This year the Sanctuary Choir sang Dubois's Seven Last Words of Christ. Dubois's work uses scripture as lyrics to tell the story from the time Jesus is put to trial until he utters his final words. If you have never heard the work I suggest looking up a performance online.
Beginning with a powerful and frightening piece, the choir painted a picture during The First Word of what it must have been like to be Jesus on Good Friday. Singing from Matthew 27:22,25, "He is death guilty! He is death guilty! Take him! Let us crucify Him!" The Second through the Sixth words give insight to Jesus's thoughts as he prays in the garden and realizes the task he has before himself. The Seventh Word is the ending of His life. At the end of the work, a prayer is given in the form of a beautiful chorale.
"Christ, we do all adore the, and we do praise thee forever. For on the holy cross hast thou the world from sin redeemed. Christ we do all adore thee and we do praise thee forever."
As the chorale was being sung, three members of the audience came up to extinguish the Christ candle (explained in an earlier post) and covered the serving plates on Lord's Supper table. Once the table was covered, the crown of thorns, which had been around the Christ Candle, was placed at the head of the table and the candle was taken out of the Sanctuary. The picture below was taken after the service so you all could kind of get the idea of the end product, the image of a buried Christ.
My words can not do justice the meaningfulness of this service. I know I would have been in the middle of the masses on Palm Sunday praising our new king. And it pains me to know I would have been in the masses on Good Friday, too. To know Jesus still loves us after he was turned on so quickly during Holy week, and still loves us today makes me ready for Easter Sunday.
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