I can never get over the “otherness” of the Gospel. It is so improbable that there would be a God this kind. Even the most wishful of thinkers wouldn’t have had the gall to assume that there was a God like Jesus. It’s like a Hollywood actor, snot-covered and crying his eyes out on the street corner, desperate to win the heart of a wasted drug addict. Like a courtroom judge, begging that he could be sentenced to prison, instead of the hardened criminal on trial.
The God proclaimed by Jesus on the cross has no sense of dignity. He doesn’t seem to understand the superiority that belongs to his title. He is so out of touch as to not even feel embarrassed to suffer at the hands of the humanity he loves so much. Doesn’t he have any self-respect? Can’t he see that the people he love just aren’t that into him?
What a beautiful revelation! In Jesus, we discover that the primary attributes of God are not his bigness or his strength, but his undying devotion to his wandering children. HE IS steadfast love that penetrates every barrier. HE IS relentless passion that would rather drown in our sorrows with us than leave us to fight alone. HE IS undying hope because if love is willing to be crushed for his beloved, what possible danger could ever tear us apart?
“Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed.”
Isaiah 53:4-5
Stephen Fulton 
Amen. Passionately and poignantly said, Stephen.