The Walk to Golgotha

Last Sunday I walked to Golgotha. The weather was gloomy and the taste of pain, fear and uncertainty were with me as the group of us walked up the hill. We were together and yet utterly alone. I felt the dark sandy soil of that place on my hands and felt cold and miserable.

A group of close friends and spiritual confidants met on a Sunday morning to pray and meditate on the life and death of Jesus Christ. As part of the meditations we each took some soil, rocks, pieces of old crosses from Golgotha. We touched them and let those fragments remind us of that day, we let them transport us back there.

I had known Jesus in my life, he and his friends had saved me. I had been alone and hungry and lost in the world. I had lived a life where I had to fight for every scrap of food, each night's shelter. I was taken in and shown kindness. I was taught of beauty and trust and love. I had seen the miracles Jesus performed and I started to live in hope. Now I was watching the son of God humiliated and my very reason for Joy in life being executed. I was walking up the hill with Jesus to watch the son of God die.

In the group we read a few readings from the Bible and then each chose a character that was present on that day. We saw the proceedings of that day from the eyes of someone who was there. Whenever one of us felt it was a good moment we blew out one or a couple of candles around the altar on the carpet. They symbolised the end of life, the dying of the Light ...

I was sick with disbelief. How could the son of God die. How could the very source of Life and Joy be spat on. Why did the man who could work miracles do nothing, simply bend in surrender to evil men. If the most powerful of all men was powerless against evil what could I do. How could I not believe that all was lost and that God had forsaken us all.

And then he asked one of his friends to take care of his mother, he died as the son of Mary. His voice was broken and tired, hopeless and surrendered but he spoke words of caring and love and continuation. Perhaps it is possible to live beauty, joy, love, trust and faith simply because Jesus showed us how. He lived a life to be an example and to teach.

If we understand that God is truly timeless then Jesus Christ dies every day in this world, but every day the miracles of his life are also re-enacted in this world.