It’s been beautiful weather in Jersey these last couple days. The kind of days you want to take a walk. Jesus took a walk on a day that was probably hot and dusty, since His walk was in Israel where the climate is different than here, as well as the terrain. His walk was life altering. His walk was historic. His walk would save all of mankind.
Scholars and theologians speculate that the cross Jesus was made to carry more than likely weighed around 300 lbs. The crossbar was estimated to weight somewhere between 70-110 lbs., depending on the length, width, and thickness of the piece. It has also been surmised that Jesus probably carried just the crossbeam, which would have been torture enough given His physical state at that time. Having lost a large amount of blood, He would have been significantly weakened, which is why a man named Simon from Cyrene was pulled from the crowd that had gathered to carry the crossbar the remaining way to the crest of Golgotha’s hill. The road Jesus travelled was later referred to as the “Via de la Rosa”, “the way of suffering”.
Just how far did Jesus carry the crossbar before He collapsed under the weight of it? There is really no way of knowing for sure, but some took an educated guess and said He carried it 650 yards. If that’s true that would be the equivalent of walking the length of 6.5 football fields. That’s a pretty long distance, especially since Jesus had been beaten bloody and was barely able to stand let alone carry anything roughly 90 lbs. across His shoulders. I would like you to take a moment, close your eyes and try to get a mental image of that scene as a bloodied, physically exhausted Jesus struggled to make His way to the place where He would die.
In His name & for His glory,
Richard Keller
Bread of Life Ministries
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