What’s Good about Good Friday? (3 Minutes in Theology)

What is

Good Friday all about? Why do we call this day good if it's the day Jesus died on the cross? Well, I want to draw your attention to 1

Peter 2 .24. The text says, he himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness.

By his wounds you have been healed. The first thing I want you to notice about the text is it says he himself.

This is actually unnecessary in the Greek. It could just say he bore our sins in his body on the tree and you would understand what the text means.

However, Peter emphatically uses the word himself there to emphasize that it's only in Christ alone that something is accomplished.

Christ himself, to emphasize solus Christus there, Christ alone,

Christ himself bore our sins in his body on the tree.

It's interesting that Peter uses the word tree there, but he's drawing our minds back to Deuteronomy where it says, cursed is anyone who is hanged on a tree.

And so Jesus being hung on the cross, being nailed to the cross on this day,

Good Friday, is not just there as an example. He's not just there merely to demonstrate the love of God.

He is there as a curse. And what is that curse? The curse for fallen man, the curse for breaking

God's holy and righteous law. And so the text says that he bore our sins in his body.

That is, Jesus literally carried our sins in himself and he became sin.

That's what 2 Corinthians 5 21 is getting at. That is, that is, he didn't merely die as or for us, for his people.

He died as his people on the cross, as their representative, whereby our sins were transferred to his account.

They were imputed to him. He bore our sins in his body on the tree, bearing the curse and wrath of God.

He propitiated the wrath of God on the cross. That is what this day is about.

He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree. God became man, taking on human flesh so that he could lay down his life for us.

And then it says that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. Just like we celebrate with Easter, Jesus rose again from the dead.

And so too must God's people rise again from the dead. And they will physically for sure.

But first there's a spiritual, as it were, resurrection from the dead, whereby we are born again.

Because of this great transaction that occurred on the cross, which is sufficient for the sins of the world, because of this great transaction, though, for God's people,

God's people will be born again. That is, under the preaching of the gospel and the heralding of Christ, God's people will die to sin and live to righteousness.

This message is for you if you will receive it. The text says, by his wounds we have been healed.

This isn't physical healing, right? We still have to deal with sickness and sorrow and death, though there will be a physical healing in the future, as it were.

But right now we're healed spiritually. We're forgiven of our sins. That's why the cross is necessary for those who repent of their sins and believe the gospel and put their faith in Christ.

That's why this is a good Friday, because on the cross, Jesus bore our sins in his body on the tree.