He Tasted Death

Easter. When I was younger--even last year!--I looked forward to Easter primarily because of all the chocolate. My gramma is huge on buying us tons of chocolate and Reeses and Mike Ike's and all that good stuff. Believe me, when Easter rolls around, we got us some serious chocolate stocks.

Good Friday. I looked forward to that because we got to go to our church and I liked seeing all my friends. Plus, in the Good Friday service there was no sermon--just worship and the Passion clips. How awesome is that?! Mmhm. Great attitude, right?

This year, Good Friday and Easter and Jesus's sacrifice--it was all real to me. I felt alive for the first time in months--and frankly, I just wanted to honor Him with my alive-ness this Easter season. So I payed attention this Good Friday service....

...and I was blown away. My church's Good Friday service is beyond incredible. It is mind-boggling. The awesome band played "Breath of Heaven" with Elizabeth Hunnicutt singing (not entirely sure if it was her, but she sings a lot at Open Door, so I'm pretty sure) near the end over silent clips of the Passion, and I could not stop crying. They had roses and Charlotte Church and "Silent Please" sessions and prayer and worship and dim lights and scripture and clips from the Passion of Christ.

This morning. Easter morning service. Again, I listened instead of letting my mind wander--and again I was blown away.

Our pastor, Dave Johnson, discussed Jesus's death, and talked about things I honestly never thought about.

You ever wonder what happened to Jesus in the three days His body was lying in a tomb?

I haven't. At all. My mind has always flowed from His crucifixion to his resurrection--I never thought about what happened in between.

He tasted death--but the crucifixion wasn't death itself. It was the process of dying.

There's a verse that the pastor gave, I can't remember the reference. But it said that Jesus went into the "lower parts of the earth" to "taste death for every man" (or something along those lines.)

In order for Jesus to experience death's grip, in order to break it and to gain the keys of hell He had to go to hell. For three days. Imagine what He went through. At the hands of the enemy for three days. The torture and agony of the crucifixion was just the beginning.

But then the morning of the third day dawned, and Jesus ascended from the fury of hell. He conquered death--my death, your death. He took our sins and paid the price so we don't have to.

Tell me that doesn't give you shivers! I went cold when I heard it.

Because of Him, we are free. Now that is much more worthy to celebrate than chocolate.