Question:  Dear Greg,

            Enjoy your answers to the many questions that are asked.  My question is: I have never heard or read why Jesus had to suffer such excruciating pain and suffering before His death.  If it just takes His blood to pay for our sins, why not just a quick death?  Your comments would be appreciated.

            Thanks in advance,

            Jack

Answer:  Dear Jack,

            The answer is based upon the fact and enormity of sin.  While Jesus was God in the flesh, and his divinity meant that his life was worth all of ours, and could therefore pay for all of our sins, he was also human.  In his humanity he experienced all of the pain and suffering that we do or can in our earthly lives.  The fact that Jesus suffered, bled and died for us makes our God more intimate and real.  Christians have a God who is a part of his creation, who became one of us, and who was willing to experience our hurts and pains rather than to declare himself exempt from our experience and somehow quickly and clinically do only what needed to be done.

            In Christ,

            Greg Albrecht