And the Nail Was Driven In

… And the nail was driven in

… O young man… for God’s sake… you hurt me…

… That’s you… and this is me… the same pain… and the same executioner… man.

… I am the nail they drove into your body… and from my pain I cried out… Yes, I am hard… but don’t be unjust to me… I’m no match for you, O humans.

… I want you to hear my story… and you be the judge.

At the top of Golgotha… in the middle of a conversation… the wooden beams of the cross grabbed me… and asked me:

How… can you betray a God whose name is God?

How… can you sink your fangs into his body?

How… can you take revenge on a man who said he was God?

How… can you make him change his word and his testimony… and stop saying, “I am the bread of life… love one another as I have loved you”?

… O world, O humans… they questioned me… and now you are questioning me… What shall I swear by to convince you that I am not like you, that I am not a criminal and a traitor like you? You killed your Lord and now you come and accuse me of it… It isn’t fair; I’m not a human being.

… No!… Stop: I am hard, that is my identity… I am iron… that is my nature… Listen to me, O humans, you who call yourselves children of God.

… From the start of the road, the hammer and I became friends… we were one and the same… You accused both of us of the death of God, and we had nothing to do with it.

… Pilate stole his innocence from us… he washed his hands before we could throw ourselves into the basin of innocence… to cleanse our hands of a deed forced upon us.

… Caiaphas, the man of power, and those with him… drove their ambitions, their treachery and their interests into the body of their God… and I’m the one called the nail.

… I was ashamed for them.

… The Jews rejected you, O God, because you didn’t carry out their wishes and ambitions.

… “Crucify him! Crucify him!”… that was their voice… And a few days earlier it was “Hosanna”… a frightening contradiction.

… They sold you like Judas… and forgot what you did for the blind man, the paralysed man and the woman with the flow of blood… They pretended to forget that you fed five thousand of them.

… They loaded you with a great cross… full of pain and tears and years gone by… its wood worn away by their hatred, their sin and their pride… and he is still God.

… They dragged your face in the dust of their Golgotha… they mocked you and laughed at you, their eyes wide open on you… “Who are you anyway? Are you the Messiah? If you’re really God, save yourself… and save us.”

And I, the nail, held my partner the hammer tight… we were choking in that soldier’s hand, unable to protect you from their injustice… We stood watching, waiting for you to arrive… We thought that if we knelt before you and you saw our tears… maybe we could ease your pain a little…

… And zero hour came… and the nail was driven in.

… I pulled myself together and whispered to my hammer, “Gently, strike me gently… go easy on me just this once, don’t hit too hard… it isn’t right, he’s done nothing wrong, believe me.”

… How could I have the heart to sink myself into his body… he who took the nails of pain, sickness and sin out of people’s hearts?

The Roman hand seized me and placed me on this young man’s hand… I felt like a little flower being planted in a vast desert… a desert grown thirsty from so much giving… the hand that gave life to so many… and touched so many faces, giving them back hope.

And in an instant the hammer fell on my head… and I felt my body drown in the cells of his body… I felt my matter turning into life… I changed from a lifeless nail… into a tear poured out on his palm, gathering up his tears of blood…
… (((You hurt me, O God, you hurt me)))…

… Your tenderness and your love broke my hardness… your gaze and your cry silenced my coldness… the warmth of your veins stole my ambition… What more could I want than to be driven in, to doze off and fall asleep in the hand of God?

… The nail became a dream… and was driven in.

… And the crucifixion became reality… the one who bore it died… but he became the sign… he became the Resurrection.

How strange this life is… the pain of his cross made me forget my own.

… Wasn’t I there from the moment he came into this world?

… I was hammered into his manger…

… With Joseph in the sawmill and the carpentry shop, I was his companion…

… And in the wood of the boat I was with him… but I never thought I would end up sharing his suffering… that’s this world for you.

… This is God… this is me… and these are you.

My brothers and sisters, good morning in the Lord… Forgive this nail if he is harsh in his words… but he is no harsher than our sin and our distance from the One who created us… Return to him: he loves you… and wants your salvation… He is the one who turns rock into streams…
… and springs of life.

… Have a blessed day…

… May God sanctify you, you who are crazy for the Lord…

… And congratulations to the nail: he has become crazy like us…

… B. J.

Father Boutros Akouri, Antonine