Friday, March 20, 2015
Matthew 27:45 From the sixth hour until the ninth hour darkness came over all the land.
SEEING IN THE DARK
Surely the darkness of Good Friday pictured our sins against the light, but it also revealed the deeds of the living God.
The Lord laid on Him the iniquity of us all. All of our sins-- the ones we know about; the ones we've fooled ourselves about; the ones we're not even aware of-- all were laid upon him, and brought this terrible darkness upon Him. Somehow the darkness God had brought on the Egyptians as one of the plagues had seemed fitting, for they were pagans. Now His own Son suffers darkness for all that is pagan in us.
It must have seemed strange and frightening to the people that day. It was no eclipse, for it was at the time of the full moon. Perhaps someone in Jerusalem that day remembered the words of Moses: "But it shall come to pass, if you do not obey the voice of the LORD your God ... cursed shall you be in the city, and cursed shall you be in the country ... and you shall grope at noonday as a blind man gropes in darkness ..." (Deuteronomy 28:15, 16, 29).
What of these curses? Paul says: "Christ became a curse for us when He hung on the tree!" No wonder He cried out at the end of those three silent and mysterious hours, "My God, my God, why have You forsaken me?" He suffered our darkness, and was forsaken, that we need never be forsaken.
Thousand, thousand thanks shall be,
Dearest Jesus, unto Thee!
