Easter Week Day 4

We took a little break yesterday. This puts us right on track to open our empty egg on Sunday morning! 

This morning we read from Isaiah 53 - while I didn't read all of it to the kids, it was such a nice refresher to me personally to read the entire chapter. Here Isaiah prophesised 500 years before Christ was born, how His life would be laid down for me. The passage is such a great reminder of God's plan from the beginning of time; here is the part I read to the kids. 

^{Isaiah 53}

³ Men looked down on him. They didn't accept him. 
      He knew all about sorrow and suffering. 
   He was like someone people turn their faces away from. 
      We looked down on him. We didn't have any respect for him. 
 ⁴ He suffered the things we should have suffered. 
      He took on himself the pain that should have been ours....
 ⁵ But the servant was pierced because we had sinned. 
      He was crushed because we had done what was evil. 
   He was punished to make us whole again. 
      His wounds have healed us. 

And now for our next three eggs (7,8,9). We learn a little more today about Jesus' suffering. How the soldiers took a "crown for the king" made of large thorns and pressed it down on his head. How they took his clothes (left him naked on the cross) and divided them amongst themselves. And how when Christ (who I remind my little ones, still had needs like us) was thirsty, they gave him a sponge of vinegar (tasting the vinegar didn't go over so well in our house!).

And although it was not in our eggs we talk about what it means to be "pierced". I explain to them that Jesus was pierced in his side (heart). This was unsurvivable - this assured that He was dead. 

Since today is Good Friday (the day of Christ death and burial) we went ahead and talked about how Christ was taken down from the cross and laid in a tomb. A large stone was placed outside the door (egg 10) and soldiers were made to stand guard. And we know the story doesn't stop here, we can anxiously anticipate our empty egg on Sunday.

 “Where, O death, is your victory?
   Where, O death, is your sting?”

1 Corinthians 15:55