Into Your Hands (Holy Week Devotional)

“Then Jesus, crying with a loud voice, said, “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.” Having said this, he breathed his last.”

- Luke 23:46

In their portrayals of Jesus’s final hours on the cross, the four gospel writers offer a moving sketch of who Jesus is. We are reminded of his divinity when he declares the plan of salvation to be finished, of his humanity when he asks for something to drink. We are shown his love for enemies when he asks God to forgive those crucifying him, his love for those closest to him when he places his mother in the care of his beloved disciple. We see the heights of his grace when he promises Paradise to the thief beside him, the depths of his dread when he cries out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

In these last words of Jesus, we are shown a Savior who is physically and spiritually exhausted, but whose heart remains with others, even those utterly undeserving of his love. His sacrifice is revealed as both the majestic climax of a divine plan and as a physical, flesh-and-blood ordeal. The emotions of the reader rightfully alternate between gratefulness and horror, joy and sorrow, in thinking about the glory of salvation and the cost required to obtain it.

So as we draw to the end of the Seven Last Words, it is instructive to note the final impression the gospels give us of Jesus. With his dying breath, Jesus’s identity as full human and fully divine, as humiliated and exalted, as fearful and faithful, is summed up in the simplest of terms: he is on the cross what he always was, the servant of his Father.

Jesus does in death what we struggle to do in life—he faithfully places himself in God’s hands. So often in times of trouble, we come to the Lord with prayers of half-faith, hoping that God will be with us but hedging our bets just in case with solutions and strategies that are convenient but not Christlike. It’s the only way; the ends justify the means; if God had a different plan He would have stopped me—these are the justifications we offer. But ultimately choosing your way instead of God’s—lashing out instead of reaching out, extending punishment instead of grace—is simply a refusal to do the hard work of trusting God when you don’t know where he’s taking you.

With his dying breath on the cross, Jesus’s words match his example—above all else, he is serving his Father, trusting in His will even when it is difficult. As you reflect today on all that the cross means for you and all that Jesus has done for you, may you not lose sight of that blessed example. Jesus trusted the Father even unto death—may you trust him in life.

It Is Finished (Holy Week Devotional)

“When Jesus had received the wine, he said, “It is finished.” Then he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.”

 - John 19:30

So many things had led to this moment. Creation. The Fall. The Covenant. The Exodus. The Law. The Promised Land. The Monarchy. The Temple. The Exile. The Prophets. Thousands of years, millions of people, and countless acts of God culminated in the humble birth of a baby boy in Bethlehem. That child grew in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and men, and when the day finally came for him to leave his home and begin fulfilling his purpose, he started his journey in the same waters that his ancestors had once crossed to enter the Promised Land. Where the waters of the Jordan had parted for them, for Jesus the heavens themselves opened, as the Holy Spirit descended like a dove and a voice from heaven proclaimed, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.”

Jesus’s ministry would prove to be a whirlwind of activity—teaching his disciples one moment, consorting with disreputable sinners the next, always extending a healing touch to the throngs of sick and disabled people who came to him. With a word, the impossible suddenly became reality—storms calmed, demons cast out, the dead raised. The longer all this went on, the more people came to believe what Simon Peter had once declared to his master, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”

 But those who stood ready to crown Jesus on Sunday proved fickle. When it became apparent that he had no intention of leading the military revolution they craved, Jerusalem’s mood turned from jubilation to rage. One of Jesus’s own disciples turned him over to jealous rivals. The crowd, given the choice between executing Jesus or a dangerous insurrectionist named Barabbas, chose Barabbas. So it was that, after a week of preparation, after three years of signs and sermons, after thousands upon thousands of years of God reaching out to His people, those people now eagerly watched His Son die.

In Christ’s final moments, the mob could not know that this execution had been predestined, that they were fulfilling a plan set in motion millennia before they were born. For them, the story of the crucifixion had begun Thursday night with an arrest in a garden. It was the news of the moment; Jesus was just another false messiah whose name they would struggle to remember in a month.

