Hello, this is Ashley Schates welcoming you to the Mark Driscoll Podcast.

For more content from my dad, Pastor Mark, senior pastor here at the Trinity Church in Scottsdale, Arizona, visit realfates.com,

where you'll find study guides to go along with each sermon series as he preaches verse by verse through books of the Bible,

daily devotions, free e-books, and more.

Now, grab your Bibles and get ready for today's sermon.

An emblem of suffering and shame.

Those are the words that an old Christian hymn uses to depict and describe the execution, the crucifixion of our God and Savior Jesus Christ.

When Jesus was a little boy, there was a Jewish uprising against the Roman government, and they responded with a mass crucifixion of God's people.

Makes you wonder if as a little boy, if he looked up and looked into the future and saw his fate and the foreboding of the crucifixion that was coming.

In the days of the early church beginning with the church father, Tertolian, Christians had to determine what our symbol or sign for our faith would be.

Ultimately, the cross was chosen, that emblem of suffering and shame.

It was at that time that God's people began making the sign of the cross, wearing the cross, placing the cross on the door of our home and on the top of our church.

Nonetheless, throughout history, crucifixion has always been state-sponsored terror.

This explains why throughout history, Hitler had Jews crucified in Dockout.

When the Nazis would take allied forces, they would crucify them on the sides of barns and homes through the throat and the testicles with bayonets.

The Commire Rouge commonly crucified people in Cambodia, and to this very day, Jihadis in Sudan are crucifying people, including God's people.

Cruifixion has always been state-sponsored terror.

It is the equivalent and our day of a beheading that is live streamed on the internet.

It's for everyone to see, and it's a warning, whatever they believed or however they behaved, do not follow in their footsteps or you will suffer their fate.

Cruifixion was invented by the Persians around 800 BC.

It began by taking a long pole that was sharp at the end and running it through a man's midsection and then dropping that pole into a hole in the ground so that he would lay there for perhaps days, suffering and bleeding in and out of consciousness, dehydrated, weeping, struggling, and ultimately surrendering to the death.

It was perfected by the Romans. They were masters in terror.

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