Nearly two thousand years ago, citizens and visitors filling the city of Jerusalem and its neighboring villages eagerly prepared to celebrate the Passover, a feast that Jewish people observe annually around this time. Gathered around tables laden with Passover foods, fathers and mothers retold the story of Israel’s exodus from 400 years of slavery in Egypt. They recalled the LORD’s command to apply the blood of sacrificed lambs to the lintels and doorposts of their houses so that the angel of death might pass over their homes, and how God judged Pharaoh, delivering His people from bondage.

Every year after that first Passover, Israel gathered to remember how God delivered them. Thus, in late March or early April, sometime between 30 and 33 A.D., Jewish people once again flooded Jerusalem and the surrounding countryside to observe Passover, with one distinct difference. Whereas ancient Israel sacrificed lambs from their own flocks to protect them from God’s judgment against Pharaoh and his land, during this Passover, God sacrificed his own Lamb to propitiate his judgment and atone for the sin of the world (John 1:29). 

Today, Good Friday, we meditate on God's great love for the world, revealed through Jesus Christ’s unparalleled sacrifice and crucifixion. As Isaiah foretold: “Our sins did it to him, our sins ripped and tore and crushed him—our sins! He took the punishment that made us whole. Through his bruises, we get healed.” (Isaiah 53:5, MSG) Jesus purchased our redemption, peace, and freedom through his death on the cross. What we could never do for ourselves, God did for us!

That Friday was a day of great sorrow and suffering for the first followers of Jesus, but as they soon learned, everything would be made new on Resurrection Sunday!