My Father, I get it, I know why you’d want to deny my existence, forsake me and all that. I’d do the same if I were you. Who wants a bastard son, someone who claims God is a man? That kind of puts you out of business, doesn’t it? Since when is God right there beside you, your neighbor, the man with the automatic weapon who’s about to kill these innocents? What then?
So here I am on this cross and I can see as far as you can into the future. It’s not a pretty picture. These people, these human beings, are mostly vile, always sinful. They seem determined to kill themselves one way or another, by self-imposed famine and vicious wars, whatever. Still, they can be kind and gentle, even creative. Hell, I spent 33 shoeless years among them. They’re interesting.
Yeah, I call myself the Son of Man, but you sent me here, didn’t you, to redeem yourself, you, the tough guy who tortured Job almost unto death and decided that was a big mistake. You’re right, Father, it was a mistake, and now I’m nailed to this cross to make up for it. What else can you do to tell these people, these human beings, that you’re sorry for what you’ve done to them?
I don’t know, it’s up to you, but no more floods, OK, that was way extreme.
Usually they just strap you to the thing and your lungs eventually give out. Gravity slowly suffocates you. But they wanted to make this a big deal, so they nailed me to the cross. Romans, what can I say, they’re committed to spectacle. Crucifixion, they call it, nails or not. I’m gonna die this afternoon, around 3:00 EST, and the skies will be crowded, darkened, by ominous clouds. Three days later I wake up, start talking, preaching to the disciples, impressing unbelievers like Saul of Tarsus. So the story goes.
Me, I’m thinking this story is funny because the joke’s on you. You, Father, will probably never get it, because you have this realistic, practically literal version of the correspondence between words and things. You don’t understand the excesses of the Word these people, these human beings, have invented, how far beyond this world, what’s right in front of them, they can go. Which is what makes them interesting.
But look, Father, where do we go with this story? Clueless preacher dies alongside criminals, or valiant rabbi saves these people, these human beings, from their own idiocy? Tragedy or comedy?
It’s getting hard to breathe, I can’t speak to you much longer. Some crazed soldier just stabbed me, are they trying to speed this up? I thought the point was to prolong the torture. Nobody knows what they’re doing anymore. No training, no standards.
I don’t know about this, you see what I mean? Are these creatures worth saving? Is Christianity gonna do them any good? Yeah, yeah, I know, you can’t be there to rescue them, not after this. Deus absconditus R Us. “Here must thou be O Man/No Helper hast though here.” A romantic poet will say this in 1799 A.D., the year of our Lord, and that would be me, not you, Dad.
Still. I fell sorry for them. No, I empathize. I know what it’s like to be a man. Consummatum est.