But we remember the crucifixion still today because we know what they did not—that when Jesus said, “It is finished,” he was talking about not just the end of a moment, but of an age. Christ’s dying breath marked the completion of a plan which began not in Gethsemane, but Eden. The cross brought an end not just to a mortal life, but to the dominion of sin over God’s people.

So many things led to the death of Christ, that turning point of history. So many lives were changed forever, so many people were touched, all so that Christ could serve as an atoning sacrifice for your sins, all so that you could have eternal life with God. This Good Friday, as you mourn the death of the Lord and offer thanks for his love, may you also draw inspiration from the magnitude of the plan that the crucifixion finished. Do not be as near-sighted as the crowd, only seeing today as the end of the week, but understand it like Christ himself did in his last moments—as the ultimate fulfillment of God’s will.

I Am Thirsty (Holy Week Devotional)

“After this, when Jesus knew that all was now finished, he said (in order to fulfill the scripture), “I am thirsty.””

- John 19:28

The crucifixion of Jesus rightfully has an epic, larger-than-life feel to it. Its climax is marked by sudden darkness, its conclusion by a massive earthquake. The symbols that accompany it, like the crown of thorns or the temple veil tearing in two, speak volumes about its monumental purpose. Scholars talk about how the crucifixion is the turning point in human history, the beginning of a new age. You cannot easily read the accounts of Jesus’s death without being awed by its footprint on history.

But tucked between all the big moments comes a smaller, more intimate one. His body wracked with pain and his spirit waning, Jesus tells the nearby soldiers in a raspy voice, “I am thirsty.” Amid all the thunderous drama of Calvary comes this soft note of human frailty. One cannot help but be reminded that, while the crucifixion is the inauguration the kingdom of God, the ultimate deliverance of humanity’s salvation, it is also the death of a man.

There had been a time when Jesus had taken five loaves of bread and two fish and with those meager offerings fed thousands. There had been a time when he had given sight to the blind and had bid the paralyzed to walk, when he had driven out diseases with nothing but a word. Jesus had accumulated scores of followers by giving strength to those whose bodies ached with all the varied frailties of humanity. But in his final hours, his task was not to overcome weakness, but to feel it.

For all the spiritual agony that the cross imposed on Jesus, a simple, pitiable request for water reminds us that the crucifixion was also a physical ordeal. The Lord was not playacting on the cross; his suffering and death were strikingly real. The debt of sin was expunged not with a metaphorical sacrifice, but with flesh and blood.

Matters of faith have a way of taking on an ethereal quality, with all the talk of sin and salvation and eternity. It is easy to lose your head in the clouds when you think about all that the cross means. May Jesus’s hoarse request for something to drink keep your faith grounded, reminding you that, for all its eternal consequences, faith is exercised in the drudgery and frailty of everyday life.

Why Have You Forsaken Me? (Holy Week Devotional)

“At three o’clock Jesus cried out with a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?” which means, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?””

- Mark 15:34

These are perhaps the most troubling words Jesus ever spoke. Everything you know to be true about his death—that he gave himself willingly so that others might be saved, that his crucifixion was the fulfillment of God’s plan of salvation, that the darkness of death was overcome by the light of resurrection—all of it is given a moment’s pause when you read those words. You cannot help but be reminded that, though Jesus was fully divine, the Word made flesh, he was completely human too. And in his most profound moment of human agony, he was utterly alone.

Some are so troubled by Jesus’s words that they seek to lessen their impact. They point out that he was quoting Psalm 22, and that while the psalm begins with those anguished cries for deliverance, it ends with confidence in God’s sovereignty—maybe, they say, Jesus was offering a subtle reminder that, despite the present darkness, God would eventually triumph. Others say he was preaching, that his words were intended to show the gathered bystanders that sin, which his death would conquer, creates separation between God and humanity.

There is comfort to be found in these explanations and others like them. They assure their proponents that Jesus was 100% in control of the situation and everything was going according to plan, that he was a contented martyr perfectly following the will of a Father who never left his side. Such explanations bring order to the chaos of the crucifixion; they make sure that the cross never feels, even for a moment, like anything but an instrument of total victory.

