Found pages from a diary...
Tuesday - September 1
I'm bored, and mad. Sitting in prison here. I hate the guards. They look at me with their condemning eyes and sneer when they hand me the meal. Prison guards come to that place where they look down on you even more with each passing week and they treat you like an animal. So I act like one: one day one of them dropped my meal of slop and I jumped him. I pounded my fists into him and used his helmet against him - I lost it that day. It was building up. Got a good beating for it, and the straw is caked in dried blood from me lying on it - passed out for a week.
Saturday - Sept 15
The beating still hurts, but the guard said something to me that made me want to pull his sword and gut him like a fish: "...good news - you're leaving soon. You got a date with death next year." I cursed him and screamed all sorts of vile things against his family. He laughed it off as he lifted his beer in a mock toast to me.
April 1
Life sucks. I was so angry the last few months. My date with death is coming. I now go to sleep lying in my filth, and recently my tears. I feel bad - what life have I lived? Alone and crying silently in this cell waiting death.
April 3
Not a good day. I just blew my top - cussed everyone out, got the prison all cursing me - even the prisoners. Three guards had to come in and they beat the crap out of me. I managed to pull off a small knife and really jacked one guard in the thigh. One guard took off his hemet and sent some teeth flying out of my bloody mouth. The blood on the stone wall is my reminder...looks like the pattern of a crow with a broken wing.
April 5
I don't want to die. It's scary to be alone. You could beat your chest pretending the world can't hold you down, but I confess I'm really scared.
April 9
New prisoner came in, heard of him. Only stories, but has caused quite a stir in prison. Heard he has special powers....
April 10
The crowds look at me while the sun bakes my skin. Strangest thing, they keep coming back to really rail and just jack up the guy near me. He must have done something bad to really piss off so many people.
April 10 - two hours later
Yeh, religious nut. I'm pissed off too. Crazy religious people have hurt us more than helped and this Jesus is making me mad. I join the crowd and yell with the crowd as they keep up their railing and spitting. It only feels good because I'm scared, I'm all alone and if I'm doing to die....I'm going to die angry and pissed off.
April 10 - one hour later...
The crowds don't stop. Even the people who were there to see me trailed away for dinner, but the crowds kept it up on this Jesus. I see the eyes of some women - they look to him with either lust, or love. Standing there weeping and looking at Jesus.
Can't tell...sweat, blood is clouding my vision.
I hear bits and pieces...miracles...healings...no possible way...
April 10 - minutes later...
I see them, their nice clothes, their self righteousness...their eyes pass over me like a dog, and they stand under Jesus.
They question him, and I sense...they just hate him...and the words they say...I hear nothing that would cause this man to be crucified. No murder, no rape, not gambling...nothing..............
April 10 - one hour later...not one crime. God, here's a man next to me who has done nothing wrong...why is he here?!!!
April 10...
Jesus scares me..he's talking. He's talking to someone about forgiveness...he's talking like an attorney....he's talking like he still cares...even against the bastards who are making his last hours miserable....
April 10
...I can't take it. I'm feeling things I never thought I would. My lost humanity, my heart is doing something. It was after I saw Jesus lifting his head and muttering, "Woman behold your son....behold your mother." It was his own mother here!!! I'm dying alone....my mom died a long time ago because I hated her and broke her heart, and no way is Jesus a criminal. Not the way He says things. He's loving them to his death....
April 10
...no way is Jesus deserving to be here. No way. I've been with him, and he's not dying like me. He's not screaming. He's not begging. He's not cursing. He's nothing like me. I'm crap, I've done it and I passed it around like the devil, but this man...is not a man I've ever met.
...those rumors, those stories....man, can they be true? Jesus, the Son of God? I've given up on religion a long time ago....but Jesus scares me. When you face death men pee, crap in their pants or they fight it like any animal. I'v watched men, children and animals die, but this man is dying like a ....lamb.
A quiet lamb...
April 10..
...Oh God, I'm so jacked up. I'm so lost. I'm scared...I don't want to go out like this. I know I hate myself....and I'm an angry man......I cry silently....
...I find comfort here next to Jesus...the other thief breaks my thoughts...he's yelling at Jesus.
The thief's eyes as are if full of white hot anger, and he spits and judges Jesus. He's just the same eight-year old bully who never grew up and he's just laying it on Jesus. My blood begins to boil...it's so wrong! He's done nothing of death! Can't you see how He is? He loves! He forgives! He actually goes to the mat for those who rail against him! Now you do the same?!!! I can't stand it!!!
I yell at the thief, "WE DESERVE THIS! This man has done nothing wrong! Look at him! He said nothing in his defense! He even tells his mother that she's going to be watched by John! Our mothers are gone! We broke their hearts! We DESERVE this!!!!"
I cry, my tears streak down....I have made a mess of my life and it's almost over.
I turn my head to see if Jesus is surprised by my defense, his eyes tell me something different: love of God. I weep like a baby in my heart and am astounded: in a place of blood and death, in a place of hell.....I find hope.
Hope is next to me. I believe.
I make a request, I want to be where Jesus is...
Strange thing, he answers, "Truly you will be with in paradise."
His answer sends chills down my body: every word soft, but spoken with the authority of the ruler of my day.
Then it hits me: I am dying next to a God man.