April 15, 2025 • 27 mins
In this heartfelt Holy Week conversation, Daria shares a personal Bible study moment centered on Romans 5:10:
"While we were still God's enemies, we were reconciled to Him through the death of His Son."
What does it really mean that God loved us even when we were His enemies? And how does that shape the way we treat others? This episode explores the depth of God’s love, the power of Jesus’ sacrifice, and the way Holy Week invites us to live, love, and think differently.
We also discuss:
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The meaning of Hosanna and the surprising history behind Palm Sunday
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Why Jesus' entrance on a donkey was such a bold statement
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What makes Good Friday services uniquely powerful
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The tension and quiet hope of Holy Saturday and Easter Sunday
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How easily we go from cheering Jesus to turning from Him—and how to stay faithful
This reflective episode weaves together Scripture, history, and personal insight to help you engage more deeply with the true meaning of Easter.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
S1 (00:30):
Daria, you had brought us a topic from some personal
Bible study. It seemed that you wanted to bring up
to the team.
S2 (00:37):
Yeah. So I stumbled upon Romans 510, which says, for
if while we were God's enemies, we were reconciled to
him through the death of his son, how much more,
having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life?
And so a couple of things really struck me when
I found this passage. Um, so we've kind of talked about, um,
(00:59):
our proclivity to fight when we see something that we,
you know, is offensive to God to really go on
the attack. Um, so the first thing that struck me
is how God treats his enemies is not how we
treat our own enemies or enemies that we perceive as
being God's enemies. Um, also, the second thing is just like, wow,
look at the depth of love that God has for us. We.
(01:21):
There was a point at which he called us his enemies,
and yet he still sent his son to die for us.
S1 (01:27):
Yeah, yeah, it's hard for us to think that we're
the ones that were God's enemies. It's always everybody else.
S2 (01:34):
Oh, yeah. It's never me. I never do anything that
offends God.
S1 (01:37):
No. Yeah. We were once God's enemies. Um, people who
don't love Jesus now don't have a relationship with him
are still God's enemies. They're still his creation, but they're
his enemies because they go against him. Well, how does that, like,
how is that impacted your, you know, thoughts each day
after reading that and thinking through those kind of two points?
S2 (02:00):
I mean, I'd be lying if I said it like
has had this huge, profound impact since I read it
a week ago, and I'm constantly meditating on it, but
it kind of has just made me stop a little
bit and go that that person is also created, um,
in Christ's image. Um, it is making me, um, just
be a little bit more aware of my thought patterns. Um.
S1 (02:22):
Yeah. How does God treat his enemies? What do you
think people normally say about how God treats his enemies?
S2 (02:28):
Smites them.
S3 (02:29):
Right. Zap them with lightning. You think of Elijah and
the prophets of Baal and all that they went through,
you know. But he he loves his enemies as well.
And we, like you, say we were among them.
S1 (02:45):
Yeah. I'm going to read the passage for us in full,
because it just I was reading it this morning and
it just is a nice reminder and it goes well together.
So Daria was quoting Romans 510, and I'm going to start.
Maybe I'll just start at five one. Therefore, since we
have been made right in God's sight by faith, we
(03:05):
have peace with God because of what Jesus Christ, our
Lord has done for us. Because of our faith, Christ
has brought us into this place of undeserved privilege where
we now stand, and we confidently and joyfully look forward
to sharing God's glory. We can rejoice, too, when we
run into problems and trials, for we know that they
had us help us develop endurance and endurance develops strength
(03:27):
of character and character strengthens our confident hope of salvation.
And this hope, the hope of salvation will not lead
to disappointment. For we know how dearly God loves us,
because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill
our hearts with his love. When we were utterly helpless,
Christ came to us just at the right time and
died for us sinners. Now, most people would not be
(03:49):
willing to die for any upright person, though someone might
perhaps be willing to die for a person who is
especially good. But what God showed is his great love
for us by sending Christ to die for us while
we were still sinners. And since we have been made
right in God's sight by the blood of Christ, he
will certainly save us from God's condemnation. For since our
friendship with God was restored by the death of His
(04:12):
Son while we were still his enemies, we certainly will
be saved through the life of His son. So now
we can rejoice in the wonderful new relationship with God,
because our Lord Jesus Christ has made us friends of God.
So it just talks about we were utterly helpless. We
were sinners and Christ came at the right time. We
(04:36):
were still enemies of Christ when he died for us.
It wasn't like we had to make right all of
our sins. And then he died for us. We were
still his enemies. So I was just looking it up
a little bit. I looked at Desiring God by John Piper,
and he was talking about this article is about does
(04:56):
God love his enemies? And they talk a little bit
about Does God love Satan? Are we supposed to love Satan?
That's not kind of what we're talking about here, maybe
for a different day. But John Piper says, in fact,
Jesus tells us to model to love our enemies as
he loves his enemies. We see it in Matthew five.
It says, I say to you, love your enemies and
pray for those who persecute you, so that you may
(05:18):
be sons of your father who is in heaven. In
other words, he loves his enemies and sends rain on
on the just. Just as he does the unjust. So
you two must treat your enemies that way. But then
he talks about the difference between us and God that
we're just like measly little humans. And he's so. He's infinite,
(05:40):
and we have a heart condition that makes us not
want to love our enemies. And with God being infinite,
he's able to love them. Um, when we can't. But
that doesn't mean we're not allowed to. So he says
we are finite and do not know the deep heart
condition of our enemies. We don't know the final trajectory
(06:01):
of their unbelief or their hardness of heart. Given our limitations,
it is always right for us to pray and work
for their temporal and eternal good until they are dead.
But God does know the heart condition of our enemies.
He knows the final trajectory of their unbelief, their hardness.
