Christ Has Died

Each Sunday I hear the words of our liturgy: Christ Has Died! Christ is Risen! Christ will come again.

On Sunday, many of us will greet one another with the words Christ is Risen! This is a good thing. Unfortunately, a few less of us will focus on the fact that if Christ had not died for our sins on Good Friday, the resurrection wouldn’t be possible.

So remember today that Christ died so you could be redeemed.

Jody has written a bit about this in her devotional today, A Time for Repentance.

It is still happening in our churches today. God comes near and people embrace His love and teachings. They begin to form prayer groups and more small groups for Bible study. Sabbath worship begins to last more than an hour as people share where and how God has been at work in their lives during the week. People begin to reach out into their communities to the homeless and the poor, giving and serving others. And “those people” begin to come to worship. “Those people” who have children who do not know how to act in a sanctuary. They don’t dress up on Sundays like they should. Church members begin to decide more of the church budget should go to the poor and missions instead of salaries and new carpet for the floor and soft cushions for the pews. And other members become enraged because their comfortable, predictable “the-way-we’ve-always-done-it” is abandoned.

Who knew that “Christ Has Died” meant that we were called to some discomfort ourselves?