“If our mediation on the cross be meagre, can our love for the Saviour be great?” – Frederick Leahy

In The Cross He Bore: Meditations on the Suffering of the Redeemer, Frederick S. Leahy provides thirteen meditations on Jesus’ sufferings on the cross to encourage believers to fix their eyes upon Christ – the author and perfecter of our faith.

This short, 100-page book invites readers to pause, worship, and look upon Christ, seeing both his humanity and deity, his obedient suffering, and his conquering kingship. Drawing from the work of great puritans, covenanters, theologians, and reformers, Leahy walks through Christ’s journey to the cross – from his sorrow in the garden to the darkness of his God-forsakenness. Leahy also highlights Christ’s offices as prophet, priest, and king in demonstrating how Jesus actively and voluntarily exposed himself to the fury of his enemies and the powers of darkness to love and glorify God’s name.

I appreciated how Leahy drew from the Old Testament to illustrate that “…Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures” (1 Corin. 15:3). The connections to prophecies, psalms, and ceremonial laws throughout the Old Testament helped me to see clearer how these passages bear witness about Christ and appreciate God’s sovereign plan for Christ to bear our divine judgment.

As Edward Donnelly notes in the foreword, “We are too apt to hurry past the cross, to undervalue, in spite of ourselves, the supreme mystery of the ages by a shallow assumption that we know it all… We need to ‘behold’, to ‘survey’, to ‘stand and stare’”. This brief read will encourage you to pause and wonder at the incredible beauty of our suffering Saviour. 

~ Leanne Zuiderveen