Does it frighten you to think about?
Do you start to contemplate, and then, guilty and squeamish, look away from that dark place in your mind, at anything, any distraction?
Can you stand to think about what Jesus went through on this day....for you?
The mock trials, the farce, the dragging to and fro, the mocking in the courts and from the soldiers.
The whippings....skin flayed open, blood pouring out.
The calls for His death from the same people that God had shepherded for so long. The Roman cooperation in such a cruel sentence of torture and death. Did the cries of those in the courtyard rend His heard the same as the Roman's whips tore His back?
Did His mother's cries break His heart as He carried that cross down the winding roads? Did His knees bleed from the falls on the rough stones?
Did He think of you, yet to be born yet known to Him before the creation of the world, did He think of YOU as the nail was driven in? Was it your face that held Him there on that Cross?
Can you imagine His suffering as for the only time in history, the Father looked away from the Son, and poured His wrath upon this willing sacrifice? Was that disconnect perhaps the worst of all? The broken communion...and why was it broken?
Because of you. And me. Our sin. You know what sins I mean. The ones that when you look inward you get a cold, uncomfortable feeling about. The ones that separate you from a righteous and holy God, who cannot bear to have sin before Him.
But God loves you, has loved you from time immortal, so what was to be done? His perfect Son, very God of very God, the Word through whom all things were made, was lifted up in your place. In my place. And all the sins that were and would ever be, were laid upon Him, and He paid the price for all of it. So that we might assume His righteousness and stand before God. Accepted. Loved. Adopted.
Because the Son took your place, and mine.
Is it hard to think about the nails thundering through the hands and feet of Christ? Can you imagine being lifted up upon that Cross? Gasping for air. Pain streaming out of every cell. And then the final agony, all of the weight of all of those sins...and the Father looking away.
Think about all of these things, my friends, consider and tremble about all that was done for you. What love was given, so freely yet at such cost.
I feel overwhelmed each time I take communion and contemplate what Christ has done for me. I pray I always will. I shudder and tremble when I think of my Lord and my God carrying all of my sins so that I might be redeemed. I have done nothing to deserve such love, such salvation, such redemption.
I think about this dark day, this Good Friday, and I am humbled and heavy hearted. My sins drove those nails. Yet I am also filled with such gratitude and awe; that His love for me compelled Him to that Cross.
My Lord and My God, that you should love me so.
He loves you, my friend, just the same.
-Beth Haynes Butler
Do you start to contemplate, and then, guilty and squeamish, look away from that dark place in your mind, at anything, any distraction?
Can you stand to think about what Jesus went through on this day....for you?
The mock trials, the farce, the dragging to and fro, the mocking in the courts and from the soldiers.
The whippings....skin flayed open, blood pouring out.
The calls for His death from the same people that God had shepherded for so long. The Roman cooperation in such a cruel sentence of torture and death. Did the cries of those in the courtyard rend His heard the same as the Roman's whips tore His back?
Did His mother's cries break His heart as He carried that cross down the winding roads? Did His knees bleed from the falls on the rough stones?
Did He think of you, yet to be born yet known to Him before the creation of the world, did He think of YOU as the nail was driven in? Was it your face that held Him there on that Cross?
Can you imagine His suffering as for the only time in history, the Father looked away from the Son, and poured His wrath upon this willing sacrifice? Was that disconnect perhaps the worst of all? The broken communion...and why was it broken?
Because of you. And me. Our sin. You know what sins I mean. The ones that when you look inward you get a cold, uncomfortable feeling about. The ones that separate you from a righteous and holy God, who cannot bear to have sin before Him.
But God loves you, has loved you from time immortal, so what was to be done? His perfect Son, very God of very God, the Word through whom all things were made, was lifted up in your place. In my place. And all the sins that were and would ever be, were laid upon Him, and He paid the price for all of it. So that we might assume His righteousness and stand before God. Accepted. Loved. Adopted.
Because the Son took your place, and mine.
Is it hard to think about the nails thundering through the hands and feet of Christ? Can you imagine being lifted up upon that Cross? Gasping for air. Pain streaming out of every cell. And then the final agony, all of the weight of all of those sins...and the Father looking away.
Think about all of these things, my friends, consider and tremble about all that was done for you. What love was given, so freely yet at such cost.
I feel overwhelmed each time I take communion and contemplate what Christ has done for me. I pray I always will. I shudder and tremble when I think of my Lord and my God carrying all of my sins so that I might be redeemed. I have done nothing to deserve such love, such salvation, such redemption.
I think about this dark day, this Good Friday, and I am humbled and heavy hearted. My sins drove those nails. Yet I am also filled with such gratitude and awe; that His love for me compelled Him to that Cross.
My Lord and My God, that you should love me so.
He loves you, my friend, just the same.
-Beth Haynes Butler
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