Reliving the Passion ... A Book Review

Walter Wangerin Jr., Reliving the Passion: Meditations on the Suffering, Death, and Resurrection of Jesus as Recorded in Mark (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan, 1992)

In this necessary book Wangerin, a skilled wordsmith and devout follower of Jesus, leads us to our personal “reliving” of the suffering, death, and resurrection of this unusual man from Nazareth. Wangerin insists it is necessary. It is, after all, history’s greatest tragedy. Yet it is a cosmic triumph. Any alleged triumph that does not deliver us from life’s greatest tragedy – our death – is no triumph. We need to see how His awful death overcomes ours. We need to see how our “sin” has brought death upon us and Him. We need, as Wangerin argues, “to see our sorrier selves,” in these events and our need of His “holy self.” We need to see the path He took in life and how this is the way He calls us to walk with Him. We must learn that “it is the experience of genuine grief that prepares for joy.”

And so he guides us, over 41 days, through every nuance of one emotion after another. We wonder at the love of a woman who lavishes costly ointment on the Master. We steal through the streets of Jerusalem with His followers, clandestinely arranging for what would be their final Passover with Him. We see Him betrayed, renounced, falsely condemned, ridiculed, brutalized. We watch Him die. We realize the depth of His resolve as he deliberately chooses to taste every drop of the “cup” of pain He is asked to drink. The infinite reach, and deep compassion of His love tears at our hearts. Watching Him die we see clearly, perhaps for the first time, the supremacy of His power.

Wangerin dramatically leads us through all of it, every bit of the story, right to the door of the empty tomb. He does this in 40 stages; “40 devotions” he calls them. They “best fit the forty days that lead to Easter (except the Sundays)” he explains, “as you will be participating in an ancient practice of our Christian Church: observing Lent, examining grace, understanding the crucifixion as the moment of marvelous love and your salvation, and giving God thanks for a resurrection which promises your own in the end.”

For the past five years I have done as Wangerin’s suggested. “Reliving” these days with Jesus has deepened my love for Him. I will continue the practice until I see Him face-to-face and can hear Him tell the story personally.

Thank you , Walter Wangerin, for this inestimably valuable gift!