Here we are just about a week away from Good Friday and Easter in April 2025, the modern world hums all around us. Our lives seem to be measured in data points—steps tracked, emails ignored, sins tallied—yet beneath this mechanical rhythm lies a deeper story, THE story, one of brokenness and redemption that echoes through the ages. This season invites us to pause and consider: What does it mean to be human in a world that often feels less than human? The answer lies in the cross and the empty tomb, where the enormity of our sin, the courage to confront our shame, the renewal of our spirits, and the reclamation of our humanity converge in Christ’s love.
Imagine, for a moment, the weight of every sin ever committed.
He died for every sin you have ever committed. The same is true for me, and for every one of the 117 billion people who have ever lived (117 billion is the estimate of all of human life that has ever existed).
Let’s assume that each person commits an average of ten sins a day. For some, that would be a bad day; for others, it would be a good day. Then let’s estimate the average life span across human history at around thirty-five years (it was thirty-two in 1900, lower in the centuries before but much higher in the century since). Let’s further assume that the typical person commits their first sin around the age of five, leaving thirty years of active sinning.
Now let’s do the math:
• 10 x 365 days a year = 3,650 sins per person per year.
• 30 years per person = 109,500 sins per person per lifetime.
• Multiplying this by 117 billion people in history = 12,811,500,000,000,000 sins.
I have no idea whether this math is accurate or not, but the point is, it somewhat illustrates the enormity of the sin burden Jesus bore at Calvary for us.
12,811,500,000,000,000 is a number so vast it defies comprehension. Yet this is actually an incomplete and conservative idea of the burden Jesus bore on the cross, he also died for future sins. As the Apostle Paul writes, “For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Corinthians 5:21). On Good Friday, we recall not just a historical event but an act of infinite love, one that absorbed every failure—past, present, and future—culminating in Jesus’ anguished cry: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46). The holy Father turned away from the sinless Son, now laden with our guilt, revealing a sacrifice no finite mind can fully grasp. In a culture that quantifies everything yet understands so little, this truth anchors us: no sin, and no amount of sin, is beyond redemption.
Yet sin’s shadow lingers in modern life, often as shame—a silent wound that thrives in secrecy. We hide behind digital screens, curating perfect personas while wrestling with doubts, addictions, or past wounds. The Gospel of Luke offers a counterpoint: a woman, suffering for twelve years, steps trembling into the light, touches Jesus, and hears, “Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace” (Luke 8:47-48). Her story is ours. Today, Jesus calls us to speak our shame to Him—not to be condemned, but to be healed. Dietrich Bonhoeffer once said, “The Christian needs another Christian who speaks God’s Word to him… He needs his brother as a bearer and proclaimer of the divine word of salvation.” As Easter approaches, we’re reminded that the church is not a showcase for the flawless but a hospital for the broken, where vulnerability meets grace. The resurrection promises that our wounds, once exposed, become testimonies of restoration.
This healing sparks a deeper renewal, a shedding of the “old man” for the “new.” Toby Keith’s song “Don’t Let the Old Man In,” inspired by Clint Eastwood’s defiance of age when they played golf together, takes on spiritual weight through Paul’s words: “We know that our old man was crucified with him so that the body of sin would no longer dominate us” (Romans 6:6). In a world that idolizes youth yet resigns us to decay—physical or moral—Christ’s victory on the cross and resurrection empowers us to reject the old nature. The “new man,” is alive through the Holy Spirit, and frees us from sin’s grip, not to perfection, but direction, and to growth. C.S. Lewis wrote, “We are not merely imperfect creatures who must be improved: we are rebels who must lay down our arms.” We are in a spiritual war, Easter Sunday is our declaration of surrender and rebirth, a call to live fully as God’s renewed creation, even as the years or temptations press in.
Modern life continually threatens this renewal with another more subtle danger: the mechanization of our humanity. Our inboxes overflow with robotic platitudes— “disrupting the salad industry,” “impactful changemakers”—mirroring AI’s rise and our own descent into rote existence. Psalm 115 warns of idol-worshippers: “Those that make them are becoming like them,” a present-tense prophecy for a world that equates sentience with code. Augustine observed, “Men go abroad to wonder at the heights of mountains… but they themselves are God’s greatest work.” When we reduce life to inputs and outputs, we risk becoming the lifeless idols we craft, as I wrote yesterday, C.S. Lewis calls it “men without chests.” Good Friday and Easter should cause us to interrupt this slide, pulling us back to the flesh-and-blood reality of Christ’s sacrifice and triumph. No algorithm can replace the Savior who wept, bled, and rose.
As we approach Good Friday 2025, we confront and attempt to understand the weight of the sin, shame , and pain Christ carried. On Easter, we also need to realize that we rise with Christ, renewed and fully human. “Behold, I make all things new” (Revelation 21:5), He declares—a promise not just for eternity, but for today. In a world of brokenness and machines, the cross and empty tomb remind us who we are: sinners redeemed, shame-bearers healed, rebels made new, and humans beloved by a God whose ways, as Isaiah 55:9 proclaims, soar higher than our own. This is the meaning of Easter, interrupting modern dead and hopeless life with undying hope.