A Criminal’s Account

 The following is the script for a Good Friday experiential worship I developed a few years back.  I wanted to share it here in the hopes of getting people into the spirit of contemplation and introspection for this Holy Week.  May it speak to your heart and move you closer to the cross this special season.  

 Setting the Stage:

 You have just laid down for a nights rest when you find yourself fading into a dream.  This dream is like no other.  You find yourself in a dimly lit room with the orange glow of candlelight dancing off objects around you.  The room is empty except for two chairs—one for you, and one occupied by a stranger.  

This night, within this dream, you are being granted a special audience with a man you never thought you’d meet or ever even considered interest in meeting.  This man had a front row seat to the most important event in human history.  While other spectators simply gazed on while Jesus was crucified, this man held an almost unique position—being crucified alongside the Savior of humanity.  One of two criminals crucified with Christ, he was the only one who saw the light and received Mercy and Grace straight from the lips of the sacrificial Lamb of God.  

As you spend the evening with this criminal, listening to his accounts of the events of that fateful Friday, and reading the prophecies written about these accounts hundreds of years before they occurred, I challenge you to consider the response of your heart and its influence on your life.  

A note about the stories: 

Not much background detail is given about the criminals hung next to Jesus.  Translators use multiple words to identify them—from thieves, to criminals, to bandits, to revolutionaries.   At times the author will use a little artistic license attempting to stay as close to a scripturally based storyline while also adding some imagination to the depth of the character.  

An Undeserved Reward

 Welcome.  I’m glad you could join me tonight.  I invited you here to listen to my story.  I know you’ve heard about the death of Christ a thousand times, but I still wanted to give my account because of my hope that it will inspire you to go and be the kind of person I wish I could go back and be.  

          So, where do I begin?  Well, I’m from a little town called Capernaum in Galilee.  Actually, Jesus spent a lot of time there.  I heard him address the crowds once after someone told me that he had heard that this Jesus fellow had been walking on water.  He got into some argument with a bunch of priests and started talking about how He was the bread of life and we shouldn’t worry about things like food and clothing because these things would rot away.  Needless to say I didn’t put much stock in what he had to say at the time. 

You see I was raised in a reasonably well-off home.  My dad owned a boat building shop and worked really hard.  Actually, he worked so hard I never saw him.  I was supposed to be helping him and learning the trade, but I didn’t want to have anything to do with it.  I wanted to do my own thing and have fun.    

I guess over time I just went down a path of destruction.  Next thing I know, I was there hanging on a cross next to this man who supposedly did these miraculous things.  And now I’m here, in Paradise. You know, at first, when He told me that I’d be here with Him I wasn’t sure what to believe, and He kinda had to explain it to me when we got here.  How I could be rewarded with a free-ticket to His Kingdom after all the things I’d done?  I know I don’t deserve it—no one does, but I’m thankful and I want to share with you what I experienced.   

In the Presence of Failure

 So, I was one of those “criminals.”  That’s putting it mildly.  I was only twenty-four when they put me up there, but I started my career as a criminal when I was about thirteen.  Back then it was small potatoes—snatching loaves of bread or fish or fruit or jewelry off the stands in the street markets.  

Then I graduated to roughing up strangers for money in dark alleys at night, and teaming up on travelers on roads between towns with a gang I used to follow.  Then there were several young women whom I took advantage of their affections for my own satisfaction leaving them to deal with the consequences of the loss of their purity.  I hear that’s not a big deal in your day, but in ours, the girls could get stoned for it.  

To top it all off, and the reason I was hung up there, I killed a man. At the time, I considered it self-defense but in reality, I was robbing him, and he was defending himself from me.  We wrestled, and I eventually hit him over the head with a rock.  

And that other guy who hung with us, I heard he killed four or five people—just waited for lone travelers on small roads and attacked them and took whatever they had.  He got caught after bragging about it in what you would call a tavern.  

So we were the kind of people Jesus was hung up there with. That’s just crazy.  I didn’t understand what He was doing there.  It just didn’t make sense.  I can still remember the first time I saw Him. Apparently they were trying to make an example out of Him because I’ve never seen someone so brutally beaten and lashed.  He was covered from head to toe 

with blood stained sweat, bruises, whip stripes, gaping lashes, dirt, and what looked like a crown of crudely wound thorns.  I’ve never seen anything like it.  It was horrifying.  I couldn’t figure out how he could walk, much less stand or see.  And yet somehow, even when He fell or was pushed to the ground, He still got up.  And He never yelled or screamed at His captors or fought back.   

