For many, today begins Spring Break, which means a week without chores, a week without school, a week without work, and a week without responsibility.  This week should not, however, be a week without Jesus. Can you imagine what life would be like if Jesus was not around? I suppose if you’re a sinner it’s not hard to imagine, but for God’s people the idea must be unfathomable.

Well…let’s fathom it.

SUNDAY

A week without Jesus begins, not with Sunday, the Lord’s Day, but with SINDAY, because without Jesus there is no forgiveness of sins. We are reminded in the book of Hebrews that without the shedding of blood, there can be no remission of sins (Hebrews 9:22). This was a point I made in Bible class yesterday: Some have the mistaken idea that God could have saved man any way that He wanted and that He just arbitrarily chose to use Jesus’ death on the cross as the way to accomplish His plan.

No.

Jesus was the plan. From before the beginning began, God knew man would sin and need a Savior, and that the price to be paid (to satisfy God’s inherent need for justice) would be His sinless son. Take Jesus away and there is no other way. Without Jesus, every day is a day saturated in soul-damning sin.

MONDAY

Without Jesus Monday would not be Monday; Monday would be MOURNDAY. Without Jesus, there are no reasons to rejoice, no mirth or merriment to be found. I’m reminded of the reaction of the prodigal son’s father when the rebellious boy came home: He threw a lavish party, filled with music and dancing. He wanted to rejoice. Why? Because a sinner repenting is cause for celebration.

Now imagine if the father did not forgive the son. Imagine if the son—who only went home expecting to be made a lowly servant—was met with something worse than his worst-case scenario: Imagine if the father turned him away angrily, bitterly, and scornfully. There would be no music. There would be no dancing. There would be no rejoicing. There would only be perpetual sadness, dejection, and mourning. What a terrible ending that would be to the story. Fortunately that’s not what happened, because the forgiveness of sins is available to those who return to the Father through Jesus the Son. Without Jesus, every Monday is a blue Monday. Without Jesus, the day might as well be called MOURNday.

Tomorrow, we’ll find out what Tuesday would be like, if it was spent without Jesus.

~ Matthew