The Awful Tragedy of Calvary
from Heavenly Aspirations by John Macduff 1818-1895 who, being in very nature God,
did not consider equality with God something to be grasped,
but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a slave, being
made in human likeness. And being found in appearance
as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death,
even death on a cross. Philippians chapter 2, verses
6 through 8. Our Lord's earthly condition
was one of extreme poverty. The foxes had holes, and the
birds of the air had nests, but the Son of Man had nowhere to
lay His head. Not merely did He assume our
nature in its lowest form, but He endured opposition, indignities,
and sufferings of every kind. His cheeks were smitten. His
face was spat upon. His temples were pierced with
prickly thorns. His back was ploughed with scourges. His hands and feet were fixed
with iron spikes to the accursed tree. His burning thirst was
tantalized with vinegar and gall. His last prayers were turned
to ridicule, and his dying groans were converted into impious mockeries. Men reviled him, Satan buffeted
him, and in his last extremity even God forsook him. But he
bore it all without a single murmur. The awful tragedy of
Calvary, in all its circumstances of woe, stands in dread prominence
above all that the annals of time have ever recorded. Many
strange events have taken place before now, but never was there
such an event as this. The sun stopped shining. Luke chapter 23 verse 45. In
the past the sun shone upon heart-rending spectacles in abundance, but
he veiled his face in mourning when the prince of life expired. on the disastrous flood, on the
burning cities of the plain, on the sea-sunk legions of Egypt,
on the armies of Sennacherib prostrate beneath the angels
blast he looked down as it were with bright indifference but
when the atoning substitute was suspended on the cross the gaze
at such a spectacle unappalled was impossible you