Day 90: He is Risen!

Based on Matthew 28: 1-6 and Mark 16: 1-6.

Tiberius let out a huge yawn as he leaned against his spear.  Not even the most athletic, strong Roman soldier in Jerusalem could defeat those endless yawned that creep up on you.  What could you expect though after staying up most of the night.  He poked Procleus with his foot, who was sleeping in front of the large stone sealing the tomb's entrance.

"Wake up!  It's your turn to take the next shift!"

The burly man growled and cocked his helmet off from his eyes.  "It's not even dawn yet, Tiberius!  You agreed we'd switch shifts at daylight!"

"But I can barely keep my eyes open, Procleus.  Come on!"

The man groaned again as he stood up.  "I don't know why we have to watch this blasted tomb anyways.  It's just a dead guy.  Who's going to want to even go there with the smell of rotting flesh, let alone have any interest in stealing a bag of bones?  No one can open the tomb anyways.  This stone was sealed in front of it at least five times."

"I know what you mean.  There's only been two people who came by in the past three days.  One of them was his mother!"

Procleus shook his head as he stood up and stretched.  "I don't understand our leaders sometimes."

"We don't have to.  Our orders are only to obey."   Tiberius laid his spear aside and nudged Procleus' arm right before he was going to sit down.  "Look."  He pointed to the horizon.  "Dawn's light.  We're trading off right after all."

Suddenly, the ground trembled right under their feet.  Stones clattered loudly against other rocks on the dirt.  The trees shook violently, and some even became uprooted.  Dirt started slipping into the tiny cracks that were forming not one foot from their feet.  Then, behind their heads, came the most terrifying cracking noise they had ever heard.

"Tiberius, look out!"  The Roman soldier shoved his comrade out of the way as the round stone cracked symmetrical up the middle and began falling to the ground.

They yelled as they ran away and tried to keep their balance.  The rock landed with a loud thud, and the earthquake stopped.  The two soldiers breathed heavily and stared dumbfounded at the tomb and broken stone.

Tiberius was the first one with enough courage to investigate.  He walked a few steps forward before he stopped again.  A light shone from inside the tomb.  Tiberius looked back at Procleus, who wore the face of terror.  Tiberius looked back at the cave.  The light was gone.  Both men stayed paused for minute, waiting for something else to happen.  When nothing came, they both cautiously approached the tomb, grabbing their weapons as quickly as possible.  Tiberius motioned that on "three," they would look inside.  Procleus nodded in agreement with the plan.  The sunlight was bright enough for them to see that all that was inside the tomb was a white burial robe. 

Both men hustled out as soon as humanly possible. 

"Did you see any body?"

"No," Procleus answered in a half-whisper.  "I didn't hear anyone come up."

"Neither did I."

Then, in the blink of an eye, an angel dressed in white stood in front of the two men.  They yelled and jumped back from sheer surprise, which turned immediately to fright when they saw the man shone brighter than any light they had ever seen.

"Jesus has risen from the dead," he smiled.  "Isn't that amazing?  Praise the Lord!"  His voice was illustrious, melodic, and authoritative, but it was just enough to push the men over.  Both fainted on the spot.  The angel chuckled and entered Jesus' tomb to sit at the edge of the coffin.  Daylight had fully broken now, and three women on donkeys could be seen riding towards the tomb.

Day 89: Resurrection of the Saints

Based on Matthew 27: 52-53.

A loud coughing could be heard deep in a cave, right after the earthquake ended that erupted after Jesus breathed His last.  A white linen-clad body slowly sat up.

"It's dark.  What is this this over my eyes?"  The mummy removed the bandage that covered his eyes, revealing the face of John the Baptist.  "I still can't see.  Everything is so dark."  He swung his legs over the side of his coffin like structure and stood up somewhat shakily, as though he hadn't used his legs in weeks.  John saw a light in the distance that indicated the beginning of the cave.  He walked towards it and thought hard about how he got there.  He could not remember.

"What's the last thing I do remember?  I was... in Herod's jail.  Then he called to see me.  I was led into a another room, and there was a large guard.  They made me get on my knees, and I saw the guard pull out a sword.  Then-"

John touched his neck.  No scar could be felt.  He moved his head around.  It functioned perfectly.  He looked at his wrists.  There was no evidence that chains had chaffed them.  It was a miracle.  John jumped up and praised God.

In another tomb, a man slowly rose from what had been his resting place for the past...the decades were too numerous to count.  He groaned as he took his bandages off and coughed from the dust that arose.

