For some of us, we don’t fully understand what is so good about Good Friday. The fact that Jesus Christ, the proclaimed Son of God, King of the Jews was so humiliated by his Jewish persecutors in a mock trial held by the Romans, then brutally tortured through a senseless whipping and bruising of his body, forced to carry his own heavy wooden cross up a long tall hill to be then stripped naked and nailed through the wrists and feet to that cross and hung until He slowly bled to death and died on that cross seems quite so unnecessary. Before being taken off that cross, Jesus was speared through the side to make sure he was completely bled out and dead. What is so good about the death of this son of a carpenter who turned radical against the very religious people of his time?
You have to go back into the history of the world to find the answer. Since the beginning, when God created the world, God had a plan. Some call it a mystery, but it was a plan from an all knowing Creator God of the World, from the beginning of this world to the end to have all men who believed in Him to spend eternity with Him.
The plan was unknown by most of the people God created whom He loved, but, even before the first man set foot in the Garden of Eden, God had a plan to save the people of the world so that they would spend eternity with Him in His Heavenly Kingdom. There is a book that tells the whole story from the beginning to the end if you care to read it. That book contains the history of the world and the mystery of the God who created it. Unlike most books you can read, this one was written by men who were inspired by God to write it.
From the first man Adam to the last man on earth, God would save His people. God created us perfectly imperfect. He knew we would not live perfect sin less lives, that was his perfect plan. To have an internal void within us that would cause a longing for, seek a deeper relationship with a Spirit Father being that would perfectly fill that void that was created within us.
When man would look up at the stars and moon at night, when we would feel the gentle breeze blow or feel the warmth of the sun at day and see all of creation, we would know that there was a creator to all that we could see, hear, smell, touch and taste.
But, we needed help. From the beginning, we needed God’s help. From the very get start, we began to see God’s plan unfold. There was someone else besides God who came into the plan. The devil. Yes, Adam and Eve, the first human beings created by God, were influenced by an intruder. And ever since the first deception, the intruder has been guilty of intruding and trying to mess up God’s perfect plan. The book has much to say about the devil if you want to read it and see for yourselves.
Fast forward, God’s plan unfolded over thousands of years to that little town of Bethlehem in Judea. God in a very mysterious way, made himself a man to dwell among us. He was fully human, yet God. Yeshua, was his name, a Hebrew boy God intended into a humble existence with humble worldly human parents.
Even as Yeshua grew up, people saw that he was different. This is also recorded in the book. As Yeshua grew to be a mature man, he also grew closer to the God of the Hebrew people. He astounded the religious by his knowledge of the scriptures and what seemed to the religious, a deeper understanding of their God, as the scriptures revealed him to those he taught. God introduced himself to the world through Jeshua as the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit when Jesus was baptized in the Jordan River by John the Baptist.
We know a lot about Yeshua in his three year ministry on earth. He had many eye witnesses besides the four writers of the Gospels. Basically, Yeshua Loved people. He was empowered by God through the Holy Spirit to spent most of his three years teaching, Healing the sick, raising the dead, cleansing the lepers, driving out demons and eventually, his ultimate sacrifice, giving his life up on that Good Friday as the Lamb of God, Savior of the world.
We can fully know who Yeshua, or Jesus is through reading the Holy Scriptures and hearing the word of mouth. Most people have heard of Jesus in one extreme to another. Most people know that he died on a cross to save people from their sins who believe in him. But, most people don’t know the whole story. To know Jesus as Savior of the world is important for all for sure, Jesus died on the cross, but to know him as your personal savior and Lord is another thing altogether. Jesus not only died, he rose from the dead on the third day after he died. He rose from the dead as the messiah, the Christ. To know of Jesus is one thing, but to know Yeshua Jesus as your Lord and Savior is another. Jesus came to the world to “Help us” where we could not help ourselves. Jesus came to the world to introduce us to the God of all gods, the Lord of Lords. The one and only True God who loves all people, created all people to know Him so intimately that we could and should call Him “Father.”
Jesus leaves us with so much, as the book, the Holy Bible tells us. John 3:16 says, “For God so Loved the World, that He gave His only beloved Son, so that those who believe in Him should not perish but come into everlasting life.”
Good Friday is only the beginning friends. There is so much more, so much, much more. Jesus, or Yeshua is the Lamb of God, sent to take away the sin of the world. As 1 John, chapter 3, verse 8 summarizes for us,” Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil forever…” Good Friday was the finish line for Jesus the Christ. His blood became the needed sacrifice to open the gates of Heaven to all who believe in Him. Now, let us read the rest of the book to see what happens next!
Mark Conway is an evangelist living in Sterling with his wife Maryna. He can be contacted by email at akmark50@hotmail.com.
