John 3:16 – Walking in His Promises
category
“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.”
It’s one of those memories that I thought I had written down. I guess I hadn’t but it’s okay because it was so impactful that I remember it pretty clearly.
I owned a DVD copy of “The Passion of the Christ” but it sat on the shelf with a collection of other DVD’s. It sat there for a few years because I could never bring myself to watch it. It didn’t matter that my family and friends said the movie was really good, I just couldn’t bring myself to sit and watch something that I knew would be so brutal and hard to watch. I’m not one who likes violence in movies to begin with and it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know this movie would have that in it.
But there came a time…..
I believe that time was in the year of 2011 where I told myself that no matter what, I would sit down and watch this movie and not let anything distract me from doing so. I must have watched it after my children went to bed because I don’t remember having any distractions. So I sat….and made myself watch it. I’m not going to lie…..it was tough to watch.
Now I admit that I can get a little emotional when watching a good movie or listening to a great song but that just shows I’m human right? Well “a little emotional” is an understatement of what happened by the time this movie was over. I was bawling. I mean cry me a river was no joke here! That movie hit me at my core and when it was over I remember asking the question why.
I couldn’t understand why this had to happen and why it had to happen the way it did. Why did Jesus have to go through all of this for mankind when mankind doesn’t deserve it. Why would He leave His rightful place in heaven knowing that He would be taking on the burden of every kind of sin and sickness imaginable. As I sat there thinking about this question, the number three came to mind. Over and over the number three ran through my mind.
Often I turn to the concordance of my Bible and look up words that come to mind. I do it to see what the scriptures have to say about that particular word. I find that a lot of the time God speaks to me in this way. So I looked to see if the word three existed in the concordance of my bible, and sure enough it did. To my surprise there were a lot of scriptures with the word three in it, but the one that stood out comes from the words of Jesus himself out of Matthew 27:63.
‘After three days I will rise.’
At that moment everything I had watched that night came back around full circle. Jesus had to endure the cross so that day three would come. The most important day in history (the resurrection) was made possible because Christ was willing to take on all sin and sickness, thereby giving Him victory over death. It’s by His victory that we are redeemed and made right with God. These events… as brutal and unfair as they were, are the only way we can have eternal life with our Lord and Savior…. so long as we believe. Therein lies the most well known bible verse for Christians –
I know the verse well, but that night, in a very humbling way, it took on a deeper meaning for me. The grace, mercy and purest form of love that God has for us was born as a baby, lived a perfect life and laid down His life so that all of us who have declared Him as our Lord and Savior may live in Him and He in us. After literally enduring the weight and pain of the world on that cross Jesus cried out with a loud voice the words,
“It is finished!”
And bowing His head, He gave up His spirit.
At that moment it truly was finished and because of that Friday, day three, the Resurrection Sunday was made possible!
The tomb was empty for He had Risen! Happy Resurrection Day!
Amanda
BE THE FIRST TO COMMENT