There is much written about Good Friday. The sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the Cross is incomprehensible to my puny human intellect. There is much written about Easter Sunday. Christians around the world rejoice and proclaim that “He is risen!”. But there is not nearly as much written about one of the saddest and most confusing days in history. The Saturday between the Friday horror of Jesus on the Cross and the Sunday mystery of the resurrection. Some churches do observe Holy Saturday but it was never a tradition in my faith upbringing. I have been thinking about what that day must have been like for those who dropped everything to follow Jesus. How crushing those events had to be. I imagine the fear they felt that they would also be killed. And for what? On Saturday they feared they had given their careers and their very souls for a false hope. I think in particular of Peter. I identify
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Valuing everyone is how Jesus lived. He modeled that value with women, children, people with physical and mental challenges, lepers, social outcasts, and sinners. He served the weak and loved the unloved. He created the template for the New Testament church. How did the early church explode and multiply against all odds? By serving selflessly, recklessly, and fearlessly. There was nothing comfortable about spreading the news about Jesus in the days, months, and years after His resurrection. The Apostles understood after the Cross what Jesus had been trying to tell them earlier. That the world measures greatness on an entirely different scale from the one that God uses. Remember that debate among the apostles? They had the criteria for greatness completely wrong. They began to argue among themselves about who would be the greatest among them. Jesus told them, “In this world the kings and great men lord it over their people, yet they are called ‘friends of the people.’
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