This is being written on what is called "Good Friday". I often have asked what really was good about that horrible day when our Lord Jesus Christ was crucified. Yet, He gives the answers!
On the Sunday before, the crowds had led Him in a triumphant celebration through the streets of Jerusalem shouting "Hosanna! Blessed is He Who comes in the name of the Lord!" What a difference a few days can make!
Jesus Christ had celetrated the Last Supper (Passover) with His disciples. He had shocked them by taking his garment and washing His disciples' feet to teach them that they also should be serving others! He had been tried in a series of illegal trials. He had come into Garden of Gethsemane and prayed with all His being that if it were His Father's will, He would not have to go to the Cross, yet being willing to yield to His Father's will. In the meantime, Peter, James, and John, whom Jesus had asked to watch and pray with Him, were sleeping. As that Friday of His Crucifixion opened, He was led, bearing His Cross, down a very narrow street and out to a hill that looked like a skull, called Golgotha, there to meet his death. Beaten, bleeding, and so tortured that He did not even look human, His hands and feet were nailed to the Cross, and, eventually, a spear pushed into his side to make sure He was dead as the Savior gave His life for the forgiveness of the sins of all who would and will trust in Him. So what was good about all that? What made it a Good Friday?
I think the answers come partly from His willingness and love for us that led Him to die for us. But I also think that His final sayings from the Cross also help here. The saying come from all the gospels, and we don't know the order of these sayings, but I am placing them and the encouragement they give in this order.
"My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken me?" What was good about that? It was good that although the Father looked away as His Son took upon Himself our sins, that "forsaking" would not be forever. Jesus would arise from the dead and return to His Father in Heaven. And, Glory to God, we, too, shall rise as the Lord returns or as we close our eyes in death and walk forgiven into the Kingdom of Heaven, because of what Jesus did for us that day. He who had never sinned took our sins to the Cross and provided our redemption.
"I thirst." What was good about that? I think that Jesus longed not only for quenching of His physical thirst, but He thirsted that ALL will come to know Him as Lord and Savior because of what He did there at Calvary. "God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance." Not that everyone will, because not all will repent and truly turn to Him (remember Judas?) Too many will reject Him. But, like Peter, no matter how we deny Him, if we truly come to Him humbly seeking forgiveness, we get it!
"Father, Forgive them, for they know not what they do." Praying for His accusers, His Crucifiers? Yes! He was asking the Father to forgive them. Wow! And He ever lives at the Right Hand of God to ever pray for us! That is Good News, and that is awesome!
To the thief on the cross beside Him who begged to be remembered when Jesus came into His kingdom, Jesus said, "Today thou shalt be with me in Paradise." The moment a truly repentant sinner comes to Jesus asking for forgiveness and salvation, he/she receives it. And at the very moment of the death of a Christian, he/she is right then in the presence of God and ushered into His kingdom!
To his mother he said, "Woman, behold thy Son", and to his beloved apostle John "Behold thy Mother." I think it is SO awesome that Jesus loved His mother so much and saw her grief, which much have been almost unbearable, that He wanted someone to care for her and help her through the crisis of the death of her Son. And who better to do that than the disciple who was probably closer to Him than any other, John. John was immensely suffering there at the Cross, too? Jesus knew they would need each other!
"It is finished." It was at this point that Jesus knew He had totally fulfilled everything His Father had sent Him to do. He was giving His life for you and me, and He knew that His work on earth was done.
And finally, "Father, into thy Hands I commit my spirit." And there the Savior gave His life and everything He was into the hands of God, His Father. He had said that He came not to reject the law, but to fulfil it. And He did! Totally!
Well, I hope you see that it was a truly terrible Friday, but also a very good one as the Lord gave His life on a cruel Cross for YOU.
This devotion article can be viewed in it's entirity at http://www.parsonscorner.org/pcimunity/showthread.php?tid=341
About the Author
Graceblest is an administrator at the Parsons Corner Internet Ministries. Her devotions are available on the PCIM Christian Fellowship Message Baord at http://parsonscorner.org/pcimunity/
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