(Note: this post was originally a mini-message I delivered at Bethany Wesleyan Church for a Good Friday Service)

How would someone describe you?  Think about it and be honest with yourself.  If someone had to describe you, what would they say?

Obviously, someone should start the description process with the hair.  Alright, maybe that is just wishful thinking on my part.  It has been said that I have the best hair in the Lehigh Valley (okay…the person who actually said that was me…).  We do tend to start with physical attributes though, don’t we?  Hopefully, the description would go deeper.  They’d talk about if you were a nice person, a caring individual, a creative mind, a loving parent, etc.

For most of us we will be described by what we have done.  When I was in 5th grade I had a teacher named Mr. Dippery. (Seriously!  Imagine the fun a 5th grader could have with the name Dippery! Oh the temptation to say Dippy or Drippy.)  We took a class trip to a local park with a creek and Mr. Dippery made it very clear that every year someone fell into the creek.  He made it just as clear that we were not to be that person.  Wouldn’t it be great if this was the year where no one fell in the creek?  Yeah, that would have been great.  I can’t remember if it was hot out, if the water looked refreshing, or if maybe I saw a fish, but I ended up in the creek.  For Mr. Dippery, I became the “fall in the creek” type of kid and that description was probably well deserved!

How would someone describe you?

Jesus is on the cross and two other men are on crosses with Him. Matthew and Mark describe them as thieves. But Luke chooses a different word – a Greek word that literally means “those who do evil works.”¹  This is probably one of the ways we’d all least like to be described.  But the fear is that at one point or another in our lives this could have described any of us.  At one point or another we’ve all done evil. And we all hope not to be remembered for those moments.

Jesus hung on the cross with these two men. One, for some reason or another, decided to berate and mock Him. Did this evil man feel better from his words? Did he feel like part of the crowd? Did resorting to bullying make his situation seem better? I don’t know.

While one berated Jesus and mocked who He was, the other took a different stance.  Something from his evil life changed. Could he change his past? No, every action he had made remained.  Could he change his present situation, of hanging on the cross? No, he was literally nailed to that situation.  But he must have seen something in Jesus’ actions that gave him the hope to believe.  And as his heart began to change, he made a simple plea:

“Jesus, remember me when You come into Your Kingdom.”

And with those words he proclaimed his faith, his belief, his hope, his heart.

And Jesus replied, ‘Truly I tell you, today you will be with Me in Paradise.”

Many across the world will remember Good Friday as the day that the world, humanity, a race of “those who do evil works” destroyed the greatest person among them.  It could be the day that they took the one true innocent man, the one Man that certainly was not “one who did evil works” and killed Him next to those who did.

That is one way to remember Good Friday.

I’d encourage you to remember Good Friday like this:  The day our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ looked into the eyes of one who did evil works – a representative of each of us, maybe the worst of us – and because that man believed, Jesus invited him to spend eternity with Him in paradise.

How would someone describe you?

Remember that no matter how lost you are – Jesus came for you and on the cross He invited you to paradise with Him.  However your past may describe you – with a confession to Jesus Christ and a belief in Him, He will describe you as one fit for paradise, one made for His family.

How would someone describe you?

If those of us who claim to be Christ’s followers would show the compassion and love that Jesus showed even up to His most painful moment on the cross, think about how you and I would be described!  Think about the difference we could make!

How would someone describe you?  Time will tell.

From Good Friday we do know one thing, how Jesus would describe you – worth it all.

 

 

¹Adam Hamilton, Final Words From the Cross, (Abingdon Press, 2011) p. 38.