"Oohh, where am I?"  The greyed man stared at his surroundings.  "A tomb?  Yes, that makes sense.  I believe I even remember dying, but...what am I still doing here?  Now?"

Puzzled, Samuel decided to look around outside.  He shielded his eyes from the bright sun.

"Gah!  I haven't felt the sun in years!"  He blinked as his eyes adjusted, and he nearly had a heart attack.  "The land looks so different!  So many houses, and they're so funny-looking!  And what's that?  A temple?  It's marvelous!  Wait a minute."  The old man bent his legs a few times.

"They don't hurt me."  He bent down and touched his toes.  "Haha!  This is amazing!!"  He even started to run around.  He smiled and laughed as he felt the breeze in his face and no pain at all.

"It's like I'm a new man!  God is good!"  He stopped short again and felt his stomach.  "Man, I'm starving!"

One man walked out of his tomb and seemed to know that he had risen from the dead.  He was whispering prayers of thanksgiving to God.  When he saw the dark clouds outside, he stopped short and stared towards Golgotha at the three wooden crosses.  "I knew I was right.  God told me the truth all along.  Precious Savior!" Isaiah fell to his knees and wept tears of wonder, thanksgiving, and sorrow for the death of the Son of God.

This was just a few examples of the hundreds of saints that rose to life again on the day Jesus died.  These saints stayed close by their tombs until the day Jesus rose from the dead.  Without even knowing, they felt it was safe to venture out into town on that day.  Most of the older saints went unnoticed by the people that passed them.  The Jews didn't know exactly what the saints looked like.  The younger ones, those who died several years to a few days ago, gave the people of Jerusalem more of a scare.  Here are some of the reactions.

"Ahh!  J-J-Jude, you're here!  Standing right in front of me!"

"I'm sure I saw him!  It was John the Baptist!  He walked right past me, and I clearly saw his face!"

"There's this strange man that was talking to me earlier today that acted like he'd never seen the city before.  He was dressed in dated, peculiar clothes."

"I think I've been out in the sun too long."

"First, Jesus risen from the dead, and now His followers and the saints, what a miracle!  Praise God!"

"I..just got scolded... from the prophet Isaiah.  I think I have some praying to do."

Day 88: Good Friday

Heaven, for the second and last time in history, was completely and utterly sad.  The first time was when Adam and Eve sinned in the Garden of Eden.  The sadness God had felt that His precious creations had sinned had permeated through the air.  Now, the angels felt this same thick, depressing atmosphere, but it was unlike anything they had ever experienced.  They knew this day would come, but they hadn't expected for heaven to feel so...empty.  Every single angel felt some level of sadness.  The more cheerful ones tried to keep themselves busy by pruning the Tree of Life.  Some of the older angels, wanting to be more industrious, had started making sure there were plenty of rooms available for the huge amount of residents they would be expecting shortly.  A majority of the angels could only sit on the clouds, with their legs dangling, or fly back and forth and pace, distraught.

They knew better than to disturb God right now.  He was saddest He had ever felt.  God is never helpless, but in human terms, this would be the closest word to describing Him right now.  His most precious and only Son Jesus, the One had forever existed with Him, was below Him suffering the worst pain imaginable on the cross.  The life was draining right in front of His eyes.  The pain quivered through every muscle of Jesus' body, and fatigue from the lack of sleep, physical exhaustion, and pain were etched in the shadows of His hollow face.  God felt every pain Jesus did, although it wasn't as intense.  God wanted more than anything else in the world to snatch His Son right from that cross and place Him safely in His arms.  He missed Him terribly.  In the very least, He wanted to send more angels down to strengthen Him and remove some of His pain.  But God could not do any of that.  This was the only way the rest of His dear children could be saved and come into heaven.  God missed them just as much.  All Jesus had to comfort Him was God's promises, which were strong, but not quite the same.  God's heart ached more, and He forced Himself to turn His back on Jesus again.  The Lord's cries below echoed in the ears of the Lord above.

The clouds surrounding the Creator grew even darker.  The angels shook; they couldn't even see His throne room anymore.  Some of the angels couldn't take the grief any longer and began shedding tears that splashed onto earth.  Combined with God's intense grief was His growing anger towards those who had harmed His Son and refused to believe in Jesus, to believe in Him.  This anger was manifested in the form of an earthquake.

Even though heaven was a scary place for these few brief hours, the angels remembered that this moment was going to lead to something greater than they could possibly imagine.  New guests would be coming, Jesus would be with them soon, and heaven would have the greatest triumph over Satan.