It was Palm Sunday last week, commemorating the triumphal entry of the Lord Jesus Christ into Jerusalem. It also signaled the coming to the end of Lent which ended earlier. Millions of Christians had embarked on self-elected deprivation of food and water, and distancing of themselves from earthly pleasures, in memory of the Lord Christ’s suffering, although some authorities say it is in commemoration of His fasting for 40 days and 40 nights in the seclusion of the wilderness. It is universally called Lent, and the first day is called Ash Wednesday — a day the Roman Catholic Church priests sprinkle ashes on the heads of penitent congregants. The fasting period is ever a sobering, reflective, and penitent period.
A few weeks ago, millions of Moslems all over the world similarly embarked on their yearly 30 days of fasting, taking a cue from, indeed patterned after the example of the great Prophet Mohammed, who moved into the privacy and seclusion of the wilderness to do his fasting. It is a special season. Mosques are filled to overflowing with Moslems turning their gaze upwards in gratitude and supplication to our Maker. It is so delightful and instructive that both Lent and the Moslem Fast have been taking place about the same time for a while now. It is elating given the beneficial effects of fasting on the body and the inner man. Fasting affords man the opportunity to give the body a break from its enormous workload. Withdrawal from food for some time is like bringing the city of millions of trillions of cells to a standstill on the last Saturday of sanitation for the month. All the wastes that the heavy work schedules have locked up in the closets are brought out and emptied as all energy is diverted to detoxication of the household. Thereafter, the body gets lighter, livelier, more radiant, and more youthful.
By far more important, however, is the benevolent effect of true fasting on the inner man, the man himself. True, a revitalized cloak or vessel, as a refurbished motor car is to the motorist, is an invaluable asset for spiritual mobility and outreach. It is in the capacity of a fast to loosen the spirit from the body for a while and connect man to his Maker that its greatest benefit lies. It bears repeating for me to state that we human beings on earth are a union of body and soul, the soul itself a union of spirit, that is, of man and the non-physical, encased in finer coverings. The unions are held together by a mesh of radiations to which each party makes a contribution. Full consciousness is a state in which each party makes a contribution.
It must be pointed out that not all fasting brings benefit. There cannot be a blessing where fasting does not engender an awakening inwardly. The season of sobriety, contemplation, and inner awakening, is being polluted in our land by the waves of fierce contestation for power and influence and the attendant disputations. It may not be quite out of place to assume that a wave of purifying flames or currents has enveloped the land, and gathering steam, will continue until May. Of course, in the ballooning population of materialists and power gladiators who may not believe in the Higher Hand that is at work in the affairs of man, a great many must shake their heads in pity, wondering what has befallen the world!
Lent, stigmatization experiences, and the celebration of Palm Sunday signal that another Easter is around the corner. In stigmatization, blood oozes out of the palms and feet of those afflicted. The stigmatics bear exactly the wound marks of the Lord Christ when He was crucified on the cross. They jerk; they are flogged by unseen hands and with unseen canes. It is a phenomenon that knows no gender, age, race, colour, tribe, or country. They yell; they shout; they cry for help. Science and medicine have no answer for the agony. The more easily well-known stigmatics of our time were German-born Therese Neumanne and priest Padre Pio (Francesco Forgione) of Italy. Therese Neumanne from Konnersreuth, Bavaria, Germany, was only 20 when her experiences began. She bore her fate for 30 years bleeding profusely in the replica of the wound marks of the crucified Christ on many Fridays with her condition worsening usually in the last two weeks of every Lent. She passed away in 1962. The experiences were similar to those of 50-year-old Innocent Okorie of our own Orlu whose agony usually peaked on Good Friday. The language Therese and others heard in the hour of their torments has been confirmed by philologists as that spoken around Golgotha at the time of the crucifixion of the Lord. In April 1989, the Sunday edition of The Guardian did an elaborate report on the three cases in Nigeria.
