Bernard: O sacred Head, now wounded

Friday, April 18, 2014
    Good Friday
Meditation:
    Then the governor’s soldiers took Jesus into the Praetorium and gathered the whole company of soldiers around him. They stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him, and then twisted together a crown of thorns and set it on his head. They put a staff in his right hand and knelt in front of him and mocked him. “Hail, king of the Jews!” they said. They spit on him, and took the staff and struck him on the head again and again.
    —Matthew 27:27-30 (NIV)
Quotation:
O sacred Head, now wounded, with grief and shame weighed down,
Now scornfully surrounded with thorns, Thine only crown;
How art Thou pale with anguish, with sore abuse and scorn!
How does that visage languish, which once was bright as morn!

What Thou, my Lord, hast suffered, was all for sinners’ gain;
Mine, mine was the transgression, but Thine the deadly pain.
Lo, here I fall, my Savior! ’Tis I deserve Thy place;
Look on me with Thy favor, vouchsafe to me Thy grace.
    ... Bernard of Clairvaux (1091-1153), included in Masterpieces of Religious Verse, James Dalton Morrison, ed., New York: Harper & Bros., 1948, p. 198 (see the book)
    See also Matt. 27:27-30; Ps. 69:7; Isa. 53:3-5; Matt. 20:18-19; Mark 15:16-19; Luke 23:3-37; John 19:1-3; Rom. 5:8; Heb. 12:2-3; 1 Pet. 3:18-20
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, You are the King.

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