Someone has observed that “Every day is a good day. Some days are just better than others.” I believe that is true. At least, for Christians, it should be.

A Good Tuesday

On this past Tuesday, our son drove three-and-a-half hours to pay a surprise visit to his mama, who hadn’t seen him in over a year because of COVID restrictions. What a wonderful time we had together. I’d call that a good day (even though she cried occasionally) – a very good day.

In the evening, we received word that a close friend of mine, a faithful Christian pastor, died from the effects of the COVID virus. Less than three hours later, another faithful Christian brother and friend of mine died from liver cancer. Our hearts were breaking. They are aching still. For a while, it no longer felt like a very good day. It began to feel like a bad day.

The reason this day remained a very good day is that we do not sorrow as those who have no hope. We are alive in Christ. That makes every day a good day. Jesus reminded Martha and His disciples that “I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live:.”

Although we will miss Tim and Gil for a while, we are truly happy that Tuesday ended so well for them. Immediately after they exhaled their last earthly breath, they drew their next breath in Heaven and got to see Jesus face to face.

You might say that yesterday was the very best day of Tim’s and Gil’s life on earth. It was even better than the day they were born and even better than the day they were born again. They are alive in a place specially prepared for them by Jesus Christ himself. They have no more pain or sickness, nor will they ever have to experience either again. No longer are they surrounded by the pandemic of sin on every side. They are in the hallowed presence of the Lord – and so shall they ever be.

A Good Friday

Once every year, Christians around the world observe Good Friday. It commemorates the day that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, was crucified.

It’s fair to say that no one awoke that morning thinking that “This would be a good day to be crucified.”

Nonetheless, after Jesus endured a monumental evening in prayer, struggling between the weakness of His flesh and the willingness of His Spirit to be obedient, even to death on the cross, He presented himself as the perfect, spotless Lamb of God who alone could pay the penalty for our sins.

Natural eyes could not see how that was a good day at all. It seemed like a bad day to those who had followed Jesus and had come to love Him. The one who had healed and promised so much hope for the future was tortured until He was as completely disfigured as a man could be. Then He was nailed to a cross to ensure that He would continue to suffer until He died.

His accusers despised Him. His followers despaired for Him. Some denied Him. They all deserted Him.

Yet, Jesus, who for the joy that was set before Him, endured the cross and despised the shame.

Now, through Spirit eyes, we can see and know that that Friday was a good day – a very good day, to be followed soon by the best of days when the Lord made it evident that Jesus had conquered death and risen alive from the grave!

It wasn’t until several hundred years later that that Friday was referred to as Good Friday. Despite various and sundry speculation as to why we call it Good Friday, no one today really knows for certain.

As we approach Good Friday in 2021, let us not mourn as they did on that day. Let us rejoice because that Friday, Jesus shouted, “It is finished!” The long-awaited Redeemer, who had come to save sinners like you and me, fulfilled His promise at exactly the right time. That Friday. That Good Friday.

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