“Good Friday?”
Blessings Follk!
Today is traditionally referred to as “Good Friday.” It is believed by most of the professing church to be the day that the Lord Jesus Christ was crucified.
An examination of the Word reveals this to be incorrect.
Yep.
Jesus was not crucified on Friday.
Now, let me hasten to say that it matters not. This is not something in which we separate fellowship, but, we should know the truth.
The coming of the Lord...the first time and the second time...was/is prophesied throughout the Word. The Lord revealed to His people through various ways the things to come.
The Feasts of Israel - really the Feasts of the Lord given to Israel - provide tremendous insight.
Here is the brief version.
The Lord gave Israel 7 feasts...4 in the spring, 3 in the fall.
The spring feasts were fulfilled when the Lord came the first time -
- Passover
- Feast of Unleavened Bread
- Feast of First Fruits
- Feast of Pentecost
The Lord gave precise detail as to how these feasts were to be celebrated, days to celebrate, etc. (See Leviticus 23).
The church has been mistaken for centuries in thinking that Jesus was crucified on Friday. I believe this occurred due to the the following Scripture…
John 19:31
31 The Jews therefore, because it was the preparation, that the bodies should not remain upon the cross on the sabbath day, (for that sabbath day was an high day,) besought Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away.
KJV
The error has occurred because folk thought the sabbath day in verse 31 was a reference to the weekly sabbath.
This is not true.
It is a reference to the sabbath which is the high day of the first day of the Feast of First Fruits.
Lev 23:6-8
6 'Then on the fifteenth day of the same month there is the Feast of Unleavened Bread to the Lord ; for seven days you shall eat unleavened bread.
7 'On the first day you shall have a holy convocation; you shall not do any laborious work.
8 'But for seven days you shall present an offering by fire to the Lord . On the seventh day is a holy convocation; you shall not do any laborious work.'"
NASU
Again, this is not a divisive issue. I participate in “good Friday” events...leading a service this afternoon at a local portion of the Body of Christ. But, we do well to know what the truth.
I believe it is important because the truth will allow us to stand against the lies of the evil one.
I remember wondering about the Fri-Sun. I knew Jesus said…
Matt 12:39-40
39 But He answered and said to them, "An evil and adulterous generation craves for a sign; and yet no sign will be given to it but the sign of Jonah the prophet;
40 for just as JONAH WAS THREE DAYS AND THREE NIGHTS IN THE BELLY OF THE SEA MONSTER, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
NASU
Jesus said 3 days and 3 nights...not portions thereof.
This confused me. Oh, I had heard all the explanations, yet they were forced and contrived.
The answer was to be found in the correct understanding of the Word, especially the Feasts.
So, here is the sequencing of events in the last week of Jesus life…remember, the Hebrew day begins at sunset...
On the 10th day of Nisan the lamb to be sacrificed at Passover was to be set aside to be examined…was it perfect?
Ex 12:3
3 Speak ye unto all the congregation of Israel, saying, In the tenth day of this month they shall take to them every man a lamb, according to the house of their fathers, a lamb for an house:
KJV
The same happened to Jesus...He was the Passover Lamb...then…
| Day | Our day/hour | Event |
| Nisan 14 - Passover Lev. 23:4-5 | 6 p.m. - 5:59 p.m Tues sunset - Wed sunset Hebrew Wednesday | 3 |
| Nisan 15 - Unleavened Bread Lev. 23:6-8 | 6 p.m. - 5:59 p.m. Wed Sunset - Thur Sunset Hebrew Thursday | A Sabbath Day A Holy convocation First night/day in tomb |
| Nisan 16 | 6 p.m. - 5:59 p.m. Thur Sunset - Fri Sunset Hebrew Friday | Second night/day in tomb |
| Nisan 17 | 6 p.m. - 5:59 p.m. Fri Sunset - Sat Sunset Hebrew Saturday | Weekly Sabbath Third night/day in tomb |
| Nisan 18 Feast of Firstfruits Lev. 23:9-14 | 6 p.m. - 5:59 p.m Sat sunset - Sun sunset Hebrew Sunday | First Day of Week Resurrection |
Fifty days from Firstfruits (Pentecost) - Lev. 23:15-22 - with outpouring of the Holy Spirit the Spring Feasts are fulfilled.
