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As I was reading Acts 3:1-5 I was immediately drawn to verse 3, “To whom he shewed himself alive after his passion by many infallible proofs”, and upon further review I found that this word ‘passion’ is used in all of scripture but once.

 

According to Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance, the word passion, ‘used only in certain tenses for it; apparently a primary verb; to experience a sensation or impression (usually painful):1’

 

It is important to us to understand how much it meant for Jesus to go to Calvary’s cross for us. It was not merely a single act that ended upon that cross. Jesus endured a great deal of suffering and pain in his physical body while taking upon him the transgressions and sins of man that began with Adam.

 

From Garden to Garden, Eden to Gethsemane, sins, iniquities, transgressions, wickedness, evil thoughts and imaginations: wrong doings such as theft, murder, adultery, fornication, lying, covetousness, hatred, jealousy, deceitfulness and drunkenness – these all, and many other things since the time of Adam & Eve’s disobedience had filled the cup of man’s iniquity, incurring the wrath of a righteous, holy God. This is why Jesus came into the world in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, to condemn sin in the flesh and redeem us from all iniquity.

 

It was that bitter cup that Jesus faced in Matt 26:39, ‘And he went a little further, and fell on his face, and prayed, saying, O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt.

 

You and I are the reason Jesus endured this passion; this pain and suffering. He understood that there was something greater yet to come. Three days after this suffering Jesus raised from the grave, conquering once and for all, death, hell and the grave!

 

The awesome change Jesus Christ has made in our lives proves conclusively to us the truth of His resurrection. "If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new" (II Cor 5:17).

 

I encourage you today to embrace New Life and allow the resurrection power of God be a reality for you.