He knows whether he will exert an omnipotent, saving influence
in their lives. Therefore, what he expects from us in
(06:21):
our ignorance and our finiteness isn't the same as what
he exercises in his wisdom and knowledge. He expects us
to pray for their salvation and their work for their
salvation until they are dead. And that doesn't always give
way to salvation. Um, both God and his people love
their human enemies, but not in the same way. Since
God is all wise and all governing, and we are
(06:43):
finite and very limited in our understanding and wisdom. So
John Piper is just saying, we don't know if our
enemies are going to stay enemies of God or not,
and that doesn't really matter. God still calls us to
love them and pray for them. And then the second
part of your kind of thought about this, Daria, was
and the depth of God's love for us to sacrifice
(07:05):
himself for his enemies is a great kind of thought.
As we start out this Holy Week, the week leading
up to Easter. So yesterday, if your you went to
church and your church probably discussed maybe maybe they didn't.
It was Palm Sunday, and I want to talk a
little bit about the history of Palm Sunday. Why is
there palms? What's with the palms? Okay. So Palm Sunday,
(07:31):
about 150 years before Jesus comes through and they lay
down the palm branches, there is Judas Maccabeus led Jewish
people to victory over the Seleucid dynasty. And after the victory,
they waved palm branches like in celebration of the victory.
S3 (07:48):
Right?
S1 (07:49):
Then Judas stamped palm palm branch images into their coins
to kind of commemorate the Jewish victory, um, for their people.
And then 150 years later, the Jewish people are under
foreign rule again. Who is that? The Romans. So here
we are in Jesus's time, 150 years later, after Judas Maccabeus,
(08:12):
and they're under foreign rule again. So then Jesus comes
through on Palm Sunday And the people are waving their
palm branches again, shouting Hosanna, which means save us now!
Hosanna means save us now. So basically they're saying to Jesus,
rescue us again, like was done before. Like you. Like
like Judas did back 150 years ago from the suppression
(08:35):
of the Romans. And Jesus does rescue them, but not
quite in the way that they wanted or expected, right?
Jesus rescues us in ways that we don't even fully
comprehend and understand by his death on the cross for us.
So Palm Sunday kind of starts the week of Holy Week,
(08:55):
Sunday to Sunday. So this past Sunday was Holy Week.
We've just been in what is it, 40 days of lent.
So the 40 days leading up to Easter. So there's
seven days left. Palm Sunday happens. Thursday is Maundy Thursday,
which is when the Lord's Supper would have taken place.
S3 (09:15):
Right?
S1 (09:16):
And then we have Good Friday. Has anyone ever been
to a Good Friday service?
S2 (09:20):
Um, I went to my first one last year.
S1 (09:22):
What did you think?
S2 (09:23):
Um, I wasn't I mean, I had no idea what
to expect going in. Um, it was it was very somber. Yeah. Um,
you know, the lights were off. It was very, very serious.
There was worship, there was reading, I, I enjoyed it. Um,
it's quite different than your average Sunday service, though.
S1 (09:37):
Yeah. What about you, Ron?
S3 (09:38):
I have not, but I have a friend at UPS. Who?
That's her favorite service all year.
S1 (09:44):
Oh, it's my favorite service all year as well. I
love the Good Friday service. Kind of like you said, Daria.
It kind of is leaves. It leaves you feeling a
little bit like. Ah, there's something like missing here. Yeah,
there's it's not complete tension. Yes. And it should. That's
like what the design of the service should be is
to leave you feeling kind of in tension with something
because you are going into almost not quite 48 hours
(10:10):
of expectation. Uh, this is what the people during Jesus's
time would have been. You know, they're in mourning and
they're waiting for Jesus to rise.
S2 (10:22):
And they thought that he was a different kind of savior. Yes.
And now they're like, well, he's no savior now.
S1 (10:26):
Exactly. So they have this tension of, oh my gosh,
we put all of our. Easter eggs in this basket and.
S2 (10:35):
Not any more. Eggs are too expensive.
S1 (10:37):
Exactly. Fake plastic eggs. We've put all our eggs in
this basket. That he's going to save us and rescue us.
And look. He died.
S2 (10:42):
What do we do now?
S1 (10:43):
What do we do now? And let us not forget
that the people that were saying, save us, rescue us,
are also the people that eventually crucified him.
S2 (10:51):
Oh, yeah. Probably many of them. The exact same group
of people.
S1 (10:54):
Yes. So you go into Good Friday. You have a
Good Friday service. Hopefully it's contemplative and it should leave
you feeling like there's something missing here. I feel like
I'm kind of in tension, and it gives you that
kind of 48 hour, just a little bit less than
48 hour Time frame of waiting for Easter and the
(11:16):
expectation and hope of Jesus's return, which also should help
us look towards Jesus's second return. Because right now we're
in this waiting period of Jesus has come, but he's
coming again, and we have this tension that we live
in that we talk about every day on this show,
the tension of we're Christians and we love Jesus and
we're being sanctified, but we're not fully, like, fully there yet.
(11:39):
We're waiting for Jesus to come back. We're not perfect.
We still have sin. And that's kind of a shortened
version here on Holy Week. The expectation. And then of course,
we have Easter Sunday where Jesus is risen and we're
excited and there's hope. And, um, it feels like there's
hope for the future. So I just was really, um,
(12:04):
I had a lot I've been thinking a lot about,
particularly the word when you're talking about Palm Sunday, the
word Hosanna, because I think we say it a lot,
but we don't actually know what it means. Right? It's
in a lot of our worship songs, like the one
song Hosanna, that you say it over and over. And
I don't know if I'd ever really thought about that.
The word Hosanna means save us now. I think it
was always just like a part of the story. And
(12:25):
I never really asked the question, what does that mean?
S2 (12:27):
I thought it meant the Lord was here or the
Lord is here, which is apparently wrong.
S1 (12:31):
Well, maybe that's what I was, what I researched, but
I could be wrong too.
