Still unvanquished by pain, he is even with his last breath pronouncing words of grace and consolation for the guilty and repentant! He is mighty to save even in his humiliation!
The third utterance is recorded by St. John as follows:—
"Now there stood by the cross of Jesus his mother, and his mother's sister, Mary the wife of Cleophas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus, therefore, saw his mother standing, and the disciple whom he loved, he said to his mother, Woman, behold thy son, and to the disciple, Son, behold thy mother."
Thus far, every utterance of Jesus has been one of thoughtful consideration for others, of prayer for his enemies, of grace and pardon to the poor wretch by his side, and of tenderness to his mother and disciple. But in tasting death for every man our Lord was to pass through a deeper experience; he was to know the sufferings of the darkened brain, which, clogged and impeded by the obstructed circulation, no longer afforded a clear medium for divine communion. He was to suffer the eclipse which the animal nature in its dying state can interpose between the soul and God. Three hours we are told had passed, when there was darkness over all the land, like that that was slowly gathering over the head of the suffering Lord. "And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eloi, Eloi, lama sabacthani, which is, being interpreted, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" Those words, from the Psalm of David, come now as the familiar language expressive of that dreadful experience to which the whole world looks as its ransom:—
"After that, Jesus said, I thirst. And one ran and filled a sponge full of vinegar and put it on a reed and gave him to drink. And when he had received the vinegar, he said, It is finished, and he bowed his head."
What we read of his last utterance is that "he cried with a loud voice, and gave up the ghost." This last loud utterance was in the words, "Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit."
It is the interpretation that the church has given to these last words that they betokened a sudden flame of joyful perception, such as sometimes lights up the brain at the dying moment, after it has been darkened by the paralysis of death. As he said, "It is finished," light, and joy, and hope, flushed his soul, and with this loud cry of victory and joy, it departed like a ray of heavenly light to the bosom of the Father.
Such were the seven "last utterances" of Jesus—and when can we hope to attain to what they teach? When shall we be so grounded in Love that no tumult or jar of outward forces, no insults, no physical weariness, exhaustion, or shock of physical pain, shall have power to absorb us in selfishness, or make us forgetful of others? When shall pity and prayer be the only spontaneous movement of our hearts when most hurt and injured—pierced in the tenderest nerve? When shall thoughtfulness for others, and divine pity for degraded natures, be the immovable habit of our souls? How little of self and its sufferings in these last words; how much of pity and love—the pity and love of a God!
Could we but learn life's lessons by them, then will come at last to us the final hour, when, our trial being completed, we shall say "It is finished," and pass like him to the bosom of the Father.