Behold the man..

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As he looked up, aroused, he stood erect*.

With suff’ring passionate, he entered in

to situation, body bloody flecked

himself he had no cover, where he’d been

he’s put to shame by some, but unashamed

himself he then provides for others too,

He thinks of those who’ll suffer. Though un-named

half of the population there are who

will weep and wail for loss immesur’ble°

He enters into their own space as well.

He knows the function he’s to play, and will

not shirk the work that God gave him. To dwell

in dwelling place of the Most High, but sim-

ult-an-e-ous-ly in the place where tears

are often shed, for “living dead” (now him)

who bore their Crosses, at the points of spears

to place of shame and death, where hopes & plans

for forty years of life on Earth, down here,

must all be smashed and ruined; this is Man’s

and Woman’s lot, when occupied, in fear.

And he without that fear, though with real dread,

was occupied with purposes of God,

because he acted out what they just said

and in his wake we find we don’t just nod

in time with pumping heart, with beating life,

participating in a nature “from

above”** us, that would enter into strife,

bring grace into a place “forsaken” long.

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Notes 

*  “Behold the man!” - Pilate to the crowd of skulking stooges paid by authorities to help get rid of someone (who makes them look small) on that Friday morning. (John 19:5)

° Women of Jerusalem, weep not for me, but for yourselves… for if this is what is done when the wood is green, what will happen when it is dry?... (Luke 23;26-38) And John comments that Jesus looked up from the cross and saw his mother and John standing near each other, & engages in another  thoughtful play on words when he says to his mother “Woman. Behold, your son!”, following this, shortly after with a comment to John  “”Behold your mother.” in the context of the writer’s following interpretive comment, that “from that time John took Mary into his own home…” (John 19:25-27 )

**  “from above” is a play on words employed in the New Testament Greek by important  characters: Jesus (John 3:3,7) and the Johns [the Baptist & the other apostle (sent one) of the Christ, and James (James1:15;3:17)] The Greek word “ἄνωθεν (=anothen)”  had two senses (A bit like the English word “another” can be said in such a way as to mean “another”(instance of) or “an other”(not the same): one of the meanings of the Greek word “anothen” actually meant “another”, & the other sense meant “from above”, two concepts that in some situations might well be related, but might also have distinctly different nuances. John the Evangelist (or the writer of the fourth gospel - often called John) records Jesus using this play on words (in chapter 3, verses 3,7,followed by John the Baptist’s comments included later in the chapter (chapter 3 verse 31) for anyone who missed the fact that Nicodemus missed the meaning of Jesus, when Jesus spoke of a man being birthed anothen) to indicate that Nicodemus (a Man, a Jew, a leading teacher, of the Jews (known as the people of God) missed the central point of Jesus, [He was not just another of the many prophets born of a woman; he was the one born from above; and the same holds for everyone else who would enter & live under the reign of God] while shortly after (in chapter 4), a Woman, a Samaritan (spat on by “the people of God”), an adulteress, presently unmarried, got, saw, & accepted the main point of Jesus and his mission. 

This participation in a higher nature is the news that both John & Peter  pass on from Jesus: “He was in the world, and the world came into being through him, yet the world did not know him. [11] He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him. [12] But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, [13] who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God. (John 1:10-13); and “His divine power has given us everything needed for life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and excellence. [4] Thus he has given us, through these things, his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may escape from the corruption that is in the world because of lust and may become participants of the divine nature”(2 Peter 1:3-4 )..

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