Welcome to the Season of Lent, Dear Friends,
The season of Lent is a very powerful time for Christ followers, and a very emotional time for many. On the last night with his disciples, after they had dinner together in that upper room in Jerusalem, Jesus finds himself in the garden of Gethsemane. He was about to make a sacrifice that would counteract the deed committed by Adam and Eve so many generations earlier.
The book of Romans, chapter 5, talks about this. The first Adam introduced sin into the world through one act. And Jesus Christ, by making one decision and through one act, paved the way for sin to be eradicated from your life and from the world. You see, ours is the God who judges sin, and then turns right back around and does everything he can to solve the problem we created. In Gethsemane, Jesus prayed, “My Father, if it’s possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will” (Matthew 26:39).
I know all analogies fall short, but it would be like one of our young Imagine Kids taking a parent’s cell phone into the bathroom and dropping it into the toilet (which may have happened, for all I know). All the contacts, all the notes, all the pictures, emails, and text messages gone. The child apologizes, but as a parent, what do you do? Is there any way to explain to a young child the significance of what they have done?
All the child can say is, “I’m sorry.” And so, the parent in that situation does the only thing a parent in that situation can do. He or she goes to work remedying the problem their child created and paying the price to fix the problem.
Two thousand years ago, our gracious God, our heavenly Father, sent his Son into this broken world to face the judgment we should have faced. He was mistreated, he was mocked, he was ridiculed, and then at the end of his life, he willingly laid himself down on a Roman cross and was crucified to pay for sins he did not commit. Only a good and gracious God would do such a thing.
God is good, and God is gracious, and God has the whole world in his hands. The brokenness and tragedy of this life remind us that things are not as they ought to be. But the cross reminds us that one day, they will be. During Lent, I feel as if God is saying to the world, “Trust me, for I am the good and gracious and trustworthy heavenly Father.”
What you have longed for, and what you have dreamed of, will one day be a reality, — because that’s what God wants, too.
God has the whole world in his hands,
Bruce Jones, Pastor
Imagine Church