The essence of drawing attention to the yearly occurrence is that it comes with Lent, and as in the words of another stigmatic, steel worker George Hamilton, who once said to The Observer newspaper of London: “As Good Friday approaches, the blood flows more strongly. In Lent, it’s pretty bad. If I walk across the carpet it feels like I am walking on tacks or broken glass. I have to change bandage twice a day”. Thus, it should go without saying that every stigmatic looks forward to when Lent and Good Friday will be over so that they can be freed from their inexplicable harrowing experiences. Yet, they can only be freed when they come to the recognition of their guilt that they participated in the crucifixion of the Lord, in the decision to get rid of Him, in the plan to nail Him to the cross, in mocking Him or in rejoicing while He hung on the cross bleeding and in horrifying agony. It was dastardly murder of the Son of God!
Unknown to millions of mankind, Palm Sunday commemorating the triumphal entry of the Lord into Jerusalem was a mock re-enactment of the grand reception for the Lord Christ arranged by the Resistant Movement in collusion with Judas Iscariot to entrap Him, wanting Him to lead a rebellion against Rome. Rather than war, the Prince of Peace addressed, in the Temple, the congregation that had come to do battle, but disguised as Passover pilgrims, preaching peace, submission to the Will of His Father, and love for their enemies. Thus the Lord disarmed them; and the crowd that shouted Hosanna the previous day, saying: “Blessed is the King of Israel that cometh in the name of the Lord.” (John 12:13), got enraged and felt let down; they resorted to shouting “Crucify Him”! the next day in response to the appeal by Pilate to their sense of compassion: “Behold, I bring Him forth to you, that ye may know that I find no fault in Him”! Only Judas understood that the Lord Jesus was not going to assume the role he had intended for Him. The howling mob had been worked up by the priests, Pharisees; Sadducees, scribes and members of the Sanhedrin who were pressing for the death of the Lord Jesus Christ.
For 40 days of retreat from the worldly by Christians, from the pulpits exhortations had thundered across the globe for them to imbibe and internalize anew the Teachings of Christ and the concomitant good life as well as the warning: “Repent, the Day of Judgment is nigh”!
Officials are warning residents in California to be prepared for what has been described as “a treacherous flood season”. Stated Karla Nemeth, director of the state’s Department of Water Resources, on Wednesday: “California has one of the largest snowpacks on record. As this snowpack melts in the coming months, the waterways will be especially cold, fast, and running higher than normal”. Meteorological authorities in Nigeria have themselves warned their compatriots to be prepared for an unusual amount of rainfall this year, bringing in its wake serious flooding.
Today, Christendom will remember the disappointment with mankind, the agony, and crucifixion of the Lord, the Son of the Almighty Father. It is yet another day and opportunity to think about the correctness of the age-long attitude of human beings to His death on the cross. The question will continue to come to the fore: Why did He have to die? Christ was indeed without guilt. He was innocent absolutely of charges drawn up against Him. In quiet moments, one can’t but ponder over and shudder at the thought and horror of the miscarriage of justice. Is it not possible, come to think of it, that human beings may not have given sufficient thought to the gravity of the crime committed against the Lord by mankind? A world leader burdened by imperfection is not likely to send an innocent man to die in place of a sinner. If he does, the world be horrified. A perfect one is even less unlikely to exchange an innocent person for a transgressor because it will not be justice, yet justice is inseparable from perfection, otherwise, perfection will not be perfection. Perfection also does not permit improvement or arbitrariness. Man may have misread the crucifixion of Christ, though condemned it, and then came to the conclusion that it was willed that He should die the way He did, especially as there were prophecies that it would happen. It is something for all to think about.
I cannot, but think again and again about the maltreatment meted out to the Lord. Consider it: the priests and the establishment of His time, it was, who, unable to bear His Teachings, which they found irksome, organized the death of the Redeemer. They accused Him of blasphemy. They wanted Him to deny His Source of Origin which is the Almighty, as a Part of Him. “The Father and I are One”, He said. “The Father is in me, I am in the Father.” “My kingdom is not of this world”. “Where I go, you cannot come”.
He taught mankind how to speak, how to think, and how to act and never relented in pointing to the Will of His Father, which He emphasised must be done as the only way to the Kingdom of Heaven.
