Holy Week is the central celebration of the Christian church. It begins with Palm Sunday, marking the day Jesus enters the city of Jerusalem, and concludes with the Resurrection, what we have come to call Easter Sunday. Jesus’ death and resurrection is the heart of God’s plan for the world, and the event that changed the world forever.
“He told them, ‘This is what is written: The Messiah will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, and repentance for the forgiveness of sins will be preached in His name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.'” Luke 24:46-47
When Jesus says, “it is written,” He is telling us that this has been God’s plan all along. The gospel message is God’s masterwork. It is His invitation to every person to experience His grace and to begin a new life. Luke outlines three key truths in Jesus’ final appearance to His disciples in His Gospel. In the week ahead, we can respond to this invitation by opening our lives more fully to these truths and by encouraging others to experience them for the first time.
A LOVE THAT CONQUERED DEATH
When Jesus appears to His disciples after rising from the dead, the Bible says they were startled and frightened. Was this really Jesus? How was it possible that the man they saw killed days earlier could now be alive and with them? In response, Jesus showed them His hands and His feet. The risen Jesus, the eternal Jesus, still had the scars from His crucifixion. To follow the risen Christ is to follow the one who bore the cross, the one who died for your sins and the sins of the world. Good Friday is a day to remember this sacrifice and the cost of our forgiveness. Many people choose to fast on this day and take time to both confess their sins and remember the suffering that heals them.
To follow the risen Christ is to follow the one who bore the cross, the one who died for your sins and the sins of the world.
A LIFE BEYOND BELIEF
After showing them His hands and feet, the disciples still did not believe “because of joy and amazement.” In other words, they could hardly believe it. Nothing in their experience prepared them for this moment, for this truth. To help them better appreciate this, Jesus asked them for something to eat, proving that He was not a ghost and this was not a vision. He had a different body, but very much a real one.
The bodily resurrection shows a continuity between who we are and who we will be. Death is not an end, but a transition. The gospel teaches that God raised Jesus from the dead, and our hope takes its shape from this central affirmation.
“But our citizenship is in Heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who, by the power that enables Him to bring everything under His control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like His glorious body.”
Philippians 3:20-21
A POWER FROM ON HIGH
The Resurrection not only accomplishes our forgiveness, but brings a new purpose for our lives. And to live this new life, we need a new power, otherwise known as the Holy Spirit. Because of Jesus’ sacrifice, we have daily access to this power, as do our friends and neighbors who have yet to experience the gospel message for themselves.
I hope you will consider bringing a friend to one of our Easter services next weekend. As God has invited us, we are called to invite others. Allow God to use you to assist Him in changing someone’s life forever.
For more details about Good Friday and Easter here at Browncroft, click the button below.
Pastor Rob
The message of Easter is that God’s new world has been unveiled in Jesus Christ, and that you’re now invited to belong to it. — N.T. Wright
