Good Friday | Sunday is Coming

Greg had Friday off work for Good Friday so we decided to use this day to finally start to tackle our yard... which has been in disarray since we moved in over a year ago. To look at our house you may wonder if it is abandoned... we're gonna try and change that! :)  So my sweet little kiddos spent the night at their grandparents and for the first time in... well forever, I woke up with no one needing me. I had nothing calling for my attention, except what needed it most on this day: Jesus.

I finally had an unlimited amount of time to sit, pray and read. Seeing as it is Good Friday I opened my Bible to the accounts of Jesus' death.

One of the amazing things about a living word is that it is never the "same old story". The words don't change. The details aren't altered. It is the same story I have read and heard since as long as I can remember... and yet, with each reading my spirit is stirred with a new element, a detail not seen or understood before. The Holy Spirit moves within His word to teach me something new every time.

Today was no different.

I read the accounts as listed in Mark and in Matthew. It is a hard story to read and it is so tempting to keep going and not stop before the next chapter:

Jesus Rises From the Dead. 

But I force myself to focus on Friday; on the darkness of Friday. I know Sunday is coming. But I need to remember what Friday means; what Friday was.

A verse in Mark's account really struck me this time. In Mark chapter 14, just after Jesus was seized in the garden by the guards:

Mark 14:50
"Then everyone deserted Him and fled."

A very short, easily missed statement.
Every follower, apostle, disciple and friend - ran and hid.

What resonated with that verse, to me, was the hopelessness that we are left with if Friday is all there is. Jesus' death was key to the story of redemption, but if that was it; if Sunday did not come... it was just the death of a man who made bold claims and nothing more, just like hundreds of others that had come before him throughout history.

It speaks so much to the truth of the gospel and how the actions of those closest to Jesus are key in the proof of who Jesus claimed to be.

Upon Jesus' arrest - they deserted him and denied him. And most of them stayed in hiding for the duration of those dark hours and days before Sunday. His death meant the end of his ministry. It meant the end of all that he claimed. It meant the end of hope. Jesus was gone. Jesus was dead. And with him went all that he claimed he would do. In that moment, they were the biggest fools.

Or so it seemed.

My mind has been overwhelmed all morning with the anticipation of Sunday. It is with the events of Sunday that the apostles are transformed. They go from hiding, deserting, fearing and denying - to standing, boldly declaring and even dying for the name of Jesus, son of God, Redeemer of man.

How does a transformation like that happen?
Sunday makes that happen.
Sunday and the resurrection of the One they thought was dead.
Sunday and the fulfillment of prophecies they didn't even understand until that moment.
Sunday and the moment Jesus, God as man, overcame death and sin.
Sunday when Hope become a real thing; a thing never truly understood until that day.
Sunday makes Friday Good Friday.

"If Jesus rose from the dead, then you have to accept all he said; if he didn't rise from the dead, then why worry about any of what he said? The issue on which everything hangs is not whether or not you like his teaching but whether or not he rose from the dead."
-Tim Keller

I am not sure what God is stirring within your heart this Easter Week, but this is what He is stirring in mine. The overwhelming truth that if Friday is all we had - then Jesus was not who He said He was and we believers are, as Paul declares:

"... more to be pitied than anyone in the world"

The resurrection changes everything.
I pray you are able to take time to focus and meditate on the death of Jesus and what that means. But do not lose sight of what is to come: Sunday is coming and in that is all redemption and all hope. The disciples, those who knew him best deserted him when all they knew was Friday, but the world was turned up-side down when Sunday came... and 2000 + years later it's still happening.

"He was born. He died for our sins. Now He's raised again. He has risen from the dead. If all that's true, then you can be saved, then there's hope for the future, then your sins can be forgiven, then you can have a relationship with God, then the Spirit of God can come into your life and change you."
-Tim Keller