The Pain
What pain there must have been. I just can’t imagine. Can you? Hanging there on the cross, the pain must have been unbearable. Nails driven into the hands and the feet. Wearing a crown of thorns on the head. He hangs there, in pain. We just can’t imagine what it must have been like.
While that is true, that is not the pain that I am talking about. Can you imagine the pain of being separated from the heavenly Father? Jesus faced that as He hung on the cross. The pains of the cross were nothing compared to the pain of bearing the fullness of law on our behalf. “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46) Forsaken, not because He hung on the cross. Forsaken because He was facing what each one of us deserved. He was paying a price that you and I cannot pay. In doing so, He faced the greatest pain of all, forsaken by the Father on the cross.
That is what makes today such a Good Friday. I am often asked why it is called Good Friday when Jesus died on this day. Because of what Jesus did on the cross on that Friday long ago, through faith in Him alone, you and I no longer need to fear being separated from our heavenly Father. We receive the gift of eternal life in heaven instead of eternal damnation in hell. That all comes because of that which Jesus did on that day. Is not this a good thing? It truly is a Good Friday. On this day, the Son of God paid our ransom price.
In a hymn we sing:
“Here I might stay and sing,
No story so divine!
Never was love, dear King,
Never was grief like Thine.
This is my friend,
In whose sweet praise
I all my days
Could gladly spend.” (My Song is Love Unknown, text, public domain)
