One way to look at life is as a series of choices... Every day we choose, some have small consequences, some large. But each one means an opportunity not taken, a chance missed, a road not taken. Robert Frost”s famous poem talks of the consequences
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference..
Jesus also spoke of the most important decision of our life as being a choice between two roads. But unlike Robert Frost, Jesus makes it clear that the road most people choose is actually more attractive, more inviting, than the other one. People avoid it because there are rocks, and ruts, and sharp turns, and steep hills.
Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the road is easy that leads to destruction, and there are many who take it. For the gate is narrow and the road is hard that leads to life, and there are few who find it. [Mt 7:13-14]
That choice includes how we respond when it comes to our own personal suffering. (1) We can rail against God and say, “If you are such a great and powerful and loving God, why did you let this happen to me?” Or, (2) we can acknowledge that we are sinners and don’t deserve any good thing, and cry out for mercy and help in our time of desperation.
The world is full of people who rail against God in their self righteousness and presume that the creator of the universe is obliged to make their life smooth. But there are only a few who own up to the fact that God owes us nothing, and that any good to come our way will be due to his mercy, not our merit. Few of us are criminals facing the bar of justice, but each of us can identify with one or the other of the two thieves who were crucified beside Jesus in terms of how we respond to suffering.
They had both been picked up by the Romans’ latest sweep up the road from Jericho, trying to clear the road of bandits for the benefit of the pilgrims coming to Jerusalem for the Passover. Abner and Dismas hadn’t met before; there may have been honor among thieves but there sure wasn’t much cooperation. The pickings on the Jericho road were too slim.
It was a lousy life, anyway, Dismas thought, might as well get it over with. He just wished he’d fought a little harder, so that the soldiers would have had to kill him. Crucifixion was such a horrible death! You could always count on a Gentile - especially the Romans - to raise killing into an art form, he thought to himself. He might not be much of a Jew, but at least he only killed by accident, and he only stole to eat. Dismas found himself drifting off into a sort of nightmare, a jumble of memories. He never expected to grow up to be a bandit. But what else could he have done? His family had barely been able to scratch a living out of their stony ground even before the taxes went up that last time. Well, he supposed he could have enlisted in the Roman army, or Herod’s auxiliaries, but there were some things even he wouldn’t stoop to, and that was one of them. He was a Jew. Although what good that did, when YHWH had clearly abandoned his people.
A sudden, new pain stabbed through his shoulder as the twisted muscles cramped. A sharp hiss of agony escaped his lips and then he became suddenly aware of a buzz of new activity going on below him. A third cross was being added. A crowd had gathered, there were dozens of people - maybe as many of a hundred, he couldn’t tell - clustered around the bare ground where the soldiers were nailing the victim to the crossbar. What were they shouting? And why were the temple priests there?
The soldiers finished their grisly task and started pushing the cross upright into place. Dismas gasped again, this time not from pain but from surprise. It was that Gallilean rabbi! That one that people were saying might be the Messiah! He had gone once, to hear him, but the crowds were so big he couldn’t hear, and who believed in a Mes-siah any more anyway.
A bystander picked up a clod of dirt and hurled it at the new figure. One of the soldiers pushed him back with the butt of his spear. The crowd began to shout taunts. “King of the Jews, hah!” they shouted. “You’re no king of ours!” “Imposter!” “Traitor!” were some of the epithets he heard. On the other side of the rabbi, Dismas’ fellow bandit Abner opened his eyes and his mouth and joined in. “Aren’t you the Messiah? What kind of a Messiah are you, anyway? Show us your stuff! Do a miracle! Save yourself and us!”
The man’s eyes opened. What was his name, anyway? Dismas remembered having heard it. Yeshua! Yes, that was it. How ironic. Yeshua means "God is salvation." Yeah, right. God has abandoned you, just like he’s abandoned the rest of us. Dismas could see the blood running down Yeshua’s face - there was a ring of thorns on his head, sticking into the skin. He opened his mouth to echo the crowd’s taunt when Yeshua spoke.
“Father,” he said. “Father, forgive them. They don’t know what they are doing.”
And then it seemed that Yeshua looked directly into his eyes. No, not his eyes. His soul. The words he had been about to speak froze on his lips. Dismas saw his life stretched out in front of his, opening out like a scroll for a judge to read. He saw each decision he had made, mercilessly spelled out in all its appalling, disgusting detail. All the excuses he had made to avoid facing the truth about the mess he had made of his life, every defense and self-justification stuck in his mouth. And for the first time he knew them for the lies they were.
And it seemed to Dismas that there was a road in front of him, with two forks. One final decision faced him, now at the end of his life. One fork continued on in much the same direction, an easy downhill slope, going along with the crowd, running over anyone who got in his way, telling himself he had no choice. The other branched off sharply uphill. It was a narrow, rocky road, one he might have missed if he hadn’t been paying attention. But now, with Yeshua’s eyes on him, he knew somehow that this was the way out, his last chance, the only way he could escape from all the evil he had done - the evil he had almost become - and the punishment he so richly deserved.
Tearing his eyes away from Yeshua’s face Dismas sharply criticized Abner. “Hold your tongue! Don’t you fear God? You’re under the same sentence as he is! The difference is that we belong here, our sentences are just. We are getting exactly what we deserve, but this man has done nothing wrong.”
With these words an enormous weight seemed to slip from Dismas’ shoulders. Even his own body, pulled down by gravity and weakness from the crossbar seemed lighter. He looked back at Yeshua. The words seemed to come almost by themselves. With an inexplicable combination of relief and hope, he said, “Remember me, Yeshua, when you come into your kingdom.”
The tenderness in Yeshua’s eyes was like nothing Dismas had ever seen before. Tears sprang to his eyes and he lowered his head. He wished he could fall on his knees, no, onto his face, in front of this man. How was it possible, that here, nailed to a cross, in a degree of physical pain he had never even imagined enduring, he should for the first time in his life feel free?
He raised his eyes again, in gratitude and awe, to find Yeshua still looking at him, waiting for him.“Truly,” he said, “believe me when I tell you this, today you will be with me in Paradise.”
Dismas teaches us six lessons.
First, he finds the courage to stand against the crowd. We can’t let ourselves be sucked into the kind of attitude that says, “If your God is so great and loving, then “Why Ukraine?” “Why genocide in China?” “Why the earthquake inTurkey?” “Why doesn’t he come down off his perch on the cross and do something?”
The second thing about the penitent thief was that he feared God. God was important to him. He may not always have listened or obeyed, but God mattered. And brought face to face with God, he bowed in submission.
Third, Dismas admitted that he had done wrong. Faced with the sinlessness of Christ, his own guilt became inescapable. Too many people are unwilling to face their own responsibility for the messes they’ve gotten into, and until they do that, they are blind to the only way out.
Fourth, he accepted his punishment as deserved. This is the real test of humility before God. Many will confess their sin with their mouths but get angry with God when their acts have consequences. And this anger reveals that they don’t really feel undeserving. They still feel, deep down, that they have some rights before God.
And then, fifth, he goes a step further and acknowledges that Jesus is King. He is not only good, he is powerful.
And finally, the penitent thief does one more thing. He fears God, admits wrong, accepts justice, acknowledges the goodness and power of Jesus. Now he pleads for help. And he gets it. Without delay, without further ado - when we ask for mercy, God answers.
