Thinking About Good Friday

If you are a Christ follower, one of us who has been bought with the blood of the Lamb, I pray you’ll pause for just a minute today (maybe now) and reflect on all that it took for God to redeem you. I would submit to you that as painful as the beatings were, as humiliating as the mocking was, as gut wrenching as the nails and the crown of thorns were, perhaps the most devastating thing for Christ on that day was bearing the weight of my sin and your sin. Think about it.  Jesus had lived 33 years and had never felt guilt over something He’d done.  Not even once did He have a reason to be ashamed.  He never suffered the feeling of embarrassment about a stupid mistake.  But, suddenly, on this day some 2000 years ago, He felt the weight of the fall.  He felt the guilt of my sin.  He experienced my shame.  He suffered the embarrassment of my stupid mistakes. (And not just mine, but yours and everyone else’s.)  And because He went through all that, I no longer have to be chained to guilt and shame and embarrassment.  He took all that and crucified it on the cross and gave me freedom and life and a newness that permeates everything in me.  That makes this Friday awfully good!

He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. - 2 Corinthians 5:21