Saturday, the Second Week of Lent

Second Station of the Cross - Jesus is given His cross

   "So they took Jesus, and he went out, bearing his own cross, to the place called the place of a skull, which is called in Hebrew Golgotha.”  (John 19: 17)

   Try to imagine the condition of our Lord at this point in His passion.  He had not slept at all the night before.  He had been arrested in the Garden of Gethsemane and taken to the High Priest.  At dawn He was taken to the home of Pilate.  When Pilate learned that Jesus was Galilean he sent Him to Herod who mocked and tormented Him then sent Him back to Pilate.

   Upon His return to Pilate he was scourged.  The Romans had developed the method of scourging to cause the victim and much pain as suffering, stopping just short of their death..  Loss of blood was extensive and many did not survive the scourging.  By the time it was through, Jesus would have hardly been recognizable; a mass of cuts, tears and gouges in His flesh from head to toe.

   After the scourging, he was further tormented by having the crown of thorns jammed onto His head, furthering His pain and blood loss.  He was then brought before Pilate, the High Priest, scribes, and Pharisees again.  At this point he was condemned to death.

  By now it had been close to two full days since He drank, eaten or slept.  He had been dragged from Gethsemane to the High Priests home; from there to Pilates home; from there to Herod’s palace and back again to Pilate’s home.  Scourged, beaten and tormented beyond normal human endurance He was now given the Cross that He would be forced to carry to Golgotha.

   Sit quietly for a few minutes and consider the price Jesus was willing to pay for our sins.  Did our sins make the scourging more painful, the thorns sharper, the cross heavier?  I believe that they did.  I believe that every sin we have committed and will commit weighed upon Him as He quietly and painfully began to carry the cross that paid the debt for our sins.

   In deep sorrow for inflicting such pain on our Lord, let us reach out to God and plead for His mercy.  He will not refuse even though we are just as responsible for the death of His Son as those who carried out the sentence over two thousand years ago.  This is the purpose of Lent.  To try to understand what He suffered for us and seek His forgiveness.