The Cost

Hello, friends. My name is Bill Crowder, and I'm glad you can join me for this devotional reading from Our Daily Bread that I've entitled, The Cost. Michelangelo's works explored many facets of the life of Jesus, yet one of the most poignant was also one of the most simple. In the 1540s, he sketched a pietà, a picture of Jesus' mother holding the body of the dead Christ for his friend, Vittoria Colonna. Done in chalk, the drawing depicts Mary looking to the heavens as she cradles her son's still form. Rising behind Mary, the upright beam of the cross carries these words from Dante's Paradise.

There, they don't think of how much blood it costs. Michelangelo's point was profound. When we contemplate the death of Jesus, we must consider the price he paid. The price paid by Christ is captured in his dying declaration, It is finished.

The term for It is finished, telestai, was used in several ways to show a bill had been paid, a task finished, a sacrifice offered, a masterpiece completed. Each of them applies to what Jesus did on our behalf on the cross. Perhaps that's why the Apostle Paul in Galatians 6 wrote, May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world. Jesus' willingness to take our place is the eternal evidence of how much God loves us. As we contemplate the price he paid, may we also celebrate his love and give thanks for the cross.

Today's Our Daily Bread devotional scripture reading is from John chapter 19, verses 25 to 30. Near the cross of Jesus stood his mother, his mother's sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus saw his mother there and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to her, Woman, here is your son. And to the disciple, here is your mother.

From that time on, this disciple took her into his home. Later, knowing that everything had now been finished and so that scripture would be fulfilled, Jesus said, I am thirsty. A jar of wine vinegar was there, so they soaked a sponge in it, put the sponge on a stalk of the hyssop plant and lifted it to Jesus' lips. When he had received the drink, Jesus said, It is finished.

With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit. Let's pray. Father, how grateful we are for your love to us and your love for us and how shocking and amazing and awesome it is that you would manifest that love in such a costly way in Jesus giving himself for us on the cross. May we never stop being grateful and may we ever celebrate the wondrous love that sent your son for us. In Jesus' name, amen. Today's encouragement was provided by Our Daily Bread Ministries.