Today is a new day. Well, of course! Sunday, March 28, 2010. A day we have never seen before, new challenges, new opportunities, unseen possibilities.
I am thinking of something different. Today is a new day–the first day of a new chapter of my life. I will not preach today, nor next Sunday, nor the next Sunday. I will teach my Bible class. I will share special time with “my kids” in Kid’s Time as we begin the worship assembly, I will encourage God’s people as we surround the Table, but I will not preach.
There is another possibility–today is a new day, the Lord’s Day, the first day of another week, evidence of God’s goodness and love and mercy. Today is recognized in the Christian world as Palm Sunday. The fellowship in which I worship and serve has not traditionally made much of it. That has likely been to our loss. I doubt it gets mentioned today unless I mention it–which I will! It is Bible; it is fact; it is history. To mention something is not to celebrate it. It is the first event in the most documented week of Jesus’ life. The contrast is striking. Those who shouted Hosanna on this Sunday were long gone the following Sunday. Some of those shouting Hosanna were perhaps among those who shouted “Crucify Him”. Mobs are fickle. Mankind is fickle.
John Stott (The Cross of Christ) wrote, “There is good biblical evidence that God not only suffered in Christ, but that God in Christ suffers with his people still. … It is wonderful that we may share in Christ’s sufferings; it is more wonderful still that he shares in ours.”
Dietrich Bonhoeffer (Letters and Papers from Prison wrote, “It is a good thing to learn early that God and suffering are not opposites but rather one and the same thing and necessarily so; for me, the idea that God himself suffers is far and away the most convincing piece of Christian doctrine.”
From the perspective of this new day, our Lord could see the events of the coming week, culminating in suffering and death. As Good Friday and Easter approach, there is another meaning of the phrase: New Day. As we focus on the world-changing event which will grab the attention of the Christian world next Sunday, the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, we see the possibility of a newness that will never fade or grow old. Take time to meditate today on what God has done for you in Christ.
Welcome to the church that celebrates Easter–the New Day which is possible in the resurrection of Jesus–52 times a year!