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Humble Hero
break from its power. Without help from God, humanity must die,
and He saw great numbers dying within reach of help.
The Terrible Weight That Christ Bore
The iniquity of us all was laid on Christ as our Substitute and
Security. The guilt of every descendant of Adam was pressing on
His heart. All His life Christ had been proclaiming the good news of
the Father’s pardoning love, but now with the terrible weight of guilt
upon Him He could not see the Father’s forgiving face. This pierced
His heart with a sorrow that no human can ever fully understand.
This agony was so great that He hardly felt His physical pain.
Satan wrung the heart of Jesus with fierce temptations. Hope did
not tell Him that He would come out from the grave a conqueror,
nor did it tell Him that the Father accepted His sacrifice. Christ felt
the anguish the sinner will feel when mercy will no longer plead for
the guilty race. It was the sense of sin, bringing the Father’s wrath
on Him as our Substitute, that broke the heart of the Son of God.
Angels hid their faces from the fearful sight. The sun refused
to look on the awful scene. Its full, bright rays were illuminating
the earth at midday, when suddenly it seemed to be blotted out.
Complete darkness surrounded the cross. “Until the ninth hour there
was darkness over all the land.” There was no natural cause for this
darkness, which was as deep as midnight without moon or stars. It
was a miraculous God-given testimony that would confirm the faith
of later generations.
In that thick darkness God hid His presence. God and holy angels
were beside the cross. The Father was with His Son. Yet He did
not reveal His presence. In that dreadful hour Christ was not to be
comforted with the Father’s presence.
In the thick darkness, God veiled the last human agony of His
Son. All who had seen Christ in His suffering had been convicted
that He was divine. Through long hours of agony He had been open
to the view of the jeering multitude. Now He was mercifully hidden
by the mantle of God.
A nameless terror held the crowd gathered around the cross.
Cursing and insults stopped. Vivid lightning occasionally flashed
from the cloud and revealed the crucified Redeemer. Priests, rulers,