Holy Saturday

"The women who had come with him from Galilee followed and saw the tomb and how his body was laid...On the Sabbath they rested according to the commandment." Luke 23:55 - 56

The Saturday after Jesus' death was the worst Sabbath day in history. In less than twenty-four hours Jesus had been arrested and executed. The disciples who fled in fear in the garden where most likely hiding in the same locked room where Jesus would find them Sunday. Saturday was a hopeless day, a day of shock.

Three years earlier the disciples had left everything they had to follow Jesus (Matthew 19:27). Now everything was over. Jesus was gone and no one expected him to return. They had nothing. At some point they must have asked themselves, "What are we going to do?" Every dream of Jesus being king was dashed and fear of their own imprisonment or death had set in (John 20:19). As a follower of Jesus they knew their future could easily follow the same path as their master. So they waited. Without hope, full of fear, they waited.

I think the angst of hopeless waiting is necessary to feel the joy of Easter. Without the resurrection of Jesus there is no hope. Without the resurrection of Jesus all that waits is a traitors death. There is no joy, hope, love, or restoration without the resurrection. Without Jesus every human being is hopelessly separated from and under the judgement of God. Without the resurrection we, like the disciples, are left with nothing but fear. Tonight spend some time thinking about your sin and how without Jesus, without the resurrection, you have nothing. When we see that, Sunday morning, resurrection morning, will be joy and life to us!

Good Friday Meditation

Good Friday is set aside to remember the death of Jesus Christ and it's implications for all humanity. There is a long list of things we learn in the Good Friday passages (Matthew 27, Mark 15, Luke 22 - 23, and John 18 - 19). Today I want to draw your attention to four thing that always stand out to me when I read these chapters.DenialPeter's there fold denial of Jesus alway hits me hard. The most painful, emotionally raw record of the event is found in Luke 22:54 - 62. Luke's account, like the other Gospels, shows Peter denying Jesus three times out of fear for his own life. It's a stark contrast to the Peter who days earlier said, "Lord, I am ready to go with you both to prison and to death." What makes Luke's account especially painful is the moment he records in verse 61. After Peter denied Jesus the third time, "the Lord turned and looked at Peter." I can't imagine the brokenness Peter felt as he locked eyes with the God he was denying.CowardicePilate is one of the most cowardly individuals in all of Scripture. He was the political ruler who handed down Jesus' legal death sentence even though he knew better. Here are some of the things Pilate said before he sent Jesus to be crucified. "I find no guilt in this man." "You brought me this man as one who was misleading the people. And after examining him before you, behold, I did not find this man guilty of any of your charges against him." "I have found in him no guilt deserving death." So why did Pilate send Jesus to his death? John 19:12 tells us that the Jews threatened Pilate's Roman position. So Pilate bowed to the pressure of the crowd not to save his own neck but to save his job.HatredThe religious leaders hated Jesus--they were threatened by his teaching and popularity. So they hired a traitor, secretly arrested Jesus in the middle of the night, and put him through a mock trial with false witnesses. The depths of their hatred for Jesus is seen most clearly in John 19:15 when the chief priests cry out to Pilate, "We have no king but Caesar." No king but Caesar? These men represented the nation of Israel. God gave them a kingdom and set up a kingship. God promised their forefather David that he would always have a man on the throne. You can be sure the chief priests had not forgotten God's promise. In the moment, however, their hatred for Jesus led them to cry out a lie that went against what they believed.LoveJesus showed an unimaginable amount of love when he died on the cross. He wasn't forced to die, he had a choice. "No one takes [my life] from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again" (John 10:18). When Jesus was arrested in the garden he said to Peter, "Do you think that I cannot appeal to my Father, and he will at once send me more than twelve legions of angels?" (Mat. 26:53). Jesus wasn't dragged to the cross kicking and screaming. He willingly went to his death. Why? Because he came to die. Out of love Jesus came to give his life as a ransom for many (Mat. 20:28, John 3:16). And here's the kicker. Jesus willingly, lovingly died for the denying, cowardly, hateful people we've looked at.Truth be told, we have much more in common with denying Peter, cowardly Pilate, and the hateful religious leaders than we do with Jesus. We deny knowing Jesus and his goodness every time we put something before him--whether it's our life or our pleasure. We shrink back in cowardly fear every time we fail to risk--sharing the gospel, sacrificially loving people, standing for justice--to save our position and comfort. And left in our own sin every man and woman rebels against God. We don't want Jesus to rule our life, and so we cry out, "I have no king but me." I'm not Peter, Pilate, or a jewish religious leader. The faults I see in them, however, are the same faults I see in me. We are broken sinners. But we are sinner that Jesus loves, sinners that Jesus died to save.Good Friday reminds me that Jesus came to save sinners. Rebellious, idolatrous sinners. On this Good Friday meditate deeply on your sin so that you will better know the depths of Christ's love for you. Look at Jesus on the cross and see how serious and ugly our sin is. Look at the cross and see how deep and strong God's love is for you.