But when I read Jesus’s words—my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?—I find no solace in these tidy rationalizations. Because while they paint a rosy picture of a glorious king dying a noble death, in doing so I fear they rob Jesus of his humanity. Part of the glory of Christ is that, while fully divine, he was also fully human—he laughed, he wept, he ate, he suffered. And when he died, he experienced something else, something all too human: the horror of abandonment.

What a blessing in your own struggles, when you feel like no one understands and no one is with you, to know that even Christ himself knew that uncertainty. When your prayers are met with silence, what a relief to know that there was a day when even God’s Son could not compel heaven to answer. The feeling of being alone is not a pain unique to you and your plight, it is something even the Savior experienced.

But where the crucified Christ offers you the comfort of empathy in forsakenness, he also offers salvation from that forsakenness. Because he experienced the terror of abandonment, you no longer have to—the promise of the resurrection is that Christ will be with you even to the end of the age, that you never have to struggle alone. In Christ you have what Hebrews 4:15 calls a “sympathetic high priest”, one who knows exactly what you are going through and advocates on your behalf. Because he is fully human he knows the pain of abandonment, and because he is fully divine he is able to save you from that pain.

On the cross, Jesus cried out in desperation to his Father, “Why have you forsaken me?” Those words should shake you, but they need not break you. May you instead find comfort in them, knowing that the crucified Christ suffered the same fears you do—and that the risen Christ frees you from those fears.

Woman, Here Is Your Son (Holy Week Devotional)

“When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing besides her, he said to his mother, “Woman, here is your son.” Then he said to the disciple, “Here is your mother.” And from that hour the disciple took her into his own home.”

- John 19:26-27

When you reach the end—of a journey, your career, even your life—it is natural to look back to the beginning, to retrace the steps that led you to this point. “My whole life flashed before my eyes,” say those who think they are about to die. When there is nothing left to see ahead of us, we look back.

So as Jesus hung from the cross, blood dripping down his brow and his vitality fading, I wonder if he did that when he looked down and saw his mother. I wonder if he was transported back to a day three years earlier in Cana, when his ministry had only just begun. Mary had been with him on that day too, but the occasion could not have been more different—where Jesus’s ministry now ended with the pain and humiliation of an execution, it had begun with the joy of a wedding.

It had been a happy occasion, but the festivities had nearly reached a premature end when the bride and groom ran out of wine to serve their many guests. Mary knew exactly who could produce something from nothing, who could turn worry into joy, so she had turned to her son for a miracle. Jesus had initially rebuked her, but she was undeterred, telling the servants to follow whatever instructions he gave. And her faith was rewarded—when Jesus commanded the servants to draw six stone jars of water and take them to the chief steward, it was not water he tasted, but wine.

If in Jesus’s dying hours his mind drifted back to that day in Cana, I don’t think that it would have been the miracle, the first of many, which stood out to him. I suspect it was the words he’d said to his mother when she looked to him for a sign: “My hour has not yet come.” Now that hour was here and, just like at the beginning of his ministry, so was his mother.

So it was that, beset by the physical agony of crucifixion and the spiritual agony of humanity’s sinfulness, Jesus took a small, intimate moment to care for his mother. Soon her son would be dead, her world turned upside down. She would need someone to watch over her like a son, and someone she could watch over like a mother—the sacrifice Jesus was making for the sake of humanity should not be Mary’s to suffer as well. So Jesus looked to the disciple he loved and brought him into the family the Lord was now leaving.

At Cana, Jesus had given Mary the sign she wanted, even though it was not yet his hour. At Calvary, Jesus gave her what she needed without her having to ask, precisely because it was his hour. In both instances, he showed the love of a son for his mother, but at Calvary he showed the love that God’s Son has for all who come to his cross, love that gives what is needed even when it is undeserved or unanticipated, love that can only be called grace. In his dying moments, Jesus refused to leave his mother alone to wistfully look back on her old life. Instead he gave her a new life—and he offers the same to any who will, like Mary, come near the cross.

