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For many years, I have freely proclaimed a message of hope in secular publications this week, but many readers choose to move on to something they find more interesting or wonder why it is allowed. I am fully aware of what you are thinking. As I write messages about the Christian faith, I tremble in a political era where movements like “white Christian nationalism” (much less President Trump’s Bible) make a mockery of historical tradition and Biblical truth. There are also people.
As a longtime journalist, I’ve had to face my own skepticism, but I’ve been through life’s many furnaces and realized that whatever time I have left, this is the actual good news: proclaiming the gospel. I feel that is the reason. Love.
The past three days have marked Good Friday and Easter. On this day, both devout Christians and gamblers alike celebrate the death and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth. Believers believe that Jesus of Nazareth is the Messiah (Greek for “Christ” or “Christ”). the anointed one).
We believe that Jesus, an observant Jew who observed the Jewish Passover, rose from the dead to deliver his people from the curse of sin and death.
In all three Synoptic Gospels, Jesus celebrates a ritual Passover meal in Jerusalem with his closest followers (John’s Gospel takes place at the same point in the story, in the hours before Jesus’ betrayal and crucifixion). (which records Jesus’ extensive final teachings). The centerpiece of this Passover sacrificial meal was lamb.
When the Lamb of God offered Himself on the Roman cross, God rescued His followers from the inevitable winter of cold and eternal death, and in return showed His love for us. if they accept it).
When Jesus and his disciples ate the Passover meal, which Christians refer to as the “Last Supper,” instead of taking the ceremonial wine and bread and reciting the Passover passage from the Law, Jesus essentially I did something different.
“Now while they were eating, Jesus took bread, and after he had blessed it, he broke it and gave it to his disciples, saying, “Take, and eat; this is my body.” And when he had given thanks, he took a cup and gave it to them, saying, “Drink this, all of you. Because it’s blood.” “” (Matthew 26:26-28)
Soon after, he was betrayed, arrested, tried, tortured, and then executed on a cross. The New Testament records that Yeshua (Hebrew, Jesus comes from the Greek Iēsoûs) was killed during the Feast of Unleavened Bread, which begins immediately after Passover, and was buried wrapped in white linen. It tells how it happened. And how did he rise up on the third day?
So that’s the question I have to face. If I truly believed that Jesus died on the cross to make me right with God, and if I truly believed that Jesus rose from the dead and is with me now, how would that change my life? ?
Or do I just recite the words on religious holidays and then it’s business as usual?
Consider how Jesus’ disciples, who had no standing in either Jewish or Roman society, were racially diverse, and were uneducated, became fearless proclaimers of this new kingdom. Sho.
Peter, who cowered outside the Capitol where Jesus confronted religious leaders before he was handed over to Roman authorities, and then denied even knowing Jesus, would soon become a powerful preacher of the gospel. .
Tradition from the earliest days of church history goes so far as to say that Peter was crucified upside down because he didn’t feel worthy to die like Jesus.
Why did he choose to be tortured to death? For he and his other disciples went from fear and despair to witnessing Jesus rising from the grave. It gave them strong confidence to change the world.
And the Bible says that believers can have that confidence and hope because the Spirit of God who raised Jesus from the dead now dwells within us.
Our world will change.
Indeed, in some ways, much of the world has not changed in 2,000 years.
In ancient times, the privileged classes acted by their own rules, and of course they still do. Demagogue leaders led the masses into the abyss. Violence, power, and sex dominated. The same is true today.
But for thousands of years, people have been hoping for what they can’t find. People back then, like now, grieved the death of a loved one, understood the fleeting nature of life and the inevitability of death, and wondered if it was possible to find true peace of mind and soul. .
The early Christians may have scattered when their leader was tortured and executed by the Romans, but as Peter later wrote, he rose from the dead to give them a “living hope.” When I gave, I felt amazingly empowered.
Everything changes.
Because love is the narrow path that leads us out of this world of broken dreams.
Don Miller is an opinion editor at the Sentinel and a former editor at the Sentinel and the Monterey Herald. Thank you Francis Chan.
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