good friday
I have a Good Friday song, "O Sacred Head, Now Wounded", to share with you all:
When I was in high school, I was in an Easter production called Love According to John. I was one member of a troop of about five street musicians (I played flute, although I was a fairly terrible flautist). In John 19, Pilate hands Jesus over to be crucified. Verse 17 simply says, "Carrying his own cross, he went out to the place of the Skull (which in Aramaic is called Golgotha)." In the play, the street musicians are part of a crowd that jeers and mocks and yells at Jesus as he drags his cross across the stage, walking to his death, having just been beaten and flogged. While this is going on, "O Sacred Head, Now Wounded" plays.
I remember being at a Good Friday service at the Myer Horowitz theatre in Edmonton and being overcome with emotion when we sang "O Sacred Head, Now Wounded" as part of the service. The jeering and mocking that I was acting out on stage suddenly aligned with the sins in my day-to-day life and I was left staring at the hugeness of Jesus' sacrifice and the wholeness of his love for me. I left the service and sat in the foyer on a couch and wept with sorrow and with gratitude.
So, now, more than a decade later, I listen to "O Sacred Head, Now Wounded" on Good Fridays, reflect on the sacrifice Jesus made for me (and for you!) and how I'm honouring (or not honouring) that sacrifice in my life.
(For the full lyrics, go here.)
When I was in high school, I was in an Easter production called Love According to John. I was one member of a troop of about five street musicians (I played flute, although I was a fairly terrible flautist). In John 19, Pilate hands Jesus over to be crucified. Verse 17 simply says, "Carrying his own cross, he went out to the place of the Skull (which in Aramaic is called Golgotha)." In the play, the street musicians are part of a crowd that jeers and mocks and yells at Jesus as he drags his cross across the stage, walking to his death, having just been beaten and flogged. While this is going on, "O Sacred Head, Now Wounded" plays.
I remember being at a Good Friday service at the Myer Horowitz theatre in Edmonton and being overcome with emotion when we sang "O Sacred Head, Now Wounded" as part of the service. The jeering and mocking that I was acting out on stage suddenly aligned with the sins in my day-to-day life and I was left staring at the hugeness of Jesus' sacrifice and the wholeness of his love for me. I left the service and sat in the foyer on a couch and wept with sorrow and with gratitude.
So, now, more than a decade later, I listen to "O Sacred Head, Now Wounded" on Good Fridays, reflect on the sacrifice Jesus made for me (and for you!) and how I'm honouring (or not honouring) that sacrifice in my life.
(For the full lyrics, go here.)
posted by kerry.
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