The Telescope
At Calvary, God let us erect the greatest engineering project the world has ever seen. It is greater than the tower of Babel. It is greater than the pyramids. It is greater than the discovery of the curvature of space-time. It is greater than all of the black holes combined. It is greater than any project imagined by the most fanciful of science fiction writers and the most gifted of scientists.
God let us build a telescope.
The telescope we built is his bloody wounds.
God let us open bloody wounds in his body so we could see through the opaque illusion conjured up by the serpent that camouflages the sweetness of paradise from us.
The bloody wounds pierce the veil between heaven and earth.
Through his bloody wounds, we catch a glimpse of heaven from here on earth.
When we look through the bloody wounds, we see the glorious victory. What we see when we look through the bloody wounds shatters the illusion that camouflages the sweetness of paradise from us. We learn the answer to the question, 'What is the nature of God?'. The purpose of the bloody wounds was apocalypse - revelation. God shows us his nature through the bloody wounds.
But be careful. When you look through the bloody wounds at the apocalypse, don tinted safety goggles. The light from heaven (Acts 9:3) that shines through the bloody wounds is blinding. It will knock you off your feet.
There is one thing that the almighty God cannot do. He cannot preach to us through bloody wounds. Only a man can. So God took flesh. He became a man - an equal to us in our humanity - a partner with us in our suffering.
The Testimony of the Witnesses
His bloody wounds are the witnesses who testify to the price he paid to publish here on earth the magnitude, duration and uniqueness of his love for us.
The sheep know the shepherd by his bloody wounds. By his bloody wounds, they know him . His bloody wounds are the mouth of God. When we opened bloody wounds in his body with lash, thorns, nails and spear, we opened the mouth of the Son of God so he could preach the good news of great joy to us. "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God" . The mouth of God has a distinctive voice. The voice of the mouth of God testifies about the sacrifice of the shepherd for his sheep - that the shepherd gave up his life for his sheep . Listen to the voice of the mouth of God. Listen to its testimony. Witness the truth by watching the traffic through his bloody wounds.
The God with the Bloody Wounds has the Means and the Motive to Rescue Us from our Dire Predicament in the Valley of Tears
The God with the bloody wounds who refused to let the evil we did to him poke a hole in his most sacred heart and drain it of his love for us never lets us down. He never disappoints. He is trustworthy. He has the means and the motive to rescue us from our dire predicament in the valley of tears. Jesus is the indissoluble marriage between absolute power and absolute love for us. We tortured and killed him. He suffered and died. Yet, he did not stay dead and he did not stop loving us. That he emerged from the dead still alive is the indisputable proof of his power. Nobody emerges from the dead. He did. However, that he emerged from the dead still in love with us is the indisputable proof that our conception of divinity as power is incomplete. Divinity is also love. The genuineness of his power and his love for us was proven to us by surviving the evil we did to him. That he paid such an exorbitant cost out of his own pocket for the production of the proof is the basis for a high degree of confidence in him. He paid the exorbitant cost not from his unlimited divine resources. He paid the exorbitant cost from his limited human resournces. He paid them all for us. He kept not a penny for himself. He has never paid more for anything else. All is well. We can build our lives on the foundation of his absolute power and his absolute love for us. He is the rock on which the wise set the foundation of their lives .