We all too commonly speak of the sufferings of Christ without giving a great deal of thought to their unfathomable depths. And we are also much too prone to think of His sufferings primarily in terms of His physical pains on the cross---but as great as those sufferings were they were the least of His anguish. What bore most heavily upon Him, infinitely so, was the soul-sufferings He endured at the hands of divine justice. He stood as the sinless substitute for all the multiplied millions of His people, those who were given to Him by the Father in the covenant of grace before the world began. And as their Mediator and Redeemer He took upon Himself all their transgressions and bore the equivalent of eternal death and damnation in their behalf, all in the space of a few hours. 

    The weight of this infinitely great load began to come down upon Him in the Garden of Gethsemane before His betrayal and arrest. Who among us mere mortals can begin to comprehend the slightest particle of what He felt when he "began to be sorrowful and very heavy" and said to Peter, James and John, "My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death" (See Matt. 26:37-38)? What can we poor, ignorant souls know of the awful anguish He was going through when He was "in an agony" and prayed earnestly, "Father, if thou be willing, remove this cup from me"? Or how could we know anything of an inward distress and agitation so great that His sweat came out in droplets as large as if it had been blood? And then the ultimate agony, far surpassing all expression or human understanding, came when He cried with a loud voice, "My God, my God, why has thou forsaken me?" 

    Oh what an awful debt we owed, that such an infinite penalty was required at the hands of the very Son of God in order to absolve us of our guilt, put away our sins and deliver us from the wrath to come. And what a debt of gratitude and praise we now owe Him for His great mercy toward us. Let us not forget to thank Him daily and to honor Him with lives of service and devotion. I believe that in heaven we will understand the greatness of His sacrifice far better than we do now.