Sometimes I think we “get over” Good Friday and Easter too quickly. We know the story too well. I want to spend time living with it, soaking in it, until I begin to understand the amazing truth about God’s amazing love.
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Then Jesus began to tell them that the Son of Man must suffer many terrible things
and be rejected by the elders, the leading priests, and the teachers of religious law.
He would be killed, but three days later he would rise from the dead.
Mark 8:31 NLT
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He was despised and rejected—
a man of sorrows, acquainted with deepest grief.
We turned our backs on him and looked the other way.
He was despised, and we did not care.
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God draws near to the brokenhearted.
He leans toward those who are suffering.
He knows what it feels like to be wounded and abandoned.
John D. Richardson
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Yet it was our weaknesses he carried;
it was our sorrows that weighed him down.
And we thought his troubles were a punishment from God,
a punishment for his own sins!
But he was pierced for our rebellion,
crushed for our sins.
He was beaten so we could be whole.
He was whipped so we could be healed.
Isa 53: 3-5 NLT
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“Jesus knew despair, betrayal, and agony;
in these moments,
He became the embodiment of hope.”
Tim Keller