good friday - Jeremiah's Vow

Lent 2020 | Day 39: “Fear”

NOTE: I was so busy getting ready for Good Friday, I forgot to post this! I apologize for that.

The word focus for today is “fear.”

Fear is the most natural instinct in the human experience. It is a gift from God. It helps to keep us safe in times of danger.

Even when we do not know “why” we are afraid, we know that something is “off” around us. It is not something we need to be taught. We have it from birth. This is what I call natural fear.

There is a second kind of fear: spiritual fear.

Spiritual fear is the fear that comes upon us when we consider ourselves in the grander reality of life. When we stop to take inventory of the world in which we live and ask the question: Why do I exist?

How we answer the question of existence will impact how we live our lives. What kind of people we want to be.

Spiritual fear speaks to the character we form and shape as we experience the highs and lows of life.

I don’t want to start splitting too many hairs here, but I think there is a third kind of fear. This one I want to call supernatural fear or “divine fear.”

Divine fear is the fear we experience when we come in contact with God. When we have a true and intimate apprehension of who God is and what he expects from us.

The longer live the greater our ability to tell the difference between all of these kinds of fear. And, as we grow the more we become less susceptible to the first two and become focused on the third.

The “fear of the Lord,” as the Scriptures describe it is the only safeguard we have against being ruled and ruined by our emotions. We have to look to God and trust in his provision.

On this Good Friday, this is one of the most important lessons of Jesus’ crucifixion. We can face anything that comes at us if we are moving and living in the will of God.

Holy Week 2018 | Good Friday: It’s Friday

The only reason we can call it “good” is because something good happened for us.

Good Friday. The only reason we can call it “Good” Friday is because something good happened for us. It was not a good Friday for Jesus.

But, Jesus accepted the darkness that was to fall upon him so that we might have a chance to experience the radiant light of God’s glory. I am thankful for Jesus’s obedience.

I hope that you consider that Jesus had to pass through this dark night for us.

As we contemplate the coming of Sunday remember… remember that the path to resurrection went right through the doorway of a tomb.

Lent Day #39 | Good Friday

I have often wondered if the first disciples of Jesus felt it was appropriate to call the Friday Jesus died “good.” It is difficult to fathom how anything that took place that Friday afternoon could have been considered good. Trumped charges led to a bogus trial and led which to the execution of an innocent man. The circumstances of that day are anything but good.

This evening, during our services, we had a time of confession and repentance. It was a time where we could reflect and submit to God those sins holding us back from fully surrendering to God. It was a powerful moment. At the end of the service, I could see the slips of paper that had been laid upon the cross of Jesus. As I stood there looking at them, the following thought passed through my mind.

If these represent one confessed sin (among the many possibilities) of one fellowship of believers, how must have the cross looked to God when the sins of the world, for all time, were laid upon Jesus?

I was stunned by the reality of how our sinfulness had affected the purest life to have ever walked upon the earth. The unstained, undefiled, unadulterated beauty and perfection of Jesus was ravaged by our sin. He hung on a cross, suffering because if I had to do it I would go to hell. It was the innocence of Jesus that revealed the diabolical nature of our sin. We will never fully understand what the cross of Calvary means. We can experience its benefits. We can know we have been changed, redeemed, and set upon a new path. We just do not have the capacity to process all God did for us in Christ.

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Today is Good Friday, not because it was good for Jesus, but because it was good for us!

Remember the sorrow this day represents, but look forward, for Sunday is yet to come. The following video is such a wonderful reminder of this simple reality.

(If you can’t see the video click HERE)

Some Resources for Good Friday

Here are few resources to get you thinking about Good Friday, Jesus and what all this means for you!

Raised for Us and Our Salvation: Too often in our churches the resurrection of Christ is a doctrine of secondary importance. It is neglected and forgotten until Easter comes around each year. The same disregard for the resurrection is seen in how we share the gospel. Christians can tend to share the gospel as if Jesus died on the cross and that is the end of the story. We make a zip line from the crucifixion to “repent and believe,” contrary to the example Peter sets for us in Acts 2:22-24 and 4:26. As central as the cross is to our salvation (and it is absolutely central!), what was accomplished at the cross is truly incomplete if the tomb is not found empty on Sunday morning.
Why Good Friday is Good: It was on this day that sinful humanity killed the perfect Son of God, and did it in the most deplorable and humiliating public fashion available at the time. So wretched and seemingly hopeless was humanity’s condition that when faced with One who was one of us, but so not like us; when faced with the One who could and would redeem us and lead us to God, we lashed out with murderous intent and nailed him to a Roman cross. No, by any measure available, this did not seem to be humanity’s finest hour. But it was God’s greatest hour.
The Father’s Cup (Good Friday): This is a wonderful and powerful retelling of the events Good Friday.
The Day Jesus Died: The day that Jesus died—the day we remember as Good Friday—goes down in the history of the world as a day of great suffering, when Jesus Christ endured the weight of sin and shame on our behalf. As we remember what it cost him to reconcile us to himself on this day, it is worth walking through what Jesus endured that day.
The Good (the Bad and the Ugly) Friday: “Why do we call it Good Friday if it’s the day when Jesus was murdered?” If you haven’t fielded that question from a child or a newcomer to the Christian faith, you’ve probably wondered yourself. The common answer is “It’s good for us, because the cross is how Jesus saved us.”
What Happened on Friday of Holy Week?: The witness of the four gospels are harmonized so that can read for yourself what was taking place during the Friday of the first holy week. It is well worth the time to read it.

Enjoy.

Happy Easter!