GIVING BLOOD - Devotional for January 24, from "Good Seeds"

One of the soldiers pierced His side with a spear, and immediately there came out blood and water…for these things came to pass, that the Scripture might be fulfilled…”They shall look on Him whom they pierced.” (John 19:34,36-37)

A friend of mine went to the blood bank to give blood. A noble thing to do. I’m not saying he’s exactly cavalier about it, but he’s done it many times before, so after a short rest he sauntered over to the restroom. And that’s where it happened: nearly losing consciousness, he managed to get himself down on the floor…and there he sat for 10 or 15 minutes, too weak to stand, to crawl, even to call out. He was finally rescued, helped into a chair, and given some juice. In relating the story to me he said, “I think I now have a little idea of how Jesus must have felt when He was being crucified. Oh, I can’t relate to the excruciating pain He endured, from the nails, the crown of thorns, and the lacerations on His back. But this feeling of ‘losing it' caused by a loss of blood – well, I just had a taste of that, and let me tell you, it was awful!” In His MIND Jesus knew He was dying, to be sure. And He knew it in His HEART, too, for dying was the whole reason for His coming: to literally die, in our place, for our sins, the just for the unjust, the unblemished Lamb for a sinful world of men. But now He was beginning to feel it, in His BODY, this eerie sensation brought on by the loss of blood. Fighting to maintain consciousness, He must have felt the life literally draining out of Him as the blood steadily flowed from His many wounds. He was human, of course, so He had to sense it: “I’m dying, I’m actually dying, for since there’s nothing to stop the flow of my blood, there’s nothing to stop the life from going out of my body.” In those hours on the cross, Jesus managed to speak only seven times, mostly just fragments of sentences. My friend said now he knows at least a little bit about that: “With no strength to cry out for help the fear and panic just washed over me.” What an insight into what our Savior suffered…for you, for me! But there is another way that we can – and must – feel what Jesus felt. We don’t have to go to the blood bank for this one. No, we just go to the cross – our cross this time. We must take it up – Jesus said so. And the life: our plans, our proficiencies, our pleasures, will all begin to drain from our veins, and we will find ourselves sitting on the floor, in a quiet panic, unable to move or speak. But that’s good. Now Jesus has us right where He wants us. And in His time He comes to replace our emptiness with His fullness, our silly toys with his sacred joys, our bright shiny beads with His endless abundance! When’s the last time we gave blood like this?