Easter

Matthew 27:45-46

From noon until three in the afternoon darkness came over all the land. About three in the afternoon Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” (which means,”My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”).

Devotional

In the beginning, when God created humans He said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness…” (Genesis 1:26).  Since the beginning of all creation and before, God the Father, Jesus the Son, and the Holy Spirit is and always will be in a perfect community with one another. They had a relationship with each other that was perfect in love and they shared their goodness with us, humans. 

As we are made in His image, we are also made to be in community with God and with one another as His creations; to love one another. But of course, humans cannot be good as God is, we can only turn towards Him to trust and depend on Him, or we can turn away and pretend He isn’t there. 

God is with each and every one of us from beginning until the end. He gives us endless chances to come to Him and accept Him as our Lord. Even though humans choose to turn away a lot of the time, God is faithful and continues to give us opportunities. He wants us to accept His great love for us, and to love Him back. And He will do anything so that we may have that chance.

What could a parent love more than their own child? God loves Jesus so much, but you and I, and everyone else, we are His children also. God loves us so much, too. He loves us so much, He sent Jesus to earth in the form of a human, and Jesus lived his entire life without sinning even once. He lived a life that no human could ever do, and even though he was pure and no one could blame him for anything, Jesus died an embarrassing, and extremely painful death that He didn’t deserve. He died so that every human in the rest of history could have an opportunity to know God and His amazing love for us. 

Jesus knew what would have to happen to him when he came to earth. He was scared. But he still chose to walk into this life on earth because he loves us too much. He would rather suffer and be in pain, than to see us suffer and be in pain. Even though Jesus’ relationship with God the Father is perfect in love, when Jesus was on the cross, he was in so much pain. He even felt like his Father in heaven abandoned him because of how intensely he was hurting. In that moment, his perfect community felt completely broken. And even if you were the only person in the history of the world to ever sin, and nobody else sinned, Jesus would still choose to come to earth and do what he did, and feel all that he felt, so that you could have a chance to know how much God loves you, and accept it into your heart. 

And through his own power, Jesus was able to resurrect himself from the dead, and become alive again! (Who can even do that?!) Jesus not only went through all of this craziness on earth, but he also gave himself life and breath again! He is stronger than death! We can trust that God is someone who is so strong and powerful, that He is someone we can completely trust, and that He loves you, me, and everyone else so so so much :) Jesus is our Lord and Saviour.