(NOTE: I do not mention Holy Thursday here because this comes out in the paper on Friday.)

Good Friday service is tonight (for those getting this on Friday) at 6:30 PM. (Light supper before it at 6:00.) This is the hardest service I do each year. The effort is to let the scriptural story of the trial and death of Jesus come to life for people.

I have the help of our great choir, directed by Mr. Blake Glass. This year, we also have a guest cellist. (Yes, I love me some good cello!)

Truth is, I think the big attendance should be at Good Friday as well as Easter.

As our choir will sing, “Without His Cross, There Is No Crown.”

Good Friday is the heart of Easter. Easter is the answer to the suffering of Good Friday.

And that suffering is all for us. Yet most Christians pay no attention to Good Friday and simply jump over it to Easter.

(Our Easter service is at 11:00 AM.)

But those willing to relive Good Friday can better feel the power of Easter.

We see through scripture the degradation of Jesus—the mockery, the beating, the crowning with thorns.

John shows us that Pilate was playing politics. He was afraid of the crowd on one side and Rome on the other.

He thought he could get off the hook by hauling the brutalized Jesus out for the religious leaders to see.

There He was, covered in blood from head to toe.

“Crucify him! Crucify him!” they shouted.

Hope was gone.

We know the feeling.

It’s over. It’s over.

And then—suddenly—it’s not.

It’s Easter.

It’s joy.

And life goes on.

Always—and forever.

And I’m inviting you to two great services: Good Friday and Easter Sunday.

Make sure I meet you.

I don’t want to offend anyone. People of all faiths have a chance at heaven.

There is truth in all the great religions. We all belong to God, and God loves all of us equally.

But evidence suggests that the essentials of Christianity are true.

However hard some may fight it, it looks like the Shroud of Turin is the real thing. A new cutting-edge X-ray dating technique sets the Shroud at the time of Christ.

The argument may be over. For the image on the Shroud tells the complete story of the crucifixion and the resurrection of Jesus.

It is like a snapshot of the body of Jesus at the very moment of the body’s transformation.

The Shroud tells us that the body de-materialized. As the Shroud fell through the body, it recorded the bones in the hands and the bony sockets of the teeth. These are visible on the Shroud image.

The image is over the blood, which means the blood went on first. And we know it is human blood.

Someone died and was raised 2,000 years ago. The only candidate is Jesus.

If I were not a believer, I would hate to face all the evidence that Jesus is, in fact, Lord. Just His appearance to people of many faiths in religious experiences and NDEs would shake my unbelief.

I want to live reality.

I want the truth and nothing but the truth.

And all the evidence I am aware of points to the truth of the primary claims of Christianity.

The primary claims. Not the nonsense claim that people of other faiths go to hell.

Sunday is Palm Sunday.

Choose reality in your life.

I am working again on my book Discovering God, a project of many years.
Subtitle: What We Know through Religious and Near-Death Experiences.

I am “teaching through it” every Sunday morning at 9:45.
We are learning in the class that there is no good reason not to believe in God.
God is accessible.
God communicates.
God reveals God—to any who will listen.

I have been interested in religious (or transcendent) experiences since I was 14. God gave an audible reply to a prayer.
I was in a bit of a bad mood. I said, after I prayed, “Nobody heard me.”
A voice clearly replied, “I heard you.”

At age 19, I stepped into my front yard on the farm to look up at the sky and pray.
I did look up.
But before I could say a word of my prayer, I was hit with a joy so strong I thought it would kill me.
Literally! I asked God to stop. I could take no more joy.
I had no idea what had happened to me.

I found William James’ masterpiece, The Varieties of Religious Experience, in my college library.
I realized I had had a mystical experience.
I cover a wide range of spiritual experiences in my book, including NDEs.

Everyone!
I say everyone should have a chance to discuss the profound experiences we cover in the class.
I would offer this class on a Thursday evening, from 6:30 to 7:30, if twelve people sign up for it.
If interested, drop me an e-mail. (Or come on Sunday morning.)
It is life-changing.

saintmatthewumc.com
revmaxb@tx.rr.com

As our democracy slips away, we continue to wonder how this could happen. A new study sheds light.

Poland also is tending to elect authoritarian leaders. A new study there of 2,000 voters revealed people do not all agree on what democracy is.

The word “democracy” is popular, but many people have no interest in the elements of democracy, like protecting the rights of minorities and freedom of the press.

Turns out Jesus was right again. He divided the world into two groups: those who love humanity as God does, and those who love only their own group.

“If you love those who love you, what reward do you get?” he asks.

He tells us anyone can do that. It comes naturally.

Jesus says we must love beyond the bounds of our own friends and family.

Jesus ministered to the outcast, the marginalized.

We know some who put us in our present danger were simply uninformed. All they knew was the price of eggs.

But many, as the study shows, simply do not love or even care about the neighbor who is different.

They have no interest in the rights and needs of those Jesus called “the least among us,” those who are vulnerable, powerless.

They don’t care who gets hurt if it’s not them.

But there may be a change coming. It looks like everyone will get hurt except the billionaires.
The evil now loosed seems all-consuming.

Again, Jesus warned us, “Do not expect good fruit from a bad tree.”

Most people may come to see it: This rotten apple will hurt all of us.

Yes, worship is at 11:00.

This Sunday, I will talk about something much of the church has failed to get right— salvation.

And much of the church fails to get salvation right because they fail to get God right. Many ministers are very confused about God.

They will say that “God is love,” for John clearly tells us that. But they also preach that God is vengeful and full of wrath.

Even some parts of the Bible get God wrong. Revelation tells us God will pour out “bowls of wrath” on humankind.

God will not do that.

There is no wrath in God. And how do I know this? In two ways.

First, Jesus tells us.

He says that God loves even His enemies. He says that God is “kind to the ungrateful and to the wicked.”

Dumping bowls of wrath is not kind.

Second, our experience of God tells us that God is love—always love.

I know thousands of accounts of religious and near-death experiences in which people meet God. No one has ever met a God of anger. No one has ever met a God who would want to hurt us.

Millions of people have gone to heaven briefly in near-death experiences. They have not seen one bowl of wrath there.

Yes, I know. Even the blessed Paul mentions “the wrath of God.”

That’s why it is essential that we put Jesus first in reading the Bible.

That is the only way for us to get God right.

Now, how does salvation look without the wrath? Who is saved?

My sermon Sunday: How Did She Get In?

It’s about a Jewish woman who receives a welcome from Jesus during an NDE.

Sunday at 11:00. Join us, in person or online.