14. Turning from his enemies, our Lord describes his own personal condition
in language which should bring the tears into every loving eye. I am pouredout like water. He was utterly spent, like water poured upon the earth; his
heart failed him, and had no more firmness in it than running water, and his
whole being was made a sacrifice, like a libation poured out before the Lord.
He had long been a fountain of tears; in Gethsemane his heart welled over in
sweat, so that he was reduced to the most feeble and exhausted state. All mybones am out of joint. As if distended upon a rack. Is it not most probable
that the fastening of the hands and feet, and the jar occasioned by fixing the
cross in the earth, may have dislocated the bones of the Crucified One? If this
is not intended, we must refer the expression to that extreme weakness which
would occasion relaxation of the muscles and a general sense of parting asunder
throughout the whole system. My heart is like wax; it is melted in the midstof my bowels. Excessive debility and intense pain made his inmost life to
feel like wax melted in the heat. The Greek liturgy uses the expression “thine unknown sufferings,” and
well it may. The fire of almighty wrath would have consumed our souls forever
in hell; it was no light work to bear as a substitute the heat of an anger so
justly terrible.
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