I just didn’t get it.  

The Cross

I’m not sure if you’re familiar with the process of crucifixion, but let’s put it this way—not long after our crucifixions, the Romans ended the practice because it was too inhumane and they wanted to appear less barbaric and more civilized.

They put these cross beams on our backs and made us carry them through the streets of Jerusalem and up Golgotha Hill.  When we got there, they attached our cross beams to the uprights, and three soldiers held us down kicking and screaming while another drove a nail through our wrists just below the palm and into the wood.  Up until that point I’d never felt something so painful in my life, but then they stacked our ankles and drove one nail through both, and that was even more excruciating.  

Then several soldiers worked together to lift our crosses and once upright another hit the base of the cross until it fell into a hole and with one violent crash our crosses dropped about two feet into post-holes.  I swear mine bounced when it hit bottom.  I thought the nails were going to tear right through my skin.  And the splinters in my back, I cringe every time I remember it.  

They did this to us one at a time.  The other criminal, on the other side of Jesus, went first, so I got to hear how agonizing it was for him before it happened to me.  Jesus had to listen to both of us.  I actually thought I heard Him praying for us while we were going up.  

I swear the other criminal screamed for 10 minutes straight.  I thought I would, but I ran out of breath.  Part of the torture of the cross was that you couldn’t breathe.  The nails in your wrists fighting against the weight of your body felt like you were being torn in half, and the stress on your body caused it to build up fluid in your lungs making it difficult to breathe.  All you could do was try to lift yourself up by the nails in your feet and hands long enough to gasp for air.  

I can’t imagine what it felt like for Jesus.  With all those lash marks, the open flesh on His back, the bruises, and blood.  I can only hope He was so numb by then that He didn’t feel much, but I doubt it.  Still, He didn’t scream quite like we did.  Of course, He cried out, but there was something different about it, something dignified.  It was like the cry of a dying soldier knowing His sacrifice meant the battle was won.  I just don’t know how to explain it better than that.  

Games and Mockery

 At first I played my usual part—I followed the crowd.  It was like a feeding frenzy.  I don’t know who was louder—the soldiers or the chief priests.  Add to them us two criminals and I don’t know how He took it.  It was bad enough trying to hold yourself up long enough to breathe.  Add to that the agony of feeling your bones in your hands and feet splitting. 

 I guess for me screaming at someone else was a way to deal with my pain.  As long as I could find some humor in what was being said to him I didn’t seem to pay as much attention to the fact that I was in the same predicament.  But His response took the fun out of it—He just ignored it.  

I couldn’t figure that out.  How could He be so calm? He even asked for those of us who were taunting Him to be forgiven.  That was like heaping hot coals on my lap.  It was in complete contrast to my entire life.  Where I was always concerned with myself, here this man was tortured and yet had His torturer’s interests on His mind.  That was just crazy.  And it got me thinking.  

What kind of man thinks like this, acts like this, holds out like this?  What kind of man could take the pain like He did?  Of course, He let out His own agonizing shrieks and even kept praying out loud, but His demeanor in all of this was impossible.  I’ve seen people crucified before, and I know what was going through my mind and the mind of the other criminal on the other side of Jesus. 

When someone is crucified they always curse everyone in attendance—be it the soldiers, the passers-by, those who accused them; anyone and everyone is on their hit list.  They spit, they scream, they curse, and usually they blame everyone else for what is happening to them.  It’s just part of the process.  No one ever believes they deserve to be crucified—it’s a shameful way to die, despicable.  So what made Him so different?  I couldn’t figure it out.  

 A Son’s Final Act of Grace

 Up until this point, I hadn’t even really noticed her—I was just in too much pain.  But He spoke to her, and I realized that there were more than just mockers in the audience.  His mother was there.  She’d been watching the whole time.  Her clothes were drenched with sweat and tears.  Three other women were holding her, and a young man stood with them.  At first, I wasn’t sure if he was with them because he seemed to be trying not to draw attention to himself and they were wailing.  

          But when Jesus addressed them, it was made obvious that he wasn’t just another onlooker.  I wasn’t sure how He did it, but Jesus gathered up enough strength and breath to transfer custody of His mother to this young man as a new son.  It was quite touching.  Jesus was making sure that she was looked after.  

Personally, I’d never known that kind of relationship with my mom.  She died giving birth to my brother when I was only three.  That may be why dad worked so hard and why our relationship was strained leading me down my path to that destruction.  I don’t know.  Who can say?  

