Coffee and Good Friday
Today finds me with a cup of coffee checking email in Frankfurt. It's Good Friday. I'm contemplative and eager to return home. Christ is so much at the center of living that I find it important to consider the very first Friday before the resurrection.
Now there was a man named Joseph, a member of the Council, a good and upright man, who had not consented to their decision and action. He came from the Judean town of Arimathea and he was waiting for the kingdom of God. Going to Pilate, he asked for Jesus' body. Then he took it down, wrapped it in linen cloth and placed it in a tomb cut in the rock, one in which no one had yet been laid. It was Preparation Day, and the Sabbath was about to begin.
The women who had come with Jesus from Galilee followed Joseph and saw the tomb and how his body was laid in it. Then they went home and prepared spices and perfumes. But they rested on the Sabbath in obedience to the commandment. (Luke 23:50-56, NIV)
Christ has certainly changed life as we know it and, lest we lose the plot, we should not drift away from the reality of " For God so loved the world that he gave his only son that whoever believes in him would not perish but have everlasting life."
Yesterday, whilst on the train from Koeln to Frankfurt, I saw a glimpse of the change sparked by the first Good Friday and the Easter to follow. The train was quite crowded and we struggled to find seats. I was able to help an elderly Korean lady to her seat and a gentlemen from the Congo took the seat next to me. The three of us could converse very little because of language; however, we shared a common reality. We were all believers in Christ- and visibly so.
You could see kindness -even patience and deference- in the interaction with others, some of whom were a little stressed with the seating dilema. Yet, once underway, the gentleman from the Congo sat and read a book on spiritual warfare - in French. The elderly Korean lady was reading - in German no less- a book by the martyred German pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer. I sat with my english New Testament and a small booklet by John Piper reading silently but singing in my heart a praise to Christ for He has truly changed and is continuing to change the world and drawing together a people from every tribe and tounge and nation.
So today, this Good Friday, I sit happy to know him and excited for the Easter that is coming.
Now there was a man named Joseph, a member of the Council, a good and upright man, who had not consented to their decision and action. He came from the Judean town of Arimathea and he was waiting for the kingdom of God. Going to Pilate, he asked for Jesus' body. Then he took it down, wrapped it in linen cloth and placed it in a tomb cut in the rock, one in which no one had yet been laid. It was Preparation Day, and the Sabbath was about to begin.
The women who had come with Jesus from Galilee followed Joseph and saw the tomb and how his body was laid in it. Then they went home and prepared spices and perfumes. But they rested on the Sabbath in obedience to the commandment. (Luke 23:50-56, NIV)
Christ has certainly changed life as we know it and, lest we lose the plot, we should not drift away from the reality of " For God so loved the world that he gave his only son that whoever believes in him would not perish but have everlasting life."
Yesterday, whilst on the train from Koeln to Frankfurt, I saw a glimpse of the change sparked by the first Good Friday and the Easter to follow. The train was quite crowded and we struggled to find seats. I was able to help an elderly Korean lady to her seat and a gentlemen from the Congo took the seat next to me. The three of us could converse very little because of language; however, we shared a common reality. We were all believers in Christ- and visibly so.
You could see kindness -even patience and deference- in the interaction with others, some of whom were a little stressed with the seating dilema. Yet, once underway, the gentleman from the Congo sat and read a book on spiritual warfare - in French. The elderly Korean lady was reading - in German no less- a book by the martyred German pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer. I sat with my english New Testament and a small booklet by John Piper reading silently but singing in my heart a praise to Christ for He has truly changed and is continuing to change the world and drawing together a people from every tribe and tounge and nation.
So today, this Good Friday, I sit happy to know him and excited for the Easter that is coming.
posted by Thomas Muse @ 02:01 PERMALINK
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