No you didn't waste any money.  The Stations are a marvelous way to meditate 
on the death of Our Lord, and his suffering.  I think what you are doing is 
a wonderful way to reach out to your Catholic brothers and sisters. 
Considering there is still a lot of anti Catholic sentiment among 
protestants even today.  As exhibited in the sad post below.  It also 
exhibits the lack of understanding the stations are celebrated by many 
protestant churches as well.  As the stations are a marvelous method for 
focusing our attention on the suffering of our Lord to cleanse us from our 
sins to say the stations are man made is ridiculous.  As they are based in 
scripture.  These are they.  Though the 14 stations are written below, the 8 
celebrated by protestants are expanded on to show how the meditation is 
practiced.   In increasing numbers, even evangelical Protestants are 
rediscovering the value of liturgically shaped communal and personal 
devotional practices. As a result, there has been an increasing interest 
from Protestants in the Stations of the Cross, especially as part of a Good 
Friday service of worship. Some churches combine the Stations of the Cross 
with a Tenebrae service, a Service of Darkness that climaxes the Services of 
Holy Week before Easter Sunday. However, the Stations are used, they can 
become a powerful, and for many innovative, means of worship.

Many Protestants prefer to use only eight Stations of the Cross, since those 
are the main events recorded in the Gospel accounts about Jesus' journey.

Station 1:  Pilate Condemns Jesus to Die
Station 2:  Jesus Accepts His Cross
Station 3:  Simon Helps Carry the Cross
Station 4:  Jesus Speaks to the Women
Station 5:  Jesus Is Stripped of His Garments
Station 6:  Jesus Is Nailed to the Cross
Station 7:  Jesus Cares for His Mother
Station 8:  Jesus Dies on the Cross

However, some Protestants use an expanded form of the Stations to maintain 
the traditional fourteen stations but still include only events with a 
biblical basis.  This usually requires beginning the Stations with Jesus' 
prayer in Gethsemane.

1. Jesus Prays Alone
2. Jesus is Arrested
3. The Sanhedrin Tries Jesus
4. Pilate Tries Jesus
5. Pilate Condemns Jesus to Die
6. Jesus Wears the Crown of Thorns
7. Jesus Carries His Cross
8. Simon Helps Carry the Cross
9. Jesus Speaks to the Women
10. Jesus Is Nailed to the Cross
11. Criminals Speak to Jesus
12. Jesus Cares for His Mother
13. Jesus Dies on the Cross
14. Jesus is Laid in the Tomb

In most cases, especially if these are used in connection with a Tenebrae 
service, there is no mention of the Resurrection. There will be a place for 
that on Sunday morning. But to preserve the journey as a commitment to God 
in the darkness, the journey of the Stations should end at the cross and the 
tomb.

Some Protestants might be temped to use this solemn occasion as an 
opportunity to participate in Communion. However, this is not a proper use 
of Eucharist. Traditionally, for good theological reasons, Eucharist, 
Thanksgiving, is not offered on Good Friday. Eucharist is not primarily a 
sad occasion to remember death, but a "Thanksgiving" (which is what the word 
eucharist means) for grace, a celebration of God's salvation and 
restoration. While Eucharist is often offered on Maundy Thursday because of 
its association with the Last Supper and Passover, or on Easter Sunday as a 
celebration of forgiveness and hope, Friday is not the time for celebration. 
That moves too quickly and too easily to hope without first confessing our 
hopelessness without God.
Station 1

Now Jesus stood before the governor; and the governor asked him, "Are you 
the King of the Jews?" Jesus said, "You say so."  But when he was accused by 
the chief priests and elders, he did not answer.  Then Pilate said to him, 
"Do you not hear how many accusations they make against you?" But he gave 
him no answer, not even to a single charge, so that the governor was greatly 
amazed. . . . So when Pilate saw that he could do nothing, but rather that a 
riot was beginning, he took some water and washed his hands before the 
crowd, saying, "I am innocent of this man's blood; see to it yourselves." . 
. . and after flogging Jesus, he handed him over to be crucified. (Matt 
27:11-14, 24, 26b)

Jesus, I wish you would speak!  I wish you would proclaim who you are.  I 
wish you would confront the disbelief of the crowds and the arrogant 
cowardice of the powers that be. Surely someone will speak up for you! 
Where are the lepers who were healed?  Where are the blind who can now see? 
Where are all the people who ate the bread and fish on the hillside?  Where 
are those who followed you so easily when they thought you would become King 
of the Jews? Yet no one speaks.  No voice in the crowd comes to your 
defense. You stand alone.

You stand before Pilate, the power of Rome.  Weakness stands before 
strength.  And yet, Pilate, the ruthless enforcer for the Empire is not 
really in control here.  He cannot make you confess.  He cannot quiet the 
crowds. For all his power, he cannot find the courage to do what is right. 
So he does what is safe.  He yields to the crowds for the sake of order. 
Courage and strength do not always sit on thrones or judgment seats. Power 
is not always in the hands of Empires.

