Jesus is led away to be crucified

All four gospels (Matthew 27:32-34, Mark 15:21-24, Luke 23:26-31, and John 19:17) share the events as Jesus is led from the city of Jerusalem to the place where he is crucified called the place of the skull (Golgotha in Aramaic).

The cross that Jesus was carrying was too heavy of a load for him after he had just finished taking a beating from the Roman guards. Simon from Cyrene was pulled from the crowd and commanded to carry Jesus’ cross. Jesus was offered some wine to drink mixed with gall and Jesus took a taste. After tasting it, Jesus refused to drink it.

Why would the soldiers mix the wine with gall? Some suggest that maybe the gall was used as a poison for the wine. Others have claimed it to offer the wine as a bitter taste for the person about to die. Is the offering of wine similar to today’s time when the person about to be executed is given their choice of a last meal?

Luke’s account is the only one to share what Jesus said to the many people (which included weeping women and children) as he was led to Golgotha.
He said, “Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me; weep for yourselves and for your children. For the time will come when you will say, ‘Blessed are the barren women, the wombs that never bore and the breasts that never nursed!’ Then “‘they will say to the mountains, “Fall on us!” and to the hills, “Cover us!”’ For if men do these things when the tree is green, what will happen when it is dry?”

Jesus paints a picture of utter desolation when women are rejoicing with barren women. In every generation since the beginning of time, people have always seen pregnancy, birth, and growth as a blessing. In this instance, Jesus insisted that a time will come when this feeling will be reversed and the blessing will fall on those who can’t bear children and nurse them to good health.

Jesus goes on to say that the mothers will ask for mountains to fall on them and hills to cover them. This picture is vivid in that Jesus says raising children in this time will be an extremely difficult task that it would be better to squashed by a mountain than raise children in that age.

Jesus’ last reference to the green and dry trees is interesting to note. Ezekiel 20:47 speaks of green and dry trees. The green trees were in full bloom and offered their fruits as the dry trees were a sore sight to see and offered no fruits. The people of this time had Jesus and still didn’t believe he was God’s son and now it’s been over two thousand years relying on the dry trees.