REFLECTIONS ON THE STATIONS OF THE CROSS
REFLECTIONS ON THE STATIONS OF THE CROSS
I: Jesus is judged to death
Oh, Lord,
Everyone on that day was sure that by condemning You, agreeing internally with the judgement passed on You, or even actively supporting the actions of Pilate and the high priests, he was doing a just deed. Of course, after all, a sense of collective solidarity gives a sense of security. What the chosen people enslaved by the pagans can need more that to feel themselves secured? After all, You did not become for them the Liberator King, You did not establish their truth on earth, You did not put their enemies to shame, You did not grant them a pleasure of revenge and triumph over all who despise them. So let You crucified, let the Caesar be a king for us, maybe this way we will get rid of the feeling of humiliation. This is exactly what we think, denying Your Reign in our hearts and worshiping the kings of the world, worshiping together, worshiping them imitating each other, in order to feel safe, to feel successful, opposite to those who follows the Crucified King.
Forgive us, Lord, as we are so weak and small in faith, and grant us ability to see behind the Cross the Radiance of Your Glory, the Glory of the True King! Amen.
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II: Jesus takes up His Cross
Oh Savior,
how can I understand, how can I believe that the heavy cross that You took on Your shoulders is the weight of all my sins that I have committed, committing now and will commit while I am living on this earth? How can I believe that You knew me long before you formed me in the womb of my mother, You knew whom you want to see me and you knew whom I would become. Giving me life, introducing me into this world, You already knew that you would take up the cross of my mistakes, the cross of all that evil that I would bring with me into the world. And by Your Cross you will save me from eternal condemnation. How can I believe this, except by the power of Your grace, for which I ask you humbly standing under Your Cross? Amen.
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III: Jesus falls for the first time
Oh, Lord,
You are the True God, but You did not consider it humiliating to become a True Human. You fell, and this fall is not of God, but of Man. The fall of each of us. How many such falls have been and will be on our way to eternity. The ancient enemy does not sleep; he wants to turn our every fall into despair. “You fell”, he whispers, poisoning our thoughts. “You fell, which means your path is completed. You failed as your God failed. Stay here, in the place of your fall, come to terms with this reality, praise yourself for being able to pass at least a little and do not even think to get up”. And while our will is paralyzed by poison of the devil’s temptations, You, oh Lord, are rising up. Not for yourself, but for me. Sweating and bleeding, You are rising up to carry my cross, which you have taken on Your shoulders to Calvary, to the place of my liberation and healing. In You, Lord, I also rise. Only in You, only by Your Power I can silence the devil, only by Your strength I can continue the path. So grant it to me. Amen
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IV: Jesus meets His Mother on the way to Calvary
During hard times we often recall our carefree childhood. God created Adam and Eve as adults, and their children were born in a world that had fallen away from God, there were almost no memory of the bliss of paradise. Is it not for this that God gave people lost the memory of paradise such a lively and joyful experience of childhood, so that by remembering these days, full in the sunlight, as we imagine our childhood, we could anticipate the eternal joy of life with God. And You, Lord, were a child too – the beloved and only Son of Your Mother. It was She who gave You – to the Eternal Word, to the Son of God, a feeling of security, peace and comfort. It was She who was Your only support and helper during those years of Your life hidden from us. What did you remember, Lord, when you saw in the crowd Her eyes full of love and pain? Maybe those happy and carefree days spent with Joseph and Mary? Lord, for the sake of that endless love, fidelity and inescapable sorrow that lives in the Heart of Your Mother, bless all parents, those who are alive and those who have left this world. Amen
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V: Simon of Cyrene helps Jesus carry the Cross
Lord,
among the crazy crowd, not long ago singing Hosanna to You, and now full of malicious joy, looking at Your sufferings, there was a man who gave Your shoulders a rest from the weight of our sins, even it didn’t last long. The man whose name was Simon came to your aid. Two thousand years have passed, and we remember him with gratitude. And his name and the place where he was from. So in face – who was a helper and who was helped? Remembering this station f Your Way of the Cross, Lord, we ask You, bless and save from all evil all those who helped and helps us to bear our cross. And open our eyes to the suffering of others, so that we can help those who are weary under the weight of their cross, so that we can walk with at least the part part of the way. Indeed, You are living in in each of them. Amen.
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VI: Veronica wipes the face of Jesus
On the days when mental or physical pain engulfs our entire being, we feel completely abandoned and alone. How we need to see a face full of sincere compassion and willingness to help in this noise of banal, meaningless consolations, in this obsessive and monotonous sounds of so-called “right phrases of encouragement”. Could Veronica save You from these torments? And was her attempt to wipe your face so important for pacifying the pain that pierced your entire body? “You are more beautiful than all the sons of men” the Psalmist once sang about You. And now You are disfigured by thousands of blows. No one would have enough strength to restore Your former appearance but it did not stop Veronica. Her heart did not remain indifferent to your suffering. “Let him, who is going to his execution, feel like a man again, even for a moment,” she thought, fearlessly separating herself from the crowd. “Let all of these heartless people see a Man in Him!” Perhaps for a moment Your face was changed, Veronica wiped off the blood and dirt, the crowd was able to catch Your glance – in which there was a pain, but there was no condemnation and hate. Who knows how many hearts turned at that moment. Lord, we pray You, let the compassion and fearlessness of Saint Veronica be an example of attitude for us towards those who are easier to be condemned, easier to be refused than to be rescued. Amen.