I have been alone.  I have been falsely accused, and no one has spoken for 
me.  I have been treated unfairly by those who could have used their power 
for better purposes. I can understand some of your feelings as you stand 
silently before Pilate and watch him proclaim his own innocence as he 
condemns an innocent man.

But perhaps I have treated others unfairly as well.  Perhaps I have not 
spoken up for others when they needed a voice.  There are those around me 
who have been treated unjustly.  Have I always had the courage to come to 
their defense?  There are those around me who feel alone and abandoned. 
Have I always been there for them? O Lord, forgive me for not always being 
who I should be.

I find it easy to condemn the moral cowardice of Pilate.  Have I ever given 
in to pressure from others to take the easy path rather than the right path? 
Have I ever chosen the easy path over the right path?

Jesus, I see in your silence the quiet strength that reveals a peace and a 
resolve.  O Lord, help me deal with the unfairness of life without becoming 
critical of others.  Help me to be sensitive to the pain and feelings of 
others.  Give me the courage to do what is right without being swayed by the 
demands of others.

Song or Music


Station 2:  Jesus Accepts His Cross


Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the governor's 
headquarters, and they gathered the whole cohort around him. They stripped 
him and put a scarlet robe on him, and after twisting some thorns into a 
crown, they put it on his head. They put a reed in his right hand and knelt 
before him and mocked him, saying, "Hail, King of the Jews!"  They spat on 
him, and took the reed and struck him on the head.  After mocking him, they 
stripped him of the robe and put his own clothes on him. Then they led him 
away to crucify him. (Matthew 27:27-31)

Carrying the cross by himself, he went out to what is called The Place of 
the Skull, which in Hebrew is called Golgotha. (John 19:17)

Jesus, I cringe at the pain of the thorns. But I am wounded far more deeply 
at the humiliation and degradation you suffer, that the very thing you came 
to offer us as a gift becomes a source of ridicule.  The crowds thought of a 
King in terms of power.  But you came to be the kind of King who shepherds 
his people, who takes responsibility for their wellbeing, whose principles 
are faithfulness, justice, and righteousness (Isa 11:3-4). And yet, the 
people are not ready for that kind of King.

I would like to think that I am ready to follow you who offer a Kingdom of 
peace and love for one another.  But am I?  Am I willing to yield my ideas 
of what the Kingdom should look like for the role of a servant?  Am I really 
so willing to give up my human preoccupation with power and control and 
accept a different kind of crown than I was expecting?

I see you accept the Cross in the midst of such mockery. You could have 
refused. What more could they have done to you? Yet you begin this journey, 
knowing full well where it will lead. I hear no words of complaint, no 
protestations of innocence, no cursing the injustice. And yet I am so prone 
to complain and whine about the most trivial things. Sometimes the things I 
face in my life are more than trivial.  Sometimes the troubles of life bear 
down on me. But I so easily fall into self-pity. I too often assume that I 
am the only one who bears a cross, or that my cross is larger and heavier 
than any others.

But I am not alone in that.  People all around me bear far more than I must 
bear. You accepted your cross without self-pity. O Lord, forgive me for 
forgetting that in my weakness I am driven to trust on you, and that in that 
trust my weakness becomes your strength.  Forgive my attitudes of self-pity 
that make me more repulsive than loving. I do not ask for crosses to bear. 
But when they come, give me the strength to bear them as one who follows 
your example.

Song or Music


Station 3:  Simon Helps Carry the Cross


They compelled a passer-by, who was coming in from the country, to carry his 
cross; it was Simon of Cyrene, the father of Alexander and Rufus. (Mark 
15:21)

Jesus, I can only imagine the awful weight of that cross you carry. It is 
not just the weight of beams of wood that presses down on you. It is also 
the weight of the burden you carry for those whom you have loved.  You came 
to offer them life, and yet they return only death.

So I see you fall from the crushing weight of pain and grief.  I don't know 
how many times you have fallen.  But I know that your physical strength is 
failing.  The soldiers must recognize this as well, because they force a man 
from the crowd to help you carry the cross the rest of the way to the place 
where you will be crucified.  Perhaps they are afraid that you will die 
before you make it to the top of the hill. The man of Cyrene was just a 
bystander passing through on his way into town from the countryside.  And 
yet he bears the weight of the cross to save your strength.

I would like to think that if I had been there I would have rushed from the 
crowd and volunteered to carry that cross for you.  But would I have had the 
courage to face the Roman soldiers and risk being forced to join you on a 
cross?  Would I have really been so eager to share your cross if it meant 
that I might have to die on one as well?  Would I have been willing to risk 
everything to ease your suffering for a few moments by letting you know that 
you were not alone?

