The Seven Words
THE SEVEN WORDS
LAST WORDS are always impressive, especially when they come from the lips of one dearly loved. The atmosphere of the approaching end charges them with added solemnity and meaning. In the light of eternity, the trivial and nonessential is usually abandoned. It is recorded that when Lord William Russell mounted the scaffold, he took his watch from his pocket and gave it to Dr. Burnett with the remark, “I have no further use for this. My thoughts are in eternity.”
Because they were His last words, and spoken under such tragic circumstances, the seven sayings of our Lord from the pulpit of the cross are of special significance. In them He laid bare His inmost soul, and in them He exemplified the spiritual principles He had been teaching. They are a luminous interpretation of His sufferings, and for this reason are included in our study.
It is significant that He spoke seven times from the cross—a complete interpretation of the stupendous event that was being enacted. Each of these sayings is an ocean of truth compressed into a drop of speech, and warrants close and reverent study. It is to be expected that utterances on a cross would be staccato, and yet that monstrous monument was transformed into the most eloquent pulpit of the ages.
Seven times He spake, seven words of love,
And all three hours His silence cried
For mercy on the souls of men:
Jesus, our Lord, is crucified.
Suspended on the cross! On His pale brow
Hang the cold drops of death; through every limb
The piercing torture rages; every nerve,
Stretched with excess of pain, trembles convulsed.
Now look beneath and view the senseless crowd; How they deride His sufferings, how they shake
Their heads contemptuous, while the bitter taunt,
More bitter than the gall they gave, insults
The agony of Him on whom they gaze.
But hark! He speaks, and the still hovering breath
Wafts His last breath to all approving heaven:
“Forgive them, for they know not what they do!”C. P. LAYARD