Worship Around The Cross : Worship in Holy Week
This is our Sunday teaching from Senior Pastor, Tom Thompson. Recorded live at our Sunday Service in Harris Academy Purley, Croydon on Sunday 30th March, 2025. Below you can find the full talk audio, and a summary article.
Want to lead a connect group session on this teaching? The notes are coming soon!
Worship at the Cross: A Call to Awe and Revelation
This week, our church journeyed to the foot of the cross in Matthew 27, where Jesus—beaten, humiliated, and crucified—cried out in anguish before giving up his spirit. But even in his suffering, the earth itself responded in awe. Darkness fell, the temple curtain tore, rocks split, tombs opened, and even the Roman centurion declared, “Surely, he was the Son of God.”
Dorothy opened our teaching with honesty: she once skipped over the crucifixion passages out of fear. But life’s own hardships helped her realise that no pain we carry compares to the pain Jesus bore for us. Now, the cross fuels her worship. True worship, she reminded us, flows from awe—a deep reverence for a Saviour who bore our sin and opened the way to God.
Dorothy drew our attention to four key responses in Matthew’s account:
Creation responded – Darkness at midday showed that all of time and nature bowed in reverence to Jesus.
The temple responded – The tearing of the veil symbolised the end of religious barriers. Now, all have access to God through Jesus.
The dead responded – Holy people were raised to life, a shocking sign that Jesus’s death broke the power of sin and death.
The centurion responded – A Roman soldier, seeing what unfolded, recognised Jesus’s divine identity.
Josh picked up this theme of response, encouraging us to notice that even rocks and the earth recognised the truth of Jesus’s identity, even when it was hidden in human weakness. In contrast, we are often distracted—by stress, busyness, or disappointment—and miss what the rocks saw clearly. Worship, he said, invites us to fix our eyes on who Jesus truly is, not just how we feel in the moment.
So, whether we’re on a mountaintop or in a valley, we’re invited to worship with boldness and faith. Jesus’s glory is not only eternal—it’s revealed. Let us not hold back. Let the rocks not cry out in our place. He is worthy.