In just a few days, Christians in Alpine and around the world will celebrate Easter, the Day of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Jesus told His disciples about His impending death and resurrection three times in the Gospel of Matthew. The first time was just after Peter made his good confession that Jesus was the Christ, the Son of the Living God (Matthew 16:16), and was commended for his understanding.

But a few verses later, Jesus told the disciples that He would suffer, be killed, and be raised again on the third day (Matthew 16:21). The quick-spoken Peter said this must never happen, and was rebuked for his words (Matthew 16:22).

Just after Jesus healed an epileptic, He again said that He would suffer, die, and be raised, and the disciples were very distressed (Matthew 17:23). And in Matthew 20:18 – 19, Jesus told them He would be handed over to the authorities to be mocked, flogged, and crucified, and that He would be raised on the third day.

Notice that once Jesus said He would die, the disciples stopped listening. They apparently heard nothing about Him being raised in three days. We might expect them to ask, “What? You’re going to be raised from the dead? How could that be?”

They didn’t ask, and they were not at the tomb to greet Him on the Day of Resurrection. Only after the Resurrection would they understand that in the kingdom of Jesus, where the greatest of these is the least, and the least is the greatest, where people are told to be born again, and where nothing is impossible with God, the crucifixion becomes the glorification of Christ, a beautiful thing. For this we sing Alleluia!

Does this mean that Jesus embraced the cross, that He looked forward to this manner of death? In the Garden of Gethsemane He told the disciples Peter, James, and John that He was deeply grieved, and He prayed this in Matthew 26:39, “My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me; yet not what I want but what you want.”

He prayed this prayer three times as He sweat drops of blood and while the disciples slept. No, Jesus did not embrace the cross, but He did embrace the will of the Father all the way until He said from the cross, “It is finished.”

He never wavered in His purpose to become the sacrificial lamb who takes away the sin of the world, but that was on Friday, and Sunday, the day of Resurrection was coming.

The resurrection of Jesus is the foundation of Christianity. Matthew’s gospel starts and ends with the extraordinary claims that Jesus was born of a virgin, and that He was raised from the dead. All four gospels speak of the Resurrection, and although there are variations in the stories, the essentials are consistent. They agree that Jesus actually died on the cross, that He was buried, and that He rose from the dead. For this we sing “Alleluia.”