You Will Be With Me (Holy Week Devotional)

“[Jesus] replied, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise.”

- Luke 23:43

When Jesus died on the cross, he was flanked on either side by two men who had earned their fates. Matthew’s gospel tells us they were thieves, but no other information is given about them. The details of their crimes go unreported, the whereabouts of their families are unknown, and even their names are a mystery. The only reason we are even aware they existed is because they happened to be crucified next to Jesus—otherwise, like most criminals, they would have simply been disposed of by their society and hastily forgotten.

This was part of the humiliation of crucifixion. You would be mocked and flogged, stripped naked and publically nailed to a cross, left to hang there until death—and then you would be forgotten. No prison guard would ever have to bring meals to you, no letter would ever be sent to you, no visitor’s shadow would ever darken the floor of your cell. You had been permanently dealt with, and now society could move on from you and your crimes without ever having to think about you again. Crucifying the worst criminals unto death gave the public tacit permission to forget them entirely.

To one of the thieves at Jesus’s side, it seems that this was the most severe consequence of his crime. For when he spoke to Jesus in those last hours, it was not to taunt him like his fellow criminal did. Nor did he appeal to Jesus out of desperation to miraculously lift him off the cross or call down an army of angels to save him. Rather, his appeal to Jesus was as meaningful as it was simple: “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”

All that he wanted, all he dared hope for, was for the Lord to remember him. Something, whether the evidence of his eyes or the leading of the Spirit, had led him to believe that Jesus was indeed the Messiah he claimed to be, that death on a cross would somehow lead to Jesus coming into his kingdom. And though the thief had no illusions about being part of that kingdom, it would be enough to know that, while everyone else forgot about him, the Messiah remembered.

When you are at your most alone, when all others have abandoned you, this may be your prayer as well. You don’t expect God’s help, you don’t think He’ll fix everything for you, you just want Him to remember you. You just want to know that, when everyone else has forgotten you, He has not. That would be a mercy. That would be enough.

But from an abundance of grace, he gives more. To the thief on the cross, Jesus offered more than a memory in his kingdom, he offered him a place in it. “Truly I tell you,” he said, “today you will be with me in Paradise.” When the man wanted only to remain in Jesus’s mind, Jesus promised to remain at his side. When he wanted only remembrance, Jesus promised him presence.

He offers the same to any today who, like the thief on the cross, will cry out and place their trust in him. When others forget you, when friends and family fail, not only does the Lord remember you, He stays with you. No one is too lowly or too far gone; no one is a hopeless case. When you feel most alone, may you lean on the grace of God, knowing that not only does the Lord remember you, He is with you.

They Don't Know What They're Doing (Holy Week Devotional)

In commemoration of Holy Week, I will be posting a devotional every day this week. Each day’s verse will be one of the “Seven Last Words,” the seven statements Jesus made from the cross as recorded in the four gospels. I hope that reading these devotionals will help keep the cross at the front of your mind this week as the church prepares to celebrate the resurrection on Easter Sunday.

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“Then Jesus said, “Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.””

- Luke 23:34

The latter half of Jesus’s first statement from the cross could not be more evident—those who had sent him to the cross did not know what they were doing. For the crowd’s part, many of them had, less than a week before, hailed Jesus as their conquering king. Now they looked on with satisfaction as he was crucified by the same Romans they had once hoped he would overthrow. As for the Pharisees and the chief priests, it is clear that they did not understand either—as easy as it is to portray them as sinister villains, the truth is that they thought they were carrying out God’s will, defending His name against the blasphemies of a pretender claiming to be His Son. And the Romans, from Pontius Pilate to the soldiers hammering nails into Jesus’s hands, simply wanted to keep the peace through any means necessary, bewildered by the shifting passions of Jerusalem.

No one at Golgotha really knew what he was doing—no one but Jesus. Only he knew that they had condemned God in the flesh. Only he knew that this was fulfilling God’s plan of salvation. Only he knew that his death was serving as a sacrifice for all who would believe. Everyone else was clueless to the magnitude of what was happening, blinded by their own fear and rage.

