The week that changed the world

Over the ages, many have built remarkable structures, accomplished extraordinary feats of human endurance, or committed terrorist acts, all for the purpose of being remembered in history. Each of those attempts have proven futile.  

The pyramids of Egypt have survived. The exact Pharaohs they were to commemorate… those names didn’t survive. The fastest athletes of 1800 were bumped to the curb by faster legs in 1900, whose names were erased by faster records in the 2000’s.

It’s a good lesson for all of us who work feverishly in this life with the hopes of leaving a personal legacy and with a desire for being remembered. 

One of my great-grandfathers served as a pastor for many decades.  Upon his death, Grandpa Heinrich asked that all of his sermons and writings be burned.

“Read the Bible,” he shared. “It’s a much better use of your time.

Leaving a legacy about himself was not important.

Then there is this week, remembered on many church calendars… the week that changed the world. 

The year stamped on every penny and quarter in our pocket, reminds us of the death and then the life — and that is the right order — of Jesus Christ.  He came to earth some 2000 years ago. 

Though He never put pen to paper Himself, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John did for us.  Though each of the writers retells the life of Jesus in slightly different detail, the point of each book is the same. This Jesus, after being crucified and laid in a tomb, came alive again after three days! No one else can lay claim to that.

His resurrection under His own power served as a guarantee of a promise Jesus had previously made. Jesus said, “I am the resurrection and the life.  He who lives and believes in me will live, even though He dies.  And whoever lives and believes in me will never die!”  John 11:25-26

We’re told that on the continent where the Christian faith is growing most rapidly, 12 million Africans have become believers in Jesus Christ in the past 12 months. Why? Because of one week that changed the world.  

This Jesus reminds us that the reason we don’t fit into this world all that well, is that we were made for a better world. It also gives purpose to our lives, knowing that the Lord has put us here at this time and place to serve as His hands and feet and to share this Savior.

For this writer, that meal that Jesus celebrated with his disciples on Thursday of this hallowed week, is the meal that I cherish weekly at my church, especially as so as my hair grows a bit more gray.  Jesus’ death on Good Friday, gruesome as it was, serves as a daily reminder of the high cost for my sin and rebellion against God.  It is called Good Friday, because of the good that Jesus accomplished in paying the full and complete price for my sin.  Resurrection Sunday is not simply a celebration that Jesus rose from the dead.   It is a pledge and assurance that there is a life beyond my grave, and that our citizenship is in heaven.

Do we know that this week is the correct month and day of the events of Resurrection Week in the Bible? No. What we do know is that the events of Jesus walk to the cross are well recorded and attested to by the eye witnesses of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John and many others.  

The four Gospels are worth reading this week.  They tell of the week that changed the world.  May it turn your world upside down as well.

John Lehenbauer, Pastor Emeritus

Christ Lutheran Church & School, Perry

johnlehenbauer@gmail.com