Eden Valley, South Australia (Copyright thegloryofgodismanfullyalive.wordpress.com)
Martin Luther King Jr was martyred because he stood up for African Americans.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer was martyred because he stood up for those oppressed under Hitler.
Joan of Arc, Ghandi; many have been martyred because they stood up for their people group and their countrymen.
But only one man in all of history has been martyred for standing up for the people of every nation on Earth.
He died for people of every tribe and tongue.
He died for every social class. Rich and poor. Learned and unlearned. Outcasts.
Prostitutes, lepers and the mentally ill. He died for those that society despised and rejected.
He died for those who loved him, but also those who hated him.
Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
This was a man who died for you and me.
Let’s not let Easter end without thinking about that.
For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near by the blood of Christ.
15 While Jesus was having dinner at Levi’s house, many tax collectors and sinners were eating with him and his disciples, for there were many who followed him. 16 When the teachers of the law who were Pharisees saw him eating with the sinners and tax collectors, they asked his disciples: “Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?”
17 On hearing this, Jesus said to them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”
The Glory of God is Man Fully Alive 