Good Friday 2017

Welcome to Good Friday. That title has always been a little confusing to me. Growing up there was the joke that went around saying it was good because we got out of school and it was typically good weather so we could enjoy the day off.

I would find out later that it was called Good Friday because on this day around 33AD, Jesus Christ was crucified for the sins of the world (Matthew 27; Mark 15; Luke 23; John 19).

How could something that was so brutal, so shameful, so wrong be considered good in any sense? What sadistic person said, “Let’s remember this day as something good and put it on the calendar to remind us!”?

I’m not sure who that person was, but I am so grateful that they did.  It is days like this that I am reminded of just how often that God wants us to see that there is so much more than what appears on the surface.

The saddest day in history is also one of the greatest.  On this day… on that hill called Golgotha/Calvary… the Son of God took the sins of the world and dealt with them!  It turns my stomach to think about all that Jesus went through – the mockery, the shame, the beatings, the torture – it was all because of my sin.  All that junk that Jesus went through was meant for me.  But because of the love that God has for us, He took it so I didn’t have to.

May this day be so much more than another “day off” for us.  My prayer is that it would be a day of reflection… a day that we remember the high price that Jesus was willing to pay just to redeem us.  If anyone needs any proof that they are cared about, they need only to turn their eyes to that hill called Calvary and see God hanging there with arms wide open saying, “I love you this much!”

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Good Friday Thought

I have been going through the My Utmost For His Highest - Holy Week devotional on bible.com this week.  It has been a great preparation for me leading up to the celebration of the resurrection of Jesus Christ.  I wanted to share today's devotional with all of you.  I pray that it will speak to you as it did me.

The death of Jesus Christ is the fulfillment in history of the very mind and intent of God.  There is no place for seeing Jesus Christ as a martyr.  His death was not something that happened to Him - something that might have been prevented.  His death was the very reason He came.  

Never build your case for forgiveness on the idea that God is our Father and He will forgive us because He loves us.  That contradicts the revealed truth of God in Jesus Christ.  It makes the Cross unnecessary, and the redemption "much ado about nothing."  God forgives sin only because of the death of Christ.  God could forgive people in no other way than by the death of His Son, and Jesus is exalted as Savior because of His death.  "We see Jesus... for the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor (Hebrews 2:9).  The greatest note of triumph ever sounded in the ears of a startled universe was that sounded on the Cross of Christ - "It is finished!" (John 19:30).  That is the final word in the redemption of humankind. 

Anything that lessens or completely obliterates the holiness of God, through a false view of His love, contradicts the truth of God as revealed by Jesus Christ.  Never allow yourself to believe that Jesus Christ stands with us, and against God, out of pity and compassion, or that He became a curse for us out of sympathy for us.  Jesus Christ became a curse for us by divine decree.  Our part in realizing the tremendous meaning of His curse is the conviction of sin.  Conviction is given to us as a gift of shame and repentance; it is the mercy of God.  Jesus Christ hates the sin in people, and Calvary is the measure of His hatred.

(Taken from My Utmost For His Highest - Holy Week devotional via bible.com). 

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The Tow Truck

The other day, I was driving down the road and saw this image before me at the red light.

I got to thinking, "how appropriate?"  When your vehicle breaks down and you are not able to go anywhere or do anything, who do you call?  The tow truck people.  They come with their big fancy truck, load you up and take you to a place where repairs can be made.

It hit me for the first time that the mechanism on the back of the tow trucks that our broken vehicles are loaded onto is the shape of the cross.  How cool is that?  When our lives are broken down and left on the side of the road as dead, what is brought to lift us up and take us to a place of restoration: the cross of Jesus Christ.

Keep your eyes open... Jesus has His message out in our world in many different ways.

 

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