Last Words Archives

Jesus was in pain and dehydrated on the cross, and His statements were often short. But his longest saying comes from Psalm 22 and reveals much about Him.

The first statement Jesus made from the cross was, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do” (Luke 23:34). Maybe we would have understood it more if He had said, “Father, condemn them,” or “Father, judge them.”

Christ’s passionate love for the world is evident in His statements from the Cross.

Can you think of someone right now whom you cannot imagine ever being a follower of Jesus Christ? I would challenge you to start praying for that person by name. No one is beyond the reach of God's hand. Jesus prayed for the very people who crucified Him. Can you pray for someone who has wronged you?

To varying degrees, each of us has felt the pain of rejection and loneliness. Jesus knows exactly how you feel.

I would like for us to consider what I believe was God's most painful moment, the most painful moment for our Lord when He was on this earth.

For more than twelve hours, Christ had been in the hands of men.

The ancient Greeks boasted of being able to say much in little - "to give a sea of matter in a drop of language" was regarded as the perfection of oratory.

And now there remained nothing more to fulfill prophecy than the offering him the drink of vinegar and gall, and in order to fulfill this he cried "I thirst."

This first of the seven cross-sayings of Jesus presents Him in the attitude of prayer.

The words are recorded, not to finally reveal, but to reveal so much as it is possible for men to know, and to set a limit at the point where men may never know.

It is one of the ultimate ironies of the biblical story that Jesus cried out “I thirst.” He who is the water of life now dies of thirst.