It is finished.

Over. Done. No chance to change anything, to tweak something, to do it over.

I like those words. It's nice to have finished projects, well-written papers turned in, and a pile of clean dishes rather than a sink of unwashed dishes.

But those three words, while I love them when I get to say them, are a bit harder to deal with when they come from Jesus.

Because when Jesus says those three words from atop a cross, I am no longer in control. I no longer get to say what my life will look like, and I don't get to choose the easy way out anymore. Those three words, spoken more than 1,800 years before I was born, shape my entire life.

Those three words change everything.

Yesterday was Good Friday--the day that Christians mark the death and burial of Jesus. If you read any of the gospel accounts of what happened on that original Good Friday, then you'll know that it wasn't particularly good for Jesus. But Christians call it 'good' because the day that Jesus suffered and died is also the day that he told us "it is finished."

Sins? Gone. Death? Over. You? Loved beyond measure.

But they also make me nervous. There's no chance in those three words for me to make it up to Jesus, (as if I ever could anyway.) There is no me in that sentence at all. Those three words say to me "I've done everything for you. There is nothing more to do for your salvation. There are no brownie points to earn, no extra credit to be gained, no more love to seek out. It's finished."

This is the heart of the Christian faith--trust that when Jesus says "it is finished," he means it.

So today, we sit between Good Friday and Easter. We occupy that space where it is finished, but more is coming. It's the already and the not-yet. Because tomorrow, we learn that not only does Jesus finish what we could not do for ourselves, but he goes one step further.

Tomorrow, we learn that we have hope beyond anything we could possibly imagine.