Whose Tragedy?

Was Jesus' death anything other than a terrible tragedy? Jesus was a young man, he was innocent of the charges brought against him and his death was engineered by his enemies. Surely all these facts add up to no more than a tragic event?

The events of Jesus' crucifixion were terrible, but the cross was not simply the murder of an innocent man. It was not an accident. During his life Jesus told people they should expect him to be killed in this way. It was God's plan. Jesus told his followers that he had come on a rescue mission. A mission to liberate men women and children from the terrible dilemma of wrongdoing, of sin.

The cross (the Passion) was at the heart of this rescue mission. So while the cross was something of a tragedy, it only happened because people had gone wrong in the first place. The tragedy started when people first turned their backs on God and decided to live to please themselves, and it continues today whenever we live selfishly, as we do wrong, speak wrong, and even think wrong thoughts. That's the greatest tragedy: our own sinfulness.
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