Maundy Thursday: The Last Supper and The Passover Lamb

On this Thursday before Easter, on what has come to be known as Maundy Thursday, we prepare our hearts for an incredible weekend of remembrance and celebration.  Today we remember the Lord's Supper.  And I want to use traditions surrounding that night which Christ shared with his disciples to appreciate anew the sacrifice to which it points.  More than anything I pray the Word of God pricks your heart and draws you to worship the One Who is highly exalted for His humility.  Although it is a holiday representative of the celebration we enjoy everyday as believers in a risen Savior, Easter is set-apart annually to clearly rejoice in the cosmic epicenter of our faith and the history of the world: the death and resurrection of Jesus.When Christ instituted the Lord's Supper or what we have come to know as "communion", he was celebrating the Passover with His disciples.  My family is Jewish by heritage, not religiously, but we have found some of the Jewish traditions and celebrations to be incredibly encouraging to our faith in Christ.  Just last week we celebrated the Passover in our home with friends from our church.  I'm sure that a practicing Jew would find our version highly offensive because our whole purpose was to show how Christ is the fulfillment of the Passover that was begun in the time of Moses.  We follow much of the Jewish traditional Seder (order of elements), but we obviously deviate from their explanations of the traditions and instead choose to see the beauty in the picture it was intended to paint: the Passover Lamb who takes away the sin of the world.Listen to Christ's words as recorded in the gospel of Luke:

And he took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to them, saying, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” And likewise the cup after they had eaten, saying, “This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood."(Luke 22:19-20 ESV)

At this point in our Passover Seder we take a broken piece of the Afikomen and eat it in deep faith and appreciation for the sacrifice that was made for our sin.  The Afikomen was a piece of matzah (unleavened bread) that had been broken earlier in the night.  I have an Afikomen cover which has three compartments with three pieces of matzah in each.  At a certain point in the Seder the middle piece of matzah is removed and broken and part of it hidden away somewhere in the house to be found by the children and brought back as the dessert.  Although Rabbinical tradition has a terribly tough time attempting to explain these actions and their significance, they are at once recognizable to us who worship the Triune God and the Son who was sent to be broken, killed, buried and who rose from the grave.  Especially interesting is that the word Afikomen is the only Greek word in the Hebrew Seder.  It is from the Greek word aphikomenos, which in the aorist tense is translated: "he has come".  Amen and praise God He has come!  The Afikomen is the symbol of affliction.  Isaiah spoke of the suffering Messiah in chapter 53:

[4] Surely he has borne our griefsand carried our sorrows;yet we esteemed him stricken,smitten by God, and afflicted.[5] 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.[6] All we like sheep have gone astray;we have turned—every one—to his own way;and the LORD has laid on himthe iniquity of us all.

Exactly how Jesus celebrated the Passover with his disciples I'm not sure, but it is abundantly clear in the Scripture that as He broke the bread and shared the cup He was declaring Himself to be the Passover Lamb.  There was no longer any need to slit the throat and spill the blood of an animal sacrifice.  The Sacrifice was here.My professor, Dr. Andy Davis shared these three lessons that the sacrificial system was supposed to teach us:

1. All sin deserves the death penalty (Romans 6:23)

2. The death penalty can be paid by a substitute (Leviticus 16:21-22)

3. The substitute cannot be the animal, it was to point us to Christ (Hebrews 9:11-15)

So rejoice this Maundy Thursday in the Lamb of God.  With His wounds we are healed, washed in the cleansing fountain of His blood.

Isaac asked, "Where is the lamb for the burnt offering?" (Genesis 22:7-8)

Abraham answered: "God will provide the lamb for the burnt offering"

Isaiah prophesied: "like a lamb that is led to the slaughter..." (Isaiah 53:7)

John the Baptist announced: "Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!" (John 1:29)

And the angels sing: "Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!" (Revelation 5:12)

Palm Sunday and April Fools

Palm Sunday commemorates the day Jesus rode into Jerusalem to shouts of hosannah on a road covered with palm branches and cloaks. April fools is a day of pranks--say something that's not true to mislead someone and spring "April fools!" at the opportune moment. So what, other than landing on the same date this year, do Palm Sunday and April fools day have in common?Jesus' palm Sunday entry into Jerusalem is often called the triumphal entry. Jesus rode in on a colt, fulfilling Old Testament prophecy, to the shouts of an excited crowd. For a moment it looks like Jesus is coming into his city a triumphant king. But things are not as they seem. In the eleventh chapter of Mark's gospel we read that after entering the city Jesus went to the temple. When Jesus comes to the temple, crowds shouting 'hosannah' and 'blessed be the coming kingdom of our father Daivd', we would expect them to enthrone Jesus as Lord and King and worship him. That would have been the appropriate thing to do, the thing that Marks gospel may leads us to expect. But that's no what happens. There is a huge anticlimax once Jesus makes it to the temple--absolutely nothing happens! Jesus gets there, looks around, and heads back out of Jerusalem to Bethany (Mark 11:11).You know what happens next in the story. Shouts of joy turn into shouts of opposition. Crowds that rejoiced in Jesus' coming turn into crowds that shout crucify. If you look at Palm Sunday from the perspective of the crowd it is not a triumph, it is a tragedy. The worst April fools joke in history: a crowd shouting misleading praise only to reveal their disbelief and anger at the opportune moment. I think Mark is trying to teach us something in all of this. James Edwards, author of The Gospel According to Mark writes:

Mark’s account is noteworthy for what does not happen. The whole scene [the 'triumphal entry'] comes to nothing. Like the seed in the parable of the sower that receives the word with joy but has no root and lasts but a short time (4:6, 16–17), the crowd disperses as mysteriously as it assembled. Mark is warning against mistaking enthusiasm for faith and popularity for discipleship. Jesus is not confessed in pomp and circumstance but only at the cross (15:39).James R. Edwards, The Gospel According to Mark, The Pillar New Testament commentary (Grand Rapids, Mich; Leicester, England: Eerdmans; Apollos, 2002), 338.

Palm Sunday is vivid reminder of two great truths. On the one hand, Jesus is King and rightly deserves our shouts of worship. On the other hand, faith in Jesus and being a true disciple is not the same as a fleeting moment of enthusiasm or following a crowd. Oh, that our faith would not be a lifelong April fools joke! The real test of our faith, as with the crowd, is in our actions; not so much what we say about Jesus but what we do with Jesus.