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VII: Jesus falls for the second time
Lord, you know everything, you know how quick we are to condemn those who denounced an evil in us by their own example or by their words, by their actions. How glad we are for the downfalls of those we consider as moral authorities. Surely, because each of their fall is like a release for us from responsibility for our personal sins. The world rubs its hands with glee every time problems arise in Your Church. After all, Your Voice, which the Church speaks, cannot leave anyone indifferent. And what we have to do? One must either listen to this Voice and follow It, or eagerly look for ways to discredit, to overthrow from the pedestal, to silence the Church. Forgive us and have mercy, Lord, that we rejoice in the falls of others, that we justify ourselves with them or exalt ourselves above others. Grant us the grace to see only our own falls, grant us the grace to rise again and thereby to witness Your power that transforms hearts. Amen.
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VIII: Jesus meets the women of Jerusalem
Who else but the Son of God can be so generous and condescending towards the sons of men that even at the hour when it seemed that there was nothing left in Him – neither human nor divine dignity – to comfort others in the weeping. As eternally all of You are given to the Father, so now here, on sinful earth, all of You are turned to us, all of You are giving Yourself to us. True Lamb of God, we pray you, Lord, do not let us deceive ourselves and boast of our righteousness before You and others, for we have received everything that we have from You. If we comfort others, it means you first comforted us. Amen.
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IX: Jesus falls for the third time
And again an evil hiss sounds in the heart – “look at yourself, you fell again, does the Lord need someone like you? Everyone is on their feet, look, some are even on top, and you? You are again in the pit of you vices. Your God helped them, because they are stronger than you. He forgot about you. And the Church does not remember you. She has her own favorites, not as drooping as you. So have a pride, have a respect for yourself, go away, leave this path. That is not for you”
Lord, my help is in the Holy Spirit, who inspired the apostle to say – “For as He suffered, being himself tempted, he can help those who are tempted.” Get away from me, Satan, my Lord passed the way that was assigned to me, in Him I have already defeated you, in Him I have already risen above my sins, did you not know that? Here is the sign of the cross, the sign of my Lord’s victory over my sin. Amen.
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X: Jesus is stripped of His garments
Lord,
From the day of Your Incarnation and Birth into the world, You did not come to collect for Yourself, but to give Yourself. Will we ever be able, while still alive, to fully realize that by coming to church for divine services, we are not doing you a favor. What favor can we do to the Lord, who silently allows us to take away from Himself the last testimony of His not even divine, but human dignity – His clothes? We can only respond to Your Sacrifice by stretching out our empty palms to You, calling on You as the Savior. Our sins do not insult You, Lord, as our conviction that we do not need salvation. We are weak, and You know this, for this reason you came into the world and suffered, and deprived Yourself of heavenly glory, in order to become in everything like us, apart from sin, to rapture us to heaven with Yourself. Do not allow us, Lord, to devalue Your Sacrifice with our pride. Do not let us fall into the snares of the evil one who tells us that we do not need Your Sacrifice or that Your Sacrifice has no power to change us. Amen.
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XI: Jesus is nailed to the Cross
Here it is, that moment of the slaughter of the Lamb.
May God the Father be glorified, for He has known from time immemorial that the man created by Him will turn away from Him, and the blood of His Son will be the price of our return to Him. Amen
Glorified be the Son, who accepted the Father’s will and redeemed us by His blood. Amen
Glorified be the Holy Spirit, who opens our eyes to the truth and motivates us to seek Salvation in Christ. Amen.
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XII: Jesus dies on the cross
It is done.
Together with the Most Holy Theotokos the Virgin Mary, in unity with all the angels, with all the saints, let us stand in silence at the foot of the Cross, on which the Savior of the world, the Lord of the Universe, the Son of God Jesus Christ is Crucified.
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XIII: Jesus is taken down from the Cross
This is the hour of a false triumph of all the forces of evil. The Hope of the World is killed. Silence took over everything. Sorrow chained the heart of everyone who trusted in You, Lord. How many times in our lives it seemed to us that You really died? When we are sure that the evil in us has won, when we go into unhealthy laughter, celebrating our personal defeat, when we embrace our sins like old friends, as if they are the only thing we have. Salvation did not happen, whether we could not, You could not, what’s the difference? You died and that’s all we know about You and about ourselves too.
How wrong we are! Can we believe that at this moment, when evil reigned seemingly forever in our hearts, the Lord Himself descends into the hell of our soul to destroy that hell? Yes, we can! Lord, I’m waiting for You. In the hell to which I have doomed myself, I am waiting for you, Savior. Amen
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XIV: Jesus is laid in the tomb
Lord, you took everything with You behind that stone that the Roman legionaries put to your tomb. My pain, my despair, my loneliness. I am so used to them that it seems that without them there is no me. It seems like I have died myself. So be it, Lord. I want to die to my old life and be buried with You. After all, I believe that not even three days will pass before a new life will be born in me, Your Life, oh the Risen Lord, and this life will never end. And the enemy, who has pursued me all this way, will be put to shame by Your Victory. To You the Kingdom and power and glory forever. Amen.
By Paulus T.A. (Baku)
9 March 2020