It All Begins With a Cross!

As we enter into this weekend leading up to Easter Sunday, I know that it is going to be a very busy couple of days.  Today our church will host two Good Friday Services—we are hosting one on behalf of the community and then tonight we will have our own Good Friday communion service.  Tomorrow we are holding an Easter Egg Hunt for the kids.  And, Sunday will be our Resurrection Day Services, complete with an Easter morning breakfast!  It’s going to be a great weekend of celebration.  And, it ought to be.  After all, we are celebrating the pinnacle of our faith: the resurrection of Jesus Christ—the event upon which all of the Christian faith stands!

Today, on this Good Friday, I am reminded that it all begins with a cross.  Our whole weekend of celebration that will include Easter eggs, chocolate bunnies, special breakfasts, and churches that will be filled music and joy, begins with a symbol of suffering and death: the cross of Jesus Christ.  All of our joy and high resounding praise begins with the sounds of mourning, sorrow, and death as we recall and recount the huge price that was paid for our sins, as the very Son of God gave his life as the ultimate sacrificial lamb. 

I have said many times, there would be no meaning to the cross without the resurrection. That is true. But, it is also true that there would have been no resurrection without the cross. There is no celebration of Easter unless we first pass through Good Friday—unless we first take the way of the cross. 

The Apostle Paul wrote, “May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.” (Galatians 6:14 – NIV) The Apostle Paul knew that all he had and all that he was, it all came first of all through the cross. He knew that everything good he had experienced through Christ came first of all because of Jesus’ suffering and death. He was eternally grateful for the cross.    

Today on this Good Friday, even as we prepare for the celebration of Easter Sunday, may we remember that it all begins with a cross!

Have a great day!

Pastor Tim Harris