Holy Week

How can Lent be almost over already? It is crazy how time has gone by so quickly and I haven't realized how fast it has actually been moving.  But this is ultimately my favorite week in the church. There is such deep reverence and we go through Christ's passion.


During every Holy Week, I watch The Passion of Christ.  It reminds me what Jesus put himself through for us! He didn't have to die on the cross, but he loved us so much that he wanted us to share with him eternal life.  How crazy is that? For every single sin that ever was, he died for that.  


Our crosses in life, we think that we are hard, but Jesus is carrying so much of our own cross, and we don't even realize it.  In the Stations of the Cross book that I have, one of my favorite lines is during the second stations of Jesus takes up His Cross:

"My Jesus, LORD, I take my daily cross. I welcome the monotony that often marks my day, discomforts of all kinds, the summer's heat, the winter's cold, my disappointments, tensions, setbacks, cares.  Remind me often that in carrying my cross, I carry Yours with You. And though I bear a sliver only of Your cross, You carry all of mine, except a sliver, in return."

Whenever I read that passage, I really see me just carrying a little toothpick size of wood, while I am walking beside Christ that has this HUGE cross of lumber on his back. I want to say that I will carry more, I want to tell him that he doesn't have to carry so much, just to help me a sinner.  But he carries that cross not just for me, and not just for you.  He carried that cross for EVERYONE.  

This season makes me think of two songs that are really close to me.  The first one is "By His Wounds" by Steven Curtis Chapman, Brian Littrell, Mac Powell, Mark Hall.  The second one is a not as well known, but it was a song that I sang in 8th grade choir  during Holy Week, and it has been always stuck in my head since.  It is "Face the Cross" by: Ruth Elaine Schram and Scott Schram.  That song is just powerful for me this time of the year.  Listen to them, and think about what Jesus did for us this Holy Week.  

How can we change our lives that just might make His Cross just a bit lighter?

We each have the choice, to face the cross, and be thankful for the greatest gift we have ever been given.  Or turn away from this gift, and say that our life and our selfish desires are all what really matter.