Between Two Crosses
Between Two Crosses
In my weaker moments, I’ve wondered if the Lord’s disciples had as tough a time believing as we do.
After all, they had the benefit of rubbing shoulders with the Master every day for almost three years. As John wrote, Christianity for them was something “which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched” (1 John 1:1).
They were eyewitnesses to the Lord’s greatest miracles. They saw dead men raised with a word, lepers healed with a touch, paralytics leap to their feet at His bidding. They watched His hands form fresh bread and charcoal-broiled fish out of thin air—enough to feed thousands of hungry people. They witnessed a boiling sea and a screaming wind fall silent and calm in an instant at His three-word command.
When it comes to the issue of faith, I have to admit, the disciples aren’t the ones I identify with most. But there is somebody in Scripture who believed in a most extraordinary way.
One of the criminals who hung there hurled insults at [Jesus]: “Aren’t you the Christ? Save yourself and us!”
But the other criminal rebuked him. “Don’t you fear God,” he said, “since you are under the same sentence? We are punished justly, for we are getting what our deeds deserve. But this man has done nothing wrong.”
Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”
Jesus answered him, “I tell you the truth, today you will be with me in paradise” (Luke 23:39-43).
Yes, it was marvelous for the disciples to believe in Jesus. With the exception of the betrayer, those men stuck with the Lord through golden days of glory and storm-darkened days of anxiety and gloom. They had left everything to follow the Lord—even at the risk of their very lives.
But to me, it was an even greater display of faith for this dying felon to put his trust in the Lord. That man on the adjacent cross never had the benefit of seeing all the mighty signs and miracles which flabbergasted the disciples. He never shared in their quiet talks around the evening campfires. He never enjoyed their camaraderie under full sail in an open boat under a wide Galilean sky.
The criminal saw only Jesus in agony, in suffering, and in weakness. He saw Him deserted, mocked, naked, humiliated, and despised. He witnessed no majesty and power—and yet he believed.
But whatever this story says about the faith of a penitent thief, it says even more about the One who responded.
The Lord Jesus never gave so complete a proof of His power and will to save as He did upon that occasion. In the day when He seemed most weak, He showed that He was a strong deliverer. In the hour when the Lord’s body was racked with pain, He showed that He could feel tenderly for others. At the time when He Himself was dying, He conferred on a wicked criminal eternal life.
If there was ever a time when Jesus deserved to think a little about His own comfort, it was on the cross. But even there, His thoughts were of others. He offered them hope; He offered them life.
He was reaching out to redeem.
The encounter between those two crosses on that dark day is a story of unceasing wonder. That the same dying Savior would reach down the centuries to save you and me is more wonderful still.