Friday / Simon of Cyrene
- 6 hours ago
- 2 min read
He wasn’t looking
for God.
Jerusalem was swollen
with pilgrims.
Bread baking.
Lambs crying.
Children weaving between strangers.
Roman eyes watching everything.
Another Passover.
Another year
under empire.
His wife
would be waiting.
Alexander,
already hungry.
Rufus,
full of questions.
The road home
already unfolding
in his mind.
Then—
a hand
on his shoulder.
Not kindness.
Authority.
You.
Carry it.
For a heartbeat
he thought
about refusing.
But Roman hands
do not ask twice.
So he bent.
The timber
was rough.
Heavy.
Wet
with another man’s blood.
Not his sentence.
Not his crime.
Not his cross.
Only,
for a little while,
his burden.
The man beside him
could hardly walk.
His back
opened by the lash.
His face
hidden beneath blood
and dust.
A crown
no king
would choose.
Simon kept
his eyes lowered.
Better
not to know.
So they walked.
One stumbling.
One carrying.
The crowd pressed close—
some jeering,
some weeping,
most simply watching,
as though suffering
were another thing to do
before supper.
The hill
came slowly.
Each step
an argument
between flesh
and gravity.
Then—
the condemned man
fell again.
Without thinking,
Simon reached.
For a moment
their shoulders
leaned
into one another.
Nothing
was said.
The soldiers shouted.
The crowd surged.
The road
kept climbing.
At the place
they called
The Skull,
they lifted
the timber
from his shoulders.
As suddenly
as it had come,
it was gone.
He stood back.
Hammer.
Iron.
Wood.
The machinery of empire
turning once again.
He watched
until darkness
covered the hill.
Then he went home.
Alexander
asked
why he was late.
Rufus
noticed
he hardly spoke.
His wife
placed bread
on the table.
No one
knew
what to say.
Years later,
when Mark
told the story,
he remembered
Alexander.
Rufus.
As well as Simon.
Perhaps
because some Fridays
never end.
Perhaps
because once
you have walked
beside the Wild Messiah,
the road home
is never
the same.
Rev’d Jon Swales
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