Gift from Creator Tells the Good Story 27
27
1As the sun began to rise, the head holy men and council elders laid out their plans to kill Creator Sets Free (Jesus). 2They tied him up again and dragged him away to turn him over to Spear of the Great Waters (Pilate), the governor from the People of Iron (Romans).
THE BETRAYER TAKES HIS OWN LIFE
3When Speaks Well Of (Judas), the one who betrayed Creator Sets Free (Jesus), saw they had decided to have him killed, he was overcome with sorrow. He changed his mind and took the thirty pieces of silver back to the head holy men and the elders.
4“I have done wrong!” he told them. “I have betrayed the blood of an innocent man.”
“What do we care?” they said back to him. “You did this to yourself.”
5He threw the thirty pieces of silver on the floor of the sacred lodge and ran away in sorrow. He then left them and hanged himself.
As the light of the sunrise grew brighter on the horizon, his lifeless body could be seen hanging from the branch of a tree. He could not live with what he had done.
The head holy men did not know what to do with the pieces of silver.
6They picked the silver pieces up from the floor and said, “It is not permitted to put them in the storehouse of the sacred lodge, for it is blood money.”
7So they counseled together and used the silver to purchase a clay field that had been used for making pottery to use as a burial ground for outsiders. 8From that time on it has been called the Field of Blood.
9This gave full meaning to the words of the prophet Lifted by Creator (Jeremiah), “He was sold out for thirty pieces of silver by the tribes of Wrestles with Creator (Israel). This is how much they thought his life was worth. 10With the silver they bought a field of clay, as instructed by the Great Spirit.”#27:10 Jeremiah 32:6-9
ON TRIAL BY THE PEOPLE OF IRON
11Creator Sets Free (Jesus) now stood before the governor of the People of Iron (Romans) for questioning.
“Are you the chief of the tribes of Wrestles with Creator (Israel)?” the governor asked him.
“It is as you say,” he answered.
12Then the head holy men began to accuse him, but he gave them no answer.
13“Why are you silent?” Spear of the Great Waters (Pilate) asked him, “Do you not hear their accusations?”
14But Creator Sets Free (Jesus) answered not one word, which amazed the governor.
WHO SHALL BE RELEASED?
15It was a tradition during the Passover festival to release to the crowd one criminal, whomever they wanted. 16At that time they were holding a prisoner with a deadly reputation whose name was Son of His Father (Barabbas).
17“Which one shall I release?” the governor raised his voice to the crowd. “Son of His Father (Barabbas) or Creator Sets Free (Jesus), who is called the Chosen One?”
18Spear of the Great Waters (Pilate) said this because he knew the head holy men and elders had handed over Creator Sets Free (Jesus) because they were jealous of his reputation with the people.
When the governor of the People of Iron (Romans) would make his final decision about the guilt and fate of a person, he would sit on a great rock carved into a seat. This seat was called the Stone of Deciding.
19While he was sitting there, a messenger came from his wife with these words: “Do no harm to this innocent man, for today I had a dream about him that troubles me greatly.”
20But the head holy men and the elders talked the crowd into asking for Son of His Father (Barabbas) to be released and to have Creator Sets Free (Jesus) put to death.
21Once more the governor asked the crowd, “Whom do you want me to release?”
“Son of His Father (Barabbas)!” the crowd roared back.
22“Then what would you have me do with Creator Sets Free (Jesus), who is called the Chosen One?” he asked them.
With one voice they shouted, “Nail him to the cross!”
23“But what wrong has he done to deserve this?” he asked them again.
But their voices grew louder and louder, “Nail him to the cross!”
24Spear of the Great Waters (Pilate) could see that their minds would not be changed. He was worried that the crowd might turn violent, so he decided to give them what they wanted. He washed his hands in a vessel of water in front of all the people and said, “This man’s blood is not on my hands. It is on yours!”
25“Let his blood be on us and on our descendants!” they answered him back.
CONDEMNED TO A VIOLENT DEATH
26So the governor released Son of His Father (Barabbas) to them. He then turned over Creator Sets Free (Jesus) to the soldiers to be whipped with cowhide strips and then nailed to a tree-pole—the cross.
The People of Iron (Romans) used a whip with many strips of leather, each braided together with bone and metal. The victim would be tied to a large rock, exposing his bare back, and then lashed. The pieces of bone and metal would rip and tear the skin from the body, leaving the victim almost lifeless.
BEATEN AND MOCKED BY THE SOLDIERS
27The governor’s soldiers dragged Creator Sets Free (Jesus) into the great hall of the governor’s lodge, and all the soldiers there gathered around him. 28They stripped off his clothes, wrapped a fancy purple-and-red chief blanket around him, 29and twisted together a headdress from a thorn bush and pressed it onto his head. Then they put a chief’s staff in his right hand and began to bow down before him.
“Honor to the chief of the tribes of Wrestles with Creator (Israel)!” they mocked him, making a big show of it, insulting him with cruel words and twisted faces.
30They spat on him and took his chief’s staff and clubbed him with it. Then they took turns beating him on his head, over and over again. 31When they were done, they stripped him of the chief blanket, put his own garment back on him, and took him away to nail him to a tree-pole—the cross.