Were any of us placed in Jesus’s position, this would fill us with anger and despair. We would label the crowd as ignorant, as hateful, as savages too blinded by mob mentality to see the glory of God before them. We would want to see their cluelessness punished and our righteousness rewarded. We would want justice.

But that is not what Jesus wanted—he wanted grace. As he suffered and bled, as he heard the jeering and endured the humiliation, he did not ask his Father to silence his tormentors, but to forgive them. In a moment when anyone else would have been unable to think of anything but his own pain, Jesus was thinking of theirs, the pain of sin that only God could remove. From the cross, in both word and deed, Christ served as intercessor for even the sinners who put him there.

Jesus’s first saying from the cross reminds us that while sin blinds, grace gives light. Sin demands that you see the world in terms of what you deserve, and that you lash out when you believe you are not getting what you’ve earned. Grace puts others first, even when they do not deserve it—and even when it means you suffer as a result. It allows you to forgive people who mistreat you because you understand that, blinded by sin, they truly don’t know what they’re doing. Even in his agony, Jesus responded to sin with grace—as his follower, may you find the strength through him to do the same.

Loving Impractically (Friday Devotional)

“Mary took a pound of costly perfume made of pure nard, anointed Jesus’s feet, and wiped them with her hair. The house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume. But Judas Iscariot, one of his disciples (the one who was about to betray him), said, “Why was this perfume not sold for three hundred denarii and the money given to the poor?” (He said this not because he cared about the poor, but because he was a thief; he kept the common purse and used to steal what was put into it.) Jesus said, “Leave her alone. She bought it so that she might keep it for the day of my burial. You always have the poor with you, but you do not always have me.”

- John 12:3-8

Judas had a point.

I know he’s a villain in the gospel story, a wolf in sheep’s clothing whose name is now synonymous with betrayal. I know he was a thief who valued money over people, ultimately selling out his Lord for thirty pieces of silver. And I know that the question he asked was grounded in his thievery, not genuine concern for the poor (the gospel writer makes that much clear). I know all that, but when I think about his question—why was this perfume not sold for three hundred denarii and the money given to the poor?—I can’t help but think he had a point.

After all, 300 denarii wasn’t chump change—it was the equivalent of 300 days’ wages, 10 months’ worth of paychecks. The perfume Mary poured out on Jesus’s feet, sold at cost, could have gone a long way toward helping to feed and clothe the poor, just like Judas said. Jesus was always reaching out to those on the bottom rungs of the societal ladder, and now Mary had wasted an opportunity to help. Whatever his motives, there was a kernel of truth in what Judas said: Mary’s gesture just wasn’t practical.

Indeed, it was extravagant. Face to face with her Lord, this man who had raised her brother from the dead, she was overcome with the need to give him all that she had. Reason demanded that Mary save or sell her costly perfume, but love demanded that she use it.

In reflecting on this story, it is worth noting that Jesus does not praise Judas’s question, but Mary’s action. That’s because love is not always practical; sometimes in its truest form it is extravagant. When reason demands that you protect your feelings, love says to forgive. When reason says to defend yourself, love says to turn the other cheek. When reason says to think about your own problems, love says to think about others.

There is a place for practicality in faith, but there must also be a place for extravagance, an understanding that love looks beyond what is reasonable to what is meaningful. You can draw inspiration not only from Mary’s act, but from the cross, where love compelled Christ to spill something far more costly than perfume. Having been loved so abundantly, may you then show grace and love to others—even when it’s not practical.

Something Old, Something New (Friday Devotional)

“Thus says the Lord, who makes a way in the sea, a path in the mighty waters, who brings out chariot and horse, army and warrior; they lie down, they cannot rise, they are extinguished, quenched like a wick; ‘Do not remember the former things, or consider the things of old. I am about to do a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.’”

