Many soldiers interacted with Jesus. He was arrested by them, mocked and abused by them, crucified by them, and, finally, His dead body was guarded by them.
In The Robe, Roman Tribune Marcellus Gallio was given what should have been a simple job for anyone in the Roman Empire’s army: oversee the crucifixion of a Jewish rabble rouser. Life, though, had not gone very well of late for the military man. As punishment for an indiscretion he committed in Rome, he was “assigned” to a remote post in the far eastern reaches of the Roman Empire; an exile intended to end his career.
Nothing went as planned; not the plans of his enemies and not the plans made by Marcellus. He was profoundly affected by his exposure to Jesus. And like him, each of the other soldiers would, at some point, have to deal with their own Jesus encounters.
Interacting with Jesus changes everything.
Consider the guards dispatched to keep watch over His tomb. However you read the Matthew 28 passage, it comes down to one thing: they were soldiers, commanded to perform a task by their civilian superiors. To their credit, when they failed in that task —and who can defeat God?— they immediately reported the truth to their superiors ... as good soldiers do.
Yes, they were paid and instructed by their superiors to tell a different story; a story that, in the view of their leaders, served the national interest much better than the truth.
But, eventually, someone talked.
Yes, even though paid —and, lets face it, threatened— by their superiors, at least one of those guards, somewhere, sometime, spilled the beans. We have the entirety of the story in the Gospels, "on the record" if you will. So, someone on the inside told someone on the outside.
Those tomb guards had seen things, felt things, and heard things vastly different from most humans in all of history. Their piece of the story was extraordinary in the extreme.
If you were one of those guards —had seen, felt, and heard the things they did that morning— would you give credence to the claim that the person who had occupied that tomb had, in fact, risen from the dead? Could you believe the other things people were saying about Jesus ... that He was the Son of God, that he could forgive sins, that His kingdom was a heavenly one, that anyone could enter that kingdom by following His commandments?
I think you might.
And I think you, too, might break your silence.
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PHOTO: https://www.amazon.com/The-Robe/dp/B000BX9KGQ
Portions of this reflection are borrowed from You Had One Job, Tomb Guards! which was published in April 2017.
More about the soldiers: https://military.odb.org/series/what-happened-to-the-soldiers-who-killed-jesus/
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READINGS FOR THE COMING WEEK
Resurrection of the Lord (April 12, 2020)
https://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu/texts.php?id=38
Jeremiah 31:1-6
Psalm 118:1-2, 14-24
Colossians 3:1-4 OR Acts 10:34-43
John 20:1-18 OR Matthew 28:1-10
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Easter is upon us as we go through this “Quarantide” season. Let’s keep praying for one another as we continue our hiatus. The extension of the COVID19 shelter-in-place order means DaySpring’s Lectionary Breakfast is still not meeting. Here are this week’s scriptures and a reflection.
Keep safe. Keep in touch.
Blessings,
Steve
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