Many words have been written about the crucifixion of Jesus. Yet words can never be fully adequate to capture the depths of the mystery of human sin and evil that is so bound up with the mystery of the redemptive love of God in Christ Jesus. I was drawn to a short poem by George Herbert (1593-1633) and need not say more.
The Agony
--George Herbert (1593-1633)
Philosophers have measured mountains,
Fathomed the depths of seas, of states, and kings,
Walked with a staff to heaven, and traced fountains:
But there are two vast, spacious things
The which to measure it doth more behoove:
Yet few there are that sound them: Sin and Love.
Who would know Sin, let him repair
Unto Mount Olivet; there shall he see
A man so wrung with pains that all his hair,
His skin, his garments bloody be.
Sin is that press and vice, that forceth pain
To hunt his cruel food through every vein.
Who knows not Love, let him assay
And taste that juice, which on the cross a pike
Did set again abroach; then let him say
If ever he did taste the like.
Love is that liquor sweet and most divine
Which my God feels as blood; but I, as wine.
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