If my memory serves me right, it was 55 years ago this spring, in 1952. It was on a warm spring Friday night, in the small southern Minnesota town of Slayton, when two cars collided, both carrying teenagers out to have a good time. I was only seven years old at the time, and I learned about it later in driver's training school. 1952 was a time of overpowered motors, cheap gasoline, much optimism and no seat belts. One car was driving into the town carrying six young folks, and the other car, a convertible, was driving out of town, carrying seven. Drivers of both cars, coming from opposite directions, must have decided to see how fast they could take the big bend near town. One driver stayed in his lane, but the other, due to his high speed, veered into the opposite lane, and the two cars collided head-on. Police say one or both may have had their lights off, perhaps driving by the bright moonlight. And each car had been going very fast, maybe 100 mph or more, because when the police came upon the scene, eleven young people were dead and the other two died that night. Thirteen high school juniors and seniors from the same small town, all dead the same night. It was the worst single auto accident in Minnesota history, and one of the worst in American history. The people of that town never got over that terrible loss. One of the local people said those teenagers were "dying to live, but instead, all of them just ended up dead."

         Some 2,000 years before that night, thirteen other people from rural Israel, Jesus and His twelve disciples, celebrated His Last Supper on a bright moonlit night. That so-called last supper was really Christianity's First Lord's Supper, the night our Lord Jesus gave us His body and blood under bread and wine. Later that night, one of them carried out a terrible mission of betrayal, and the remaining eleven were scattered while their leader was captured and mocked, denied and convicted, tortured and then crucified. That next afternoon Jesus died, but not before He opened the doors of heaven to someone formerly on the crooked road to nowhere.

          That day on that cross of Calvary, Jesus was dying, but dying to live. He was dying, not for Himself, but that we might live. The cross was no accident. It was not an afterthought in a drama of revenge, but rather the centerpiece of God's plan of salvation. From that cross, Jesus of Nazareth brought hope to a world lost in its sin, a world where people were traveling roads that led to nowhere, a world that today still needs a Savior to forgive it, slow it down, and put it on the right road, the road of faith that brings us to heaven.

         And in a few moments from that cross, Jesus helped a dying man find life. We don't know much about the thief on the cross. We know he was condemned to death, just as Jesus was. And we know he briefly joined the others against Jesus. But something stopped him short. Maybe it was hearing Jesus forgive His hecklers, or that He made provision for His mother. Whatever it was, something moved his heart and he did an about-face, and took a chance, a leap of faith. After hushing the other thief, he said, "Lord, remember me when You come to Your kingdom." And Jesus said He would: "Today you will be with me in paradise."

         Little did that thief know what his faith would bring him. God's plan of salvation is centered around the sacrifice of His Son. Jesus earlier had said, "Unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it does die, it produces many seeds." (John 12:24) He was talking about Himself, of course. A seed does no good remaining in the packet. Its purpose is to go into the ground, to decompose, to give life to the next generation.

         Jesus was the seed of God's new humanity. He would be the kernel that would produce eternal life for all who cling to Him in faith. Jesus died that we might live.

         Today, if you drive into Slayton, Minnesota, you will pass a memorial of a dozen or so crosses at the place where all those teenagers died. Each cross represents a life, and each one gets its meaning from the One who gave His life on a Friday night, the first Good Friday when God's Son died that we might live.

         All over the world people have erected memorials to Holy One of God who died for us. But we always must remember that He is not dead, but living. Jesus did die, but He also rose again. We live on the Easter side of the calendar, not the Good Friday side.

         May we who gather for this brief service give thanks for the sacrifice of His Only Son, so that our sons and daughters might have hope for more than just a good time in life, hope for real life that only He can give us, hope in Jesus Christ our Lord, amen.

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  Epiphany logo designed and provided by Dale Bargmann at daleb@ecentral.com