S2 (12:35):
But no, I was going off memory. I'm probably wrong.
Everyone's wrong.
S1 (12:39):
We're all wrong here. Um, so I've just been thinking
about about that. Of asking Jesus to save us now.
And we're kind of in that same, same time period
as they were waiting for Jesus. Yes. We're waiting for
Easter to celebrate that he has risen again, but also
looking forward to our current time period waiting for Jesus
(13:01):
to come back again. So I've just been thinking about that.
What are some things that you guys have thought think
about during the Holy Week or leading up to Easter
or on Easter Easter Monday. What are some stuff that
sits with you guys during this holy time?
S3 (13:16):
The roller coaster of emotion. Yeah. Of, uh, you know,
the whole, uh, blessed is he who comes in the
name of the Lord. Everything is upbeat and happy, and
then it turns on a dime, basically. And, you know,
we've got the Garden of Gethsemane. He's arrested. He's taken
(13:38):
to jail or to to court and then crucified. You know,
and it's like gone from if you think about the disciples. Wow.
We're finally getting some traction here. We're really, you know,
we're with the in crowd and then boom. No, I
don't even know him. You know, I want to hide.
(13:59):
And Jesus is crucified and and you may think it's
all over. And then resurrection. Mary has seen him, you know.
Then Peter and John see him. And little by little
more and more. And then hundreds, thousands see him. And
then it it takes off, you know. Then the the
(14:21):
whole church is born.
S1 (14:24):
Yeah. It feels like if looking at the looking back
at the story on Thursday, he's like, it's like, Jesus,
you're starting to act kind of weird. Like, why are
you acting weird?
S2 (14:33):
We see him very agitated on Thursday. Yes, in a
way that most of Scripture does not portray him. He's
I mean, obviously he's in character because he's God, and
God is always in line with his own character, but
he's seeming out of character.
S1 (14:45):
Yeah. Yeah. And he's like, with his friends doing this
dinner and they're just trying to, like, have probably a
dinner that they had many times before and they're just
hanging out as friends. And then you're like, wait, Jesus
are like acting weird. So I can't imagine the emotions
that they felt. Daria, what does Holy Week do for you?
S2 (15:04):
I mean, something I've been kind of sitting with the
last couple of Easters is the crowd and how the
crowd turned on him in the span of less than
a week. Um, you know, a lot of the people
that were yelling, crucified him, might have witnessed his miracles,
might have been his followers, and just kind of what
that says for how how fickle we are as people,
how forgetful we are for what God has done for us. Yeah. Um,
(15:27):
and something that, um, our pastor, uh, stressed yesterday during
his sermon is just, um, they should have known there
were all these very obvious signs and symbols, you know,
going back to the Old Testament. The religious leaders of
the day should have known this was a fulfillment of
the prophecy. Um, and something new I learned was. So,
you know, Jesus riding in on a donkey is a
symbol of peace. I thought that was a modern interpretation.
(15:49):
And it realized in the ancient Near East that was
a well-known. Like, if a leader is riding in on
a horse, that's a sign of war leaders riding in
on a donkey that was a well-known symbol of peace.
And they still missed it.
S1 (16:00):
Yeah.
S2 (16:00):
But it's easy to go look at them. They're so,
you know, they're so ignorant. How could you miss that?
I'm probably worse.
S1 (16:06):
Oh, yeah, we do the same type of thing. We
do the same things today. It just doesn't look as outright.
What does it look like for us to cheer for
Jesus one day and then jeer him the next day?
S2 (16:21):
I mean, it's very easy to praise him when things
are going well and things are going your way. But
as soon as something happens that you don't like, you
get angry and you shake your fist. Why, God? Why?
Where are you? You're never here when I need you.
S1 (16:35):
Yeah, I'd love to hear from our listeners. Text or
call (440)Â 546-2255. What are the ways that we cheer for Jesus?
And then five days later, we're saying, crucify him. Crucify him.
Asking him to save us. And then five days later, saying,
crucify him. Ron, any thoughts from you?
S3 (16:56):
It's easy for us to be swayed by the crowd
like Daria mentioned. Yeah. And you know, you're at church. Great. You're. You're. Hosanna!
Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.
And then you're out amongst the guys and the construction crew,
or whatever your job may be. And everybody's wolf whistling
(17:19):
at a girl or, you know, swearing up and down
about stuff, and. And you don't want to not fit in.
But Jesus has changed you. And you should evidence a
change in life. So don't don't follow the crowd.
S1 (17:37):
Yeah.
S3 (17:38):
Follow the Lord.
S1 (17:39):
And we've been talking about Holy Week in our last
few minutes. So there's Palm Sunday and then Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday,
Thursday is Maundy Thursday, which would be the Lord's Supper,
Good Friday, Holy Saturday, which is a full day of
Jesus being dead and in the tomb, and then Easter Sunday.
And then there's Easter Monday, which isn't like part of
(18:02):
Holy Week, but people get the day off sometimes, which
is nice. We get. Off good Friday here at Moody
Bible Institute, Moody Radio. So we will be on a
rewind on Friday. Celebrating Good Friday with our church families,
as we hope you do as well. More about Holy Week.
Sometimes it's called Passion Week or The Passion of the Christ.
(18:22):
Does that ring any bells to anybody? Yes. What does
the word passion mean to you when you hear the
word passion?
S3 (18:29):
A very strong emotion. Oftentimes it's tied to intimacy and,
you know, relationships between men and women. But, you know,
a strong anger is passion. Um, if you if you
feel strongly about helping the those experiencing homelessness or helping
(18:54):
those under incarceration, that is a passion of yours.
S1 (19:01):
And then how would that if we use that same
word when we look at the Passion Week or the
passion of the Christ, how does that how does that correlate?