I just know that something about this exchange moved something in me. It was like something hard in me was melting away, and I was seeing something new and beautiful, and I wanted more of it.  At the same time, I was broken because I realized it was too late for me.    

 A Step in the Right Direction

 The next thing that happened threw even me for a loop.  In typical form the criminal on the other side of Jesus ripped into Him with selfish words—“aren’t you the Messiah?  Save yourselves and us too!” he taunted.  He didn’t believe Jesus was any Messiah.  He was just caught up in the frenzy.  

But then it happened.  My mouth opened, and something new came out—I defended Jesus.  Not only did I defend Him, but I admitted my guilt and acknowledged His innocence.  I even reminded the other criminal that he might reconsider his boldness in light of the fact that he was about to find out for sure if Jesus was who He said He was as he was about to meet his maker with the rest of us.  

Where did this come from?  Up until now I had never considered anyone but myself, and here I am about to die an agonizingly long and painful death, and I’m defending a stranger hanging next to me.  I bet that never in the history of crucifixions had anyone ever defended anyone else from the tauntings of the onlookers, and here I am defending someone from someone else who is also hanging on a cross.  

What had gotten into me?  Was it His demeanor? Was it His prayers?  Was it something about His presence?  I just couldn’t help myself.  For the first time in my life, I was feeling something I can only guess was compassion. 

This guy had no business being up there—He was innocent.  But we earned it; we deserved it. It just wasn’t fair!  It wasn’t right.  It wasn’t justice.  And no one, not even His beloved rag-tag group of followers was there to stand in the gap between His silence and their cursings.  Yeah, there were some women there, and it seemed like maybe one disciple, but where were the rest? And why wasn’t anyone standing up for Him?  Cowards!  

And it was right after that He gave me a promise—that I would be here, in this Paradise, and somehow I knew it was real.  Somehow I believed.  Something in me was different.  

And the Rocks Cried Out

But I really didn’t have time to think about it—about what in me had changed; because almost as soon as Jesus made the promise there was a massive earthquake.  It was like the rocks were crying out.  It was so powerful I thought our crosses were going to come down.  Rocks were rolling down hills all over.  Even the hill we were on, Golgotha, or the Place of the Skull, lost the protruding boulders that gave it its foreboding appearance.  We heard screams coming from the city, and it wasn’t long until we could hear wailing and people screaming that the temple curtain had torn in two.  

About the same time, the sky went dark.  It was like night.  The soldiers lost their composure and had to be ordered to maintain their ranks.  There was confusion everywhere.  People couldn’t figure out if it was coincidence or something to do with Jesus.  I know one thing, the crowd had become silent, and no one was mocking Him anymore.  It was almost as if God Himself stood up to defend Him.  

I don’t think everyone heard it, but I heard Jesus cry out “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit,” and then He died. I know at least one of the priests heard Him because he gasped and said something about a quote from a Psalm. 

It was actually strange.  Usually, a person hangs on a cross for at least a day or two, even more.  It takes a while to die.  You actually sort of drown from your lungs filling up with fluid and blood from the stress on your body.  But this Jesus died in about six hours.  I guess it might have something to do with the beating and lashing, but like I said, there was a peacefulness about Him—even in what He said.  Who says stuff like that?  

 A Change of Heart

 Then another strange thing happened.  I’d been kinda watching this centurion for a while now.  He wasn’t quite like the others. He seemed like he was struggling with this assignment.  Usually, centurions are ruthless—they have to be in order to be the leaders of their companies of about 80-100 men.  And even though Jesus received a severe beating and lashing back at the courts, this centurion was holding the reins back on his soldiers from any further unnecessary infliction of pain on Jesus.  At first I just thought he was making sure that Jesus stayed alive until he was crucified—he could have gotten in trouble if Jesus hadn’t. 

But then he opened his mouth.  He started praising God and said, “Surely this man was innocent.” I could have believed the innocent thing—I think we all knew that deep down.  But where did this praising God come from?  And how could he be praising God instead of groveling on the ground in fear?  You’d think that if you had just executed the Christ, if He was who He said He was, you’d be scared God might punish you.  

Maybe the centurion had seen what I’d seen.  Maybe he’d felt what I felt.  After listening to the things Jesus had said, asking God to forgive us, maybe the centurion realized that God wasn’t that kind of God.  Maybe we’d all had it wrong all along?

