So, as most everyone knows, I was converted this summer. That means a lot of things are really coming alive to me on a spiritual level like they never did before. One of those things is definitely Easter! It's even more different being in a foreign country, but such a blessing at the same time to spend it with spiritual family. Saturday night we had an Easter dinner here at the Villa, we played games, had an Easter egg hunt, ate a big meal and watched The Passion of the Christ. This was the first time I had seen this movie in awhile, and definitely the first time since my conversion. Everything about it was so real, it put a beautiful image in my mind of what my Jesus, my Redeemer, my First Love, went through. A piece of my heart broke with each slap, each punch, each drop of blood. I really did not believe I would cry because I never cry in movies, there were times when I had tears streaming down my face. I guess it goes to show He took my heart of stone and replaced it with a heart of flesh, huh? All I could think about when the nails were being driven into his hands was how that was supposed to be me. While He cried out for His Father, that was to be me. He did that all, because He loves me. I was in His mind while He was hanging on that cross. You see, this is where the story really picks up, the grave did not hold Him. He's not still in the tomb. At the very end of the movie you see the character who played satan in what I suppose is hell, screaming this blood curdling scream. In the next scene you see the stone being rolled away, the burial garments, for lack of a better term, deflating, with Jesus sitting next to them with the sun shining on His face. When He stood up the camera got a shot of His nail pierced hand. Okay, I know that was just the movie, but this actually happened! For a disclaimer, this blog is not a post about how you should "turn or burn" so please, do not get that idea. I will say, this is my experience, this is what Jesus has done for me. Before I was a self-centered, angry, broken, unhappy mess. Now I, at least try more often, to think of others, I have the joy of the Lord, and have a new whole heart. It is not even because He died, obviously that had a huge part of it, but it is because HE LIVES. He saw what awful messes we were, so he put on, not even figuratively, but physically looked like our sin. Historical reports say that He did not even look like a man when they got done beating Him. He looked like my sin. Like your sin. That is what sin does, it makes the things that were once whole, beautiful and perfect and completely destroys it. Do you remember what I said about how at the end of the movie Jesus was back to His perfect state with the sun shining on His face? Yeah, that my friend is a picture of what His payment of sin did and still does. I know because I am living proof. This is what Jesus does. This is what He did. This is the work He has started in me.
Blessings,
Allysa
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