Saying it's like it's a big, strong emotion is that
Jesus had big, strong emotions that week, or he had
passion for someone or something, like, why do we use
the word passion?
S2 (19:22):
I don't know that I ever really thought about it.
S1 (19:23):
Neither did I.
S2 (19:25):
It is kind of a strange word to use when
you really think about it.
S1 (19:28):
Yeah, I was wondering the same thing and I found
this article about who is it, uh, Christianity Today, and
it says in today's, you know, language evolves over time.
In today's new Oxford American Dictionary Dictionary, you'd find these
things strong, a barely controllable emotion, an intense desire or
enthusiasm for something much like Ron said. But in good
(19:52):
old dictionaries, like the older version of the Oxford English Dictionary,
which has been considered the definitive historical dictionary. So someone said,
you'll find passion primarily defined according to its original meaning
suffering from the Latin word paseo. This consensus goes back
to at least the second century, when Tertullian wrote the
(20:12):
Latin passion pass passionis Christi. We're speaking Latin. Thank you
so much. I don't speak Latin.
S2 (20:21):
Nobody does.
S1 (20:21):
No.
S2 (20:22):
It's a dead language.
S1 (20:23):
Exactly. Unless you go to a Latin school. Okay, so
maybe it needs to be used more as a suffering.
The week of suffering. That would make more sense, right?
But over time, we've slowly lost this sense of the word. Because,
you know, language changes over time. But I do wonder
how we got from, like, a suffering word meaning suffering
(20:45):
to like, I love you so much, maybe.
S2 (20:48):
Or unhindered emotion.
S1 (20:50):
Yeah, maybe it's just because you feel so sad or
so desperate because you love somebody so much, or you
feel so passionately about saying, I can't use the word
passionately to describe it.
S3 (20:57):
Right?
S1 (20:58):
You feel so intensely. I don't know. He says even
among the recent pandemic. Pew Research found that more than 70%
of U.S. adults generally agreed that suffering is mostly a
consequence of people's own actions. Passion, on the other hand,
is mostly connected to enjoyment in our culture. Right. You
do something because you're passionate about it. I'm passionate about
(21:19):
water sports, so I'm not actually, I don't.
S2 (21:24):
Know what to say. Lauren. Picturing you on the lake
with a sea-doo or whatever.
S1 (21:29):
I wish I could. I wish I could water ski,
but I can't. I'm not very good. But if I
were passionate about water sports, that would be it. It's
an enjoyment thing. But if we're looking at the Latin
version of the word, it would mean suffering, which a
lot of people say is a consequence of our own actions.
Latin paseo is also related, in other English words, as passive,
(21:52):
which one carried the same primary definition to suffer. While
we don't usually associate passivity with pain, the idea is
that a passive person suffers as well. But the object
is not. The is not the subject of the action.
In other words, the passive person suffers as a result
of inactivity. Okay, so there's lots of definitions going on here.
(22:15):
In Jesus, we not only see the full depth of
God's passion, or we can change the word out for suffering.
In Jesus, we see not only the full depth of
God's suffering for us and the suffering that was an
essential part of it. John 316 but also the full
depth of the perfect human passion for God. He quotes
Hebrews 12 for the joy set before him endured the cross.
(22:37):
During lent, we look at an example of Jesus in
his journey of sacrificial suffering, which inevitably, inevitably presents us
with at least two choices to actively embrace. Embrace the
obedient life, or let life happen to us. Both would
be passion to embrace it or to passively let it
happen to us. To live passionately is the truest sense
(23:00):
of the word, is to follow the way of the
Lord and to accept the cost, whatever it may be,
as we have considered the joy set before us, not
least in death or worldly habits, right? We're supposed to
put to death our worldly habits. So the two ways
of passion you can either actively, intensively and intentionally choose it,
choose to suffer with Christ, or it's just going to
(23:20):
happen to you whether you choose it or not. How
can we this week, looking at the passion of the
Christ so the suffering of the Christ. How can we
choose to join God in his suffering through Jesus?
S3 (23:37):
I think one thing is being aware of it. If
you're just living your life and you're watching your series
on Netflix and you're tending to your children and all
of all of the day to day things, Yeah. And
not being involved, not getting into the word reading specifically,
(24:01):
you know, don't jump back into, uh, Old Testament stuff
if you're if you're reading through that on your Bible plan,
jump ahead and go ahead and read some of the
the later chapters in the gospel that give you, um, the,
the overview of the the last days of Christ, the,
(24:22):
the Passion Week. And then. Meditate on that throughout the day.
You'll read it, you know, maybe it'll be 10 or
15 minutes of reading, but then also take time to
think about it. Maybe you're in the shower and while
you're scrubbing your hair and all of that, you're you're thinking,
(24:45):
you know, wow, today would have been the day that
the The Last Supper was, was going on and they
had that Seder meal, and we've chosen to take part
of that out and made it our communion element in church,
different things where you can contemplate and dwell on that and,
(25:08):
you know, not just gloss over it.
S1 (25:11):
Yeah. So our options this week in the week, the
Passion Week, the Holy Week, or we hear, you know,
people say the Passion of the Christ popular movie is
Christ's suffering for us. How can we join in in
Christ's suffering this week? What does it look like for
us to join in in Christ's suffering this week? His
(25:33):
sacrifice and his suffering was for a purpose, and ours
can be too. It doesn't quite look like us being
put to death on a cross, but what does it
look like for us to suffer with Christ, particularly this
Holy Week, as we are looking at Christ's death and
thinking towards his resurrection and celebrating it. Easter Sunday should
be a celebration, but what does it mean for us
(25:55):
to join Christ in his suffering this week and beyond
this week, as we daily live our lives? Does it
mean that we have to put to death ourselves our
own selfish desires, the things that we want? We're not
being asked to be put to death on a cross,
but we are being asked to put to death our
(26:15):
own selfish desires. So I just want you to think
about that as I think about that this week. How
can we join in in Christ suffering this week as
we look towards Easter and after Easter? Because Easter Sunday
is real. It's a real thing that happened. It is
a it continues to affect our lives today. It's not
just the one Easter Sunday we just celebrate today. Christ
(26:39):
is sitting on the throne. He's raised from the dead,
and we can be grateful for that and look towards
his second coming this Holy Week. How can you take
part in Christ's suffering?
