In the world of shopping the Friday after Thanksgiving is called “Black Friday”, today was local business day and Monday will be “Cyber Monday”. Forgotten in these three days of shopping is tomorrow, Sunday. So I have decided to call it “Jesus Saves” Sunday.

Jesus Saves day is the complete opposite of the other three shopping days. Jesus Saves Sunday calls not for purchases but for sacrifices. Jesus saves is also a free day. It does not cost any money to participate.

Last Sunday at the SOAWatch some friends and I got into a friendly discussion on the street in front of Fort Benning, Ga. of why Jesus was killed. They were arguing he was a Jewish heretic. I argued he was killed by the Romans and his crime was treason, put on the top of the cross with the words: “Jesus of Nazareth, King of Jews.” One of my friends then asked why Jesus was killed.

I did not have a ready answer but this question has always puzzled me. The normal phrase that Jesus died for our sins makes God seem like a sadistic father, sending his son to be killed. The only sensible answer to why Jesus was killed came when I was at Loyola studying for my Masters degree in Pastoral Studies. The teacher, a very wise woman, told us God was not a sadistic father sending his son to be killed. God sent his son not to be killed but to show us the Way back to God. Jesus being true to the will of God and a person of integrity did what he had to do, give the message he had to give and for this he was killed.

Jesus saves by being true to who he is, despite suffering, sacrifice and death. Jesus saves not by dying for us but by being true to himself and willing to suffer the pain and death necessary in this Way.

So tomorrow if we go to a Worship service we can escape the way of shopping for a time and enjoy the way Jesus saves.

Now there is another story of why Jesus Saves, see below.

Jesus and Satan were having an ongoing argument about who managed to get the most out of his computer. This had been going on for days and God was tired of hearing all of the bickering. God said, “Cool it. I am going to set up a test that will run two hours and I will judge who does the better job.”

So down they sat at the keyboards and typed away. They moused away.

They did spreadsheets,
They wrote reports.
They sent faxes.
They sent out e-mail.
They sent out e-mail with attachments.
They downloaded.
They did some genealogy reports.
They made cards.
They did every known job.

But just a few minutes before the two hours were up lightening flashed across the sky. The thunder rolled and the rains came down hard. And of course the electricity went off.

Satan was upset. He fumed and fussed and he ranted and raved, all to no avail. The electricity stayed off. But after a bit the rains stopped and the electricity came back on.

Satan screamed, “I lost it all when the power went off. What am I going to do? What happened to Jesus’ work?”

Jesus just sat and smiled. Again Satan asked about the work that Jesus had done. As Jesus turned his computer back on the screen glowed and when he pushed “print,” it was all there.

“How did he do it?” Satan asked.

God smiled and said, “Jesus Saves.”

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