I read this article today in the Press-Enterprise about how a lot of Christians skip by Good Friday. To be honest, this is usually me as well. The Protestant (and especially evangelical protestant) tendency is to focus on the joy and celebration of the resurrection. Our church is having a Good Friday service tonight for the first time in several years and I'm really excited about it. It's going to be fairly heavy because of an intense focus on Jesus' suffering and the cross. Our pastor is going to ask people not to say a word as they leave until they get into their cars.

But I'm excited about it. Why? Because without the suffering and the cross, the resurrection is meaningless. I'm excited to go on a journey in the next couple days that looks more closely at what Jesus went through in order to make the final payment for sin. And then I'm excited about Sunday when we'll celebrate the new life that can be found because of that death and resurrection.

Sunday should also be great because it's the one day when people who NEVER go to church will show up. We've sent out 45,000 invites into our community and we'll see what the impact of them is on Sunday. My hope is that people will discover new life in Christ and then discover new life in community through the local church.

This entry was posted by Mike Lovato, on Friday, April 14, 2006. You can leave your response.