Virtual Methodist

It was now about the sixth hour, and darkness came over the whole land until the ninth hour, for the sun stopped shining. And the curtain of the temple was torn in two. Jesus called out with a loud voice, "Father, into your hands I commit my spirit." When he had said this, he breathed his last. Luke 23:44-46 (ANIV) Yesterday's reflection was entitled "It is Finished..." but I wasn't quite finished, and neither was Jesus. Luke's gospel has him using some words of another Psalm, this time Psalm 31, before, finally, breathing his last. William Barclay tells us that this was the first prayer that every Jewish mother taught her child to pray last thing at night… The Jewish equivalent of the old English prayer: Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep; Should I die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take. We've reflected previously on the relationship between Jesus and his mother… Had Mary taught Jesus this prayer? But if his mot...

knowing that all was now completed , and so that the Scripture would be fulfilled , Jesus said, "I am thirsty…" A jar of wine vinegar was there, so they soaked a sponge in it, put the sponge on a stalk of the hyssop plant, and lifted it to Jesus' lips. When he had received the drink, Jesus said, "It is finished ." With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit. John 19:25-30 (ANIV) Completed… fulfilled… finished… Three words all drawn from the Greek word “telos” “the end…” Eugene Peterson reflects that repeated use better when he uses the word complete in all three places… And in many ways that word gives a better sense of the words that John’s gospel uses, in that “finished” can tend to give the despairing idea that everything is “done” defeated… As I am sure that his disciples and his mother felt that day… But the word complete carries the idea of "completion"… wholeness… perfection… nothing missing… The final piece of the jigsaw completing th...

Sometimes there is a lot of debate as to exactly what the last thing a dying person has said. When the playwright Oscar Wilde died, there were a number of last words attributed to him. One story has him sipping champagne in his bed and saying "Alas, I am dying beyond my means.” Another, more famously has him saying "Either this wallpaper goes, or I do!" He may well have said either, both or neither at some point in the whole process… they certainly sound like him… But they are unlikely to be his very last words as he is said to have converted back to Catholicism on his deathbed and a priest was with him up to the very end, and because of the sanctity of the confessional relationship between priest and parishioner, the priest never disclosed what words were exchanged between them. Throughout this week I've been looking at the 7 recorded comments of Jesus on the cross. As I wrote earlier, they’re drawn from all 4 Gospels, because no one contains them all. Indeed Matthe...

He wasn’t just a thief… Given that the Romans were crucifying him, he was much more than that… he was probably a rebel, a thug, a murderer… a threat to the state… He had lived a ruthless life and was dying an equally ruthless death…Yet at the last minute, he found it in himself to turn to the man unjustly crucified beside him and say: “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” There's actually nothing in the text to say that he said this with any less mockery than his co-condemned had used when he said: “Aren’t you the Christ? Save yourself and us!” But most believe that he was genuine… That this was the clearest example of a last minute conversion in history. Some people leave everything to the last minute. There’s even a famous website dedicated to finding theatre tickets, gifts and holidays for those who don’t plan ahead… But as has been pointed out by many preachers before me, few of us have the luxury of knowing when our very last minute will be… There may be websit...