Besides, I have my own crosses already.  I have as much as I can bear 
without taking on the added burdens of others. And what would people think 
of me if I were seen consorting with criminals and enemies of Rome in such a 
public spectacle?  So instead of offering to help, I tried to become 
invisible in the crowd.  And when the soldiers were looking around for 
someone to press into service, I looked away and pretended not to notice 
what was happening.

It is easy to pretend not to see the needs, the grief, and the suffering 
around me every day.  It is easy to pretend not to hear the cries for help 
that come in many forms from those among whom I walk every day.  It is easy 
to convince myself that I am too busy, or too tired, or have too much on my 
plate already to get involved in the lives of others.  There are simply too 
many who need too much.

And yet I remember something that you said, something about taking up my own 
cross and following you. You said something about becoming a servant of all, 
of putting myself last and others first.  Is this what it means to be a 
servant?  Jesus, are you showing me what it means to be that kind of 
servant.  Is this man from Cyrene modeling for me the path of discipleship?

Must Jesus bear the cross alone
And all the world go free?
No, there's a cross for everyone
And there's a cross for me.

O Lord, forgive me for becoming so preoccupied with myself that I have 
become deaf and blind to the grief and suffering of those around me. 
Forgive me for my indifference.  Constantly remind me that I cannot love you 
without loving others as well. Help me always remember that to be a follower 
of yours means that I share in the burdens of others.  Lord, show me someone 
whose cross I may help carry.

Song or Music


Station 4:  Jesus Speaks to the Women


A great number of the people followed him, and among them were women who 
were beating their breasts and wailing for him.  But Jesus turned to them 
and said, "Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me, but weep for 
yourselves and for your children.  For the days are surely coming when they 
will say, 'Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that never bore, and the 
breasts that never nursed.'  Then they will begin to say to the mountains, 
'Fall on us'; and to the hills, 'Cover us.'  For if they do this when the 
wood is green, what will happen when it is dry?" (Luke 23:27-31)

Jesus, as you struggle along the road toward that awful place of death, you 
see a group of women among the crowd following you, already grieving at your 
impending death.  You have heard this wailing many times before at funerals 
and tragic events.  But now, they mourn for you.

You have always shown equal compassion to women you have encountered across 
the years.  You have always seemed to understand the unique burdens that 
women bear in a world and a culture that pushes them to the margins of 
society. So here, as you bear the most unimaginable pain of body and heart, 
you stop to speak to them. You are about to die, and yet you are more 
concerned with others than with your own suffering and death.

But your words are strange and seem out of place on this road of sorrow. 
They have a prophetic ring to them as if you were still trying to tell 
people something important that they cannot quite grasp, or that perhaps 
they do not really want to hear.  You speak of even darker days, of far 
worse things to come upon the people.  Yet, how can things get worse?

I do remember that you often spoke of repentance, calling the people to turn 
from their wicked ways and accept the coming of the Kingdom of God. 
Sometimes you sounded like Isaiah or Jeremiah as they warned the people to 
return to God in the face of impending catastrophe.  Many times you 
criticized the religious leaders and those who thought themselves righteous, 
warning that they would bring destruction upon the people and the land.  I 
remember that once you even spoke of the destruction of the temple.  But no 
one really believes that is going to happen.  God had always been with us, 
and surely he will not let such a terrible thing happen to his people.

And yet, no one thought the exile would happen.  And here you are on the 
path of sorrow stumbling toward your death.  No one thought that would 
happen either. Maybe you understand more than we have realized.  Maybe you 
see something that we have refused to believe. Maybe we are not as righteous 
as we have thought.  Maybe we have rejected repentance, not because we did 
not need it but because we needed it more than we dared admit.

Is that what you mean by these strange words?  Is it possible that your 
death is only the beginning of things for which to weep? Is it possible that 
our refusal to repent and change the way we live is causing these beginnings 
of sorrow? Is our own sin and our refusal to confess it really the reason 
you are on this path?

I would like to think that I have repented, that I have confessed my sins 
and stand righteous before God. I would rather play the part of the 
righteous follower. I would rather weep for you, Jesus.  I do not want to 
weep for myself and the pain I bring to others because of my failures and 
sin.  Yet, how long has it been since I have shed tears for my own failures, 
for my own sins?  Have I really been honest enough with God about who I am?

O Lord, forgive my unwillingness to repent, to confess all that I am before 
you.  Help me go beyond the repentance mouthed in words of false piety, to 
sweep away all the facades of who I try so hard to be before others, and 
recall who I really am inside.  Help me once again stand before God with a 
bare and open heart. Help me not just to repent in words, but to put that 
repentance into action in everything I am and do.  O Lord, give me the gift 
of tears to weep for my own failures, for my sins, for the pain I bring to 
others, and to live the fruits of repentance.