Daria, you had brought us a topic from some personal
Bible study. It seemed that you wanted to bring up
to the team.
S2 (00:37):
Yeah. So I stumbled upon Romans 510, which says, for
if while we were God's enemies, we were reconciled to
him through the death of his son, how much more,
having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life?
And so a couple of things really struck me when
I found this passage. Um, so we've kind of talked about, um,
(00:59):
our proclivity to fight when we see something that we,
you know, is offensive to God to really go on
the attack. Um, so the first thing that struck me
is how God treats his enemies is not how we
treat our own enemies or enemies that we perceive as
being God's enemies. Um, also, the second thing is just like, wow,
look at the depth of love that God has for us. We.
(01:21):
There was a point at which he called us his enemies,
and yet he still sent his son to die for us.
S1 (01:27):
Yeah, yeah, it's hard for us to think that we're
the ones that were God's enemies. It's always everybody else.
S2 (01:34):
Oh, yeah. It's never me. I never do anything that
offends God.
S1 (01:37):
No. Yeah. We were once God's enemies. Um, people who
don't love Jesus now don't have a relationship with him
are still God's enemies. They're still his creation, but they're
his enemies because they go against him. Well, how does that, like,
how is that impacted your, you know, thoughts each day
after reading that and thinking through those kind of two points?
S2 (02:00):
I mean, I'd be lying if I said it like
has had this huge, profound impact since I read it
a week ago, and I'm constantly meditating on it, but
it kind of has just made me stop a little
bit and go that that person is also created, um,
in Christ's image. Um, it is making me, um, just
be a little bit more aware of my thought patterns. Um.
S1 (02:22):
Yeah. How does God treat his enemies? What do you
think people normally say about how God treats his enemies?
S2 (02:28):
Smites them.
S3 (02:29):
Right. Zap them with lightning. You think of Elijah and
the prophets of Baal and all that they went through,
you know. But he he loves his enemies as well.
And we, like you, say we were among them.
S1 (02:45):
Yeah. I'm going to read the passage for us in full,
because it just I was reading it this morning and
it just is a nice reminder and it goes well together.
So Daria was quoting Romans 510, and I'm going to start.
Maybe I'll just start at five one. Therefore, since we
have been made right in God's sight by faith, we
(03:05):
have peace with God because of what Jesus Christ, our
Lord has done for us. Because of our faith, Christ
has brought us into this place of undeserved privilege where
we now stand, and we confidently and joyfully look forward
to sharing God's glory. We can rejoice, too, when we
run into problems and trials, for we know that they
had us help us develop endurance and endurance develops strength
(03:27):
of character and character strengthens our confident hope of salvation.
And this hope, the hope of salvation will not lead
to disappointment. For we know how dearly God loves us,
because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill
our hearts with his love. When we were utterly helpless,
Christ came to us just at the right time and
died for us sinners. Now, most people would not be
(03:49):
willing to die for any upright person, though someone might
perhaps be willing to die for a person who is
especially good. But what God showed is his great love
for us by sending Christ to die for us while
we were still sinners. And since we have been made
right in God's sight by the blood of Christ, he
will certainly save us from God's condemnation. For since our
friendship with God was restored by the death of His
(04:12):
Son while we were still his enemies, we certainly will
be saved through the life of His son. So now
we can rejoice in the wonderful new relationship with God,
because our Lord Jesus Christ has made us friends of God.
So it just talks about we were utterly helpless. We
were sinners and Christ came at the right time. We
(04:36):
were still enemies of Christ when he died for us.
It wasn't like we had to make right all of
our sins. And then he died for us. We were
still his enemies. So I was just looking it up
a little bit. I looked at Desiring God by John Piper,
and he was talking about this article is about does
(04:56):
God love his enemies? And they talk a little bit
about Does God love Satan? Are we supposed to love Satan?
That's not kind of what we're talking about here, maybe
for a different day. But John Piper says, in fact,
Jesus tells us to model to love our enemies as
he loves his enemies. We see it in Matthew five.
It says, I say to you, love your enemies and
pray for those who persecute you, so that you may
(05:18):
be sons of your father who is in heaven. In
other words, he loves his enemies and sends rain on
on the just. Just as he does the unjust. So
you two must treat your enemies that way. But then
he talks about the difference between us and God that
we're just like measly little humans. And he's so. He's infinite,
(05:40):
and we have a heart condition that makes us not
want to love our enemies. And with God being infinite,
he's able to love them. Um, when we can't. But
that doesn't mean we're not allowed to. So he says
we are finite and do not know the deep heart
condition of our enemies. We don't know the final trajectory
(06:01):
of their unbelief or their hardness of heart. Given our limitations,
it is always right for us to pray and work
for their temporal and eternal good until they are dead.
But God does know the heart condition of our enemies.
He knows the final trajectory of their unbelief, their hardness.
He knows whether he will exert an omnipotent, saving influence
in their lives. Therefore, what he expects from us in
(06:21):
our ignorance and our finiteness isn't the same as what
he exercises in his wisdom and knowledge. He expects us
to pray for their salvation and their work for their
salvation until they are dead. And that doesn't always give
way to salvation. Um, both God and his people love
their human enemies, but not in the same way. Since
God is all wise and all governing, and we are
(06:43):
finite and very limited in our understanding and wisdom. So
John Piper is just saying, we don't know if our
enemies are going to stay enemies of God or not,
and that doesn't really matter. God still calls us to
love them and pray for them. And then the second
part of your kind of thought about this, Daria, was
and the depth of God's love for us to sacrifice
(07:05):
himself for his enemies is a great kind of thought.