We as believers celebrate the resurrection with every breath we take...not just on particular day of the year. Still, we do well to reflect upon the varied things the Lord did for us during this week.
Let us do so and rejoice!!!
Today’s reading from the “So That’s Why” Bible consist of pp. 561-567.
Blessings!!
“You Are Not A Scary Accident…”
Blessings Folk!!
A quick follow-up to our previous time together…
Never forget that you are wonderfully made…
You are not a mistake…
Read the following and note what is true about you…
Ps 139:14-18
14 I will give thanks to You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Wonderful are Your works, And my soul knows it very well.
15 My frame was not hidden from You, When I was made in secret, And skillfully wrought in the depths of the earth;
16 Your eyes have seen my unformed substance; And in Your book were all written The days that were ordained for me, When as yet there was not one of them.
17 How precious also are Your thoughts to me, O God! How vast is the sum of them!
18 If I should count them, they would outnumber the sand. When I awake, I am still with You.
NASU
Know these truths.
- You were made...not an accident of “nature”, etc.
- You are/were fearfully made...not scary
...but amazingly, in awe, beyond comprehension - The works of the Lord are wonderful. You are a work of the Lord...the pinnacle of His creation
- Each of us knows...our soul knows...very well that we were created. Even those who reject the knowledge know in their soul the truth. They choose to reject. God has placed this knowledge within each person…
Rom 1:18-19
18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness,
19 because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them.
NASU
- You were made in secret...skillfully wrought
- The Lord saw who you were to be prior to your being formed. He knows!
- The Lord has written in His Book the number of days ordained for you, even before one of them existed!
It is amazing how the Lord designed us.
But, wait! There is more! lol
The Lord thinks on you constantly, without ceasing.
Precious thoughts.
Vast in number.
More than all the grains of sand of the world.
He never leaves us.
He never forsakes us.
Therefore, why should we worry and fret.
The Lord made us.
The Lord thinks on us.
Thereby we live and breath and have our very being...
Give thanks...
Today’s reading from the “So That’s Why” Bible consists of pp. 552-556.
“Abortion is a Blessing…”
Blessings Folk!!
From time to time one encounters an event that brings into sharp focus the battle that is taking place in the heavenlies and the strategy of the enemy.
Such is the case with the following article...of course, it is from an international paper… rare is the media in our nation that reports such.
The article recounts the recent appointment of the new Dean of the Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge, Massachusetts. This person provides oversight to “theological education”.
The new dean presented a “sermon” in Birmingham, Alabama sometime in 2007. The dean did not post the sermon on the internet until summer 2008. It provides insight into the mindset of perversion.
Here is the link:
Abortion is a blessing and abortionists are doing holy work, says Anglican priest :: Damian Thompson
Please take the time to read...two key phrases are used repeatedly…
“abortion is a blessing”
“our work would not be (is not) done”
This is just another example of that which the Word forewarned…
2 Tim 4:3-4
3 For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears;
4 And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.
KJV
2 Peter 2:1-3
1 But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will also be false teachers among you, who will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing swift destruction upon themselves.
2 Many will follow their sensuality, and because of them the way of the truth will be maligned;
3 and in their agreed they will exploit you with false words; their judgment from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep.
NASU
Jude 3-8
3 Beloved, while I was making every effort to write you about our common salvation, I felt the necessity to write to you appealing that you contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all handed down to the saints.
4 For certain persons have crept in unnoticed, those who were long beforehand marked out for this condemnation, ungodly persons who turn the grace of our God into licentiousness and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ.
5 Now I desire to remind you, though you know all things once for all, that the Lord, after saving a people out of the land of Egypt, subsequently destroyed those who did not believe.
6 And angels who did not keep their own domain, but abandoned their proper abode, He has kept in eternal bonds under darkness for the judgment of the great day,
7 just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities around them, since they in the same way as these indulged in gross immorality and went after strange flesh, are exhibited as an example in undergoing the punishment of eternal fire.
8 Yet in the same way these men, also by dreaming, defile the flesh, and reject authority, and revile angelic majesties.
NASU
This new Dean pursues strange flesh, openly.
The Dean denies the Truth of the Word.
We must contend for the faith.
We must speak forth the truth.
Press on and do so.
Today’s reading from the “So That’s Why” Bible consists of pp. 541-547.
Blessings!!