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Nailed

  Yesterday I shot myself in the finger with a nail gun.  

  Yes, it hurt. How could it not? It didn’t go all the way through, but I did feel it hit the bone. Later in the evening as I was downing ibuprofen for the throbbing pain I had pause to reflect on something remotely (and I emphasize remotely) similar. Being as it is Easter weekend, we celebrate the resurrection of Yeshua. 

  Though my thoughts last night were not so much on the resurrection as they were on his crucifixion I reflected on how I felt by the quick penetration of a nail into my finger and how minuscule that pain was compared with having a nail, the size of a railroad spike going through my wrist, which is what Yeshua would have experienced. And that pain was compounded by the beating he had had previously, and the whipping that left his back in shreds of flesh not to mention the crown of 3” long thorns pressed hard into his head. My pain was fleeting and minuscule. His pain was excruciating and enduring for several hours. To think that he suffered through that incomprehensible torture and death because he had love for all those around him, even those who were crucifying him, he had love for his enemies, contemporary and in the future. He has love for all men and women, and he gladly let himself be nailed to that cross because he loves us and wants us to be with him in heaven one day if we so choose. Not everyone will make it. Just saying you believe in him or being baptized does not in and of itself mean you’ll make it to heaven (though those things are required) once you do those things you still have to live a life he wants you to live. Don’t let his sacrifice mean nothing to you. One day your time upon this earth will be over but your life will not end there. Just as Yeshua was resurrected we will be too. All people will continue living on. It is just a matter of whether you will live in the utter darkness of hell and torment or in heaven with joy and peace and love. You choose.

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