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Luke 23 :: Good Friday? Really?

Luke 23

From Luke 22:67-70

Having already begun the beating, the men in charge of Jesus asked him, "Are you the Messiah?"

"If I said yes, you wouldn't believe me.  If I asked what you meant by your question, you wouldn't answer me.  So here's what I have to say:  From here on the Son of Man takes his place at God's right hand, the place of power."

They all said, "So you admit your claim to be the son of God?"

"You're the ones who keep saying it."

In Chapter 23, amidst the crucifixion narrative, Luke records Jesus as saying...

• Those are your words not mine.
• Father, forgive them; they don't know what they're doing.
• Don't worry, I will.  Today you will join me in paradise.
• Father, I place my life in your hands!

These are not the words of a king.  These are not the words of the most powerful man on earth.  These are not the words that I want my Savior to say as he is spit upon, beaten, tortured and killed.  This is not the way it is supposed to happen.  Why doesn't he fight?  Why doesn't his Father step in?  Why can't he stop this?

The answers to these questions mean everything.  The answers are the reasons why such a horrible day can be referred to by Christ-followers everywhere as "Good Friday."  Several people have put together lists of why, but I wanted to highlight one...

"This is how much God loved the world:  He gave his Son, the one and only Son.  And this is why: so that no one need be destroyed; by believing in him, anyone can have a whole and lasting life.  God didn't go through all the trouble of sending his Son merely to point an accusing finger, telling the world how bad it was.  He came to help, to put the world right again.  Anyone who trusts in him is acquitted"  - John 3:16-17 (The Message)

Jesus suffered and died to justify the love of God.  His love for his creation, so great that it cost him the life of his son.  His death, his suffering, doesn't point an accusatory finger, but extends a loving embrace.  Have you been embraced by this love?  If you haven't you can.  If you have, that's why we can call it "Good Friday."

Luke 22 :: A Look of Love

Luke 22

Sorry for my delay yesterday.  Rhonda had big birthday and I got a bit side-tracked.  I'm back today though and there was a lot in the reading this morning.  There is one section that has always stood out to me about the reading today, and it all centers around Peter's denial of Jesus.

It's easy for me to look at Peter and see myself or see others I have know that have gone a different direction with their lives.  I know the feeling of saying one minute, "I'd die for you," and the next minute, "I don't know him."  I have made those commitments and I know the frustration of the inability to follow through.  I have no problem identifying with him.

For the past several weeks, I have worked really hard at trying to learn new things about Jesus in the readings and not necessarily about me.  When I started, I wanted to see him more clearly.  In this section, I want to understand Jesus more clearly.  I locked into verse 33 when Peter responds to Jesus words of warning to them, "Master, I'm ready for anything with you.  I'd go to jail for you.  I'd die for you."  Isn't this what every leader wants to hear?  Don't you know you are a good leader when your followers tell you this?  Jesus does something, I'm not sure I would have done.  He knows that Peter wants to believe what he is saying, but he also knows that Peter cannot follow-through with his promise.  In fact, he knows that before the next day, Peter will break it.  It would be easy to read into Jesus' words a bit of "Yeah, whatever Peter, you won't even make it a day," but that is not what happened.  He starts with this little phrase, "I say to you."  This phrase is a deeper connection to Peter.  The Message translates the phrase as "I'm sorry to have to tell you this," and I believe that gets more to the heart of Jesus' response.  He was disappointed and his love for Peter was no less because he knew what would happen.  I like that...a lot.

Then later in v61, after Peter's three denials, Luke says that Jesus "turned and looked" at Peter.  Not with anger nor with pity.  The little phrase here is also important to understand Jesus better.  The phrase is used metaphorically when someone looks at another with the mind.  In a very real essence, Jesus was looking into Peter, not just at Peter.  Jesus knew what Peter had been through and he knew what Peter would become.  I believe that this "look" had a sense of hope in it for Peter, and that made it even worse for him at that moment.

I want to be this way.  I want to have this sort of love for people around me.  When you screw up, I want to look at you this way - not with disappointment, not with anger, not with I-told-you-so, but with hope.  God has bigger plans for you than your failures yesterday, today or even tomorrow.  His gaze into you is filled with hope and promise for tomorrow.  Maybe you've never seen a look like that.  Maybe you've never been told, "It doesn't matter...I love you anyway."  If that's true, my prayer for you is that Father will show you that through someone today.