What is the best news you could have heard?

     Imagine that you were there and saw Jesus as He struggled with the cross, bloodied back, crown of thorns pressed into the flesh of his skull. Imagine that you followed along, stood far-off to be safe, but watched him crucified and taken down from the cross when he died. Imagine you had heard that his friends had put Him in the cold dark tomb, that's were dead people go. Imagine that you suffered the darkness of soul that the disciples did because you too believed that Jesus was the Messiah and Savior. Imagine that your hope for God's true kingdom in your life was gone. What is the best news you could have heard?

     Maybe the best news you could've heard was the Romans will not crucify any followers of Jesus if they just pay a fine and pledge their allegiance to Caesar. Or, maybe the best news you could've heard was that the disciples had started an underground railroad to help followers of Jesus escape to another land and start a new life. Or maybe the best news you could've heard was, nobody told them about your faith, nobody knows that you were a follower, keep your mouth shut and you can go back to your life as it was before Jesus came. Well, all of these things might've been good news if Jesus were not truly the Son of God, but because He is the Son of God the best news that you could hear then or now is as the disciples put it in Luke 24:34, The Lord is risen indeed...

     And as the old hymn by Alfred H. Ackley has it: "I serve a risen Savior...He lives within my heart!"