“Your only hope for joy, your only hope for peace, your only hope for comfort, your only hope for strength and your only hope for love in this life … is found in the cross of Jesus Christ. Your only hope in this life is found in the brutal, bloody, humiliation of a naked man on a wooden post." David Platt

Crossbeam tearing wounded flesh...hammer striking iron...

shrieks of unfathomable pain...drops of redemption blood...

grimace with each agonizing breath...

trembling limbs stretched...

startled eyes searching the heavens...

haunting thoughts of abandonment and betrayal...

uncontrollable sobs from a grieving mother...

jeers from a lost crowd...repentant cries from a thief...

merciful eyes forgiving humanity...

He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree,

so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness;

by his wounds you have been healed. I Peter 2:24