Once there was a great divide between humans and God.
    We were irreparably separated from Him,
             our Lord God and Creator,
             because of our sin against Him.
But to bridge that great divide,
    God came to us as a human being — as one of ourselves.

He was born and raised human;
He lived and loved human;
He ate and slept human.
He was cold in the winter, hot in the summer,
    and exhausted at the end of the day, just like we all get.
He felt all that we feel,
    thought all that we think,
        was all that we are.
He was one of us, a human being in EVERY regard!
But He was also different — He came for a purpose.

On the Day Of Reconciliation,
    that is, on Passover in that year,
He was nailed to a tree with no regard for His innocence;
    or for who He was, man or God.
He was nailed to that tree,
    to die the slowest and most painful death
    to which a criminal could be sentenced in those days.

As He hung there dying, He appeared to be alone,
    but He was not.
For our Holy Father in Heaven was there, to His left.
And we, each and every one of us, all of humankind,
    were there, in His heart, to His right.

So . . . when it was time, He reached through time
    with His right hand and grasped our hands;
And with His left, He took hold of His Father's hand.
Then He looked to His right, to us, His brothers and sisters,
    and said, "Children, here is your Father!"
And then to His left, to The Lord God,
    He said, "Father, here are your children!"

And at exactly the ninth hour,
    when His broken, beaten, bloody body was barely alive;
As He held your hand and my hand in His right hand,
    and our Father's hand in His left hand;
In prayer, He joined His hands together and softly whispered
    the most beautiful words ever spoken by a man,
    when He declared . . . "IT IS FINISHED!"

Then He died.

The world has not been the same since that day.

Newman      
July 2009