The People of Iron (Jesus) used a wooden pole, with a crossbeam attached, to punish criminals and anyone who dared to rise up against their empire. The cross was used as an instrument of terror and torture to keep the people in fear of the People of Iron (Romans). It was one of the most painful and cruel ways to die ever created by human beings. The crucified person’s feet were fastened with iron nails to the tree-pole and their hands to a crossbeam attached to the pole—where they remained until dead.
HIS TRAIL OF TEARS
The soldiers then put a heavy crossbeam on the back of Creator Sets Free (Jesus). But he stumbled under the weight, because he was weak from the beating he had endured, too weak to bear the burden.
32On the way they came across Listening Man (Simon), from Land of Power (Cyrene) in northern Africa. The soldiers forced him to carry the cross for Creator Sets Free (Jesus).
NAILED TO THE CROSS
33They came to Place of the Skull (Golgotha) 34and gave him wine mixed with bitter herbs to drink, but after tasting it, he would not drink it. 35They stripped him of his garments and, after they nailed his hands and feet to the cross, they gambled for his clothes. 36The soldiers then sat down and kept watch over him.
37Above his head on the crossbeam, carved into a piece of wood, was the accusation against him:
THIS IS CREATOR SETS FREE CHIEF OF THE TRIBES OF WRESTLES WITH CREATOR
38Then they also nailed two outlaws to their crosses, one on his right side, the other on his left.
MOCKED BY HIS OWN PEOPLE
39As people walked by and saw him, they spoke arrogantly to him, wagged their heads, 40and said, “You who thought you could tear down the sacred lodge and rebuild it in three days—can you even save yourself? If you are the Son of the Great Spirit, then come down off that cross!”
41The head holy men, the scroll keepers, and the elders all joined in.
42“He set others free,” they said, “but he cannot even free himself. So he is the chief of the tribes of Wrestles with Creator (Israel), is he? Let him come down from the cross now, and then we will believe in him! 43He said, ‘I am the Son of the Great Spirit,’ so let the one he has put his trust in come and rescue him now—if he wants him.”
44Even the thieves who were dying next to him joined in with the others and threw insults at him.
A TIME OF DARKNESS
45At the sixth hour of the day clouds moved in and covered the land with darkness until the ninth hour.#27:45 From noon until midafternoon
46That is when Creator Sets Free (Jesus), speaking in his native language, cried out loud, “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani”—which means, “O Great Spirit, my Creator, why have you left me alone?”#27:46 Psalm 22:1
47Some of the people standing there heard him and said, “He is calling on the prophet Great Spirit Is Creator (Elijah) to help him.”
48One of them ran and soaked a cloth with the bitter wine, put it on a staff, and put it to his mouth. 49But the others said, “Wait, let us see whether Great Spirit Is Creator (Elijah) will come and save him.”
HE BREATHES HIS LAST
50But right then Creator Sets Free (Jesus), with his dying breath, lifted his voice one last time and with a loud cry gave up his spirit.
51Suddenly the earth began to quake. Large rocks cracked and shattered. Then in the sacred lodge the great heavy blanket that hung over the entry to the Most Holy Place was torn from top to bottom.
For the first time the inner chamber, where only the chief holy man could go, was open to all.
52-53The burial caves opened as the stones that covered them broke into pieces. After Creator Sets Free (Jesus) returned to life from the dead, many of the bodies of the holy ancestors were raised to life from their sleep of death. They came out from their burial caves and appeared to many in the Sacred Village of Peace (Jerusalem).
54When the head soldier of the People of Iron (Romans) and his soldiers who were guarding Creator Sets Free (Jesus) felt the earth shake and saw what was happening all around them, they trembled with fear and said, “This man must truly be the Son of the Great Spirit!”
WOMEN WHO SERVED HIM
55Many of the honored women who had walked the road with him from the time he was in Circle of Nations (Galilee) were there, watching from a distance. These were some of the women who had served him during his journeys. 56Strong Tears (Mary) of the village of Creator’s High Lodge (Magdala) and Brooding Tears (Mary), the mother of He Takes Charge (James) and He Increases (Joses), were among them, and also the mother of the two sons of Gift of Creator (Zebedee).
BURIED IN A NEW BURIAL CAVE
57A while before sunset, He Gets More (Joseph), a man of many possessions from the tribal village of High Mountain (Arimathea), who was also one who followed Creator Sets Free (Jesus), 58went to Spear of the Great Waters (Pilate). He asked for the body of Creator Sets Free (Jesus) so he could prepare it properly for burial. The governor then gave him permission to take the body.
59He took the body and ceremonially wrapped it in a traditional way using a clean, soft blanket. 60He then laid the body of Creator Sets Free (Jesus) in his own burial cave freshly cut from the rock hillside. He rolled a large stone in front of the cave and left.
SOLDIERS GUARD HIM
61Strong Tears (Mary) of the village of Creator’s High Lodge (Magdala) and Brooding Tears (Mary) were also there sitting across the garden from the tomb.
62The next day, which was after the Day of Preparing, the head holy men and the Separated Ones (Pharisees) came to Spear of the Great Waters (Pilate).
63“Honored One,” they said to him, “When he was still alive, that trickster Creator Sets Free (Jesus) said, ‘On the third day I will come back from the dead.’ 64We must put an end to his lies or his followers could take his body away and tell the people he has come back from the dead, making things worse for all of us. So we are asking that you order your soldiers to guard the burial cave.”
65He said to them, “Take with you a good number of my soldiers and set them to guard the burial cave securely.”
66So they went and placed a seal over the great stone and set the guards to watch.
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