Mocking and Beating

Now the men who were holding Jesus began to mock him and beat him; they also blindfolded him and kept asking him, ‘Prophesy! Who is it that struck you?’ They kept heaping many other insults on him. When day came, the assembly of the elders of the people, both chief priests and scribes, gathered together, and they brought him to their council. They said, ‘If you are the Messiah, tell us.’ He replied, ‘If I tell you, you will not believe; and if I question you, you will not answer. But from now on the Son of Man will be seated at the right hand of the power of God.’ All of them asked, ‘Are you, then, the Son of God?’ He said to them, ‘You say that I am.’ Then they said, ‘What further testimony do we need? We have heard it ourselves from his own lips!’ Luke 22:63-71

Whether they are images from the movies or images from our own life, we can all recall and vividly remember how it felt to be mocked, teased and even beaten. We live in a time when name-calling, mockery and verbal abuse seems to be the norm, and these behaviors always lead to some form of violence. When folks have the need to mock and abuse others, it often shows their own vulnerability, their lack of faith and personal grounding. They need to wound others to feel better. Jesus is at the hands of jailers, men with the least important, least glamorous job at the time. Their lack of true authority gets acted out in their abuse. May we pay attention to our own need to abuse and mock, and take it as a sign to self-examine, pray and draw close to Jesus, who despite how his abuser acted, did not return hate and abuse.

Precious Savior, you know abuse firsthand

you did not return hate for more hate

you forgave the convicted felons on the cross

and love the angriest and hurting among us.

We humans love a good fight to cheer on

pretending to be above the violence here

yet we often answer with crass cruel words

and demean ourselves by demeaning others.

Lord, help us today to examine our hearts

let us name our failings and not blame others

for only your words of love will bring healing

and following you is the only path to life. Amen.