[Salvation]

Wednesday – Fourth Week of Lent

The chief priest gathered up the money, but said, “it is not lawful to deposit this in the Temple treasury, for it is the price of blood.” After consultation, they used it to buy the potter’s field as a burial place for foreigners. That is why that field even today is calling the Field of Blood.
Then was fulfilled what had been said through Jeremiah the prophet, “And they took the thirty pieces of silver, the value of a man with a price on his head, a price set by some of the Israelites, and they paid it out for the potter’s field just as the Lord had commanded me.” (Mt. 27:6-10)

Here begins the haunting trail of innocent blood.

Judas tried to get rid of his guilt by throwing the “blood money” into the Temple. But the blood was still on his hands.

The chief priests and elders try to get ride of it by using it to buy a burial ground for the poor. But the blood was still on their hands.

Pilate will try to get rid of it by taking water, washing his hands, and saying, “I am innocent of this man’s blood.” But the blood will still be on his hands.

Trying to get rid of the blood of Jesus is futile. His blood is on all of us, for we are all sinners. What we need to do is acknowledge our sinfulness and let this blood do what it is meant to do. Wash away our sins.

It was for all of us that Jesus died. It was for Judas, for the chief priests and elders, for Pilate, for the people who said, “His blood be upon us and upon our children.”

It was for me that he died.

Spend some quiet time with the Lord.

[Salvation]

March 22, 2007

Passion Plays

From early times, Mystery Plays or Miracle Plays re-enacted scriptural events (and events in a saint’s life) as a way of teaching the truths of the faith. Some of these were elaborate productions, requiring three days’ performance.

The form best known today is the Passion Play which depicts the death and resurrection of Jesus. The most famous is performed at Oberammergau, a Bavarian village about 60 miles southwest of Munich.

Because of an outbreak of the bubonic plague in the 17th century, the people of Oberammergau prayed to be spared and vowed that the whole community would every ten years, stage a massive production that would present the story of Christ’s death and resurrection to the world. The town was spared from the plague, and the tradition of the Oberammergau Passion Play was born. It first performance was in 1634,

The play is performed on an open stage with seating for nearly 5,000 spectators. Members of the huge cast (there are 1,700 parts) must be Oberammergau natives, or have lived there for ten years.

The play lasts a whole day, with a three-hour break for lunch. The play is performed five times a week, running for several months. The most recent production took place May 22 to October 8, 2000.

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Josef Meier first performed the Passion Play in the United States in 1932. In 1939, his company settled in South Dakota’s Black Hills where the play is performed each summer.