The Cross – Our Way of Life (4)

 

“Jesus, knowing that all things had already been accomplished, to fulfill Scripture, said, “I am thirsty.” A jar full of sour wine vinegar was standing there; so they put a sponge full of the sour wine vinegar upon a branch of hyssop and brought it up to His mouth” (John 19:28 – 29).

 

In Matthew (27:48) and Mark (15:36) the sour wine vinegar is associated with Jesus’ cry of “My God! My God! Why have You forsaken Me?”

 

It was only the night before that Jesus was sharing the cup of the wine of the New Covenant with His disciples. He has gone from the intimacy of the Upper Room to the open shame of the Cross. The hands with which He broke the bread at the Table are now nailed to the Cross. Instead of lifting a cup of wine to His mouth at the Table, a sponge with vinegar is forced upward onto His lips.

 

Jesus inaugurates His ministry with the sign of turning water into fine wine. Jesus concludes His ministry with wine vinegar. Jesus gives fine wine to others; He receives sharp wine vinegar for Himself.

 

Jesus gives the woman at the well living water so that she will never thirst again. Jesus suffers thirst on the Cross.

 

Jesus clothes us with God’s righteousness, while His own body is stripped bear. Jesus is wounded so that our wounds might be healed. Jesus wears the crown of thorns that Adam and his race have woven, so that we might be crowned with God’s glory.

 

Jesus drinks the bitter, that we might drink the sweet.

 

This, dear friends, is the Way of the Cross, the Way of Jesus.

 

When Jesus says, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me” (John 14:6), He is speaking of us entering into Him and living by His Life. He is our source of life, our breath, our heartbeat; the way He lives is the Way we live. We learn to drink the bitter so that others may drink the sweet.

 

We learn to turn water into wine, we learn to give others the water that becomes a fountain of life within them so that they will never draw water from wells again, we learn to share the Body and  Blood of Jesus in holy Communion at the Lord’s Table, we learn to prepare that Table for others in the presence of their enemies, and we learn to have outstretched hands to the world in the Name of Jesus, and the drink the bitter and sharp wine vinegar that the world offers to us in order that others may live.

 

We learn to live in Jesus the Vine, as Christ toward others, as Jesus Christ lives within us; knowing that we “have this treasure in earthen vessels, so that the surpassing greatness of the power will be of God and not from ourselves” (2 Cor. 4:7). Let us make no mistake, we are speaking of a “treasure”! While we acknowledge the frailty of the earthen vessels, let us exalt and magnify the treasure, our Lord Jesus Christ. “Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Col. 1:27).

 

With Paul we are called to confess, “Death works in us, but life in you” (2 Cor. 4:12).

 

The Way of the Cross is the Way of drinking the bitter so that others may drink the sweet. It is bearing the sorrows and burdens and sufferings of the world, as we live in Christ and as Christ lives in us, so that others may live.

 

The Way of the Cross is living with our arms and hands outstretched.

 

When we appear before Jesus will He ask, “Show Me your hands”?