Hello God. It's me, Mara

You know, Lord, “Via Dolorosa” or “The Way of Sorrows” written by Rev. Oscar Rem in 1926, relates a fictitious “legend” about Jesus walking from the Praetorian in Jerusalem to Golgotha hill on Good Friday.  The legend says a Jewess named Veronica, a lady in Jerusalem, seeing Jesus as He passed by, sinking under the weight of His cross, came out of her house and with a napkin wiped away the blood and beads of perspiration from His face. And lo, when she examined the napkin it bore a perfect likeness of the face of the Man of Sorrows. It was as if the portrait of Jesus had been imprinted upon the cloth.

Rev. Rem continues his article: Jesus carried His heavy cross (two pieces of timber nailed cross-wise, the short timber horizontal, and the long piece perpendicular). Surely, some of the soldiers could have carried the cross for Him, but instead they forced Him to carry His cross, lashing Him with whips when He didn’t walk fast enough.  An early church father said that the sins of all men were laid upon Jesus as He walked “The Way of Sorrows” from the Praetorian to Golgotha, the place of the skull.

“Jesus carried, not His own cross, but our cross. It wasn’t the cross itself which was so heavy, but our sin which was embodied in the cross. When Jesus carried the cross He carried our sins and the sorrows caused by sin. It was love that prompted Him to carry the cross.

“Many wept as Jesus went by, but no matter how copious the tears, tears can never wash away our sin; unless the sinner accepts Christ by faith his flood of tears will not transport him to heaven, the sinner is saved by grace, not grief.”

   Thank You, Lord, that “Love Divine, all love excelling,” spurred You on.

Love, Mara