Friday In Holy Week: Mark 15: 33-37.

Friday In Holy Week: Mark 15: 33-37.

There is a Good Friday tradition in the Church which focuses on the Seven Words that Jesus spoke on the Cross.  To meditate upon them give  some insight into Jesus’ thoughts and feelings as he endured the final ordeal.  It is deeply moving to see that despite His pain at so many different levels He continues to care for others: that those who were persecuting Him should be forgiven; that one of the men being crucified with Him is assured of a place in the Eternal Kingdom; that His mother would in the days ahead be cared for by John.  

I have known people who even when going through their last days have been concerned about others and held them warmly in prayer.   They are following Jesus final example in not allowing personal circumstances, however dark, to stifle love for others.

What was the source of Jesus inner strength and commitment to others?  There might seem to be an obvious answer.  He was the Son of God!  What do we expect?  And yet on the Cross we find Him reciting verses from the Psalms which so often reflected His experience.  It is possible that in His suffering He recited whole Psalms as He was taught to do from His earliest days.   This emphasises to me something I already know but which needs to sink deeper into my being.  I am kept strong in myself and for others the closer I am to the living Word of God.  

Thursday In Holy Week: Mark 14: 12-26

 

Thursday In Holy Week: Mark 14: 12-26.

There are many paintings of the Last Supper.  Sieger Koder’s shows the table from the perspective of Jesus.  We are seeing the disciples as Jesus saw them.  There are pleading eyes, downcast heads, caring hands reaching out, a fearful glance towards the door where a shadowy figure exits.  

We know some of the baggage individual disciples carried.  One a former terrorist, another a Roman collaborator.  One will deny Him,  another betray Him, all of them potentially weak and self-serving as will be revealed just hours later.  But each of them is given the bread and wine.  ‘My body broken for you.  My blood shed for you.’   

 As they repeat Jesus’ actions in the years to come, whatever their circumstances,  they will receive anew the assurance that Jesus counted them worthy of His death.  The death that renews.   And in the remembrance the call to follow is heard once more, the commitment to serve is strengthened, the awareness of Jesus’ love is deepened.  

The Covid restrictions prevent us gathering at the Lord’s Table tonight.  But the love that flows from the sacrifice of Jesus knows no restrictions.  Jesus said: ‘I, when I am lifted up, will draw all men to myself.’  (John 12: 32).