Morning & Evening Devotional Reading–

April 14– Morning

 by C. H. Spurgeon, revised and edited by W. C. Neff

“All those who see me laugh me to scorn: they shoot out their lips at me and wag their heads (with hatred).” 

—Psalm 22:7

 

Mockery was a great ingredient in our Lord’s suffering. Judas mocked him in the garden; the chief priests and scribes laughed him to scorn; Herod discarded him; the servants and the soldiers jeered at him, and brutally insulted him; Pilate and his guards ridiculed his royalty; and on the tree all sorts of horrid jests and hideous taunts were hurled at him. Ridicule is always hard to bear, but, when we’re in intense pain, it is so heartless, so cruel that it cuts to the very bone of life itself.

Think of the Savior crucified, racked with anguish far beyond all imagination. And then picture that motley multitude, all wagging their heads or thrusting out their lips in bitterest contempt of one poor, suffering victim! Their unanimous hatred was a display of the worst evil; and yet, in the very moment of its greatest apparent triumph, it could do no more than mock at that victorious goodness which was then reigning on the cross.

O Jesus, “despised and rejected of men,” how could you die for men who treated you so poorly? This is an amazing love, love divine, love beyond degree. We, too, have despised you in the days before our rebirth, and even since our new birth we have too often honored the world in our hearts, and yet you bleed to heal our wounds and die to give us life.

O that we could set you on a glorious high throne in all men’s hearts! We would ring out your praises over land and sea until men should as universally adore you just as they once unanimously rejected you. [M&E]