Good Friday thoughts

20 03, 2008

“And after that they had mocked him, they took the robe off from him, and put his own raiment on him, and led him away to crucify him”
Matthew 27:31

via dolorosa in jerusalem

Never was there such another procession as that which went along the Via Dolorosa that Good Friday morning. Jesus died that day for us.

“Under an eastern sky,
Amid a rabble cry,
A man went forth to die – For me.

“Thorn-crowned His blessed head,
Blood-stained His every tread,
Cross-laden, on He sped – For me.”

There was human pity at the cross; medicated wine was offered the Sufferer by gentle hands. But He refused to take the stupefying draught. He would not lessen in the smallest degree his pain as the world’s Redeemer, and He would not enter the great mystery of death with faculties dulled.

Terrible as were the sufferings of Christ on His cross, we think of Him not with pity, but with adoration. What we see is the Lamb of God bearing the sin of the world.

[Source: “Morning Thoughts for Every Day of Life” (March 29) by J.R. Miller]

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Need a Revealer of Love

Whatever makes us forget ourselves and think of others lifts us upward. This is one reason that God permits suffering. We would never know the best and richest of human love if there were no pain, no distress, no appeal of grief or of need.

The best and holiest of mother-love would never be brought out if the child never suffered. The same is true of God’s love. God would have loved his children unfallen just as much as he loves them fallen, but the world would never have known so much of God’s love had not man fallen. Our sore need called out all that was richest, holiest, and divinest in our Father’s heart.

If no night came we should never know there are stars. Darkness is a revealer.

[Source: “In Green Pastures” (March 29) by J.R. Miller]