Getting pounded by insults is one thing in life that I hope you will never ever have to face. The old saying ‘sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me’ is simply not true. Remember how poor old Charlie Brown copped a verbal barrage of ‘nyah, nyah, nyah’ one day from a girl? His response was, ‘I just hate it when those nyah, nyah, nyahs just lay there in your stomach and burn’. 

The same could be said of course for Jesus. All through his life he copped a few of them – accusations that he was a drunkard (which was not true) or that he was a friend of sinners (which was true – but was never said simply as fact). He even copped this one when he was dying, ‘If you are the Son of God, come down from there and we will believe you’ (Mark 15:32)

Why was it that Jesus refused to do what they said? Logically it was a good idea. He could have done with some more followers. But Jesus knew better than what logic suggested. He could have got down quite easily, but that would have nullified the reason He came. See, it was more than nails that held Him there.

It was more than the ropes by which He was bound to the wood. It was more than that, much much more that held Him there despite the taunts of the crowds. It was out of His love for sinners, the greatest love for sinners ever known that caused Him not to get down and caused Him to die a death and pay a debt that He did not owe. It was for the purpose of our salvation that He endured these threats and hostility.

Logic said ‘get down’. Insults taunted him to do likewise. The devil also. All would entice him down except for His strong love for sinners, like you and me. Love would not let Him give up that easily. And by staying up there and not getting down, he proved that He was who they said – the very Son of God. This Easter, seek Him.