A Redemption Reflection...

The Cross... the place where utter need is met with utter grace

Glad, glad for grace; no work can boast

Hope’s miracle Love-wrought

Salvation is God’s gracious gift;

Man’s redemption blood-bought

Thankful, thankful, God’s offering

Sin’s supreme sacrifice

The righteousness of man attained

Through righteousness of Christ

Where once for all our All in all

Annulled at Calvary

The debt we owed; His grace alone

Sets sin-cursed sinners free

Hope fixates on a blood-stained cross

Faith on an empty grave

He died then rose again; our gain

The loss He came to brave

The gift of God, the peace of God

Sealed when the King of kings

 Left His throne to secure for us

The Hope salvation brings

© Janet Martin

Isa.53

(verses 10-11 always grip me!)

It pleased the Lord to bruise Him because He knew the outcome!)

 The Suffering Servant
1Who has believed our message?
            And to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed?

      2For He grew up before Him like a tender shoot,
            And like a root out of parched ground;
            He has no stately form or majesty
            That we should look upon Him,
            Nor appearance that we should be attracted to Him.

      3He was despised and forsaken of men,
            A man of sorrows and acquainted with grief;
            And like one from whom men hide their face
            He was despised, and we did not esteem Him.

      4Surely our griefs He Himself bore,
            And our sorrows He carried;
            Yet we ourselves esteemed Him stricken,
            Smitten of God, and afflicted.

      5But He was pierced through for our transgressions,
            He was crushed for our iniquities;
            The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him,
            And by His scourging we are healed.

      6All of us like sheep have gone astray,
            Each of us has turned to his own way;
            But the LORD has caused the iniquity of us all
            To fall on Him.

      7He was oppressed and He was afflicted,
            Yet He did not open His mouth;
            Like a lamb that is led to slaughter,
            And like a sheep that is silent before its shearers,
            So He did not open His mouth.

      8By oppression and judgment He was taken away;
            And as for His generation, who considered
            That He was cut off out of the land of the living
            For the transgression of my people, to whom the stroke was due?

      9His grave was assigned with wicked men,
            Yet He was with a rich man in His death,
            Because He had done no violence,
            Nor was there any deceit in His mouth.

      10But the LORD was pleased
            To crush Him, putting Him to grief;
            If He would render Himself as a guilt offering,
            He will see His offspring,
            He will prolong His days,
            And the good pleasure of the LORD will prosper in His hand.

      11As a result of the anguish of His soul,
            He will see it and be satisfied;
            By His knowledge the Righteous One,
            My Servant, will justify the many,
            As He will bear their iniquities.

      12Therefore, I will allot Him a portion with the great,
            And He will divide the booty with the strong;
            Because He poured out Himself to death,
            And was numbered with the transgressors;
            Yet He Himself bore the sin of many,
            And interceded for the transgressors.

Marching Orders and a Good Friday Eve Meditation

Over these past years of doing childcare I think most of the youngsters learn that Janet can be ‘nice’ and silly, turning into a cow, dog, pirate, pioneer, waitress or whatever else the day calls for ,

but that same Janet can also be Sergeant Janet and when she gets that certain look

and gives marching orders, well, you

Just.

 Better.

 March!

Sometimes this reminds me a little of God and us... We want God to be ‘nice’ and He is!

He loves us so much He sent His Son to die for us to break sin’s curse, death;

and to all who believe in Him He grants everlasting life.

But as much as God loves us He hates sin; the thing that separates us from Him!

He never, ever hates the sinner but always the sin!

So, just as we give our children ‘marching orders’ for their good and benefit,

He gives marching orders/laws for our good!
(but He is no Sergeant. He commands but does not demand. He never forces our obedience or love)

Why are we reluctant to yield to One who loves us so?

We live in a broken world. But we have a Healer!
 If we believe in the faithful, loving, holy, kind, merciful, righteous, redemptive God,
the Father of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ

who was obedient to death, even death on a cross!

By His stripes we are healed!

Below is the story I read to the kiddos today...
it evoked earnest 3 yr. old declarations of love for Jesus
From The Bible in Pictures for Little Eyes...

By His stripes we are healed

Love bore atonement’s rod

Faultless Obedience appealed

On our behalf to God

There is no other name

Whereby man can be saved

Jesus, Jesus, absolves death’s claim

On mortal souls engraved

He bore our wretched shame

As on a cross He hung

Stripped of all but the bloody raim-

-ent from love’s gashes wrung

Obedient, Love came

To fulfill Mercy’s plan

Jesus, Jesus the only name

That offers hope to man

That hope, eternal life 
No fear in death for we
Who, when we leave this world of strife
Know just where we will be

© Janet Martin

 But he was pierced for our transgressions,
    he was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was on him,
    and by his wounds we are healed.
Isa.53:5

Have you believed in Him.

Have you confessed that you are sinner to he who is faithful and just to forgive our sins

and cleanse us from all unrighteousness?

If you have then Hallelujah,

If you have not, it’s not too late to call on Him and be saved from His righteous wrath to come!

Have you walked through the Easter Story absorbing the sorrow, the blows, the loneliness, the pain

And then the triumph?!

He didn’t just die!

He rose from the grave and just as He rose from the grave so also will all who believe!

Good Friday

Earth trembled. Rocks split.

