there when so many of the incredible things happened. We saw Jesus turn his face towards the city and start to really shake things up. And nearly all of us failed to see – or chose to ignore – the building storm. The crowds just got bigger and the push-back from the authorities just got nastier. Rumours were flying around that there were hit-squads out to kill Jesus. But we were so sure, so sure, that this was it. That, somehow, he was going to roll over the top of it all and lead us into some sort of brilliant endgame. And, of course, he did. One that broke my heart in every conceivable way. By the time we got to the city, I thought we were unbreakable. In a week I learnt that nothing is. The triumphant entry into the city, the trouble at the Temple, the politics, the meetings, the threats, the arguments amongst us, the tears, the betrayal. All of it happening and all of us trying to work out what was going on. None of us was equipped for what happened. None of us imagined anything so brutal and swift and final. None of us but Jesus. Now, afterwards, we remember the hints he dropped, the ideas he spread among us, the clarity of his vision. He’d tried to tell us but we hadn’t wanted to hear that part of the story. We’d wanted the good times but we hadn’t wanted the truth. I was there when he was arrested. I was never far from him. I watched them hit him and drag him away. I was there when Peter refused to speak up for him. I was there when the military Governor put him through that sham trial, offering him up to the people, knowing that he was sacrificing him to the mob. I walked along the road keeping pace and weeping, as he was forced to carry the ladder and face the inevitable. I watched him bleed. I watched him stumble. I watched him fall. I watched on in horror as they nailed him to the tree. I was there when those who had brought this to be laughed and swore at him. I felt a murderous rage, more powerful than anything I had ever felt until then. An impotent, 120
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