The Seven Last Words of Christ on the Cross

We gather today to reflect on the most important act that defines us as Christians. We come to behold the cross to which our Lord Jesus Christ was nailed, completing the sacrifice for our salvation. As we gather, we take time to reflect on His last words before He surrendered His life to His Father. These words are significant in our journeys as Christians because they encapsulate His ministry and remind us to follow His example. They form the foundation of our theology: 1. Forgiveness, 2. Salvation, 3. Relationship, 4. Abandonment, 5. Distress, 6. Triumph, 7. Reunion.

Let’s open our hearts and meditate upon them as a pilot on our journey:  

1.     -- "Father, forgive them, they know not what they do" (Lk 23:34).

The soldiers who led Christ to the cross cast lots for his clothes, an unseemly "bonus" for their work. Even in the midst of his own suffering and pain, Christ offered prayers for his tormentors, aware they were unknowingly fulfilling Scripture (Ps 22:18-19).

R: Open our hearts to offer forgiveness when we are wronged.

2.     -- "Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise" (Lk 23:43).

Two criminals are crucified on either side of Christ. One hurls insults at Christ, but the other recognizes him for who he is. "Remember me" he calls out. Christ reassures the believer that he will be with him in paradise. A great consolation and assurance of being with Christ after the completion of our earthly sojourn.

R: Teach us to comfort those around us.

3.     -- "Woman, behold, your son. ... Behold, your mother" (Jn 19:26-27).

Christ sees his mother, Mary, at the foot of the cross. He presents John, the beloved disciple, as her son, and to John, Mary as his mother. By this time, Mary was most likely a widow. Christ, as Mary's firstborn son, was legally responsible for providing food and shelter for her. His death would have left her vulnerable, financially and emotionally. Some of Christ's last words are to care for his mother.

R: Move us to compassion to see the needs of others.

4.     -- "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" (Mt 27:46 and Mk 15:34).

The weight of the world's sin has been placed on Christ, and at this moment, he is completely abandoned by God, the Father. Sin separates us from the holy. Christ experienced that for us. The intimate relationship with God the Father he had his entire life was lost. The words used to convey the devastation of this abandonment are another fulfillment of Scripture in Psalm 22.

R: Enlighten our hearts to the intimate relationship you desire for us.

5.     -- "I thirst" (Jn 19:28).

These words of Christ remind us that not only was he fully God, which he showed by his ultimate forgiveness, but he was also fully man. Someone soaks a sponge in cheap wine and offers it to Christ on a hyssop stalk. Even though he had been battered, a crown of thorns pressed into his skull, and nails hammered into his hands and feet, this is the only time he vocalizes his physical suffering. We will never know the pain he experienced on the cross, but we have experienced thirst. His words ground us in his human experience.

R: May we thirst for your living water.

6.     -- "It is finished" (Jn 19:30).

Christ isn't just saying his suffering is nearly over, death is upon him, but that his mission is complete. He had completed what he came to do, to lay down his own life, a ransom for the sins of all humanity so that we would no longer be separated from God. His words are one of ultimate surrender.

R: Reveal what I need to surrender to you.

7.     -- "Father, into your hands I commend my spirit" (Lk 23:46).

These are the very last words Jesus breathed on earth before His spirit returned to His Father. The curtain in the Temple dividing the holy place and the holy of holies has been torn in half. That which kept us from God has been destroyed. Christ had been obedient to the Father, even till the end. Christ's words clearly convey that this act was one of his own free will.

Will our focus be on God in our last moments? It is, after all, “in Him that we live and move and have our being” (Acts 17:28). Are we willing to commit our spirits to God now? Such commitment to God, who is no mere abstract power or force, let alone an uncaring ruler, but is our Father, who has given His Son for our salvation, and who gives us His Holy Spirit to dwell in the temples of our bodies, cannot help but provide relief to our deepest feelings of loneliness, and motivation to reach out with His love to the lonely around us.

Let’s ask ourselves how we might unite our sufferings with Christ’s and, despite what may befall us, resolve to trust in Him and commit our spirits to the Father’s loving hands.

R: Endow us with your Holy Spirit that we may be obedient till the end of our lives. Amen.