I wonder if the people realized something as well—they all started leaving, weeping and tearing their clothes on the way.  

An Unbroken Lamb

Again, I didn’t have much time to think about it.  The next thing I knew a messenger on a horse rode up to the centurion with new orders from Pilate.  Apparently the priests had requested that this execution be expedited so they could clean up the mess before their precious holy day.  You’d think they would have thought about that before they decided to have us put up there in the first place.  Couldn’t they have waited at least another week?  

Regardless, the next thing I knew some soldiers pulled out these huge wooden mallets.  I’d seen crucifixions, and I’d heard of this practice, but I’d never seen it, and I hadn’t expected to experience it.  They started with the other criminal.  So, unfortunately, I got to hear them smash his shins with the mallet and the resulting screams of agony knowing full well that I was in line for the same treatment.  

One of the soldiers was about to break Jesus’ legs but was stopped because they thought He was already dead.  So, they came and broke mine.  I thought having nails pounded through the wrists and ankles was bad enough but having your legs broke was worse.  

While I was agonizing, I heard the centurion order one of the soldiers to confirm that Jesus was dead and through my tear-blurred vision I saw him spear Jesus through the heart, and if Jesus wasn’t already dead, He was most certainly dead then.  

Thy Kingdom Come, on Earth as it is in Heaven

I didn’t survive much longer.  Unable to lift myself up to catch my breath I became dizzy and passed out never to wake again—at least not in that world.  It seemed like no sooner had everything gone black that I saw a great light that seemed to carry me into it.  

The next thing I knew I was here, standing with Jesus and He was giving me a big hug welcoming me into His Kingdom.  He took the time to explain a lot to me.  I wish I could explain it all to you, but you wouldn’t believe me if I did and I’m sworn not to reveal it all. God wants you to seek and listen for Him, not me. He reveals what you need to hear when you need to hear it to know what you need to know to do what you need to do.   

What I can tell you is that His death was only the beginning and that He is ALIVE, and He is calling you to participate in something amazing—the building of His Kingdom.  

This is why people are still on Earth.  You see, when Adam and Eve gave into temptation, they, in essence, sold the planet to Satan through the debt of their sin.  Since then, mankind has built a kingdom for the prince of darkness.  

In the one act of Christ on the Cross, He purchased the planet back by paying off that debt.  Now He is offering you the opportunity to help build His Kingdom.  Consider it a partnership—God provides the resources if we provide the manpower.  But that means getting involved.

 Closing:               Having the Mind of Christ

 And this is what getting involved looks like—it looks like having the mind of Christ:

Though He has the power to create and destroy the universe, He didn’t feel the need to Lord it over creation, 

But instead, He willingly stepped off His throne

To take on the physical nature of a being that is not in ultimate control of his own life,

Born with all the physical frailties of a human.

Becoming this person just like you and I, 

He had humbled Himself to His earthly nature

Becoming obedient to it and experiencing it fully—even to death which He did not deserve having lived sinless, and not only this, but the torturous death of the cross.  

 So my question for you, one criminal to another, what will your death look like?  Will you, like me, realize you missed the point and lived for yourself?  Will you find yourself wishing you could go back and do it over again with your priorities straight?  

What death is worse—a physically painful torturous death like mine, or one in which your spirit realizes just how much more you could have accomplished for the Kingdom of Christ if only you’d fed your fire a little more each day?  The difference between you and me is I’m already dead, but you, you still have time.  You can still get it right.  You can still make a difference. 

I pray you take my testimony seriously.  God wants so much more for this world and so much more for you, but He wants you to be an ambassador to help make that peace between the world and Him.  So I’d like to know, in light of what I’ve said, how now will you live?

Philippians 2:1-11

1 Is there any encouragement from belonging to Christ? Any comfort from his love? Any fellowship together in the Spirit? Are your hearts tender and compassionate?2 Then make me truly happy by agreeing wholeheartedly with each other, loving one another, and working together with one mind and purpose.3 Don’t be selfish; don’t try to impress others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourselves.4 Don’t look out only for your own interests, but take an interest in others, too.5 You must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had.
6 Though he was God, he did not think of equality with God as something to cling to.7 Instead, he gave up his divine privileges ; he took the humble position of a slave and was born as a human being. When he appeared in human form, 8 he humbled himself in obedience to God and died a criminal’s death on a cross.
9 Therefore, God elevated him to the place of highest honor and gave him the name above all other names,10 that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth,11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.