Morning & Evening Daily Devotional Reading– April 9

by Charles H. Spurgeon, Revised and Edited by William C. Neff

“A great company of people followed Jesus, including a number of women who wailed and cried for Him.”

—Luke 23:27

Among the crowds that hounded the Redeemer to His doom, there were some whose bitter anguish expressed itself in wailing and tears. When I imagine the Savior bearing His cross to Calvary, I see myself joining those godly women who wept for Him. Indeed, there is much cause for grief– more cause than those mourning women may have thought. They cried, I’m sure, because Innocence was being mistreated; Goodness was persecuted; Love was bleeding, and Meekness was about to die.

But my heart has a deeper and more bitter cause to mourn. My sins were the whips that cut those blessed shoulders and crowned his bleeding head with thorns. My sins cried out, “Crucify Him! crucify Him!” His being led forth to die is sorrowful enough, but being His murderer is infinitely more grief than I can bear.

It is not hard to guess why those women loved and wept for Him. But they have no more reason than I, and I have a reason to rejoice in what He accomplished for me. The widow from Nain saw her son restored, but I myself have been raised to newness of life. Peter’s mother-in-law was cured of the fever, but I have been cured of the greater plague of sin. Out of Mary Magdalene seven demons were cast, but a whole legion has come out of me. Mary and Martha were favored with visits from the Lord, but He lives with me each day.

Lord, You have relieved me of the same debt as these women, so don’t let me express any less tears of gratitude or sorrow. [M&E]