The priests and the establishment had taught differently. The new teaching, they reasoned, therefore was undermining their power and influence. They got one of His disciples to their side. The Lord was arrested. At first, they could not effect the arrest in the synagogue because they feared the reaction of the people. On the eve of the trial, town criers had spread on the streets that the Lord they described as the false prophet Jesus of Nazareth, whom the Supreme Court had sentenced to death for blasphemy, had been arrested. The numerous pilgrims and the inhabitants of Jerusalem who had hailed the Lord the previous day as Hosanna suddenly began to say they had been deceived by the Nazarene. According to accounts, a crowd already in a hostile mood towards the Lord set out, headed for the court. All the dignitaries who had wished for the death of the Lord also thronged the court — the priests, scribes, Pharisees, Sadducees, and the members of the Sanhedrin. Caiaphas, the High Priest presiding at the trial of the Son of God invoked paragraph 82 of the penal code to convict the Lord: “Even the execution of an innocent person can serve in the maintenance of law and order, and the salvation of God’s people.” “It is expedient for us, that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation perishes not”. Caiaphas convinced his colleagues that “at last the troublesome and dangerous Nazarene really must be done away with”.
At the so-called trial, the Lord Christ was sentenced to death. Pontius Pilate, despite the warning by his wife, who had received in her dreams revelations that Christ was innocent, could not summon the strength to set Christ free in his desire to save his job. He did not want to court the disfavor of Rome, the effect of which could lead to his removal as Caesar’s governor. Unconvinced about the verdict against the Lord, he pushed the matter to the people, who also failed to save their Lord. The trial and the crucifixion are a familiar story. And the story of Pontius Pilate is the story of many a man even today. When he clearly senses what to do, for fear of his position, he fails to do it.
On the day Christ was nailed to the cross, there was sorrow in higher planes that puny human beings dared to lay hands on the Holy One, Christ; that they dared to commit such a grievous crime against their Lord. The sun refused to come out, covered by luminous hands which work it and so darkness fell at high noon. There was an earthquake, a sign of displeasure of nature beings. The curtain shielding the Holy of Holies was rent in twain, indicating a termination of God’s covenant with man.
Over the years, many a man has contemplated many concepts and asked many questions; they have asked themselves what the meaning of the parable of the husbandmen is, where the tenant did not recognise and respect the son of the landlord as the vineyard owner had expected, but did to him what they had done to his servants. Did Christ proclaim His Mission here? A great many have also asked themselves why no one has canonized Judas Iscariot and why, indeed, he committed suicide after returning the 30 silver coins he was paid to betray his Lord and Christ said of him that it was better that Judas were not born.
Mankind did not recognise their Lord and so failed to form a rampart around Him. Despite the unmitigated failure, while He hung on the cross, He prayed, being Love that He was and is, that His Father should forgive mankind, “for they know not what they do”. Thus He died through the sins of man. But for this His powerful prayer of intercession, it would have been impossible for mankind to be saved. His death was wrong — absolutely.
Today presents yet another unique opportunity for mankind to reflect deeply on their guilt — for the death of Christ was murder. It is what is wrong that is forgiven, not what is right. This day also provides another chance to go back to His Teachings which were brought to lead mankind to retrace their way and get out of the chaos and confusion which is the lot of man today, and guarantee peace to our troubled world. There must be the right understanding of the Mission of the Lord. He brought the Word for the salvation of mankind, that is, His Teachings. His Message points the way out of the dangerous dungeon in which man has trapped himself. Man is burdened, deaf, and blind and so cannot hear, and see his way clearly. Man is a spirit, and that spirit must be cleansed of all the dross that has clung to it for millennia. He must be born again. According to the enlightenment of the higher knowledge spreading on earth today, what we must also know is that everyone must wash his dirty linen by himself. The way to do it is to heed the Will of His Father. That was the Message of the Lord Christ. That was His high Mission. This is saying, therefore, that we mankind must free ourselves of errors about the true Mission of Christ.
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