Session One: He Chose to Be One of Us

​

The gifts of Easter are the most precious gifts any person could ever receive because they cost God so much to give.

God’s greatest gift of all — His greatest act of love for us — was sending Jesus into our world.

Jesus gave up:

​

Timelessness: Jesus swapped eternity for calendars. The Bible tells us God is “beyond our understanding! The number of His years is past finding out” (Job 36:26) There is no moment when God was not God, for He is eternal.

Boundlessness: Jesus gave up being a spirit to live in a body. One moment He was a boundless spirit; the next moment He was flesh and bones.

​

Sinlessness: Jesus became sin for us. An object that symbolizes the consequences of sin in humanity’s heart is a thorn bush (see Genesis 3:17-18; Numbers 33:55; Proverbs 22:5; Matthew 7:16) The thorny crown on Christ’s brow is a picture of the fruit of our sin that pierced His heart.

​

We are “by nature children of wrath” (Ephesians 2:3 NASB) Though we have been made in God’s image, we’re corrupt at the core. The sinless One took on the face of a sinner so that we sinners could take on the face of a saint.

​

Jesus never knew the fruits of sin until He became sin for us (see 2 Corinthians 5:21) When He was crucified, He cried out in a loud voice, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46) Those are not the words of a saint but the cry of a sinner.

The crown of thorns could have been made — and should have been worn — by every one of us. But it was not, thanks to the greatest gift of all.

​

Why did God give us this gift?

For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life. — John 3:16

​

God did it for us — just for us — because He loves us.