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Now the end was near. Jesus’ breathing on the Cross was so labored those watching expected death to come at any moment. But then, in an unmistakable voice of triumph, 
Jesus cried out, “It…is…finished!” (John 19:30) The words rang with victory, with accomplishment! It was as if His perspective on this whole ordeal was that a work was being done. The tone of His voice spoke of completing something that had been planned from eternity past. The books were now balanced! He had paid man’s debt to God: That debt of one perfect life which man had incurred in Eden when he used, for selfish purposes, the perfect life God had loaned him. Jesus’ perfect life had been offered up as a sacrifice to God to pay man’s debt. The work was now accomplished! (Colossians 2:13-15)
A few moments later, Jesus uttered His last words from the cross. Focused on the Father, He was heard to say, “Father, into Your hands, I commit My spirit.” (Luke 23:46) Though His body was weakened beyond exhaustion, the words rung distinctly with inexhaustible faith! He was entering death, but He was believing the promise recorded in Psalm 22 that God would not leave Him in death. The vision of God would be accomplished in Him! With these last words Continue reading
“…choose you this day whom ye will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served…or the gods of the Amorites…but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.”
Samuel Adams, the Father of our American Revolution, stated,
In his first inaugural address he stated words of such wisdom that they should sober and inspire every one of us who are Americans. If heeded, they will inspire us to become an instrument in the hands of Almighty God for the good of our children and the entire earth.
By now it was noon, and a strange thing began to happen. The sky began to darken with an eerie blackness. For a few brief moments, the air was so still it seemed to choke you as the darkness deepened. Then the earth began to tremble. Lightning bolts were exploding against the ground. Then, unexpectedly, the voice of Jesus pierced the darkness. In a loud, wrenching voice Jesus cried out,
seen—Jesus suddenly breaks in with another statement. As He looks down from the cross, He sees His mother standing there beside one of His most devoted followers, whose name is John. Looking into the eyes of His mother with those amazing eyes of peace, He says, “Woman, behold your son.” (John 19:26-27) Then looking into the face of the youthful John, He says, “Behold, your mother!” Thus, He has fulfilled His last earthly obligation. Being the oldest son in the family, it is His responsibility to see that His mother is cared for in her latter years. He is dying, thus, He gives her to a trusted friend (and John fulfilled that obligation). Watching all of this, the soldier is becoming more convinced that Jesus is Who He says He is. And if He is God’s Son, then that fact demands He be listened to. If He was God’s Son, then He would be right about everything. And if there was only one God and He sent His Son to earth to be a man that would prove He cared about us. If this was true, the Creator was evidently trying to communicate something to us humans. What could it be?
blood of its Creator.
hardest part of this hideous work would be done. One more…
Jesus has just received the tremendous beating with a whip called a “cat o’ nine tails”, so named for the ripping effect it had on bare skin. In His heart Jesus now cries to His Father for strength to get up and finish this course. By a miracle he struggles to His feet and stands woozily, trying to regain His sense of balance. The soldier points commandingly to the cross prepared for Him. Jesus staggers to it, drops to one knee and—embraces the crude, wooden structure destined to bring Him to death. Straining to rise, He lifts the cross and begins to stagger in His weakness out into the street. Dragging His instrument of death, He sets His course for a hill outside of Jerusalem known as Golgotha, “the place of the skull”. The hill was so named because from a distance it bears some resemblance to the side view of a human skull. As if prophetically named, it would be the place Jesus’ head would finally hang in death.
While feeling the intense pressure, Jesus is doing what He has done all through His life—He is, with each new attack, turning to the Father and, in His heart, is drinking in the Father’s life. That life has strength and sanity in it, which preserves Him throughout this horrendous night. Make no mistake about it. When those accusations first hit His mind, He felt the same as you do when the enemy is attacking your mind. He felt the blows to His body just like you would feel them. The difference was that, as soon as He felt them, He would—in that instant—look to the Father for another drink of His strength, His life that flows as a river from the throne of God (Revelation 22:1). This was the way He had always lived, and He was showing us now, in the very worst mental and physical suffering, that we could still drink of the River of Life—indeed, we could have it flowing through us so that God’s life could also be viewed in us.
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