Bread Crumbs – Devotions for Life

The Saturday between Good Friday and Easter is the neglected day of Holy Week.  It is traditionally called Holy Saturday but it is usually a day devoid of any holy activity.

It has become a day for Easter Egg Hunts for children and baseball and softball tournaments for youth.  Malls are packed as families frantically buy Easter clothes.  There is a run on hams at the grocery store as families prepare for Easter Dinner with the clan.

The mourning and grief of Good Friday is lost in the business of worldly activities. 

Most churches do not have worship services.

I have renamed this day Somber Saturday.  There must be tears of sadness in heaven that we can so easily move from the Crucifixion of Jesus to the joys of everyday living.

I encourage you to take time today:

to remember the Crucifixion,

to confess your participation, and

to humble yourself before Him who died for the forgiveness of your sins.

The following prayer, They Crucified Him, is one which I pray on this holy and somber day.  It reminds me of His great love.  It humbles my heart into grateful remembrance.

Take time to pray:

Lord Jesus, we remember everyone, evil or good, who took part in your crucifixion.

• The priests and Pharisees and elders who conspired to arrest you.
• Judas your disciple, who betrayed you with a kiss.
• The apostles who deserted you, yet bore witness to your glory on the Cross.
• Malchus who was struck by Peter’s sword, yet was touched and healed by you.
• The young man who followed you, yet fled naked from the crowd.
• The high priest’s maids and servants before whom Peter denied the you.
• Annas, the high priest’s father-in-law, who handed you over to Caiaphas.
• Caiaphas, the high priest, who convicted you of blasphemy.
• The chief priest, scribes, and officers who mocked, beat, and condemned you.
• Herod who arrayed you in gorgeous apparel and treated you with contempt.
• The soldiers who put a crown of thorns on you and pretended to worship you.
• Pilate’s wife who begged her husband to wash his hands of you.
• Barabbas, the robber and murderer, who was freed instead of you.
• Pontius Pilate who delivered you to death.
• Simon of Cyrene, a passerby, who was compelled to bear your Cross.
• The women who wept, wailed, and lamented your death.
• The soldiers who nailed you to the Cross and whom you forgave.
• The crowd that scoffed you as one who saved others but could not save himself;
• The thief who reviled him.
• The thief who asked to be remembered in your kingdom.
• The unknown man who heard your cry of desolation and ran to quench your thirst.
• Your mother Mary who stood by the Cross as you were dying son.
• The centurion who proclaimed you as the Son of God.
• All the women who had followed you and ministered to you at your crucifixion.

Have mercy on them and me.  

Loving Father, we thank you that Jesus who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped.  Instead he emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.  Being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

Lord Jesus today I bow my knee and heart before you in humble confession and quiet gratefulness for your sacrifice which is my salvation.  Amen.

Read Full Post »