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What is Crucifixion?A MEDICAL DOCTORA medical doctor provides a physical description.
The cross is placed on the ground and the exhausted man is quickly
thrown backwards with his shoulders against the wood. The legionnaire feels for
the depression at the front of the wrist. He drives a heavy, square wrought-iron
nail through the wrist deep into the wood. Quickly he moves to the other side
and repeats the action, being careful not to pull the arms too tightly, but to
allow some flex and movement. The cross is then lifted into place. The left foot
is pressed backward against the right foot, and with both feet extended, toes
down, a nail is driven through the arch of each, leaving the knees flexed. The
victim is now crucified. As he slowly sags down with more weight on the nails
in the wrists, excruciating fiery pain shoots along the fingers and up the arms
to explode in the brain—the nails in the wrists are putting pressure on the
median nerves. As he pushes himself upward to avoid this stretching torment, he
places the full weight on the nail through his feet. Again he feels the searing
agony of the nail tearing through the nerves between the bones of his feet. As
the arms fatigue, cramps sweep through his muscles, knotting them deep relentless,
and throbbing pain. With these cramps comes the inability to push himself upward
to breathe. Air can be drawn into the lungs but not exhaled. He fights to raise
himself in order to get even one small breath. Finally, carbon dioxide builds
up in the lungs and in the blood stream, and the cramps partially subsided. Spasmodically,
he is able to push himself upward to exhale and bring in life-giving oxygen. Hours
of limitless pain, cycles of twisting, joint-renting cramps, intermittent partial
asphyxiation, searing pain as tissue is torn from his lacerated back as he moves
up and down against rough timber. Then another agony begins: a deep, crushing
pain deep in the chest as the pericardium slowly fills with serium and begins
to compress the heart. It is now almost over, the loss of tissue fluids has reached
a critical level.The compressed heart is struggling to pump heavy, thick, sluggish
blood into the tissues-the tortured lungs are making frantic effort to gasp in
small gulps of air. He can feel the chill of death creeping through his tissues...
Finally, he can allow his body to die... All this the Bible records with the simple
words, “and they crucified Him” (Mark 15:24). What wondrous love
is this? Crucifixion was given a sentence to only the worst offenders of the law.
Thieves, murderers, and rapists would be the types who got crucified. Yet, here
Jesus is being crucified between two hardened criminals... Jesus did nothing to
deserve this type of death, yet he was willing to die, in between 2 thieves, so
that we might be saved. And there, in between the sinners, was our slain savior
for our sins. Isaiah 12:2-- Surely God is my salvation; I will trust and not be
afraid. The Lord, the Lord, is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation.
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