Jesus Dies on the Cross

V. We adore Thee, O Christ, and we bless Thee.

R. Because by Thy holy Cross Thou hast redeemed the world.

From noon until three in the afternoon, darkness covered the whole land. Jesus cried out in the words of Psalm 22: "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" (Matthew 27:46; Mark 15:34). He said "I thirst" (John 19:28). He was offered wine vinegar on a sponge. Then he cried out with a loud voice — Luke records the words: "Father, into your hands I commend my spirit" (Luke 23:46); John records: "It is finished" (John 19:30) — and he breathed his last. The curtain of the Temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The centurion who witnessed his death declared: "Truly this man was the Son of God" (Mark 15:39).

The cry of abandonment — "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" — is the opening line of Psalm 22, a psalm that moves from anguish to trust to praise and ends in triumph. Jesus, who knew the psalter perfectly, is not merely expressing despair; he is praying the entire trajectory of the psalm from the extreme point of human suffering. He enters into the darkest human experience — the feeling of being abandoned by God — so that no human being who experiences that darkness will ever be alone in it. He has gone there before us. He has sanctified even the cry of desolation.

"It is finished" — the Greek word tetelestai — does not mean "it is over" in the sense of defeat. It means "it is completed," "it is accomplished," "it is brought to perfection." The work of redemption that the Father sent the Son to do is now done. The world has been saved. The gates of Paradise, closed since Eden, are swinging open. The thirteenth Scriptural station is the hinge of history: before it, sin and death reign; after it, mercy and life begin their long victory.