Darkness draped sky and sod,

The veil in the temple

Rent by Holy God

Crowds jeered yet feared

What they had done

…nailed to the cross

God’s Only Son

Love groaned, atoned

Sin’s debt with blood

Once and for all

Redemption’s flood

…ran full and free

As His last breath

Sealed Victory

-Life beyond death

For never before,

Since Time began

Was love outpoured

As it was then

Beneath it earth trembled

Rocks split as God’s Son

Completed His mission

With ‘it is done’

© Janet Martin

Why Good Friday, someone asked as we reflected *on what took place that day, and my son replied that he heard the reason it is called Good Friday is because never before was mankind loved like it was then...

*John 19

 Then Pilate therefore took Jesus, and scourged him.

² And the soldiers platted a crown of thorns, and put it on his head, and they put on him a purple robe,
³ And said, Hail, King of the Jews! and they smote him with their hands.
⁴ Pilate therefore went forth again, and saith unto them, Behold, I bring him forth to you, that ye may know that I find no fault in him.
⁵ Then came Jesus forth, wearing the crown of thorns, and the purple robe. And Pilate saith unto them, Behold the man!
⁶ When the chief priests therefore and officers saw him, they cried out, saying, Crucify him, crucify him. Pilate saith unto them, Take ye him, and crucify him: for I find no fault in him.
⁷ The Jews answered him, We have a law, and by our law he ought to die, because he made himself the Son of God.
⁸ When Pilate therefore heard that saying, he was the more afraid;
⁹ And went again into the judgment hall, and saith unto Jesus, Whence art thou? But Jesus gave him no answer.
¹⁰ Then saith Pilate unto him, Speakest thou not unto me? knowest thou not that I have power to crucify thee, and have power to release thee?
¹¹ Jesus answered, Thou couldest have no power at all against me, except it were given thee from above: therefore he that delivered me unto thee hath the greater sin.
¹² And from thenceforth Pilate sought to release him: but the Jews cried out, saying, If thou let this man go, thou art not Caesar's friend: whosoever maketh himself a king speaketh against Caesar.
¹³ When Pilate therefore heard that saying, he brought Jesus forth, and sat down in the judgment seat in a place that is called the Pavement, but in the Hebrew, Gabbatha.
¹⁴ And it was the preparation of the passover, and about the sixth hour: and he saith unto the Jews, Behold your King!
¹⁵ But they cried out, Away with him, away with him, crucify him. Pilate saith unto them, Shall I crucify your King? The chief priests answered, We have no king but Caesar.
¹⁶ Then delivered he him therefore unto them to be crucified. And they took Jesus, and led him away.
¹⁷ And he bearing his cross went forth into a place called the place of a skull, which is called in the Hebrew Golgotha:
¹⁸ Where they crucified him, and two other with him, on either side one, and Jesus in the midst.
¹⁹ And Pilate wrote a title, and put it on the cross. And the writing was Jesus Of Nazareth The King Of The Jews.
²⁰ This title then read many of the Jews: for the place where Jesus was crucified was nigh to the city: and it was written in Hebrew, and Greek, and Latin.
²¹ Then said the chief priests of the Jews to Pilate, Write not, The King of the Jews; but that he said, I am King of the Jews.
²² Pilate answered, What I have written I have written.
²³ Then the soldiers, when they had crucified Jesus, took his garments, and made four parts, to every soldier a part; and also his coat: now the coat was without seam, woven from the top throughout.
²⁴ They said therefore among themselves, Let us not rend it, but cast lots for it, whose it shall be: that the scripture might be fulfilled, which saith, They parted my raiment among them, and for my vesture they did cast lots. These things therefore the soldiers did.
²⁵ Now there stood by the cross of Jesus his mother, and his mother's sister, Mary the wife of Cleophas, and Mary Magdalene.
²⁶ When Jesus therefore saw his mother, and the disciple standing by, whom he loved, he saith unto his mother, Woman, behold thy son!
²⁷ Then saith he to the disciple, Behold thy mother! And from that hour that disciple took her unto his own home.
²⁸ After this, Jesus knowing that all things were now accomplished, that the scripture might be fulfilled, saith, I thirst.
²⁹ Now there was set a vessel full of vinegar: and they filled a spunge with vinegar, and put it upon hyssop, and put it to his mouth.
³⁰ When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, he said, It is finished: and he bowed his head, and gave up the ghost.
³¹ The Jews therefore, because it was the preparation, that the bodies should not remain upon the cross on the sabbath day, (for that sabbath day was an high day,) besought Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away.
³² Then came the soldiers, and brake the legs of the first, and of the other which was crucified with him.
³³ But when they came to Jesus, and saw that he was dead already, they brake not his legs:
³⁴ But one of the soldiers with a spear pierced his side, and forthwith came there out blood and water.
³⁵ And he that saw it bare record, and his record is true: and he knoweth that he saith true, that ye might believe.
³⁶ For these things were done, that the scripture should be fulfilled, A bone of him shall not be broken.
³⁷ And again another scripture saith, They shall look on him whom they pierced.
³⁸ And after this Joseph of Arimathaea, being a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews, besought Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus: and Pilate gave him leave. He came therefore, and took the body of Jesus.
³⁹ And there came also Nicodemus, which at the first came to Jesus by night, and brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about an hundred pound weight.
⁴⁰ Then took they the body of Jesus, and wound it in linen clothes with the spices, as the manner of the Jews is to bury.
⁴¹ Now in the place where he was crucified there was a garden; and in the garden a new sepulchre, wherein was never man yet laid.
⁴² There laid they Jesus therefore because of the Jews' preparation day; for the sepulchre was nigh at hand.

More Easter Poems Here 
and here and here