Night has fallen. The terrible sin — that of killing the Lord — the epitome of all sin, is as good as accomplished. And Judas goes off . . .

Night has fallen indeed and yet, within the supper room there is a cry of exultation that is, in itself, a shattering of the night. ‘The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.’

Jesus is to die, and he accepts this with all the passionate commitment of his surrendered heart — so deep, so unrestricted is his love for us. His is Love to the end, the uttermost love, which is total self-expenditure.

He knows that the love driving him on is not born of the human spirit; he knows that the Father himself is pouring into his poor human heart the immensity of his own self-expending love for men.

When he hangs on the cross, naked, emptied out, reduced to nothing, we shall have some idea of what this Man is, who he is, Son of eternal Love itself. Looking on him, seeing him truly for the first time, we shall know what sort of a God we have; for the first time human beings will know what God is really like.

He is a complete reversal of all merely human notions of God: he is Love that gives.

We wounded him by our sinning — we bruised him — yet all he bore became our healing.

 

~ A Meditation by Ruth Burrows, O.C.D.

 

❤

 

Father the hour has come, glorify your Son.
~ John 17:1