And you wouldn’t have had it any other way. It’s never been a secret that the world has never understood the love of Christ, and in a society built largely upon instant gratification, three days in the tomb is three days too many to grasp. But you won’t budge, because this is a matter of faith, a matter of belief. Suffering breeds redemption, right? You’ve got this. Bring the rain. Day and night find you checking the horizon, eager for the confrontation you’re so sure will bring about a deepening of faith, a widening of belief, a wholeness of acceptance.

Jesus is condemned to death.

And when you least expect it, religion frequents the horizon you scan, and surfaces at the forefront. Perhaps a conversation takes a radical turn before resting on the subject of abortion, or euthanasia. Perhaps the cross necklace you wear around your neck betrays your beliefs before you ever get a chance to speak for them. An uncle is diagnosed with cancer. A parent is laid off from a job. A break-up. Somehow, now it’s an issue of tested belief. But you wanted this, right? You wanted the pain. It couldn’t have been more than five minutes ago when there weren’t enough words you could say in support of potential suffering. Here comes exactly what you asked for, give or take your sense of confidence. The hurt you’ve been asking for sits on your front doorstep.

Jesus carries his cross.

There it is, in all of its horrible glory, and you signed for it. The pain brings with it a host of unwanted consequences. Late nights and early mornings you spend thinking, agonizing, over what is and what isn’t and what could be. Is it too late to question the source of the struggle? Is it ever too late to ask for it all to be taken away? Like Atlas, the weight of the world rests upon your shoulders, or so it seems. And life knew exactly when the pain would strike, because conveniently those best suited to help you deal with this newfound struggle all have their own crosses to bear. Don’t these people know that you’ve got both your hands on your own cross, and it’s still not nearly enough? Your willingness to suffer transitions seamlessly into justified anger, one that seeps into anything and everything which frequents the remainder of your agenda. Suffering never asks how you’re enjoying the ride; it already knows exactly how much you hate it.

One step forward under the cross is one step too many. Two steps backward is two steps too few. You’ll fall asleep crying, and wake up to sheets still wet from the previous night’s tears. How the hell could anyone consider this life? A cross seems always just light enough to keep hope alive, and just heavy enough to ensure you’ll never reach it.

Jesus falls the first time.

You hit the dirt, and no one bats an eye. Do they even notice? Do you want them to? The view is hardly flattering from the ground up. No one seems to understand how much more than a helpful hand is required to lift a cross-carrying man again to his feet. For the first time, the full weight of everything you still hate yourself for ever requesting is now bore solely upon your own shoulders. It’s impossible to convey in words the screaming pain that runs straight from the hurt to the heart.

Jesus falls the third time.

Not that you’re counting anymore, of course. It’s now more a matter of the distance you can travel between falls, more so than the number of times you’ve pretended to avoid tripping over your own pain. You actually begin to fear that you wont reach the original intention behind the suffering at all. It hardly gets better from here, right? Does’t it always get worse before it gets better? Is it too late to drop this pain and run from it?

Jesus is stripped of his garments.

And suddenly, it’s in the open. They see it. The facade you’ve created by manipulated reputation is harshly ripped from its place, and you stand naked before the eyes of a plastic world. The addiction, the temptations, the shame, the rejection, the self-hate, the jealousy, it’s strewn across the ground in a monument to your own disgrace, and for the first time, they know the real you, the unadulterated you. When they say your name, they no longer address the person you built yourself up to be. The cross renders falsity all the more impossible. You’re so far removed from the moment when you wished the suffering upon yourself that all for which you can now yearn is its direct antithesis - somehow, take this from me. Take this cross away. Dear God, take this cross from my shoulders and let me fail.

Jesus is nailed to the cross.

But it’s a part of you now. You supported this pain upon your back for so long, bore it upon your shoulders for longer than you knew was possible, and now it supports you. The world takes notice, though they somehow stare past obvious courage into non-existent weakness. You’re reminded that you still live amidst a society that misses the obvious in favor of the digestible. And suddenly, you feel it, the full circle of your submission to the suffering you accepted seemingly so long ago; it’s changed you. You realize you never really meant with sincerity even one of the times during which you asked God to take from you your pain. Because as you hang on that cross, you understand for the first time that it was never about asking God to remove the pain. It was always about asking God to perfect you through it. How could you have ever questioned the perfection of a Savior who was physically crucified so long ago, so that your emotional crucifixion could do nothing more than strengthen the bond between God the Father and His creation? The cross is everything. And you wouldn’t have it any other way. The cross has become a crown.

You pick your head back up, and re-familiarize yourself with the horizon. Bring the rain.

Jesus is condemned to death.