The Hope of Glory: Reflections on the Last Words of Jesus from the Cross

Author: Meacham, Jon

Brand: Convergent Books

Color: White

Binding: Hardcover

Number Of Pages: 144

Release Date: 18-02-2020

Part Number: 0593236661_used

Details: Product Description
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • Pulitzer Prize–winning author Jon Meacham explores the seven last sayings of Jesus as recorded in the Gospels, combining rich historical and theological insights to reflect on the true heart of the Christian story.

For Jon Meacham, as for believers worldwide, the events of Good Friday and Easter reveal essential truths about Christianity. A former vestryman of Trinity Church Wall Street and St. Thomas Church Fifth Avenue, Meacham delves into that intersection of faith and history in this meditation on the seven phrases Jesus spoke from the cross.

Beginning with “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do” and ending with “Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit,” Meacham captures for the reader how these words epitomize Jesus’s message of love, not hate; grace, not rage; and, rather than vengeance, extraordinary mercy. For each saying, Meacham composes an essay on the origins of Christianity and how Jesus’s final words created a foundation for oral and written traditions that upended the very order of the world.

Writing in a tone more intimate than any of his previous works, Jon Meacham returns us to the moment that transformed Jesus from a historical figure into the proclaimed Son of God, worshiped by billions.
About the Author
Jon Meacham is a Pulitzer Prize–winning biographer. The Carolyn T. and Robert M. Rogers Chair in the American Presidency and distinguished visiting professor at Vanderbilt University, Meacham was educated at The University of the South, is a former member of the vestries of St. Thomas Church Fifth Avenue and of Trinity Church Wall Street, and was honored by the Anti-Defamation League with its Hubert H. Humphrey First Amendment Freedoms Prize. A fellow of the Society of American Historians, Meacham lives in Nashville with his wife and children.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Chapter 1

The First Word

There were also two others, criminals, led with Him to be put to death. And when they had come to the place called Calvary, there they crucified Him, and the criminals, one on the right hand and the other on the left. Then Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do.”

And they divided His garments and cast lots. And the people stood looking on. But even the rulers with them sneered, saying, “He saved others; let Him save Himself if He is the Christ, the chosen of God.”

The soldiers also mocked Him, coming and offering Him sour wine, and saying, “If You are the King of the Jews, save Yourself.” And an inscription also was written over Him in letters of Greek, Latin, and Hebrew:

THIS IS THE KING OF THE JEWS. —Luke 23:32–38

Jesus’s first remark from the cross is found exclusively in Luke: “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” It’s fitting that the first word should be as problematic as this one is, for the drama of the cross is itself mysterious.

Let us briefly recapitulate what we know about the road to Golgotha. Born to Mary, a young woman, Jesus preached the coming of the Kingdom of God, a kingdom that would unseat the temporal powers of the world and bring about a universal acknowledgment of Israel’s God. “Repent,” he said, “for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” In Mark, likely the earliest gospel, Jesus was reported to have foretold coming chaos, and then order:

And when ye shall hear of wars and rumors of wars, be ye not troubled: for such things must needs be; but the end shall not be yet.

For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be earthquakes in divers places, and there shall be famines and troubles: these are the beginnings of sorrows. . . .

In those days, after that tribulation, the sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light,

And the stars of heaven shall fall, and the powers that are in heaven shall be shaken.

And then shall they see the Son of man coming in the c

EAN: 9780593236666

Package Dimensions: 7.7 x 5.4 x 0.7 inches

Languages: English