Thorns
On my mind very much lately.
As I walk I pass by many thorn bushes and mesquite trees filled with thorns.
I walk through stickers sometimes and end up with one in my shoe on occasion.
How they hurt.
Nothing like walking a little too close to a thorny bush and being scratched or your clothes caught or torn.
It's a painful reminder to pay closer attention to where I walk.
Every time I see the thorn bushes, it reminds me of the crown of thorns Jesus wore for us.
And it also reminds me of how Adam and Eve were put out of the garden and the curse first began for mankind.
Genesis 3:
14 So the LORD God said to the serpent,
“Because you have done this,
“Cursed are you above all livestock
and all wild animals!
You will crawl on your belly
and you will eat dust
all the days of your life.
15 And I will put enmity
between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and hers;
he will crush your head,
and you will strike his heel.”
16 To the woman he said,
“I will make your pains in childbearing very severe;
with painful labor you will give birth to children.
Your desire will be for your husband,
and he will rule over you.”
17 To Adam he said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate fruit from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat from it,’
“Cursed is the ground because of you;
through painful toil you will eat food from it
all the days of your life.
18 It will produce thorns and thistles for you,
and you will eat the plants of the field.
19 By the sweat of your brow
you will eat your food
until you return to the ground,
since from it you were taken;
for dust you are
and to dust you will return.”
Cursed is the ground.
In one weak moment of unbelief, arrogance and disobedience the curse fell upon all.
We were cut off from the Creator.
Man, made from the dust with life breathed into him, reduced from job of caring for the created garden to farming, and dealing with thorns and thistles.
I can't imagine a world without thorns and thistles.
I've seen them all my life.
In west Texas a person sees a lot of thorns and thistles. From the mesquite trees and prickly pear cactus, to thorn bushes, thistles and stickers, catclaw vines... sharp and pointy things are everywhere you look.
I can remember as a child going barefoot trying to cross a little patch of grass beside our house to get over to the neighbor's grapevine on his fence.
I loved the deep purple concord grapes he grew, and he allowed us to enjoy them most graciously.
But in my hurry to get to the grapes, I forgot there were stickers growing in the grass. I would end up with two feet full of stickers before I realized I'd walked right into the middle of them.
Painful!
Thorns mean pain.
I can only imagine how painful it was for Jesus to wear the crown of thorns.
Not just the woody points pressed down into his skin against his head... not just the bleeding the barbs must have caused him...
But also in knowing that thorns sprung from the curse of the fall of man.
And so He was crowned with the curse of all of mankind.
The king of glory, the son of God, the light of the world, the prince of peace, Love divine...
crowned with the curse of man, torn and bleeding, dying in place of humankind.
And how our sinful nature seems like thorns to me.
Sin grows inside us pricking against our conscience, jabbing our thoughts, wild and unrelenting, never abating,
creeping into our lives like a wild weed full of stickers and thorns.
We keep cutting it back, chopping it off, plowing it under, trying to uproot it...
And it pokes us, pricks us, scratches and tears against us and sometimes even entangles us.
This brings to mind the ram caught by it's horns in the thorny bush which was used as Abraham's sacrifice in place of his son.
When we become entangled by sin, we are caught struggling to get free in our frustrating thrashing about.
The more we struggle, the more ensnared we become by what we want to be free from.
Trying to get rid of the sin in our lives is a little like trying to remove a catclaw vine from a fence.
It is one evil vine to try and rid from your property.
It grows back almost faster than you can get it cut down and removed.
It climbs fences, walls, telephone poles, trees, and even houses. And the thorns... the vine nearly seems to wrap you in thorns when you're trying to pull it away from the fence. If you don't wear gloves you're asking to come back with bloody arms.
Sin is the same way. It's insidious. It takes root and tries to grow in every part of your life.
It takes over. It climbs all over everything unwatched and grows thick and thorny and covers every inch of space until it occupies all we are.
For Jesus to be crowned with the curse must have penetrated much more than his physical body.
It must have struck him with pain much deeper inside as He bore our sin inside Him.
Our own thorns of sin must have struck his heart like nothing else ever felt by any human.
Every pain a barb of our iniquities.
Every failure of my inadequacy, not serving Him as I know I should... every wish of mine to do as I please, every broken promise, backsliding, selfishness, and every missed step ...another thorn He had to endure.
He was crowned with my sin. He was made king of my errors. He wore my shame for all the world to see.
He was made sovereign ruler of all of our sin.
And in that crown of thorns lies all of our hope.
“For he has made Him to be sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him” (2 Corinthians. 5:21).
Willingly Jesus wore the shame of all mankind.
Nobody forced Him to.
He did it for us because He knew we could not ever reach grace without His sacrifice.
Every time I pass the thorn bushes on my daily walks, I remember the crown of thorns.
Where once they brought me annoyance and occasional pain as I would brush against them,
now they bring me hope as I'm reminded just how much He loves us.
Not just me. Not just you. He loves all of us.
Come to Him.
Crown Him as king of your life forever.
"See from His head, His hands, His feet,
Sorrow and love flow mingled down!
Did e’er such love and sorrow meet,
Or thorns compose so rich a crown?"
Ram in the thicket
horns caught in a crown of brier
willing Lamb among a world of bramble
curse of Love upon Thy sacred head
You hold in Your hands my name
as You step upon the barbs for me
bruising your feet on the serpent's fangs
Thorn in Your side - a cleft in the rock
forgiveness deluge flows free
grace in redemption's tsunami
blood of the lamb
the greater flood
drowning all of our sin
old man is gone
and new has come
borne of the new ark
- a common manger
