Rita and I went to see “The Passion of The Christ,” at Mountlake 9 Theaters, with our adult daughters, when it was first released in 2004. None of us knew what to expect so it was hard to prepare ourselves.
Description: Tom at the Church of the Holy Sepluckher (PC; Ty McFarland)
I don’t know if your experience was like ours, but when the movie was over and we all exited the theater there wasn’t a sound made by any of the theatergoers. It was eerie. No one spoke a word in the lobby or the parking lot. Heads were lowered. Every face showed the evidence of spent emotion at the spectacle of all that Jesus endured for us, dying on the cross.
We are a fairly vocal family, but there was an awed silence in the car as we drove home, and when we got home everyone retreated to their rooms through the rest of the evening. No one talked. No one was interested in supper later that evening. Our home was absolutely quiet. Each of us was pulled out of life-as-we-know-it by the horror of the crucifixion, and even though the movie ends with a hint of resurrection, we couldn’t get past the cross, the tomb with a lifeless Jesus inside it.
Even though we had all been raised with a thorough belief in Jesus’ resurrection, that Saturday evening in our home, and even into Sunday services the next day, I think the whole congregation and our family was under the almost oppressive cloud of the suffering and death of the Son of God because of our sins.
We did that to Him!
And now, because of us, His bruised and broken, lifeless body lay in a tomb with the stone and Rome’s seal preventing us from go in to where He now was.
In a small way, that experience replicated for us what must have been the mood of that first Easter Eve.
The Lamb of God, slain from the foundations of the world, was dead.
Hope was gone.
Dreams of access to the revealed Kingdom of God lay with Him, lifeless in the tomb.
Description: Garden Tomb (PC: iStock)
There was no future now for that little band of disciples who had followed Him for three years.
Two of them, despondent and joy-less, headed back to their hometown to pick up the pieces of the life they had left behind to follow Him.
It was all over!
Can you feel the despair?
Everything the disciples had dreamed of, inspired by the miracles and powerful teaching, went with Jesus into that tomb.
From their perspective that day, their future and His were gone!
No wonder the Early Church “celebrated” Good Friday and Easter Eve by stripping their meeting places of any color, tapestry, art, any furniture, and any source of light. They wanted to literally feel the darkness, emptiness and horror of their Savior dead, wrapped in grave clothes, and lying in a tomb.
Because when you can feel that…then Easter Sunday morning will resound with heart-felt shouts of praise and songs of sincere worship emanating from the deepest place inside of you… “HE…IS…RISEN!”
Immerse Yourself
Listen to “Guards Are Sent to The Tomb of Jesus | Easter Drama Day 7” on Spreaker.
Prayer:
Lord, this day before Easter it feels heavy, like hope is lost. I feel the burden you carried for me. Thank you for dying for me. Thank you for giving your life so that I may live.
Reflection Questions:
- Have you ever taken a moment to sit in the grief of this day? It’s hard isn’t it? It’s hard to sit in the grief. However, it’s a powerful reminder that God died and went through this so that we could live. Tomorrow is coming!
- Take a moment to prepare your heart and thank God for his sacrifice. Take a moment to sit with God and look at your own life and any sin that might need to be confessed today.
by Alec Rowlands, Westgate Chapel
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