Fifth Sunday in Lent – Sunday

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And they shall mourn for Him as one mourneth for his only son. Zechariah 12:10.

Now the soldiers took off the scarlet mock-robe from Jesus, and put His own raiment on Him, and led Him away to crucify Him. And He carried His cross, until the Roman soldiers concluded that He needed help with the burden. They met a man coming out of the country, Simon, of Cyrene in Africa, the father of Alexander and Rufus. The soldiers compelled this Simon to bear the cross after Jesus (Matthew 27:32; Mark 15:20-21; Luke 23:26). And there followed Him a great multitude of the people, and of women who bewailed and lamented Him. But Jesus, turning unto them, said: “Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for Me, but weep for yourselves and for your children. For, behold, the days are coming in which they shall say, Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that never bare, and the paps which never gave suck. Then shall they begin to say to the mountains, ‘Fall on us,’ and to the hills, ‘Cover us.’ For if they do these things in a green tree, what shall be done in the dry?” (Luke 23:28-31)

Thus Jesus foretold the great and terrible doom that was to come upon the Jewish people, the dry tree, because it rejected the Savior, the green Branch. And He desired not tears of human pity, but tears of true contrition, namely, tears that reveal sincere sorrow and regret over one’s sins. Following such tears of contrition, the Lord desires to work saving faith through the promises of mercy and forgiveness in the Gospel. If such promises are received in the heart of an individual by faith, then there will also be a God-pleasing sorrow and mourning for Jesus on account of what He suffered.

Knowing that He endured so much pain and agony, even the torments of hell itself on the cross, all on account of “our transgressions” (Isaiah 53:5), should certainly move us to great sadness, even as we also rejoice in the benefits of that redemptive work. Tears of repentance, the prophet foretells, saying: “And they shall mourn for Him, as one mourneth for his only son.”  

God continue to grant unto us such sadness over our Savior’s suffering, and such joy over His finished work for our salvation.

PRAYER. – Alas, my Lord and Savior, of myself I am in no way sufficient or able to meditate properly and beneficially upon Thy holy Passion. Therefore I pray Thee to have mercy upon me, and to give me a rich measure of Thy Holy Spirit, working through Thy Word, that I may always know that Thou didst suffer because of my sin, to redeem me therefrom, and to give me righteousness before God and eternal blessedness, to the end that I may be truly grieved again and again by my sin, and thank Thee more and more with a joyful heart for having so graciously saved me. Amen.

Come to Calvary’s holy mountain,

Sinners, ruined by the Fall;

Here a pure and healing fountain

Flows to you, to me, to all

In a full, perpetual tide,

Opened when our Savior died.

Come in poverty and meanness,

Come defiled, without, within;

From infection and uncleanness,

From the leprosy of sin,

Wash your robes and make them white;

Ye shall walk with God in light.

Come in sorrow and contrition,

Wounded, impotent, and blind;

Here the guilty free remission,

Here the troubled peace, may find.

Health this fountain will restore;

He that drinks shall thirst no more.

He that drinks shall live forever;

‘Tis a soul-renewing flood.

God is faithful; God will never

Break His covenant of blood,

Signed when our Redeemer died,

Sealed when He was glorified.

Hymn 149. [TLH]

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