Nailing on Good Friday

There was no way I could make it to the Good Friday service; I had to nail 18 bundles of shingles to the roof before the thunderstorm came. From morning to evening I hammered the old-fashioned way – nearly 2,000 nails – long past any remaining glimmer of daylight. (As my friend likes to say, "I may not be skilled, but I'm slow.")

Whenever there was a pause in my pounding, the rooftop was a serene and quiet place. Chickens clucked and scratched below, and a songbird gave me a little private performance from a nearby branch. At some point it occurred to me that this must be about the time that Jesus was crucified, and my thoughts carried me from that tranquil rooftop to a hill far away.

I continued to pound, then suddenly realized that I was holding a hammer and nails, just like those Roman soldiers.  Of course, my inch-and-a-quarter roofing nails were nothing like the heavy spikes that pierced the hands and feet of Jesus — or were they?

I thought about those big, ugly spikes that held Him to that cross, representing the big, ugly sins of mankind.  Every murder, act of terrorism, rape, kidnapping, theft...the list of big, ugly sins is as long as those big, ugly nails.

Then I looked down at my handful of small, shiny roofing nails, and another thought entered my mind.  It isn't only the "big uglies" that pierced my Lord.  It was also all the "small shinies."  Snooty attitudes, snippy comments, egotistical thoughts, morsels of gossip, moments of apathy, tiny tantrums, harsh judgments, wisps of mini-rebellions, and countless secret self-centered sins also made Him bleed.

I looked at my big 35# bucket of little nails and saw myself.  Innumerable sins, each one a nail that inflicted pain on my dear, loving Creator.  

So that's how I spent my Good Friday.  In grubby clothes, with filthy hands, on a secluded rooftop where my lips kept whispering, ​"WHAT A SAVIOR!!!"      
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