John 19:32-34

‘The soldiers therefore came and broke the legs of the first, and of the other who was crucified with him, but when they came to Jesus and saw that he was dead already they did not break his legs. However, one of the soldiers did pierce his side with a spear, and immediately there came out blood and water.'

The shock of the painful smashing of the legs (crurifragium) by means of a heavy mallet or a bar of iron brought on premature death. The fact that Jesus legs were not broken John sees as significant (see following verses). The soldier did however pierce His side to see if He would still bleed, and thus prove to be alive.

‘There came out blood and water.' John surely has in mind the blood which represented His death for mankind and the water which symbolised the Holy Spirit of life. Through His death would now come forgiveness and life. Thus in 1 John 5:6 He is described as ‘He who came by water and blood, not with the water only but with the water and the blood'. The thought is that He came first in the power of the Spirit as revealed in John's baptism which spoke of the Spirit poured forth from above, and then through death as an offering for sin. The latter, John stresses, was necessary if the experience of the Holy Spirit was to be available to all and through all.

Various expert medical opinions have verified the possibility of this phenomenon, with ideas ranging from extreme dilatation of the stomach to serious rupture of the heart. Whatever it was it showed that He had suffered deeply. But what is to be brought out is that this was clearly an eyewitness description, something now confirmed.