During the final hours of His life, Jesus made seven last statements to mankind, illustrating His nature and what He considered to be important for us.

As we follow the pattern set by Jesus Christ, we will suffer as God prepares us for roles of great glory as members of His Family.

We have all seen 'WWJD?' on bracelets, T-shirts, and the like. Perhaps a better question is, "What *did* Jesus do?" because He left us the perfect example.

Four distinct Old Testament Messianic prophecies were fulfilled by Christ's death and cited by the Apostle John.

What was in Jesus' mind during His final hours as a human being? The Bible shows that Jesus' thoughts were not on Himself or the sins He was bearing.

The seven last sayings of Christ were all determined well before the creation of the earth.

What was Jesus thinking about during His last hours as a human? The gospel accounts reveal what Jesus knew about His suffering, death, and resurrection.

Our response to God's call has not removed all of our suffering. However, responding to God changes the reason for suffering and what it can accomplish.

Christ's sacrifice was not merely substitutionary, but representative, with Christ giving us a pattern for life - mortifying our flesh and putting out sin.

Christ endured many more than three temptations; rather, He was tested continuously, and perhaps the intensity increased as He neared the end of His life.

We are never to be ashamed of God's truth no matter what the consequences. For those who keep this charge, God will reciprocate with honor.

Crucifixion is man's most cruel form of punishment. Why did Jesus need to die this way? What does it teach us? And was Jesus stabbed before or after He died?

Our goal is to know Christ on a personal basis, knowing the power of His resurrection. This knowledge should be a practical understanding of His power.

Our lives parallel what Christ experienced: crucifixion, burial, resurrection, and glorification. The death of self must precede resurrection and glory.

Hard trials are not punishments from God for unrighteousness but tests of faith in which He is intimately involved to prepare us for the world to come.

In taking undue attention off the self, sacrifice (as an act and as a way of life) creates peace, prosperity, cooperation, and most of all, character.

In Hebrews, we learn that Jesus is the only- begotten Son, creator and heir of all things, the express image of God's person, and has purged our sins.

Daniel 7:25 reveals the strategy of the enemy: a concerted effort of the Beast to physically, mentally, and if possible, spiritually wear out the saints.

We must fight against the world's pulls (including advertising), simplifying our lives, seeking quiet to meditate and build a relationship with God.

The most formidable foe in our spiritual battle is the flesh. We must mortify, slay, and crucify the flesh, enduring suffering as Jesus Christ exemplified.

Being God's Son was not enough to automatically qualify Him to be our High Priest. He was made complete and fully ready to be High Priest through sufferings.

As soon as The Father and Son created man with the ability to choose right or wrong, They exposed Themselves to the certainty that humanity would rebel.

Films try to depict the suffering and death of Jesus Christ, but have all fallen short of presenting the full dimensions of the event—the price of our sin.

As God has designed the physical healing process, God has also designed spiritual healing, requiring that faith, suffering, and healing be part of the same process.

Jesus calls on us to remember His affliction, including the piercing, the cup, the sour wine, and the gall.

We share in Christ's suffering, realizing that glory follows suffering. It may involve enduring hardship, deprivation, duress, and outright boredom.

Christ's suffering was not confined to crucifixion, but also consisted of rejection, humiliation, and the duress of persecution. Glory follows suffering.

Affliction is a necessary aspect of life, yielding strength of character, while ease and comfort weaken us. Christ was perfected as High Priest through suffering.

Among his many other accomplishments, King David was a significant prophet. Psalm 22, for example, is a clearly recognizable prophecy of Christ's suffering.

Since the church no longer keeps the Passover with the slaughter of a lamb, we miss important and poignant details that could enhance our observance.

Genesis is a book of beginnings, and in that theme, it also contains the first prophecy. Part of it is God's curse on the serpent in Genesis 3:14-15.

Although many have gone through sore trials, virtually no one has gone through the nightmarish persecutions suffered by the early Christians in Imperial Rome.

Affliction seems to be an integral part of Christianity. However, when it is viewed in the context of eternity, it is relatively light.

There are three components to Christ's composite sacrifice for our salvation: His death through the shedding of His blood, His body, and His resurrection.

We can be assured that we are God's heirs and offspring if we are led by the spirit, remaining on the sanctified path of fellowship, growing continually.

Keeping the leaven out is very important in its own right. However, our primary focus should not be on the leavened bread but on the unleavened bread.

The absence of the 100 pounds of aloes, the folded 'turban,' and the rolled away stone indicate that a thorough cleansing and purification had occurred.

Paul conveyed to the Philippians his optimism that his imprisonment was actually a blessing, enabling him to magnify his effectiveness and bear more fruit.

In God's hands, trials and afflictions are tools to produce refined character and joy, and to move us away from worldly choices and back to His purpose.

The book of Hebrews provides reasons to recapture flagging zeal, focusing on the reason for our hope and faith, establishing Christ's credentials.

Calamities, trials, anxiety, evil, and calamities, as well as blessings, happen to Christians in order to become fashioned and molded into God's image.

Christ's bearing of our sicknesses and infirmities may have taken place throughout His life. He may have been acquainted with ill health for our benefit.

Hebrews is addressed to a people living at the end of an era, who were drifting away, had lost their devotion, and were no longer motivated by zeal.

Because we have been tempted and failed many times, and had to overcome, we will be able encourage those resurrected, proving that it is not impossible.

Many are shocked at the seeming lack of sensitivity in the Father's bruising of His Son. He struck the Being He loved most to add multiple members to His family.

What appeared to be a series of judicial set-backs for Paul was actually the outworking of God to place him before even higher levels of secular leadership.

As we approach the coming self-examination prior to Passover, we can apply six significant lessons taught to ancient Israel through the book of Lamentations.

Book One of the Psalms, parallel with the spring season, focuses on the Messianic prophecies, revealing God's plan to redeem Israel by crushing Satan.

Like the Ephesians, the weary veterans in Hebrews were becoming apathetic through outside pressures, losing their former zeal and devotion to Christ.

Love for this world will inevitably bring disillusionment. Because the world is passing away, our priorities should be to fear God and keep his commandments.

In Lamentations 3, the narrator finally convinces Lady Jerusalem that her own sins have caused her necessary punishment and affliction by God.