“They pierced my hands and my feet…” (King James Bible, Psalm 22:16)

And so, with Our Lord’s feet nailed to the Cross, his earthly journey reached its end.  It can truly be said that every step of his life, from the time he first learnt to walk as a child refugee in Egypt, had been leading surely and purposefully to that Cross on which his feet were now at last nailed together.

But that was not the end of the road, for Our Lord’s perfect obedience to his Father’s will had kept his union with him unbroken and undisturbed, and therefore God reversed man’s condemnation of him by raising his pierced Body from the dead to share his own glory and joy.  As St Paul put it, Christ “…became obedient unto death, even death on a cross.  Therefore God has highly exalted him…” (RSV, Philippians 2:8,9, our emphasis).