Page 32 of Unveiled Tamar’s Story (Mysteries & Wonders of the Bible #1)

Forgive my pride, Lord . Even as she had insisted that this impossible thing had nothing to do with her, her only focus had been on herself and her team. Never once had she thought about the high priest with anything but bitterness.

Now she did. Now she wondered what fears must haunt him, taunt him, to spur him into the actions he had taken in these last days and weeks and months.

He had heard the stories of Jesus and seen not a savior, not a way to God, but a rival.

Someone who challenged his beliefs and inspired people to follow Him instead of Caiaphas.

Jesus had chided the religious leaders openly for seeking their own benefit above the ways of God, for adorning the Law with their own rules, for caring more about the exterior than the interior.

So many had followed Him. So many had gone out to hear His sermons. That impromptu welcome last week? That must have lit a new explosion of fear in Caiaphas.

He had been the high priest for fifteen years, longer than any other man in recent history. His political career had been one of great success. Did it seem now that everything was disintegrating? Did he see all he’d been working for unraveling like a tapestry, sliced in two like the veil?

She put the last bite of bread into her mouth and let it dissolve on her tongue. Fifteen years…the same length of time she’d been in her position. She hadn’t paused to think about that before now. It hadn’t mattered.

But it helped her understand him. Jesus must seem to him as threatening as Caiaphas was to her.

“When He was hanging on the cross,” came a woman’s voice from somewhere in the crowd, “do you know what He prayed? He asked God to forgive those who put Him there. He said, ‘Forgive them, Father. They do not know what they are doing.’”

Forgive them . That “them” certainly included Caiaphas.

Caiaphas, who thought he was eliminating a political opponent.

Who thought he was ridding Israel of a heretic who would lead them astray.

He didn’t know he was killing God’s anointed.

If he knew, if that’s how he’d thought of Him, he couldn’t have done it.

Much like David, hidden in the cave when Saul came in. Had he been thinking of him as his enemy, perhaps he’d have taken the opportunity to kill him. But he’d seen Saul through different eyes. The eyes of the Spirit. He’d seen the anointing that could not be reversed even by Saul’s sin.

People so rarely did what they thought was wrong. They almost always did what they believed was right. It was only that they were so very bad at differentiating, even when they had rules and laws to guide them.

Yet Jesus had forgiven those who put Him on the cross, while He was hanging there in agony. Even then, He was concerned not for Himself, but for the souls of others. Even then, He was interceding with the Father for them.

Tamar twisted her fingers in the end of the dark pink headscarf she’d woven for Hannah three years ago. The veil had torn when the earth shook…the earth had shaken when Jesus died…Jesus had died as the paschal lambs were being sacrificed for the pilgrims. What did that mean?

Father, forgive them.

In all their history, so very few had dared to approach God.

Moses, of course. A few of the prophets had visions of being in His courtroom.

David had danced before the ark. But the whole point of the veil was to separate sinful man from sinless God, lest their sins convict them before His face and they die.

That the veil was gone, that God had made a way to welcome them into His presence again, like in Eden…

That divide could only be bridged by atonement. And that was what Jesus had offered. His was the blood spilled to pay that sin debt. He, in the moment of His death, had provided a way back to the Father.

She remembered the voice in her dreams, the one that called her His daughter. She remembered the call of that light, to go out and bear witness to the impossible. She remembered the way she felt when she realized God loved her enough to meet her there, in the cold of a borrowed tomb.

What was she? A weaver. A woman. A sister, a friend. No one special. Even so, He loved her. He called her.

Her next breath tasted of peace again. If God loved her so, he loved Caiaphas just as much. He offered forgiveness to him too. He wanted him to embrace the way back into His presence, not refuse to look at the promise of healing.

Leaning her head against the wall, she let her eyes slide closed, and she prayed for her enemy.

She didn’t know how long she’d been sitting like that before commotion rose on the stairs outside and everyone stirred, coming to alertness. Guards? No. There were only two sets of footsteps, and if they were going to be arrested, more than two would be sent to accomplish it.

The door burst open a moment later, and when Tamar spotted her brother Simon running through it, she pushed quickly to her feet.

“We saw Him!” he shouted for the whole assembly to hear. “On the road to Emmaus. He walked with us the whole way, did He not, Cleopas?”

Tamar had met Cleopas several times but didn’t know him well. Even so, there was no disguising the light on his face as he nodded. “He opened the Scriptures to us, explaining how the Son of Man must suffer and die in order to fulfill the Scriptures.”

“We didn’t recognize Him. Not then.” Simon’s gaze locked on his friend’s face, a bit of bemusement on his own. “I still do not know how our eyes were so blinded. But we invited Him in to eat with us, and when He broke the bread, we knew Him.”

Cleopas’s smile beamed over his face as he nodded. “We did. It was like the Passover meal, when He told us the bread was His body—the moment He broke the loaf, we knew.”

“We knew . Our eyes were opened, and we saw Him truly—but then He vanished from the room!” Simon turned, no doubt looking for one of the faces he knew best from this group of disciples—this group to which she hadn’t realized he belonged so fully.

His gaze snagged on hers. His eyes went wide.

Tamar could only smile. They both, today, it seemed, had encountered the risen Lord. Whatever change that brought, she wouldn’t just endure it. She would embrace it.

She would walk the second mile.