Song or Music


Station 5:  Jesus Is Stripped of His Garments


When the soldiers had crucified Jesus, they took his clothes and divided 
them into four parts, one for each soldier. They also took his tunic; now 
the tunic was seamless, woven in one piece from the top. So they said to one 
another, "Let us not tear it, but cast lots for it to see who will get it." 
This was to fulfill what the scripture says, "They divided my clothes among 
themselves, and for my clothing they cast lots." And that is what the 
soldiers did. (John 19:23-25a)

Can you trust in God when you feel most alone.

Song or Music


Station 6:  Jesus Is Nailed to the Cross


And they offered him wine mixed with myrrh; but he did not take it. And they 
crucified him, and divided his clothes among them, casting lots to decide 
what each should take. It was nine o'clock in the morning when they 
crucified him. The inscription of the charge against him read, "The King of 
the Jews." And with him they crucified two bandits, one on his right and one 
on his left. Those who passed by derided him, shaking their heads and 
saying, "Aha! You who would destroy the temple and build it in three days, 
save yourself, and come down from the cross!"  In the same way the chief 
priests, along with the scribes, were also mocking him among themselves and 
saying, "He saved others; he cannot save himself. Let the Messiah, the King 
of Israel, come down from the cross now, so that we may see and believe." 
Those who were crucified with him also taunted him. (Mark 15:23-32)

For what are you willing to give your life?

Song or Music


Station 7:  Jesus Cares for His Mother


Meanwhile, standing near the cross of Jesus were his mother, and his 
mother's sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus saw 
his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing beside her, he said to 
his mother, "Woman, here is your son." Then he said to the disciple, "Here 
is your mother." And from that hour the disciple took her into his own home. 
(John 19:25B-27)

Can you accept the others that God gives you to love?

Song or Music


Station 8:  Jesus Dies on the Cross


From noon on, darkness came over the whole land until three in the 
afternoon. And about three o'clock Jesus cried with a loud voice, "Eli, Eli, 
lema sabachthani?" that is, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" When 
some of the bystanders heard it, they said, "This man is calling for 
Elijah." At once one of them ran and got a sponge, filled it with sour wine, 
put it on a stick, and gave it to him to drink. But the others said, "Wait, 
let us see whether Elijah will come to save him."  Then Jesus cried again 
with a loud voice and breathed his last. At that moment the curtain of the 
temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. The earth shook, and the rocks 
were split.  The tombs also were opened, and many bodies of the saints who 
had fallen asleep were raised. After his resurrection they came out of the 
tombs and entered the holy city and appeared to many. Now when the centurion 
and those with him, who were keeping watch over Jesus, saw the earthquake 
and what took place, they were terrified and said, "Truly this man was God's 
Son!" (Matthew 27:45-54).

Can you imagine how much God loves you?

Song or Music
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 They were created originally to assist those who couldn't read to more 
perfectly understand the path Christ traveled while on his way to make the 
ultimate sacrifice for us.  I suggest you go to Holy scripture and mark each 
station with the appropriate scriptural text.  Texts are above.  Criticism 
of the devotional practices  of another Christian Faith shouldn't happen. 
Particularly at this Lenten season.  This season should be given over to the 
practice of charity.  Remembering the ultimate charitable act performed by 
our Lord for us to enable us all to live with God forever, and giving us a 
way to avoid the loss of heaven and the pain of hell.
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Pat Ferguson" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Saturday, February 27, 2010 11:27 AM
Subject: Re: I need scriptures for The Stations of The Cross


Okay, thank you, John.

I guess we wasted some money, then. We thought we
would do them for the Catholics.

Thanks.

Pat Ferguson


At 09:52 AM 2/27/2010, you wrote:
>The stations of the cross is a man made concept.  As for Jesus on the 
>cross, check the gospel accounts, for example, Luke 23.
>
>earlier, Pat Ferguson, wrote:
>>Hi Everyone,
>>
>>I need some scriptures, please to put on the different Stations Of The 
>>Cross Plaques we are making to sell.
>>
>>We're not going to do all of them, but just some of them.
>>
>>I also need scriptures for a Plaque with Jesus on the Cross.
>>
>>Any help is greatly appreciated, please. I do not like Bible Gateway as 
>>it's too commercialized now. Does anyone know where I can find a better 
>>place to get scriptures on line by subject?
>>
>>Vernon's getting Charlie ready to make more Plaques. We named that C&C 
>>machine Charlie. lol.
>>
>>Thanks much.
>>
>>Love and Blessings,
>>
>>Pat Ferguson
>
>John
>Currently in Ocala, Florida Overcast, 46°F Wind:Calm
>A snail can sleep for 3 years.
>Created by Weather Signature v1.31 . http://www.weathersig.com