I've nailed them to the cross.

I danced on the Sabbath And I cured the lame; The holy people Said it was a shame. They whipped and they stripped And they hung me on high, And they left me there On a Cross to die.

Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,and with his wounds we are healed.

...the other half of rising — the very half that makes rising necessary — is having been nailed to the cross.

When Jesus was nailed to the cross — and hung there in torment - he cried out — "God, my God! Why hast thou forsaken me?" He cried out as loud as he could. He thought that his heavenly father had abandoned him. He believed everything he'd ever preached was a lie. The moments before he died, Christ was seized by doubt. Surely that must have been his greatest hardship? God's silence.

One morning, in cool blood, I slipped a noose about its neck and hung it to the limb of a tree; — hung it with the tears streaming from my eyes, and with the bitterest remorse at my heart; — hung it because I knew that it had loved me, and because I felt it had given me no reason of offence; — hung it because I knew that in so doing I was committing a sin — a deadly sin that would so jeopardize my immortal soul as to place it — if such a thing were possible — even beyond the reach of the infinite mercy of the Most Merciful and Most Terrible God.

When I took up the cross I recognized it's meaning. The cross is something that you bear, and ultimately, that you die on.

I had always said that when I could see the holes in the hands and feet of Jesus myself then I would consider believing. It was very much a standard line – I wouldn't take anything on belief, I wanted to see the evidence. On that hillside I looked up at the crucifix and Our Lord was there with the holes in his hands and his feet and in that instant – I wouldn’t say I believed, I wouldn’t say I decided to start believing – in that instant, I knew. I knew that I had been looking all these years without seeing Christ crucified. There he was in front of me and I then knew that God and Jesus Christ were true. My life has been upside down ever since. All my original views were turned upside down. It has cost me quite a few friendships and has probably cost me a political career but I cannot un-know what I now know.

when Jesus Christ was still hanging on the tree nails were still into his palms and feet, and he was naked, and he was being mocked by Pharisees underneath the cross, he did not wait for the pain to subside. He cried to the Father, “Forgive them for they don’t know what they are doing.” The fact that Jesus called within the pain is a guide and a teaching for us to forgive.

O sacred head, now wounded,
With grief and shame bowed down; Now scornfully surrounded With thorns, thy only crown.

Prostrate, see Thy cross I grasp,
And Thy pierced feet I clasp;
Gracious Jesus, spurn me not;
On me, with compassion fraught,
Let Thy glances fall.
From thy cross of agony,
My Beloved, look on me;
Turn me wholly unto Thee;
"Be thou whole," say openly,
"I forgive thee all."

Q: I have read that you also, at least sometimes, had a chain around your neck, and you were tied to a tree?

It required me to suffer. It compelled me to reach.

God honors some with great suffering and grants them the grace of martyrdom, while other are not tempted beyond their strength. But in every case it is one cross. It is laid on every Christian. The first Christ-suffering that everyone has to experience is the call which summons us away from our attachments to this world. It is the death of the old self in the encounter with Jesus Christ. Those who enter into discipleship enter into Jesus' death.