Behold the man!

This station of the cross is the work of Alexander Stoddart. It's a studio model, a gift to me on my retirement as Principal of the Scottish Baptist College. It now sits alongside Karl Barth's Dogmatics, and those massive volumes in Part 4 on the Doctrine of Reconciliation.

On this Good Friday I'm preaching at the ecumenical joint service in Montrose on the text of John 19.5, "Behold the man!" The image of this station will be the focal point of the various slides, hymn words, and the programme built around John's careful choice of words.

John has five different verbs for the act of seeing. The one used by Pilate is the one that requires more than a glimpse, and much more than a surface scanning. It means to gaze, to look long and hard, it implies moving from sight to insight. This sculpture helps me to do that.

The anguished weariness of Jesus; the tender grief of Mary; that empty space, deliberately void of image and meaning; except for the heap of rubbish and detritus at the foot of the cross; the partial cross-beam from one of the other crosses, reminding the viewer that Jesus was not crucified alone, but in the company of those rejected, despised and disposable. 

Behold the man, the eternal Word made historic flesh, the light and life of all that exists entering the darkness and the finality of death. In such weakness is the power of God; in such a ridiculous spectacle of a crucified king the wisdom of God; in the judicial execution of one of the small people, the exposure of the transience and ultimate failure of empire, violence and power lust. Behold the man.