Columns

Have you ever wondered about the day after Good Friday and the day before Easter? The question is this: What happened to Jesus after He was crucified but before He was resurrected?

The Nazis were adept at using media and communications tools to twist facts, radicalize their populace and demonize targeted populations. We can only imagine how powerful that regime could have been to distract and deceive had they the digital tools available today.

We have had our adopted Mexican street cat, Felix, for a month now.

A good friend of mine who is generally very cautious and aware recently got a dose of malware on their Windows 10 PC. How did they know they got infected? The malware opened a window offering a free iPad and then began opening new tabs. Fortunately, Windows Defender blocked the content of those new tabs, but there was still the malware to deal with.

Editor’s note — This is the first part of a two-part column.

The message of the cross of Jesus Christ has never been a popular one. In the ancient world, as the early church was just starting to pick up steam, the idea of God on a cross was particularly offensive and laughable to many. Last week I wrote about the Greek word “skandalon,” a word that the Apostle Paul used to describe the Jewish reaction to his preaching about the cross. It was a scandalous idea to most Jewish minds that the Messiah would suffer in such a way. In the same letter to the Christians in Corinth, Paul describes the Gentile reaction to the cross as mostly being one of rejection as well. To Gentile minds, the message of the cross was foolish, even stupid.

When the Russians began their invasion of Ukraine, Ukrainian composer Adrian Mocanu heard the wailing warning of the air-raid sirens and said, “I thought the sirens sounded like giant wolves howling.” Well, metaphorically as it turns out, he wasn’t too far off in painting a picture of what was to come.

I had a discouraging day yesterday.

Remember when you were a kid and the more dangerous something was the more fun it became? Isn’t that why we climbed trees or balanced on a fence post or rode our bikes really fast down hills?

There is a scandal at the heart of the Christian faith. This scandal makes it hard for people to believe in the person of Jesus and in the words of Jesus. The scandal is not some kind of hidden moral failing in a leader of a movement that has just come to light. It is out there in public view and is talked about from Christian pulpits regularly. The scandal is this: Christians believe that the Messiah, the Son of God, died a shame-filled death inflicted on him by his own Jewish leaders through the enforcement of Roman law. In a word, the scandal is about the cross on which Jesus suffered death.