As Good Friday approaches, there’s one picture that quietly settles into the mind: Three crosses on a hill. One in the centre. Two on either side. And in the middle, a man who had done nothing wrong, placed between two who had.
Now pause there.
Because that picture is not just history. It is happening every single day.
Not with crosses perhaps, but with labels.
We have perfected a strange art. We do not need proof. We only need proximity. Place a good person next to the wrong people, and we have already decided what he must be. No investigation required. No questions asked. Just a neat little conclusion tied up with a ribbon of assumption.
Stand with the wrong crowd and you become the crowd.
Sit next to a loud fool at a meeting and people assume you share his thoughts. Be seen talking to someone with a questionable reputation and suddenly your own reputation begins to wobble like a badly made chair. And with that come the labels. Liar. Fraud. Cheat. Words thrown casually, but they stick like stubborn glue.
And once stuck, they define you in the eyes of the world.
That is what makes that Good Friday scene so powerful. It was not just physical suffering. It was positioning. An innocent man deliberately placed between two criminals. The message to the crowd was simple. Look at him. One of them.
And the crowd believed it.
But here is where the connection becomes beautifully clear.
Jesus did not fight the label in the moment. He did not shout, argue, or try to change his position. He allowed the world to misunderstand him completely. For a while, the label seemed to win. The scene looked convincing. Three criminals, one in the middle.
But only for a while.
Because truth does not depend on public opinion. It depends on what is real. And what is real has a way of rising.
On the third day, everything changed.
The same man who had been visually grouped with thieves was revealed for who he truly was. Not by argument. Not by defence. But by resurrection. The label placed on him could not survive the truth of who he was.
And that is the hope in this story.
If you have ever been labelled wrongly, if your name has been casually thrown into conversations you had no part in, if you have been associated with things that are not you, remember this. For a season, the label may stick. People may believe it. The picture may look convincing.
But it is temporary.
Because just as that cross could not define Jesus, neither can a label define you. If you remain who you are, if you hold on to truth, there will come a moment when what is real rises above what was said.
The world may have placed you between two thieves.
But like Him, you will not remain there…!
The Author conducts an online, eight session Writers and Speakers Course. If you’d like to join, do send a thumbs-up to WhatsApp number 9892572883 or send a message to bobsbanter@gmail.com
