The Day God Died

It is an awful thing to say. To hear. To ponder.

God Died!

But if you can't say it, believe it, trust it...  you have no salvation. Then Christianity isn't your religion. It reveals your sinfulness. It really is impossible for you to grasp this. No one should ever say God is dead. But on Good Friday, he was. We can't explain it. We can't prove it and a believer wouldn't want to insult God by proving it by human standards.

The beauty of Christianity is the eternal mystery that Jesus is God. Many men can be Jesus, but there is only one Jesus who is God. But He died. We ponder how could God let this happen? But that's the point. God, the man Jesus passively suffered for everything we do wrong, think wrong, and work so hard to live by. Yet sin permeates our lives. 

We try to excuse our foolishness, our tiredness, our lack of support for Christ's work. But Jesus knows that. 

That is why God became a man.

By His conception, His time in the womb, His birth, life and obedience, even in death, He took the place of every person whoever lived. God punished Him for our sin. Don't think too hard on it. You will lose your faith because you will conclude, "It's ridiculous, how could God kill God." There is the mystery, the gift that we receive. It is where time meets eternity. Where sin is punished. Where hell is endured. Where "it is finished!"

But this is the essence - the focus - the salvation that God gives. The way we receive it is through His Word. Through baptism. Through the Lord's Supper. They are what we take to the world to save other sinners who are desperate, hurt, in pain, and know by creation that they are the guilty ones. Jesus was God. How can He be punished for my sin. Still, "There has to be something more than my own life."

There is, the Lamb of God rose from the dead. As was said by His tomb... "He is not here."

The miracle of a God that died is the same miraculous nature that God called you to believe and gives you your belief. You trust because God gives you trust. You know that Jesus is God because God gives that to you. Because of this mystery, you are forgiven. You are saved. You are holy. You will endure what Christ did. Amen, Amen, yeah it is true.