Blessed are the pure in heart,
for they will see God.
It’s another day, another sunrise, another crucifixion.
He doesn’t have the most glamorous job as a centurion. It pays the taxes, and it supports his young family, and he serves the empire. It’s a noble job, one that his father and his father’s father have done.
Rome is far away. He does not get sent to war, he does not get sent to guard Caesar, he doesn’t even get to guard Pilate. His noble call as a centurion is to keep the crowds back during the crucifixions.
He rubs a hand over his face. After a while, it just gets old. A crowd, large or small, will gather. The criminal will trudge down the street, exhausted, dragging the cross. They will be nailed to it. The cross will be lifted. He will listen to them struggle and wheeze until they no longer have the will to stretch for a breath.
There is a buzz around Jerusalem, these days. More people. That’s what happens at Passover, though, and they’re going to squeeze in one last crucifixion before the Jewish holiday.
It’s another day. Another day for the armour. Another day where he’ll wither under the sun. Another crucifixion.
When he arrives, there’s a…strange energy about. He gets the attention of his commanding officer. “What’s going on?” he asks.
“Two rebels will be executed today,” his commanding officer says.
“Two rebels,” his commanding officer repeats, “as well as the man from Nazareth.”
His eyes widen. Now, he knows very little about the man from Nazareth. He knew he was making waves in the Jewish circles, and there was whispers that he had healed a centurion’s servant in Capernaum. He came to Jerusalem every year for Passover, but that was the custom of the Jews, and he had never seen the Nazarene.
Crucified? What happened? They just welcomed him into the city with palm branches days ago.
His commanding officer shrugs. “Their religious leaders claim he said he was the Son of God, and according to their law that is deserving of death. Pilate gave his permission. Now go on, they’ll be here soon.”
The two rebels and the man from Nazareth.
He is sweltering in his armour, for all that it just turned to the afternoon. The three men struggle on the crosses, working for their life’s breath, as the crowd—larger than he’s ever seen it—shout and jeer at the man in the middle. At the man from Nazareth. At the man who has “THIS IS JESUS, KING OF THE JEWS” hung on a sign above his head.
This man? A king? Of the people who wait for him to die?
The sky grows—dark. Not the dark that comes with a mid-afternoon storm, but the kind of dark that wishes he had a torch. For a moment he worries it’s a trap, but how could his followers cover the sun? He grips his spear more tightly, though it will do little to help him in the face of one who has the power to darken the sky.
Which god could this belong to? Apollo? Or—
He looks at this man from Nazareth. This Jesus, whom the Jewish religious leaders said claimed he was the son of God.
He flinches when the man from Nazareth cries out, loudly, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” The man whispers something after that, but he’s not sure what it is until one of his followers comes up, brandishing a soaking sponge. He holds out his spear. “No. You cannot come closer.”
“He’s thirsty,” the follower—a young man, barely younger than the centurion—says sharply. There are tears in his eyes and running down his cheeks and the centurion ignores it. He has seen tears before. The follower tenses, like he’s thinking about taking a run at the cross, and then holds out the sponge. “Just—here. Please.”
The man from Nazareth is dying, and the sponge smells sour, but he still puts it on the end of his spear and holds it up with shaking hands.
The man drinks. The sky is dark. So, so dark.
A whisper from nearby: “Now leave him alone. Let’s see if Elijah comes to save him.”
But the man cries out again, and he slumps.
It’s just another crucifixion. It should be, except the sky is dark, darker than it sometimes gets at night. It has been for hours. It’s just another crucifixion, except the crowds around cry out as the ground shakes and rocks split and there’s no way it’s tied to this man’s death, is it? But it—it must be, the ground is shaking hard enough for the tomb that he’s been focussing on all afternoon to split open and what—what is coming out of it—
His heart is thudding heavily in his chest, and he’s terrified. His gods—the gods of Rome have never done something like this. He has called on them, but there has been no answer.
One man dies—one man who made an extraordinary claim—and the world shakes.
“Surely,” he whispers, holding his composure, because there are still two rebels, yelling as the trembling earth aggravates their wounds, “surely this man was—the Son of God.”