SATURDAY 4.8.23: From Darkness to Light – Luke 23:32-56
Events came to their awful ending. Even as God in Jesus absorbed the worst that evil and hate could do (cf. 2 Corinthians 5:14-19), he stayed focused on forgiving others (verses 34, 42). The Roman centurion who oversaw the crucifixion “praised God, saying, ‘It’s really true: this man was righteous.’” That testimony likely meant a lot to a “most honorable” Gentile like Theophilus (cf. Luke 1:1-4). Joseph of Arimathea, a council member who’d stayed silent at Jesus’ mock trial, at least gave the body a decent burial. And Saturday came. “So far as we know, there has only been one day in the last two thousand years when literally not one person in the world believed Jesus was alive.”1
Reflection
• Scholar N. T. Wright summed up: “It really happened. It wasn’t a mistake. We didn’t get it wrong. It’s true. You can rely on it. This is the main point of Luke’s account of Jesus’ death and burial. He began his book telling Theophilus he could rely on these facts, and now that the most vital one is before us, he presents his witnesses one by one. The centurion saw . . . The crowds standing by saw . . . Jesus’ followers, not least the women, stood at some distance, but they too saw . . . Then the burial: again, the women saw what happened . . . Evidence. Eyewitnesses. This is what Luke promised, and this is what he’s now giving us.”2 It was fact—Jesus had really died and been laid in a tomb. Joseph’s act unwittingly made Jesus’ unexpected resurrection more undeniable. Due to Joseph’s gift, Jesus’ friends knew exactly where his body had been laid. That all made Easter a one-of-a-kind event. How different would Jesus’ impact on your life be if he didn’t really die, or if he stayed in that tomb?
Prayer: Dear Jesus, you walked into the most awful prison: the prison of death. But you went there to break those dark doors wide open. Thank you for bringing light into darkness, life out of death. Amen.
1Ortberg, John. Chapter “Saturday” in Who Is This Man?: The Unpredictable Impact of the Inescapable Jesus.
Zondervan. Kindle Edition.
2N. T. Wright, Luke for Everyone. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2004, p. 285.