As we start out this Holy Week, the week leading
up to Easter. So yesterday, if your you went to
church and your church probably discussed maybe maybe they didn't.
It was Palm Sunday, and I want to talk a
little bit about the history of Palm Sunday. Why is
there palms? What's with the palms? Okay. So Palm Sunday,
(07:31):
about 150 years before Jesus comes through and they lay
down the palm branches, there is Judas Maccabeus led Jewish
people to victory over the Seleucid dynasty. And after the victory,
they waved palm branches like in celebration of the victory.
S3 (07:48):
Right?
S1 (07:49):
Then Judas stamped palm palm branch images into their coins
to kind of commemorate the Jewish victory, um, for their people.
And then 150 years later, the Jewish people are under
foreign rule again. Who is that? The Romans. So here
we are in Jesus's time, 150 years later, after Judas Maccabeus,
(08:12):
and they're under foreign rule again. So then Jesus comes
through on Palm Sunday And the people are waving their
palm branches again, shouting Hosanna, which means save us now!
Hosanna means save us now. So basically they're saying to Jesus,
rescue us again, like was done before. Like you. Like
like Judas did back 150 years ago from the suppression
(08:35):
of the Romans. And Jesus does rescue them, but not
quite in the way that they wanted or expected, right?
Jesus rescues us in ways that we don't even fully
comprehend and understand by his death on the cross for us.
So Palm Sunday kind of starts the week of Holy Week,
(08:55):
Sunday to Sunday. So this past Sunday was Holy Week.
We've just been in what is it, 40 days of lent.
So the 40 days leading up to Easter. So there's
seven days left. Palm Sunday happens. Thursday is Maundy Thursday,
which is when the Lord's Supper would have taken place.
S3 (09:15):
Right?
S1 (09:16):
And then we have Good Friday. Has anyone ever been
to a Good Friday service?
S2 (09:20):
Um, I went to my first one last year.
S1 (09:22):
What did you think?
S2 (09:23):
Um, I wasn't I mean, I had no idea what
to expect going in. Um, it was it was very somber. Yeah. Um,
you know, the lights were off. It was very, very serious.
There was worship, there was reading, I, I enjoyed it. Um,
it's quite different than your average Sunday service, though.
S1 (09:37):
Yeah. What about you, Ron?
S3 (09:38):
I have not, but I have a friend at UPS. Who?
That's her favorite service all year.
S1 (09:44):
Oh, it's my favorite service all year as well. I
love the Good Friday service. Kind of like you said, Daria.
It kind of is leaves. It leaves you feeling a
little bit like. Ah, there's something like missing here. Yeah,
there's it's not complete tension. Yes. And it should. That's
like what the design of the service should be is
to leave you feeling kind of in tension with something
because you are going into almost not quite 48 hours
(10:10):
of expectation. Uh, this is what the people during Jesus's
time would have been. You know, they're in mourning and
they're waiting for Jesus to rise.
S2 (10:22):
And they thought that he was a different kind of savior. Yes.
And now they're like, well, he's no savior now.
S1 (10:26):
Exactly. So they have this tension of, oh my gosh,
we put all of our. Easter eggs in this basket and.
S2 (10:35):
Not any more. Eggs are too expensive.
S1 (10:37):
Exactly. Fake plastic eggs. We've put all our eggs in
this basket. That he's going to save us and rescue us.
And look. He died.
S2 (10:42):
What do we do now?
S1 (10:43):
What do we do now? And let us not forget
that the people that were saying, save us, rescue us,
are also the people that eventually crucified him.
S2 (10:51):
Oh, yeah. Probably many of them. The exact same group
of people.
S1 (10:54):
Yes. So you go into Good Friday. You have a
Good Friday service. Hopefully it's contemplative and it should leave
you feeling like there's something missing here. I feel like
I'm kind of in tension, and it gives you that
kind of 48 hour, just a little bit less than
48 hour Time frame of waiting for Easter and the
(11:16):
expectation and hope of Jesus's return, which also should help
us look towards Jesus's second return. Because right now we're
in this waiting period of Jesus has come, but he's
coming again, and we have this tension that we live
in that we talk about every day on this show,
the tension of we're Christians and we love Jesus and
we're being sanctified, but we're not fully, like, fully there yet.
(11:39):
We're waiting for Jesus to come back. We're not perfect.
We still have sin. And that's kind of a shortened
version here on Holy Week. The expectation. And then of course,
we have Easter Sunday where Jesus is risen and we're
excited and there's hope. And, um, it feels like there's
hope for the future. So I just was really, um,
(12:04):
I had a lot I've been thinking a lot about,
particularly the word when you're talking about Palm Sunday, the
word Hosanna, because I think we say it a lot,
but we don't actually know what it means. Right? It's
in a lot of our worship songs, like the one
song Hosanna, that you say it over and over. And
I don't know if I'd ever really thought about that.
The word Hosanna means save us now. I think it
was always just like a part of the story. And
(12:25):
I never really asked the question, what does that mean?
S2 (12:27):
I thought it meant the Lord was here or the
Lord is here, which is apparently wrong.
S1 (12:31):
Well, maybe that's what I was, what I researched, but
I could be wrong too.
S2 (12:35):
But no, I was going off memory. I'm probably wrong.
Everyone's wrong.
S1 (12:39):
We're all wrong here. Um, so I've just been thinking
about about that. Of asking Jesus to save us now.
And we're kind of in that same, same time period
as they were waiting for Jesus. Yes. We're waiting for
Easter to celebrate that he has risen again, but also
looking forward to our current time period waiting for Jesus
(13:01):
to come back again. So I've just been thinking about that.
