Moved to Serve

Thwack! Thwack! Ominous thuds jerked me awake and propelled me to the window. Something hard, striking something hollow. Then, raging shouts and pleading cries.

I didn’t want to look. I had to look. I did look.

A man lay on the street, curled in a fetal position. Pleading. Another stood over him, cursing and kicking his head. A red river flowed onto the pavement.

My stomach churned. I barely made it to the telephone to call for help. A compulsion to do something, anything, to stop the horror, overwhelmed me. Fear and perhaps a measure of common sense kept me inside, fighting nausea, but peering out anxiously until aid arrived.

I didn’t know the man on the ground. In spite of that, a tsunami of emotion gripped me—pity and rage that one human being could treat another so viciously.

How much greater those emotions must have been for the three women who stood within view of the Perfect Sacrifice, knowing, as his blood ran free, that love alone hung him there.

Perhaps they had seen crucifixions before—but not this one. Not HIM. I wonder if they had to link arms to stop each other from rushing forward and doing something foolhardy, or if they froze harder to the spot with each hammer blow, each insult.

The women who had followed and served Jesus in life, who stood at a distance as he died, also followed him after his death. Motivated by love and a tsunami of emotion that demanded they serve somehow, they followed their broken Saviour’s body to its final resting place.

Oh, if there’s one thing those of us who follow Christ today must never become cold too, it’s the very real, very human emotion surrounding his life and death on earth. It’s what keeps us tuned to the needs of the human beings he died for. Us. For when our emotions are stirred, our hearts are moved. And when our hearts are moved, we are motivated to respond. In love, in service, and in surrender.

Respond in Prayer

Lord, so many needs surround us. Move my heart to compassion, so I, like these women, may love enough to serve those you would have me stand beside.

Kathleen Gibson