- Isaiah 43:16-19

It doesn’t take much imagination to envision how God’s people reacted when they heard the proclamation you just read. The comfortable—the rich, the influential, the pious—nervously wondered whether this “new thing” would threaten their standing. They had prospered under the old way of doing things; why was God making a change now? On the other end of the spectrum, the uncomfortable—the poor, the oppressed, the abandoned—eagerly awaited whatever God was about to do. “The former things” and the “things of old” had done little to lift them up, so perhaps now God would give them reason to hope.

Any time something new is on the horizon, these are the dueling perspectives. Those who have benefitted from the old ways see no reason for a change and are suspicious of the implicit threat that newness brings. Those who have suffered under the old ways, who have longed for and even demanded change, see newness as a panacea. This dichotomy plays out all over the landscapes of life, from where you live to what you do to who you vote for—when you’re happy, you don’t want anything to change; when you’re unhappy, you want everything to change.

When God spoke to His people promising something new—a promise that would be fulfilled with the death and resurrection of Christ—He first recounted what He had done for them in ‘the good old days.’ When their ancestors had left Egypt, God had parted the sea for them, and when they had been pursued by Pharaoh’s army, He had used those same waters to save His people. But now a new day was coming, a day when God would act as deliverer and redeemer once again, but in a different way.

“I am about to do a new thing”—what the people likely focused on was the question of what that new thing would look like, what it might mean, whether they should fear it or embrace it. Perhaps more attention should have been paid to who was bringing it about. The people could trust whatever was to come, not because it was new, but because it was God’s.

As we commemorate and celebrate the new thing God did, sending His Son to die on the cross for the sins of humanity and then raising him in glory, we would do well to remember that lesson. Hope is found not in the old or the new, but in the God who was and is and is to come. So instead of placing your faith in the comfortable past or the exciting future, trust in the one who holds both in His hands.

Overwhelmed (Friday Devotional)

“Then I acknowledged my sin to you, and I did not hide my iniquity; I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord,” and you forgave the guilt of my sin. Therefore let all who are faithful offer prayer to you; at a time of distress, the rush of mighty waters shall not reach them. You are a hiding place for me; you preserve me from trouble; you surround me with glad cries of deliverance.”

- Psalm 32:5-7

My buddy Joe and I had no reason to think anything was amiss. His car had been running perfectly fine up to that point—maybe it wasn’t the smoothest ride, but it was an old car after all. So when the traffic light turned green and we remained stationary, I assumed he just wasn’t paying attention.

“Green light,” I said, nudging him.

He looked back at me with a mixture of irritation and panic in his eyes. “I know! It’s not working!”

As Joe frantically pushed the gas pedal, the road around us once again became a hub of activity, while we sat conspicuously still. Vehicles sped by on both sides, cars honked behind us, and I even heard a driver shout out his window at us…and his message was not exactly encouraging. Everything around us was happening so fast, too fast, and we were helpless to slow any of it down in time to think. Even as I got out of the car to slowly push it into a lot a few blocks ahead, all I wanted was to be somewhere else.

Sin has a way of provoking a similar feeling. As guilt bubbles up within you, as new temptations beckon, and especially as your sins’ consequences begin to take hold of you, you can’t help but feel overwhelmed. Suddenly everything is happening too quickly for you to handle, like you’ve been stopped in your tracks even while the rest of the world continues moving full speed. And as a sense of helplessness washes over you, all you want is somewhere to hide.

Scripture says that if you will acknowledge your sinfulness instead of trying to cover it up, if you will confess your transgressions to the Lord and repent, then He will forgive you and offer you a peace that you can’t acquire on your own. Instead of being overwhelmed by what you’ve done, you will be preserved and protected by what He has done—namely, given His only Son for you. God loves you so much that He offers a fresh start, one in which the old onslaught of guilt, fear, and anger cannot reach you.

Sin has a way of making you feel powerless in its wake, as though there is nowhere to hide. But in the face of your helplessness stands the cross of Christ, the ultimate place of refuge. So may you find yourself overwhelmed—not by the weight of sin, but by the glorious grace of God.