What are some things that you guys have thought think
about during the Holy Week or leading up to Easter
or on Easter Easter Monday. What are some stuff that
sits with you guys during this holy time?
S3 (13:16):
The roller coaster of emotion. Yeah. Of, uh, you know,
the whole, uh, blessed is he who comes in the
name of the Lord. Everything is upbeat and happy, and
then it turns on a dime, basically. And, you know,
we've got the Garden of Gethsemane. He's arrested. He's taken
(13:38):
to jail or to to court and then crucified. You know,
and it's like gone from if you think about the disciples. Wow.
We're finally getting some traction here. We're really, you know,
we're with the in crowd and then boom. No, I
don't even know him. You know, I want to hide.
(13:59):
And Jesus is crucified and and you may think it's
all over. And then resurrection. Mary has seen him, you know.
Then Peter and John see him. And little by little
more and more. And then hundreds, thousands see him. And
then it it takes off, you know. Then the the
(14:21):
whole church is born.
S1 (14:24):
Yeah. It feels like if looking at the looking back
at the story on Thursday, he's like, it's like, Jesus,
you're starting to act kind of weird. Like, why are
you acting weird?
S2 (14:33):
We see him very agitated on Thursday. Yes, in a
way that most of Scripture does not portray him. He's
I mean, obviously he's in character because he's God, and
God is always in line with his own character, but
he's seeming out of character.
S1 (14:45):
Yeah. Yeah. And he's like, with his friends doing this
dinner and they're just trying to, like, have probably a
dinner that they had many times before and they're just
hanging out as friends. And then you're like, wait, Jesus
are like acting weird. So I can't imagine the emotions
that they felt. Daria, what does Holy Week do for you?
S2 (15:04):
I mean, something I've been kind of sitting with the
last couple of Easters is the crowd and how the
crowd turned on him in the span of less than
a week. Um, you know, a lot of the people
that were yelling, crucified him, might have witnessed his miracles,
might have been his followers, and just kind of what
that says for how how fickle we are as people,
how forgetful we are for what God has done for us. Yeah. Um,
(15:27):
and something that, um, our pastor, uh, stressed yesterday during
his sermon is just, um, they should have known there
were all these very obvious signs and symbols, you know,
going back to the Old Testament. The religious leaders of
the day should have known this was a fulfillment of
the prophecy. Um, and something new I learned was. So,
you know, Jesus riding in on a donkey is a
symbol of peace. I thought that was a modern interpretation.
(15:49):
And it realized in the ancient Near East that was
a well-known. Like, if a leader is riding in on
a horse, that's a sign of war leaders riding in
on a donkey that was a well-known symbol of peace.
And they still missed it.
S1 (16:00):
Yeah.
S2 (16:00):
But it's easy to go look at them. They're so,
you know, they're so ignorant. How could you miss that?
I'm probably worse.
S1 (16:06):
Oh, yeah, we do the same type of thing. We
do the same things today. It just doesn't look as outright.
What does it look like for us to cheer for
Jesus one day and then jeer him the next day?
S2 (16:21):
I mean, it's very easy to praise him when things
are going well and things are going your way. But
as soon as something happens that you don't like, you
get angry and you shake your fist. Why, God? Why?
Where are you? You're never here when I need you.
S1 (16:35):
Yeah, I'd love to hear from our listeners. Text or
call (440)Â 546-2255. What are the ways that we cheer for Jesus?
And then five days later, we're saying, crucify him. Crucify him.
Asking him to save us. And then five days later, saying,
crucify him. Ron, any thoughts from you?
S3 (16:56):
It's easy for us to be swayed by the crowd
like Daria mentioned. Yeah. And you know, you're at church. Great. You're. You're. Hosanna!
Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.
And then you're out amongst the guys and the construction crew,
or whatever your job may be. And everybody's wolf whistling
(17:19):
at a girl or, you know, swearing up and down
about stuff, and. And you don't want to not fit in.
But Jesus has changed you. And you should evidence a
change in life. So don't don't follow the crowd.
S1 (17:37):
Yeah.
S3 (17:38):
Follow the Lord.
S1 (17:39):
And we've been talking about Holy Week in our last
few minutes. So there's Palm Sunday and then Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday,
Thursday is Maundy Thursday, which would be the Lord's Supper,
Good Friday, Holy Saturday, which is a full day of
Jesus being dead and in the tomb, and then Easter Sunday.
And then there's Easter Monday, which isn't like part of
(18:02):
Holy Week, but people get the day off sometimes, which
is nice. We get. Off good Friday here at Moody
Bible Institute, Moody Radio. So we will be on a
rewind on Friday. Celebrating Good Friday with our church families,
as we hope you do as well. More about Holy Week.
Sometimes it's called Passion Week or The Passion of the Christ.
(18:22):
Does that ring any bells to anybody? Yes. What does
the word passion mean to you when you hear the
word passion?
S3 (18:29):
A very strong emotion. Oftentimes it's tied to intimacy and,
you know, relationships between men and women. But, you know,
a strong anger is passion. Um, if you if you
feel strongly about helping the those experiencing homelessness or helping
(18:54):
those under incarceration, that is a passion of yours.
S1 (19:01):
And then how would that if we use that same
word when we look at the Passion Week or the
passion of the Christ, how does that how does that correlate?
Saying it's like it's a big, strong emotion is that
Jesus had big, strong emotions that week, or he had
passion for someone or something, like, why do we use
the word passion?
S2 (19:22):
I don't know that I ever really thought about it.
S1 (19:23):
Neither did I.
S2 (19:25):
It is kind of a strange word to use when
you really think about it.
S1 (19:28):
Yeah, I was wondering the same thing and I found
this article about who is it, uh, Christianity Today, and
it says in today's, you know, language evolves over time.
