Topics:<\/b> Easter; Hope; Jesus Christ; New Life; Priorities; Resurrection; Work<\/p>\n
References:<\/b> John 6:35; 11:25; 2 Corinthians 1:6; Titus 3:4\u20135; 1 Peter 1:3<\/p>\n
It was Good Friday. My house looked more like a set for Rescue 911<\/i> than a place of solemn preparation for the pinnacle of the church year. Barbara, my wife of fifteen years, had gotten home at 3:00 a.m. after a long shift as a hospital nurse. Her heart started to pound more than a hundred beats a minute. Her pulse raced so fast we couldn\u2019t measure it. We tried massage and relaxation exercises, but nothing helped. Desperate, I called 911.<\/p>\n
In the darkness, the emergency medical services unit arrived and rushed my normally healthy, forty-three-year-old wife to the hospital. In the early morning hours, when many churches would sing \u201cGo to Dark Gethsemane\u201d and reflect on Christ\u2019s agony on the cross, I was deep in my own darkness. I wept as I thought the unthinkable.<\/p>\n
Doctors finally controlled Barbara\u2019s racing heart and admitted her to the intensive care cardiac unit. She had another episode on Saturday, which the doctor again brought under control.<\/p>\n
I returned to our empty parsonage, facing an Easter I couldn\u2019t cancel and didn\u2019t have much heart for. I prayed, wept, and pleaded for God to give me the strength to be both a good husband and a good pastor. The question pulled at me. How can I celebrate Easter when I\u2019m living Good Friday?<\/p>\n
I prayed, cried, and paced the room. A seminary classmate called me at 11:30 p.m. He asked me what I planned to preach on Easter Sunday. I responded by pouring out my heart to him. My friend gave me a couple of thoughts to hang on to. \u201cFirst, Christ is Savior and rose from the grave,\u201d he said. \u201cDave, you are not Christ, but you will find the energy to do Easter. Second, Barb knows you love her. She wants you to be the best pastor you can be on Easter morning.\u201d<\/p>\n
Though I barely got three hours of sleep the night before Easter, somehow Christ strengthened me the next day. I was able to proclaim the eternal message \u201cHe is risen!\u201d<\/p>\n
When the Communion server gave me the bread and wine and said, \u201cTake and eat; this is the body and blood of Christ, broken and shed for you,\u201d it struck me that Christ was present with us in all his majesty, just as he was with Barbara in the ICCU.<\/p>\n
After church I found Barbara in great shape at the hospital. We concluded that Barb\u2019s working two jobs to pay off our bills wasn\u2019t worth her life. Our priorities changed dramatically, thanks to the Easter weekend when we truly lived\u2014not just observed\u2014the journey to new life.<\/p>\n
\u2014David Coffin, \u201cCelebrating Easter When You\u2019re Living Good Friday,\u201d Leadership<\/i> (Winter 1999)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Topics: Easter; Hope; Jesus Christ; New Life; Priorities; Resurrection; Work References: John 6:35; 11:25; 2 Corinthians 1:6; Titus 3:4\u20135; 1 Peter 1:3 It was Good Friday. My house looked more like a set for Rescue 911 than a place of solemn preparation for the pinnacle of the church year. Barbara, my wife of fifteen years, … Continue reading “COMING
\n ALIVE ON EASTER”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6211","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermons"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6211","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6211"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6211\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6211"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6211"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6211"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}