped from the bottom of the back upward to ensure that they haven’t missed an inch of flesh, because if they did it from top to bottom, the blood would have flown downwards and they wouldn’t have whipped the entire back. The thorns, when it catches on the skin, will pull it up when the whip is dragged away from the body. In fact, there were already recorded findings that whipping disemboweled (read: the flesh of the stomach is torn apart and the innards spill out of the body) people. There also are accounts that people have died on the whipping alone, because after it, your back will not resemble its original condition anymore: my friend compares it to raw hamburger, the soft, pink bloody meat that has no shape at all. After whipping Him 39 times (they believed that at the 40th scourging, the person dies, although some could die earlier than that), they draped a cloak on His back. In the depiction of the crowning of thorns, illustrations show that the crown as a woven ring made of vines with thorns. What it didn’t show was the size of the spikes, which were about an inch long each, and they jammed it on Jesus’ head. Since the scalp is made up of thin skin and a lot of blood vessels, the wounds inflicted by the thorns will bleed profusely almost immediately. Not contented, they tore off the cloak of His back. Since the blood on His back has already started to clot and dry up on the cloak, the tearing of it from His back immediately opened up the wounds again, and removing the clotted blood. And don’t forget: He was continually speared at His side by a soldier. Amidst all that, He was jeered, mocked and insulted by His people, the very people He was trying to save.
After that, He was made to carry the crosspiece of His cross toward Mount Calvary. Granted, it was only the crosspiece and not the entire cross, but it in itself already weighed around or more than 200 lbs., and it is made up of rough wood, whose splinters caught in Jesus’ mauled back. That is a really horrible task, because He was already weakened from His scourging and His mock crowning, He was made to carry a cross probably more than half of His weight, and it’s worth mentioning that He has already been stressed and fatigued as He was praying in Gethsemaine because He already knew what was going to happen to Him.
The crucifixion itself is even more horrible than what happened to Him as He was being tortured. As He was laid out on the Cross, the soldiers took with them the nails that they were going to use. These nails are not the carpentry-type or anything like it; rather, they are as thick as the ring made by your thumb and forefinger, and about 7 inches long, and (arguably) are square-shaped, so as not to allow too much movement. They forced Him to the Cross and nailed His wrists there, finding the vein (I can’t remember what it is called) which was connected to what we call the “funny bone.” Imagine yourself continually feeling that “electric current” running through your arms, and ends up in pain to your wrists, only to begin all over again. In the same way, the intersection between the feet and the legs were nailed to the Cross, and it was lifted up along with the other two criminals. Because of the pull of gravity, the arms will slowly go down, tearing the flesh of His hands. The only alternative that the crucified person can do is to pull himself up, but that would then transfer the pressure to his feet, but he does not have any choice. As he pulls himself up, he takes shallow swallows of air, not being able to take long gulps because of his condition and position on the cross. But remember, Jesus’ back is already mauled, so as He drags Himself up, more splinters catch in His skin, making the crucifixion more painful enough as it is. As the person starts to lose energy, He takes his breaths more shallowly as time progresses, and since the heart cannot handle the pressure, the person eventually dies. That is how painful it is to be crucified. In fact, the word excruciating was actually coined in the letter of Paul to the Romans, because there is no other way for the pain to be described. But that’s not the end of Jesus’ suffering, because He underwent through spiritual suffering as well.
In Mark 15:34, At three o’clock Jesus cried out in a large voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lamma sabacthani?” which means “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Let us remember that Christ died for us to be saved from our sins, which means that at the time of His crucifixion, our sins were transferred from us to Him. Because God, the Father, hates sin so much, He turned away from the Son who served as a receptacle of our sins. He turned away from Jesus the exact time that He needed His Father, and Jesus found Himself completely alone for the first time in His life, and it was also the most crucial one. In John 1:1, In the beginning there was God, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God, and then skip to the first part of v. 14: And the Word became flesh, and made His dwelling among us. From the beginning of time (and beyond that), there was the Holy Trinity: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. They were together in all aspects. But at the exact moment when Jesus needed His Father, the Trinity was broken because Jesus carried our sins for us. Think about that: Jesus, who is pure and holy, carried all of our sins, which was torment for Him, and He was left by the Father at that exact moment. Yet at His death came a blessing for us, because as said in Mark 15:38, Immediately, the curtain which enclosed the Temple sanctuary was torn in two from top to bottom. When Jesus died for us, the curtain separating the Father from us was torn in two, thus bridging the distance that tore us when we were sinners.
To complete this, Jesus rose again from the dead on the third day, to show that we are indeed freed from our sins, for we died with Him, and we lived again in Him, living a new life for God. He has done so much for us, He gave us everything in our lives, hey, He gave us our lives, and He gave us the way to escape from sins that we ourselves created. It’s not because we deserve it, because we don’t. He did it out of love for us. He did it as an act of Grace, a gift He gave to us freely, and it is up to us to accept it, to accept Him in our lives.