In today's new Oxford American Dictionary Dictionary, you'd find these
things strong, a barely controllable emotion, an intense desire or
enthusiasm for something much like Ron said. But in good
(19:52):
old dictionaries, like the older version of the Oxford English Dictionary,
which has been considered the definitive historical dictionary. So someone said,
you'll find passion primarily defined according to its original meaning
suffering from the Latin word paseo. This consensus goes back
to at least the second century, when Tertullian wrote the
(20:12):
Latin passion pass passionis Christi. We're speaking Latin. Thank you
so much. I don't speak Latin.
S2 (20:21):
Nobody does.
S1 (20:21):
No.
S2 (20:22):
It's a dead language.
S1 (20:23):
Exactly. Unless you go to a Latin school. Okay, so
maybe it needs to be used more as a suffering.
The week of suffering. That would make more sense, right?
But over time, we've slowly lost this sense of the word. Because,
you know, language changes over time. But I do wonder
how we got from, like, a suffering word meaning suffering
(20:45):
to like, I love you so much, maybe.
S2 (20:48):
Or unhindered emotion.
S1 (20:50):
Yeah, maybe it's just because you feel so sad or
so desperate because you love somebody so much, or you
feel so passionately about saying, I can't use the word
passionately to describe it.
S3 (20:57):
Right?
S1 (20:58):
You feel so intensely. I don't know. He says even
among the recent pandemic. Pew Research found that more than 70%
of U.S. adults generally agreed that suffering is mostly a
consequence of people's own actions. Passion, on the other hand,
is mostly connected to enjoyment in our culture. Right. You
do something because you're passionate about it. I'm passionate about
(21:19):
water sports, so I'm not actually, I don't.
S2 (21:24):
Know what to say. Lauren. Picturing you on the lake
with a sea-doo or whatever.
S1 (21:29):
I wish I could. I wish I could water ski,
but I can't. I'm not very good. But if I
were passionate about water sports, that would be it. It's
an enjoyment thing. But if we're looking at the Latin
version of the word, it would mean suffering, which a
lot of people say is a consequence of our own actions.
Latin paseo is also related, in other English words, as passive,
(21:52):
which one carried the same primary definition to suffer. While
we don't usually associate passivity with pain, the idea is
that a passive person suffers as well. But the object
is not. The is not the subject of the action.
In other words, the passive person suffers as a result
of inactivity. Okay, so there's lots of definitions going on here.
(22:15):
In Jesus, we not only see the full depth of
God's passion, or we can change the word out for suffering.
In Jesus, we see not only the full depth of
God's suffering for us and the suffering that was an
essential part of it. John 316 but also the full
depth of the perfect human passion for God. He quotes
Hebrews 12 for the joy set before him endured the cross.
(22:37):
During lent, we look at an example of Jesus in
his journey of sacrificial suffering, which inevitably, inevitably presents us
with at least two choices to actively embrace. Embrace the
obedient life, or let life happen to us. Both would
be passion to embrace it or to passively let it
happen to us. To live passionately is the truest sense
(23:00):
of the word, is to follow the way of the
Lord and to accept the cost, whatever it may be,
as we have considered the joy set before us, not
least in death or worldly habits, right? We're supposed to
put to death our worldly habits. So the two ways
of passion you can either actively, intensively and intentionally choose it,
choose to suffer with Christ, or it's just going to
(23:20):
happen to you whether you choose it or not. How
can we this week, looking at the passion of the
Christ so the suffering of the Christ. How can we
choose to join God in his suffering through Jesus?
S3 (23:37):
I think one thing is being aware of it. If
you're just living your life and you're watching your series
on Netflix and you're tending to your children and all
of all of the day to day things, Yeah. And
not being involved, not getting into the word reading specifically,
(24:01):
you know, don't jump back into, uh, Old Testament stuff
if you're if you're reading through that on your Bible plan,
jump ahead and go ahead and read some of the
the later chapters in the gospel that give you, um, the,
the overview of the the last days of Christ, the,
(24:22):
the Passion Week. And then. Meditate on that throughout the day.
You'll read it, you know, maybe it'll be 10 or
15 minutes of reading, but then also take time to
think about it. Maybe you're in the shower and while
you're scrubbing your hair and all of that, you're you're thinking,
(24:45):
you know, wow, today would have been the day that
the The Last Supper was, was going on and they
had that Seder meal, and we've chosen to take part
of that out and made it our communion element in church,
different things where you can contemplate and dwell on that and,
(25:08):
you know, not just gloss over it.
S1 (25:11):
Yeah. So our options this week in the week, the
Passion Week, the Holy Week, or we hear, you know,
people say the Passion of the Christ popular movie is
Christ's suffering for us. How can we join in in
Christ's suffering this week? What does it look like for
us to join in in Christ's suffering this week? His
(25:33):
sacrifice and his suffering was for a purpose, and ours
can be too. It doesn't quite look like us being
put to death on a cross, but what does it
look like for us to suffer with Christ, particularly this
Holy Week, as we are looking at Christ's death and
thinking towards his resurrection and celebrating it. Easter Sunday should
be a celebration, but what does it mean for us
(25:55):
to join Christ in his suffering this week and beyond
this week, as we daily live our lives? Does it
mean that we have to put to death ourselves our
own selfish desires, the things that we want? We're not
being asked to be put to death on a cross,
but we are being asked to put to death our
(26:15):
own selfish desires. So I just want you to think
about that as I think about that this week. How
can we join in in Christ suffering this week as
we look towards Easter and after Easter? Because Easter Sunday
is real. It's a real thing that happened. It is
a it continues to affect our lives today. It's not
just the one Easter Sunday we just celebrate today. Christ
(26:39):
is sitting on the throne. He's raised from the dead,
and we can be grateful for that and look towards
his second coming this Holy Week. How can you take
part in Christ's suffering?
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