Holy Week

My church from home just tweeted a few thoughts and links about Holy Week and I wanted to share them with you guys...

One of the beautiful pictures of Jesus that we find in Scripture is that of the Suffering Servant; the God|Man who lived in flesh and blood, felt the struggles of being human, and demonstrated God's love to us in his suffering and death. Henri Nouwen put it this way in his book, Compassion:

 

The mystery of God’s love is not that he takes our pains away, but that
he first wants to share them with us. Out of this divine solidarity comes
new life. Jesus’ being moved in the center of his being by human pain
is indeed a movement toward new life. God is our God, the God of the
living. In his divine womb life is always born again...The truly good news
is that God is not a distant God, a God to be feared and avoided, a God
of revenge, but a God who is moved by our pains and participates in the
fullness of the human struggle.

Like our Hebrews chapter says, God disciplines us because we are His children and to be a legitimate child, we must go through discipline. God wants to walk with us through that discipline even though it is hard. "He first wants to share [our pains] with us..."

May we finish this week learning to struggle well in our fasts and experience a wholeness with a God who came to earth so that He might suffer with us in our struggles. 

Also, this is a link to a Holy Week timeline that BibleGateway.com put together. Its interesting. I'm going to try to read through the passages each day and keep up with what was actually happening in Christ's life during the week leading to the cross. Feel free to do that too if you want :) 

http://bg3-blog.s3.amazonaws.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/holy-week-timeline.png

Love you guys. Can't wait to see you on Wednesday!