Selah
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It's late on Easter night.
When I was a young teenage girl I used to listen to the record
Jesus Christ Superstar...a lot.
I grew up in the seventies...we had records and hippies.
I think it was the movie that put Jesus into a person
I could relate to for the first time.
I could relate to for the first time.
I had heard all about how He came down to earth
as a man...but I couldn't see it.
He was sort of dream-like and far away
and saying lots of stuff I didn't pay much attention to
like the priests at the Masses I sporadically attended.
But seeing the movie Jesus Christ Superstar on TV one Saturday afternoon
turned him into someone I could relate to,
and I saw, for the first time, what was meant by
He came down as man.
I went to the record store and bought the original album
which differed slightly from the movie soundtrack.
I listened to that record over and over and over.
It was a double record set and it was in a brown cover
with gold colored lettering
and I knew all the words by heart...I still do.
But I always turned it off when it got to the part
when Jesus was on the cross.
It was too sad.
At the end of the movie the whole cast of characters gets back on the bus
except for Jesus who is hanging on a the cross as they drive past.
It's so quiet and empty and eerie as they drive away
and it must be exactly what he felt...
My God, my God, why have you abandon me?
A commenter on another blog, which I read the other day,
said that she likened Jesus going to the cross
to a woman having a baby...
and how at the end of all that pain there is a beautiful baby...
Just as at the end of Jesus's pain there is this beautiful gift.
But a woman's body is hard-wired to go into labor at the right time.
We women don't really have a choice about such things...
(if we did, I might still be pregnant, 'cause pain just isn't my thing.)
We go into labor knowing we will have a baby
just as Jesus went to the cross knowing he would rise on the third day.
But because Jesus was a man, and men have free will,
he had a choice.
He could have walked away from that garden and never looked back.
He could have said, "Well, I went as far as I could with them,
but they are a hard-headed group. See ya."
But he didn't say that. He said
Not as I will; but as You will.
He waited in the garden while his friends slept.
He waited at Gethsemane for what he knew would come.
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I watched it back then, too!! AND I ran out and bought the album as well. The music is wonderful. Did you see the new T.V. remake last week with John Legend? I was in the hospital, so I missed it. Another one with even better music is Godspell, you should find it somehow.
ReplyDeleteHard to wrap our minds around for sure.
ReplyDeleteI love the music too of JCS but I like the portrayal in Godspell even better!!
ReplyDeleteI was little girl then but I suppose it did cause that generation to relate. I do believe it was a lot worse than having a baby though.
ReplyDeleteSo thankful we get to serve a risen Saviour. It's humbling and almost overwhelming when you think of what He did for us.
ReplyDeleteBlessings~
I have never seen that musical --and I didn't even think to watch it last week. I remember as a new Christian some 20+ years ago someone telling me that it was terrible and not at all Biblical so I just never considered it. But this post, as well as hearing from many friends who loved the live version last Sunday, I just may have to try to watch it myself! Great reflections!
ReplyDeleteA beautiful post ... quite often I find myself crying in church when I think about the sacrifice that He made for us. And then I cheer up because He wouldn't want me to be sad about it!
ReplyDelete